He applied the “Page 99 Test” to his new book, The Palatine Family and the Thirty Years' War: Experiences of Exile in Early Modern Europe, 1632-1648, and reported the following:
Page 99 drops the reader into the middle of a discussion of the financial resources of the ‘Palatine Family’, a ruling dynasty whose involvement in the opening events of the Thirty Years’ War saw them reduced from the highest rank of the aristocracy of the Holy Roman Empire to landless, penniless exiles. The page in particular examines how the dispossessed Elector Frederick V of the Palatinate and his wife Elizabeth (the daughter of King James VI & I of Scotland and England) were able to ‘cash in’ on their family connection to the British royal family to obtain much-needed money. Influential figures at the Stuart court and in the royal government were willing to provide loans and financial gifts and bequests to their monarch’s exiled kin. For example, the Archbishop of Canterbury George Abbot, bequeathed Elizabeth £100 in his will ‘to make a pretty cup of gold, in token of my dutiful respect and service to her princely dignity’. Page 99 ends with an assessment of how a royal status could act as security to allow exiled rulers in early modern Europe to obtain credit from merchants and tradesmen for the procurement of food and other essential items. This was often vital for dispossessed rulers who frequently faced cashflow problems, resulting in them frequently being unable to pay for their own subsistence.Learn more about The Palatine Family and the Thirty Years' War at the Oxford University Press website.
Whilst not necessarily encapsulating the entire scope of the book, page 99 provides a valuable insight into the central themes of the overall work. The page is at the very centre of Chapter 2, titled ‘Cannon, Cash, and Kin: The Resources of an Exiled Dynasty’, which examines the military, financial, and dynastic capital available to the Palatine Family and other dispossessed rulers and houses in early modern Europe, such as Duke Charles IV of Lorraine, Marie de Medici, and the Stuart dynasty. In addition to determining the extent to which exiled rulers could access such forms of capital, the chapter assesses the usefulness of each in helping exiles recover their lost lands and titles.
More broadly, the emphasis of page 99 on the dependency of the Palatine Family on the support from the Stuart monarchs and their subjects reflects a thread that runs throughout the book. The military, financial, and diplomatic assistance that the Palatine Family received – or did not receive – from Elizabeth’s homeland not only directly impacted the actions that they could take in recovering their lost territories, but it also directly influenced the support provided by other countries. Indeed, a French ambassador reported in 1634 that some powers ‘openly suggested the abandonment of the Palatinate’ if ‘England, which, has such strong ties of obligation, cares nothing about it’.
The ever-changing military and political landscape of continental Europe during the Thirty Years’ War meant that the value of different types of ‘capital’ similarly shifted depending on circumstances. When Civil War erupted in the England in 1642, Elizabeth and Frederick’s son Charles Louis had to weigh his options between loyalty to his uncle King Charles I, and the prospect of obtaining vital financial resources from the king’s parliamentarian enemies. My book examines these difficult choices and the challenging circumstances which were largely typical of the experiences of royal and noble exiles in early modern Europe.
--Marshal Zeringue
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