Protestant Union
also called Evangelical Union, or Union Of Auhausen, German Protestantische Union, Evangelische Union, or Union Von Auhausen,
military alliance (1608–21) among the Protestant states of Germany for mutual protection against the growing power of the Roman Catholic states of Counter-Reformation Europe. In 1608, when Maximilian I, duke of Bavaria and champion of the Roman Catholic cause, seized control of the Lutheran city of Donauwörth, the Protestant princes met in Auhausen, near Nördlingen, and on May 14 formed a military union under the nominal leadership of Friedrich IV of the Palatinate. The Protestant Union's real leader, however, was Christian I, prince of the minor northern German state of Anhalt. The Union's members included the Palatinate, Anhalt, Neuberg, Württemberg, Baden, Ansbach, Bayreuth, Hesse-Kassel, Brandenburg, Ulm, Strassburg, and Nürnberg. The formation of the Union provoked the counter-alliance of the Catholic League (1609) under Maximilian.
From its beginnings, the Union was beset with internal strife between its Lutheran and Calvinist members and between the cities and the territorial magnates. The powerful Protestant elector of Saxony refused to join, and the membership remained relatively small. When, in 1620, the forces of the League were poised for attack against Friedrich V of the Palatinate, who had accepted the Bohemian crown, the Union's members, guaranteed of their prerogatives by Maximilian, refused to go to Friedrich's aid. After Friedrich was deposed by Roman Catholic armies in November 1620, the Union's members met in protest at Heidelberg but soon disbanded, never again to reconvene.
Copyright © 1994-2002 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Sources
- Encylopedia Britannica 2002, Expanded Edition DVD
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