History
Understanding Europe’s long and often troubled history is a crucial part of figuring out what makes this continent tick. Fragments of that history can be encountered in the tumbledown remains of Roman ampitheatres and bathhouses, in the fabulously ostentatious architecture of French chateaux and German castles, and in the winding streets, broad boulevards and governing institutions of its many stately cities.
Prehistory
The first settlers arrived in Europe around two million years ago, but it wasn’t until the end of the last major ice age between 12,000 BC and 8000 BC that humans really took hold. As the glaciers and ice sheets retreated, hunter-gatherer tribes extended their reach northwards in search of new land. Some of Europe’s earliest human settlements were left behind by Neolithic tribes.
Greeks & Romans
The civilisation of ancient Greece emerged around 2000 BC and made huge leaps forward in science, technology, architecture, philosophy and democratic principles. Many of the writers, thinkers and mathematicians of ancient Greece, from Pythagoras to Plato, still exert a profound influence to this day. Then came the Romans, who set about conquering most of Europe and devised the world’s first republic. At its height, Roman power extended all the way from Celtic Britain to ancient Persia (Iran). The Romans’ myriad achievements are almost too numerous to mention: they founded cities, raised aqueducts, constructed roads, laid sewers and built baths all over the continent, and produced a string of brilliant writers, orators, politicians, philosophers and military leaders.
oBest Historical Buildings
Colosseum, Rome
Pompeii, Italy
City Walls & Forts, Dubrovnik
Tower of London, London
Prague Castle, Prague
Trinity College, Dublin
Holocaust Memorial, Berlin
Dark Ages to Middle Ages
Rome’s empire-building ambitions eventually proved too much, and a series of political troubles and military disasters resulted in the sacking of Rome (in 410) by the Goths. Although Roman emperors clung onto their eastern Byzantine empire for another thousand years, founding a new capital at Constantinople (modern-day İstanbul), Rome’s dominance over Western Europe was over. A new era, the Dark Ages, had begun.
The next few centuries were marked by a series of conflicts in which the various kingdoms of the European mainland sought to gain political and strategic control. In 711 AD, the Moors – Arabs and Berbers who had converted to the Islamic religion prevailing throughout northern Africa – crossed the Straits of Gibraltar, defeating the Visigothic army. They went on to rule the Iberian Peninsula for almost 800 years, until the fall of Granada in 1492, leaving behind a flourishing architectural, scientific and academic legacy.
Meanwhile, in the late 8th century Charlemagne, King of the Franks, would bring together much of Western Europe under what would become known as the Holy Roman Empire. This alliance of Christian nations sent troops to wrest the Holy Land from Islamic control in a series of campaigns known as the Crusades.
The Renaissance
Europe’s troubles rumbled on into the 14th and 15th centuries. In the wake of further conflicts and political upheavals, as well as the devastating outbreak of the Black Death (estimated to have wiped out somewhere between one-third and two-thirds of Europe’s population), control over the Holy Roman Empire passed into the hands of the Austrian Habsburgs, a political dynasty that was to become one of the continent’s dominant powers.
The Italian city-states of Genoa, Venice, Pisa and Amalfi consolidated their control over the Mediterranean, establishing trading links with much of the rest of Europe and the Far East, and embarking on some of the first journeys in search of the New World.
In the mid-15th century, a new age of artistic and philosophical development broke out across the continent. The Renaissance encouraged writers, artists and thinkers to challenge the accepted doctrines of theology, philosophy, architecture and art. The centre of this artistic tsunami was Florence, Italy, where such inspirational figures as Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci made great strides in art and architecture. Another epoch-changing development was under way in Germany: the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenburg in around 1440. The advent of ‘movable type’ made printed books available to the masses for the first time.
The Reformation
While the Renaissance challenged artistic ideas, the Reformation dealt with questions of religion. Challenging Catholic ‘corruption’ and the divine authority of the Pope, the German theologian Martin Luther established his own breakaway branch of the Church, to which he gave the name ‘Protestantism’, in 1517. Luther’s stance was soon echoed by the English monarch Henry VIII, who cut ties with Rome in 1534 and went on to found his own (Protestant) Church of England, sowing the seeds for centuries of conflict between Catholics and Protestants.
The New World
The schisms of the Church weren’t the only source of tension. The discovery of the ‘New World’ in the mid-16th century led to a colonial arms race between the major European nations, in which each country battled to lay claim to the newly discovered lands – often enslaving or killing the local populace in the process.
More trouble followed during the Thirty Years’ War (1618–48), which began as a conflict between Catholics and Protestants and eventually sucked in most of Europe’s principal powers. The war was ended by the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, and Europe entered a period of comparative stability.
