24 The Origins of the Thirty Years War and the Revolt in Bohemia, 1618
had long favoured some form of military self-help, but the recent events
had persuaded some more moderate Lutheran princes to support the
move, notably Baden-Durlach and Württemberg, the last named in par-
ticular having about a third of his territory at risk were secularised
church lands to be repossessed.^23 Because of the differences between the
Calvinists and the Lutherans the resulting Union, which was to last for
ten years in the first instance, did not formally identify itself as a Protes-
tant body, although it is usually referred to as the Protestant Union for
reasons of clarity. A special tax levy on the members was to provide the
means to raise a paid army in the event of need, and the Palatinate took
on both the political directorate and the military command, although
theoretically this was to change every three years. Membership subse-
quently grew to nine princely territories and seventeen free Imperial
cities, among them Nuremberg, Ulm and Strasbourg. Nevertheless most
Protestant principalities, particularly those in the north, and including
the strongest Protestant power in the Empire, the electorate of Saxony,
did not join.
The Catholic response was predictable, and fourteen months later, in
July 1609, the Catholic League was founded in Munich. Like the Union,
its support was drawn mainly from southern Germany, and the great
majority of its members were ecclesiastical entities. The three Catholic
electorates from further north, Cologne, Mainz and Trier, did not join
immediately, although they did so soon afterwards. Bavaria was the only
secular principality of significance in its ranks but it nevertheless pro-
vided most of the funds, while Maximilian was the leading, indeed the
dominant, personality and the military commander. Nevertheless the
League, like the Union, declared itself from the outset to be a purely
defensive alliance, and it is argued that the number of smaller entities
joining one or other reflected a widespread belief that the institutions
of the Empire were no longer able to protect their rights.^24 Ironically the
foundation of the League was also the main factor bringing in new mem-
bers to the Union, which had otherwise made little progress beyond the
initial group.
The ink was scarcely dry on the first of these agreements when a new
conflict arose in the Empire, although in this case the main issue was
property, while the dispute escalated for reasons which were chiefly
political although with religious overtones. The dissension over the
Cleves-Jülich inheritance concerned a large group of territories in north-
west Germany, mainly on the lower Rhine, comprising the duchies
of Jülich, Cleves and Berg, together with the counties of Mark and
Ravensberg, all ruled from the duke’s capital of Düsseldorf. The ruling