Books by Peter Wilson
Peter H. Wilson is Chichele Professor of the History of War at the University of Oxford, a Fellow of All Souls College and Principal Investigator of a five-year research project on the ‘European Fiscal-Military System 1530-1870’ funded by the European Research Council 2018-23. His books include The Holy Roman Empire: A Thousand Years of Europe’s History (Penguin/Harvard UP, 2016), as well as Europe’s Tragedy: A History of the Thirty Years War (2009), which won the Society for Military History’s Distinguished Book Award. His latest book, Lützen, was published in 2018 by Oxford University Press in its Great Battles series, and his next, Heart of Europe: A History of the Holy Roman Empire, will be published in June 2020.
Iron and Blood: A Military History of the German-Speaking Peoples since 1500
by Peter Wilson
For those of you interested in Prussian/German/Austrian military history—you know who you are—Peter Wilson, author of an excellent book on the 30 Years War—has a new book out that covers half a millennium of it. This is an excellent, accessible account, even just the title clarifying a misquotation many of us learned in school (Otto von Bismarck spoke of iron and blood, not blood and iron, in his famous 1862 speech, a reference to an 1813 poem).
Interviews with Peter Wilson
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1
Westphalia: the Last Christian Peace 1643-48
by Derek Croxton -
2
Monro, His expedition with the worthy Scots regiment (called Mac-Keyes-regiment) levied in August 1626
by Robert Monro -
3
Wallenstein: His Life Narrated
by Golo Mann -
4
European Weapons and Warfare 1618–1648
by Eduard Wagner -
5
Tagebuch Eines Soldners Aus Dem Dreissigjahrigen Krieg
Peter Hagendorf (ed. Jan Peters)
The best books on The Thirty Years War, recommended by Peter Wilson
The best books on The Thirty Years War, recommended by Peter Wilson
It was a war that devastated Europe and left more than one-fifth of the German population dead. The complex peace agreement that ended it, the Treaty of Westphalia, is still credited with establishing our modern state system. Peter Wilson, Chichele Professor of the History of War at Oxford University and author of the most recent general history of the war, Europe’s Tragedy: A New History of the Thirty Years War, recommends books to read for a nuanced picture of Europe’s cataclysmic 17th-century conflict.
