Hanseatic Civil War (Merveilles des Morte)

Hanseatic Civil War
Part of Forty Years' War
The Siege of Bremen would be one of the most deadly confrontations of the Hanseatic Civil War.
Date 20 March 1596 - 5 February 1607 Location Northern Germany, Baltic Sea Result Dissolution of the Hansa Emergence of Hanover Republic Danish subjugation of Schleswig-Holstein
Belligerents
Hanseatic League (Protestant States) Hamburg-Lübeck Mecklenburg Brunswick-Lüneburg Pomerania Denmark-Norway Belgica Supported by: Rätian Union Sweden Hesse Irish Presbyterians	League of Meppen Bremen Oldenburg Münster File:Flag of the Bishopric of Osnabruck.png Osnabrück Paderborn Verden Holstein Poland-Lithuania File:1920px-Royal Standard of England (1406-1603).png England File:Celtic Confederacy flag (MdM).png Celtic Confederacy Palatine Habsburg United Kingdom
Commanders and leaders
Simon II Burkhart Andreas Burkhart Thomas Stalkoper Peter Melander Paul Behrens George II Johann Fuchs † Georg Holk John Albert II Augustus I † Magnus II of Lauenburg Red Hugh O'Donnell	Ernst Staphylus Christian I Laurentius Surius Leonhard Reinhold File:1920px-Royal Standard of England (1406-1603).png Geoffrey Vere File:Celtic Confederacy flag (MdM).png Robert Leslie File:Celtic Confederacy flag (MdM).png Christopher Seaton

The Hanseatic Civil War (1596-1607) was a major conflict centered in the Hanseatic League during the Forty Years' War. Instigated by religious differences within the league following the Imperial Elections of 1595-96, the conflict divided the Hansa between its Catholic and Jungist components, and ultimately lead to the country's dissolution by the conflict's end.

The national government of the Hanseatic League, led by Simon II Burkhart, supported the Jungist faith, which was a majority in key territories such as Hamburg-Lübeck. Conversely the western third of the nation was largely Catholic, and had been the center of the Northern Papacy in the aftermath of the Kerpen War decades prior, and this section would form a Catholic alliance known as the League of Meppen. This rebellion inspired the largely Catholic Holstein and Schleswig regions to likewise rise in revolt, crowning Christian I as their leader. The conflict quickly attracted attention from neighboring nations, with Poland-Lithuania launching an invasion of the Hansa's eastern territories, and nations such as England sending large expeditionary forces to northern Germany. In 1602 the Danish king George II would invade Holstein, beginning the Danish Intervention in the Forty Years' War, and the Hanseatic Civil War.

Neither religion would succeed in uniting the Hanseatic League once more, and in 1607 the nation was formerly dissolved. The largest portion of the nation, comprised of much of the Jungist section, would form the Hanover Republic, while numerous other breakaway states formed. Schleswig-Holstein would be subjugated by the Danish, although Denmark was repulsed from the rest of Germany. The civil war would not be the end of religious conflict, with Denmark's withdraw later inspiring Sweden to intervene.

Merveilles des Morte