Buff's Stuff: 1815 SETTLING EUROPE - WHAT A PERFORMANCE + DONALD DUCK

A grand European carve-up was settled 197 years ago today, the 9^th June 1815, just 9 days before the Battle of Waterloo on Sunday 18^th June 1815. Napoleon had been declared an outlaw by the Congress only a month before on the 13^th March. He had escaped from Elba on the 26^th February 1815. The Congress would have probably been in a bit bouleversé by this turn of events. The Duke of Wellington had nine days, after the conference, to get back to Belgium and take charge.

Metternich

The Congress of Vienna was a conference of ambassadors of European states chaired by Austrian statesman Klemens Wenzel von Metternich, and held in Vienna from September, 1814 to June, 1815. The objective of the Congress was to settle the many issues arising from the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars, and the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire.

This objective resulted in the redrawing of the continent's political map, establishing the boundaries of France, the Duchy of Warsaw, the Netherlands, the states of the Rhine, the German province of Saxony, and various Italian territories, and the creation of spheres of influence through which Austria, Britain, France and Russia brokered local and regional problems. The Congress of Vienna was the first of a series of international meetings that came to be known as the Concert of Europe, which was an attempt to forge a peaceful balance of power in Europe, and served as a model for later organizations such as the League of Nations and United Nations.

The Final Act, embodying all the separate treaties, was signed on Friday 9^th June 1815. Its provisions included:

▪ Russia was given most of the Duchy of Warsaw (Poland) and was allowed to keep Finland (which it had annexed from Sweden in 1809 and held until 1917).

▪ Prussia was given two fifths of Saxony, parts of the Duchy of Warsaw (the Grand Duchy of Posen), Danzig, and the Rhineland/Westphalia.

▪ A German Confederation of 38 states was created from the previous 360 of the Holy Roman Empire, under the presidency of the Austrian Emperor. Only portions of the territory of Austria and Prussia were included in the Confederation.

▪ The Netherlands and the Southern Netherlands (approx. modern-day Belgium) were united in a constitutional monarchy, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, with the House of Orange-Nassau providing the king (the Eight Articles of London).

▪ To compensate for the Orange-Nassau's loss of the Nassau lands to Prussia, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg were to form a personal union under the House of Orange-Nassau, with Luxembourg (but not the Netherlands) inside the German Confederation.

▪ Swedish Pomerania, given to Denmark a year earlier in return for Norway, was ceded by Denmark to Prussia. France received back Guadeloupe from Sweden in return for yearly installments to the Swedish king.

▪ The neutrality of Switzerland was guaranteed.

▪ Hanover gave up the Duchy of Lauenburg to Denmark, but was enlarged by the addition of former territories of the Bishop of Münster and by the formerly Prussian East Frisia, and made a kingdom.

▪ Most of the territorial gains of Bavaria, Württemberg, Baden, Hesse-Darmstadt, and Nassau under the mediatizations of 1801–1806 were recognized. Bavaria also gained control of the Rhenish Palatinate and parts of the Napoleonic Duchy of Würzburg and Grand Duchy of Frankfurt. Hesse-Darmstadt, in exchange for giving up the Duchy of Westphalia to Prussia, was granted the city.

▪ Austria regained control of the Tyrol and Salzburg; of the former Illyrian Provinces; of Tarnopol district (from Russia); received Lombardy-Venetia in Italy and Dubrovnik in Dalmatia. Former Austrian territory in Southwest Germany remained under the control of Württemberg and Baden, and the Austrian Netherlands were also not recovered.

▪ Habsburg princes were returned to control of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the Duchy of Modena.

▪ The Papal States were under the rule of the pope and restored to their former extent, with the exception of Avignon and the Comtat Venaissin, which remained part of France.

▪ The United Kingdom was confirmed in control of the Cape Colony in Southern Africa; Tobago; Ceylon; and various other colonies in Africa and Asia. Other colonies, most notably the Dutch East Indies and Martinique, were restored to their previous owners.

▪ The King of Sardinia was restored in Piedmont, Nice, and Savoy, and was given control of Genoa (putting an end to the brief proclamation of a restored Republic).

▪ The Duchies of Parma, Piacenza and Guastalla were given to Marie Louise, Napoleon's wife.

▪ The Duchy of Lucca was created for the House of Bourbon-Parma, which would have reversionary rights to Parma after the death of Marie Louise.

▪ The Bourbon Ferdinand IV, King of Sicily was restored to control of the Kingdom of Naples after Joachim Murat, the king installed by Bonaparte, supported Napoleon in the Hundred Days and started the Neapolitan War by attacking Austria.

▪ The slave trade was condemned.

Freedom of navigation was guaranteed for many rivers, notably the Rhine and the Danube.