From Empire To Europe

Renowned industrial expert Geoffrey Owen analyses the complex reasons behind the delayed modernisation of British industry.

Europe as we've known it is a dying myth, but colonial relations live on.

THE year 1870 will long remain memorable in the annals of Europe. For in that year occurred a great and decisive war whose outcome was destined to exercise a large and profound influence upon the history of the subsequent period; whose consequences were to prove pervasive, far-reaching and unhappy, just as the four terrible years through which the world has recently passed will inevitably determine the future of the world for many decades to come. There was a certain tragic unity to that intervening period between the Franco-Prussian War and the World War, the shadow of the former, the dread of the latter hovering over the minds of men, full of menace, inspiring a recurrent sense of uneasiness and alarm. All the various streams of activity, all the different movements, national and international, social and economic, intellectual and spiritual, all the complex and diverse phenomena of the life of Europe during that crowded half-century took their form and color largely from the memory of war, the fear of war, the preparation for war. A period like that is surely worth studying. Indeed only if men acquire or possess a just understanding of it, only if they retain a vivid sense of its lessons and its warnings, will they be able to avert a repetition of its horrors, only thus will they have the aid of either chart or compass on their voyage into the future.

In the Middle Ages nothing that happened was ever regarded as absolutely new; each development was seen as a renewal of a former state of things. By studying the concept of empire during that period, one can understand how it caused political structures to be formed which claimed to be a continuation of the Empire of Rome.

The Napoleonic Empire played a crucial role in reshaping global landscapes and in realigning international power structures on a worldwide scale. When Napoleon died, the map of many areas had completely changed, making room for Russia's ascendency and Britain's rise to world power.

An Economist and Sunday Times Best Book of the Year “Deserves to be hailed as a magnum opus.” —Tom Holland, The Telegraph “Ambitious...seeks to rehabilitate the Holy Roman Empire’s reputation by re-examining its place within the larger sweep of European history...Succeeds splendidly in rescuing the empire from its critics.” —Wall Street Journal Massive, ancient, and powerful, the Holy Roman Empire formed the heart of Europe from its founding by Charlemagne to its destruction by Napoleon a millennium later. An engine for inventions and ideas, with no fixed capital and no common language or culture, it derived its legitimacy from the ideal of a unified Christian civilization—though this did not prevent emperors from clashing with the pope for supremacy. In this strikingly ambitious book, Peter H. Wilson explains how the Holy Roman Empire worked, why it was so important, and how it changed over the course of its existence. The result is a tour de force that raises countless questions about the nature of political and military power and the legacy of its offspring, from Nazi Germany to the European Union. “Engrossing...Wilson is to be congratulated on writing the only English-language work that deals with the empire from start to finish...A book that is relevant to our own times.” —Brendan Simms, The Times “The culmination of a lifetime of research and thought...an astonishing scholarly achievement.” —The Spectator “Remarkable...Wilson has set himself a staggering task, but it is one at which he succeeds heroically.” —Times Literary Supplement