The Enlightenment
The Enlightenment (sometimes known as ‘The Age of Reason’) is the name given to a philosophical movement that spread throughout European society during the mid- to late-17th century. It emphasised the importance of logic, reason and science over the doctrines of religion. Key figures included the philosophers Baruch Spinoza, John Locke, Immanuel Kant and Voltaire, as well as scientists such as Isaac Newton.
The Enlightenment also questioned the political status quo. Since the Middle Ages, the majority of Europe’s wealth and power had been concentrated in the hands of an all-powerful elite, largely made up of monarchs and aristocrats. This stood in direct contradiction to one of the core values of the Enlightenment – equality. Many thinkers believed it was an impasse that could only be solved by revolution.
Revolution
Things came to a head in 1789 when armed mobs stormed the Bastille prison in Paris, thus kick-starting the French Revolution. The Revolution began with high ideals, inspired by its iconic slogan of liberté, egalité, fraternité (liberty, equality, brotherhood). Before long things turned sour and heads began to roll. Hardline republicans seized control and demanded retribution for centuries of oppression. Scores of aristocrats met their end under the guillotine’s blade, including the French monarch Louis XVI, who was publicly executed in January 1793 in Paris’ Place de la Concorde, and his queen, Marie-Antoinette, killed in October that year.
The Reign of Terror between September 1793 and July 1794 saw religious freedoms revoked, churches closed, cathedrals turned into ‘Temples of Reason’ and thousands beheaded. In the chaos, a dashing young Corsican general named Napoleon Bonaparte (1769– 1821) seized his chance.
Napoleon assumed power in 1799 and in 1804 was crowned Emperor. He fought a series of campaigns across Europe and conquered vast swathes of territory for the French empire but, following a disastrous campaign to conquer Russia in 1812, his grip on power faltered and he was defeated by a coalition of British and Prussian forces at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.
Industry, Empire & WWI
Having vanquished Napoleon, Britain emerged as Europe’s predominant power. With such innovations as the steam engine, the railway and the factory, Britain unleashed the Industrial Revolution and, like many of Europe’s major powers (including France, Spain, Belgium and the Austro-Hungarian empire), set about developing its colonies across much of Africa, Australasia and the Middle and Far East.
Before long these competing empires clashed again, with predictably catastrophic consequences. The assassination of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire Franz Ferdinand in 1914 led to the outbreak of the Great War, or WWI, as it came to be known. By the end of hostilities in 1918, huge tracts of northern France and Belgium had been razed and over 16 million people across Europe had been killed.
In the Treaty of Versailles, the defeated powers of Austro-Hungary and Germany lost large areas of territory and found themselves crippled with a massive bill for reparations, sowing seeds of discontent that would be exploited a decade later by a fanatical Austrian painter by the name of Adolf Hitler.
Rise of Fascism
Hitler’s rise to power was astonishingly swift. By 1933 he had become Chancellor and, as the head of the Nazi Party, assumed total control of Germany. Having spent much of the 1930s building up a formidable war machine, assisting General Franco’s nationalist forces during the Spanish Civil War, Hitler annexed former German territories in Austria and parts of Czechoslovakia, before extending his reach onwards into Poland in 1939.
The occupation of Poland proved the final straw. Britain, France and its Commonwealth allies declared war on Germany, which had formed its own alliance of convenience with the Axis powers of Italy (led by the fascist dictator Mussolini) and Japan.
WWII
Having done a secret deal with Stalin over the Soviet Union’s spheres of influence to the east, Hitler unleashed his blitzkrieg on an unsuspecting western Europe and within a few short months conquered huge areas of territory, forcing the French into submission and driving the British forces to a humiliating retreat at Dunkirk. Europe was to remain under Nazi occupation for the next six years.
The Axis retained the upper hand until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor forced a reluctant USA into the war in 1941. Hitler’s subsequent decision to invade the Soviet Union in 1941 proved to be a catastrophic error, resulting in devastating German losses that opened the door for the Allied invasion of Normandy in June 1944.
After several months of bitter fighting, Hitler’s remaining forces were pushed back towards Berlin. Hitler committed suicide on 30 April 1945 and the Russians took the city, crushing the last pockets of German resistance. By 8 May Germany and Italy had unconditionally surrendered to the Allied powers, bringing the war in Europe to an end.
The Iron Curtain
Differences of opinion between the Western powers and the communist Soviet Union soon led to a stand-off. The USSR closed off its assigned sectors, including East Berlin, East Germany and much of Eastern Europe, which heralded the descent of the Iron Curtain and the beginning of the Cold War. This period of political tension and social division in Europe lasted for 40 years and saw popular uprisings in Prague and Budapest put down by communist forces.
