Hape visits Versailles, recalling the grand court Louis XIV set up, soon copied around Europe, at extreme expense later instrumental in causing the French Revolution, with its cultural excellence but horrible neglect of practical matters ...See moreHape visits Versailles, recalling the grand court Louis XIV set up, soon copied around Europe, at extreme expense later instrumental in causing the French Revolution, with its cultural excellence but horrible neglect of practical matters like hygiene. Frederick the Great ruled from Sans-Souci in Postdam near Berlin, remarkably modern and tolerant, but waged wars at great human cost yet instrumental in becoming Europe's fifth great power. England excelled in colonialism, rising to world power, yet lost the great prize, North America, to disgruntled colonists whose war of independence preluded to European enlightenment and revolutions. Emperor Peter the Great modernized Russia, which he made into a superpower with a new capital named after his patron saint, a job continued by a German princess who usurped her husband's throne. Napoleon both spread the revolutionary ideals trough Europe and restores empire after the excesses of revolutionary terror, only to lose it against a continental coalition. Written by
KGF Vissers
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