The princes and the
Landstande
In the various principalities the outcome of the struggle between the territorial princes and the assemblies of estates (
Landstande
) was not fully decided by 1500. The vigour of the conflict arose partly out of the contrasting
conceptions
of government held by the protagonists. The
secular
princes looked upon their lands as private possessions that could be divided by agreement among their sons and drew little distinction between their private and their public revenues. The three estates regarded themselves as the corporate representatives of the whole territorial
community
and maintained that actions by a prince affecting their interests and privileges should be subject to their consent. They therefore opposed the partition of the territory by family pact among the princes’ sons. The inadvisability of breaking up the principalities into petty territorial lordships was at length conceded by the more prudent princes. By 1500 the rulers of
Bavaria
,
Brandenburg
,
Saxony
, and Wurttemberg had accepted the principles of territorial indivisibility and primogeniture.
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In financial matters the imposition of extraordinary
taxes
(
Notbeden
) remained the crucial issue between the princes and the estates. The mounting cost of war and administration outstripped the ordinary revenues of the ruler, plunged him deeply into debt, and compelled him to seek financial aid from the estates with increasing frequency. In the absence of a clear distinction between public and private revenue, the estates often contended that the deficit was a private debt of the prince and disclaimed responsibility. Needy princes were thus forced to buy temporary solvency by
concessions
that later shackled them in their dealings with the estates. The estates regarded the
Notbede
strictly as an occasional emergency tax and insisted that it should be reasonable in amount. Indeed, the estates of Bavaria and Brunswick extracted from their respective princes in the course of the 14th century a formal recognition of their right of armed resistance to extortionate taxation. Similarly, any prince who broke his agreements with the estates was subject to the right of resistance. Thus the aims of these territorial assemblies were mixed. They sought to preserve the privileges of the three orders, to restrain the power of the prince, and to limit taxation. They were, however, also actively interested in good government, and the more
enlightened
rulers usually issued their ordinances only after consultation with the estates.
The princes proceeded against these powerful and often turbulent bodies with great caution. They persistently demanded that territorial assemblies
convene
only at the summons of the prince. They discountenanced the widespread
conviction
that absentees from the assembly were not bound to pay the taxes that it voted. In consequence, the peasants, who were not represented except in the Swiss cantons, Baden, Friesland, and Tirol, remained in the grasp of the princes’ tax collectors. In these directions the princes had generally made notable advances by 1500, but in the vital matter of the
Notbede
they were still obliged to bargain with the estates as equals. They had nowhere attained their ultimate objective: to transform the tax into a regular imposition voted automatically by the estates on demand.
Beyond the
confines
of the assemblies of estates, the attempts of the princes to curb their overmighty subjects aroused vigorous resistance. The noble vassals, proud and unruly, readily combined against any prince who sought to tamper with their liberties. Wise rulers deflected the nobles’ energies into useful channels by employing them as stipendiaries. Hence even the most powerful princes?the Habsburgs in
Austria
and the
Hohenzollerns
in Brandenburg?proceeded circumspectly, and the difficult task of bringing the nobility to heel was far from completed in 1500. The cities of the princely territories defended their independence no less stubbornly. The princes revoked their charters, influenced municipal elections, and forbade the cities to associate in self-defense. The struggle was most intense in the north and east, where the
Hohenzollern dynasty
of Brandenburg emerged as the chief foe of municipal freedom. In 1442 the
elector
Frederick II
(“Iron Tooth”) crushed a federation of Brandenburg cities and deprived its leader,
Berlin
, of its most valued privileges. In the Franconian possessions of the
dynasty
,
Albert Achilles
of Hohenzollern waged a destructive war (1449?50) against a city league headed by
Nurnberg
. He suffered a resounding defeat in a pitched battle near
Pillenreuth in 1450. The elector
John Cicero took up the battle 38 years later, when the cities of the Altmark in west Brandenburg refused to pay an excise tax on beer voted by the assembly of estates. He discomfited the cities in the ensuing “
Beer War” and radically revised their constitutions to his own advantage. On the other hand, the great cities of southern Germany, enriched by the Italian trade, were more than a match for the local princes: the Wittelsbach dukes of Bavaria were decisively worsted by
Regensburg
in 1488.
The growth of central governments
Between 1300 and 1500 the organs of central government in the territorial states became more specialized and diversified. The parent body was the advisory council (
Hofrat
) of high nobles and ecclesiastics, whom the prince consulted at his discretion. Its business was not
differentiated
, and there was no
division of labour
among the councillors. It met at the summons of the prince and did not convene at regular intervals. Its membership was not fixed, and some advisers did not attend except at special invitation. Others were regional councillors who attended the prince only when he appeared in their locality. A body so unspecialized and fluctuating was ill-adapted to cope with the increasingly complex problems of central government. Hence in the 14th and 15th centuries a professional element of “daily” or permanent councillors was introduced. They were usually legists, trained in
Italy
or in the newly founded universities of Prague (1364), Vienna (1365), Heidelberg (1386), Rostock (1419), and Tubingen (1477). They were well versed in
Roman law
, which, with its centralizing and
authoritative
precepts, provided a
congenial
climate for the growth of the powers of the territorial princes everywhere save in Saxony, Schleswig, and Holstein, where the ancient customary codes were deeply rooted. Financial administration, which required specialized skills, was placed under the direction of a separate department of government, the treasury (
Hofkammer
). An inner ring of favoured advisers, the privy council (
Geheimrat
), was also instituted to
counsel
the prince on affairs of state. The besetting weakness of the new administrative structure was financial. Few princes followed the example of the Hohenzollern dynasty in drawing up an annual budget and requiring financial officials to submit regular accounts to the government. On the positive side, chanceries gradually created a common
German language
, which Luther later used to spread his message.