By the late 1980s the Soviet Union’s grip on Eastern Europe was weakening as the former superpower’s economic feet of clay crumbled. The Cold War era came to an end in 1989 with the fall of the Berlin Wall. Germany was reunified in 1990; a year later the USSR was dissolved. Shortly afterwards Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary and Albania had implemented multiparty democracy. In Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic and Slovakia), the so-called Velvet Revolution brought about the downfall of the communist government through mass demonstrations and other nonviolent means.
Europe United
The process of political and economic integration across Europe has continued apace since the end of WWII. The formation of the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1957 began as a loose trade alliance between six nations. By 1992, this alliance had evolved into the European Union (EU) and since the Treaty of Maastricht came into effect in 1993 its core membership has expanded to 28 countries. Even though the UK is in the process of leaving the EU, five other candidates – Turkey, Macedonia, Montenegro, Albania and Serbia – are on the books for future membership. All except Albania and Macedonia have started negotiations for entry.
Another key development was the implementation of the Schengen Agreement in 1995, which abolished border checks across much of mainland Europe and allowed EU citizens to travel freely throughout member states (with the notable exceptions of the UK and Ireland).
Even more momentous was the adoption of the single currency of the euro on 1 January 1999 as a cashless accounting currency; euro banknotes and coins have been used since 1 January 2002. To date, 19 countries have joined the Eurozone, while the UK, Denmark and Sweden have chosen to retain their national currencies. In future any new states joining the EU will be required to adopt the euro as a condition of entry. It’s a hot topic, especially since the financial crash in countries including Greece and Spain, which has required richer nations (principally France and Germany) to bail out several of their more indebted European neighbours.
Economic Challenges
Since the 2009 European debt crisis, growth throughout the EU has been sluggish, with many countries dipping in and out of recession. Unemployment figures across many European nations remain high, especially in Spain and Greece.
Although the euro stabilised after a series of multi-billion-euro rescue packages for Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain, the currency is still subject to uncertainty. In 2015, an extension of Greece’s bailout was granted in the hope of keeping the country within the eurozone, to avoid a Greek exit (aka ‘Grexit’), and to avoid other debt-saddled countries following suit. And the European Central Bank launched massive quantitative easing (QE) measures involving money printing and bond buying, pumping over €1 trillion into the economy in an effort to resuscitate it.
By 2019, most eurozone economies were well on the way to recovery, but the uncertainty surrounding the UK’s decision to leave the EU posed unprecedented political and economic questions for the future of Europe.
Timeline
4500–2500 BC
Neolithic tribes build burial tombs, barrows, stone circles and alignments across Europe.
1st century BC – 4 AD
The Romans conquer much of Europe. The Roman Empire flourishes under Augustus and his successors.
410
The sacking of Rome by the Goths brings an end to Roman dominance.
1066
William the Conqueror defeats the English King Harold at the Battle of Hastings.
1340s–1350s
The Black Death reaches its peak in Europe, killing between 30% and 60% of Europe’s population.
15th Century
The Italian Renaissance brings about a revolution in art, architecture and science.
1517
Martin Luther nails his demands to the church door in Wittenburg, sparking the Reformation.
1789
France becomes a republic following the French Revolution. Numerous aristocrats are executed by guillotine.
1815
France’s defeat at the Battle of Waterloo ends the First French Empire and military career of Napoleon Bonaparte.
19th century
The Industrial Revolution transforms European society, with railways and factories bringing in the modern age.
1914
The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand leads to the outbreak of WWI (1914–18).
1939–45
WWII rages across Europe, devastating many cities. After peace is declared, much of Eastern Europe falls under communist rule.
1957
The European Economic Community (EEC) is formed by a collection of Western European countries.
1989
The fall of the Berlin Wall heralds the downfall of oppressive regimes across much of Eastern Europe.
1993
The Maastricht Treaty leads to the formation of the European Union (EU).
2002
Twelve member states of the EU ditch their national currencies in favour of the euro.
2009
Europe is rocked by a series of financial crises, leading to costly bailouts for Ireland, Greece, Portugal and Spain.
2014
Scotland votes on and rejects becoming a fully independent nation and so remains part of the United Kingdom.
2015
Greece defaults on loan payments. Bailout proposals with tough conditions trigger riots and Greek banks close.
2016
Some EU borders are shut as millions of refugees and other unofficial migrants attempt to reach safe European havens.
2017
Following a referendum in favour of quitting the EU, the UK triggers Article 50 setting in motion ‘Brexit’.