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The Peace of Augsburg (1555) was a peace treaty that sought to end the religious struggle in the German lands and the Holy Roman Empire in the mid-sixteenth century. The Peace of Augsburg was signed by Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, who was a Catholic and the Protestant Schmalkaldic League. The treaty of Augsburg was an attempt to end the series of religious wars that had destabilized the Holy Roman Empire, which was the largest political entity in Europe at the time.

The treaty, also known a the Settlement of Augsburg , sought to prevent Catholics and Protestants from going to war again and to end religious tensions and violence in the Imperial lands. The treaty briefly did maintain peace in the Holy Roman Empire, but the treaty ultimately failed. Why did the Peace of Augsburg fail and how did it lead to the Thirty Years Wars?

The settlement ultimately failed because it did not, admit Calvinist to the terms of the treaty and it was unable to define the religious status of the Episcopal states. Most importantly, it created a mutually hostile Protestant and a Catholic bloc in Central Europe. This hostility eventually led to the Thirty Years War, the most brutal conflict according to some, in European history.

The Catholic Church attempted to suppress Luther and he was forced to seek the protection of the ruler of Saxony. The message of Luther and his calls to reform the church was greeted enthusiastically in many parts of Germany. The elite and the urban middle class were tired of the corruption and worldliness of the Church. This led to the establishment of many break-away churches that refused to acknowledge the authority of the Pope. Many temporal rulers in Germany adopted Protestantism and secularized Church lands and established Protestant Churches in their land.

The supporters of Luther knew that Charles was too preoccupied with his wars in Italy and the Ottoman’s to intervene. It was only after Charles V had defeated the French king could he turn his attention to affairs in Germany. He formed a League that aimed to destroy Protestantism and re-establish religious unity in the Empire. Charles and his army was were victorious and captured Saxony and won a great victory at the Battle of Milberg.

Despite these defeats, the Protestants refused to come to terms and abandon their faith. Charles became aware that it would be impossible to destroy Protestantism. One of the members of his League defected to the ProtetantsProtestants, and he helped them to win a minor victory. This shift convinced the aged and infirm Charles of the futility of any further war.

The Peace of Augsburg, also called the Augsburg Settlement was signed in September 1555 by Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, and the Schmalkaldic League, signed on 25 September 1555 at the imperial city of Augsburg.<ref>Elliot, J.H. <i>Imperial Spain 1469–1716</i>. Penguin Books (New York: 2002), p. 208</ref> It officially ended the religious war and attempted to establish a religious settlement in the sprawling German lands.<ref> Hale, p. 134</ref> The principle of <i>cuius regio, eius religio</i>, was the most important aspect of the treaty. This principle states that the ruler of the realm decided the faith of the people.<ref>Von Friedneburg, p 76</ref> This was to ensure the internal unity of the states within the Holy Roman Empire. If a ruler was Catholic, then he could determine that all those who lived in his realm had to be Catholics. Those who did not accept the situation could migrate to a jurisdiction that was Protestant.

The Peace of Augsburg created a temporary end to hostilities, it did not resolve the underlying religious tension in Germany and in central Europe. There were continued tensions between Catholics and Protestants. Despite the agreement that those who did not share the religion of the prince or ruler should conform or leave the realm, in the treaty many did not. This meant that there were rival groups of Catholics and Protestants living near each other in an uneasy peace. There are many instances of riots and violence between the two groups. The situation was made more complex by the spread of Calvinism in the latter part of the sixteenth century. Many Germans were drawn to the teachings of Calvin and his ideas on the ‘elect’ and ‘predestination’. Several German rulers , especially in Brandenburg and the Rhineland , tolerated Calvinists. The Calvinists although Protestants were not Lutherans and they were distrusted and even persecuted by Lutheran rulers.

Catholics naturally saw them as just another Protestant sect. The rise of Calvinism in Germany was not foreseen by the Peace of Augsburg. At the time of the writing of the treaty , they were a small group. By the 1580s they were a significant minority and their activities helped to increase religious tensions in Germany. By the 1600s several rulers proclaimed themselves Calvinists, such as the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel and the Elector of Brandenburg. As Calvinists, they were not covered by the principle of ‘one ruler, one faith’, this threw the entire Peace of Augsburg into doubt. Furthermore, Calvinists , because they were recognized under the Peace of Augsburg , were in effect unable to secure any tolerance for their faith in the Empire. This was to play an important part in the breakdown of the Augsburg Settlement. Indeed, the collapse of the Augsburg settlement can be attributed to actions borne out of Calvinists ' frustrations. The so-called ‘defenestration of Prague’ involved Calvinists attacking and throwing representatives of the Holy Roman Emperor out a window. This was to trigger the Thirty Years War that left most of central Europe a wasteland.<ref> Wilson, Peter, <i>The Thirty Years War: Europe's Tragedy</i>. London: Belknap PresPress, 2011), p. 67</ref>

In the Holy Roman Empire, there were very many ecclesiastical principalities and they ranged in size from a small town to large territories, often containing significant urban centers such as Cologne. The Treaty after protracted negotiations had to deal with the issue of ecclesiastics who converted to Lutheranism. The Catholic side was concerned that if a bishop or another religious leader converted that his realm would become Lutheran. This had happened during the Reformation. The Head of the Teutonic Knights in Prussia, originally an order of warrior-monks had converted to Protestantism and as a result , all the Prussian territories had become Protestant. The Catholics demanded that any bishop or religious leader that had converted to Lutheranism should return his realm as by rights their lands belonged to the Catholic Church.