Talk:Concert of Europe

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 * Opening Paragraph of This Article **

The opening paragraph of this article makes sense only after reading several other articles and rereading the opening paragraph to put it into context... The article listed below (where it comes from I have no idea) seems to make more sense and have greater authenticity to it. Although, the principles of this article have merit, there is little beyond opinion to substantiate it. It may all in fact be true, but it seems disorganized in concept. Stevenmitchell 20:20, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

The Concert of Europe describes the broad co-operation between Europe's great powers after 1815. Its purpose was to maintain the peace settlement concluded at the Congress of Vienna following the defeat of Napoleonic France. Centered on the 1815 Quadruple Alliance of Britain, Austria, Prussia and Russia (expanded in 1818 to include France's restored Bourbon monarchy in the Quintuple Alliance), the Concert was divided throughout by the differing ideological perspectives of its principal participants. While the Continental powers sought to maintain the political status quo in western and central Europe to the extent of armed intervention against revolutionary outbreaks which might threaten conservative order, British statesmen from the 1820s pursued a less reactionary policy, notably in opposing any threat to the revolutions against Spanish and Portuguese rule in Latin America. Britain similarly stood aside from the Continental monarchies' authorization of Austrian military intervention in the 1821 Italian Carbonari insurrections and French intervention in Spain in 1823. The July Revolution of 1830 eroded the unity of the Continental powers by bringing France under a more liberal monarchy. The Concert's principal accomplishments were the securing of the independence of Greece (1830) and Belgium (1831). In 1840 the powers (except France) intervened in defense of the Ottoman Empire (against which they had supported Greece) to end Egypt's eight-year occupation of Syria. Fatally weakened by the European revolutionary upheavals of 1848 with their demands for revision of the Vienna frontiers along national lines, the last vestiges of the Concert expired amid successive wars between its participants - the Crimean War (1854-56), the Franco-Austrian War (1859), the Austro-Prussian War (1866) and the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71).

Confusion
I'm told in a homework assignment the CONGRESS SYSTEM and the CONCERT OF EUROPE are the same thing, yet in this article, they are different. this could use a little more clarification. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by SBKT (talk • contribs) 16:51, 27 March 2007 (UTC).

Where's the reference to pentarchy, are we to assume it's UK-FR-DE-IT-ES? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.151.51.3 (talk) 14:41, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Securing Belgian independence?
I'm by no means an expert on the topic, but shouldn't the assertion that the Congress System securred Belgian independence be somewhat revised? I say this because under the Congress of Vienna it was agreed that Belgium should be absorbed into, what would become, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. Belgium had hitherto been under Austrian control as the Austrian Netherlands and afer 1815 it was under the rule of the Dutch King William I. The Belgian Revolution in 1830 was, amongst other things, a backlash against Dutch hegemony. Belgian indepenence may have been a consequence of the Congress System, but to say that it was secured by the Great Powers is a bit of an overstatement. If anything, it is an example of how flippantly lesser powers and peoples were treated by the Quadruple Alliance, illustrating one of the major flaws of the Congress System.

More broadly, too, the article seems to describe the Congress System as something positive and uses unspecified generalisations, e.g. "most historians agree...". I find that in much historiography the Congress System is seen as reactionary and as an attempt to suppress nationalism in many European provinces (an example being the Troppau Protocol, November 19, 1820). A number of historians including E.L Woodward, Howard Nicholson and L.C.B. Seaman, and even Karl Marx regarded the Congress System as a failure. Perhaps this article could be more balanced. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Themitfords (talk • contribs) 14:30, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Citing source material
I'm unsure how to lure little boys into my van, so before I run off to learn how I'm adding this note here, as much for myself to remember where this came from, as it is a reference to any other ambitious wiki editor. The bulk of this article, along with some possible copy & paste infringement comes from the book: "The Empire of the City" by E.C. Knuth, chapter IV, "The Concert of Europe". Several paragraphs are word for word from the book, but the copy I have shows a copyright of 1945, and was reprinted in 1983, so I'm not sure if the original copyright is valid anymore.Lefick (talk) 20:36, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Merge discussion
Given that Concert of Europe, European Restoration and the Age of Metternich articles all refer to the European era of 1814-1848, it seems unnecessary that there be three articles on the same subject; the only difference is what each term refers to, but it would seem that this can all be contained in the Concert of Europe article. (Whether this should be the surviving page, I don't know; it seems like the most formal and common term, however, so I would argue in favor of that.) -- LightSpectra (talk) 23:05, 15 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Seen that User:LightSpectra suggested this merge as of May 16th, 2010, and no one objected to it, I see no reason why not merge the content of both articles into Concert of Europe. Agreed. Krenakarore (talk) 20:57, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

This article is a mess. The English is a grammatical and stylistic shambles. Presumably a Russian wrote the article? Also, the German is wrong, it should be "Das Konzert Europas", not "Konzert der Europa". But the term doesn't exist in German, no German historian refers to the "Konzert Europas". 85.76.182.190 (talk) 19:52, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Congress of Berlin?
"Meetings of the Great Powers during this period included: ... and Berlin (1878)."

Surely it is inaccurate to portray the Concert as lasting until the Scramble for Africa? Harfarhs (talk) 20:13, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

The map is incorrect
The congress of Vienna map is incorrect,since it depicts the Kingdom of Poland in 1815,which doesnt exist after its partition from the great powers since 1795 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partitions_of_Poland) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.251.109.106 (talk) 15:45, 18 October 2018 (UTC)
 * A comment of this type should usually go on the talk page of the file itself, not just any random article that uses it. However, in this case, I think you are simply misreading the map or/and the legend. The former and current states of Poland (unsure what you meant) are all clearly colored as parts of Prussia, Russia, Austria and the small Free City of Krakow, and there is no mention of the 1795 Kingdom. What is depicted accurately is what happened in 1815: Napoleon's ally the Duchy of Warsaw became the "new" nation of the Kingdom of Poland (labelled on this map in red and presumably what you're referring to), but the King was the Czar of Russia (why it's green like Russia) and was supposed to be held separately but wasn't really, and the entity was also known as "Congress Poland" which was the alternate name given on this map for the same entity in black text in quote marks under the red text giving its proper name. It's accurate. JesseRafe (talk) 16:11, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Update/add content
I am planning on updating this page and adding a significant amount of new content, particularly with the Congresses and Conferences that took place during the Concert of Europe. To do this I am also planning on reformatting much of the current page, and overwriting some sections. Kristin.T98 (talk) 14:42, 25 October 2019 (UTC)


 * Good idea, there doesn't seem to be anything much about the post-Crimea period, the Concert was still a thing although not in quite the same way as before.Selfstudier (talk) 18:11, 29 October 2019 (UTC)