In disproving many misconceptions about confessional conflict and the religious sensibilities of early modern soldiers, Nikolas Funke’s new book establishes itself as a key text within the study of early modern warfare and religious change. Set within the societal context of the German-speaking lands of the Holy Roman Empire, Faith in war picks up on several strands of research within new military histories of war, including the motivations and mentalities of soldiers, and the ways in which civic society shaped, and was shaped by, military cultures. At the same time, it offers fresh perspectives on how early modern soldiers and military authorities negotiated confessional diversity and religious pluralism, while simultaneously challenging the stereotype of the soldier as ‘irreligious’ and ‘ungodly’. More specifically, Funke achieves a cultural-historical interpretation of the past by critically examining the influence of social and religious norms on the behaviours and actions of military personnel. This makes for a book that is both ambitious and engaging.
Faith in war reads as one continuous, sustained argument, with the chapters advancing from more general sociocultural and military contexts (which act as benchmarks for subsequent discussions) to the ways in which soldiers understood, projected and negotiated their own religious beliefs. This structure undoubtedly lends an element of coherence and ease of argument to the book. The first chapter directly challenges stereotypes of the early modern solider as an amoral and irreligious figure − a narrative that many early modern writers and subsequent scholars have been all too eager to embrace. The second chapter addresses the character of religion in the armies of the Holy Roman Empire; here, Funke concludes that even in conflict typically defined as ’confessional’ or religiously motivated, military authorities fostered strategies of confessional co-existence that downplayed religious differences and promoted universal Christian mindsets and values. These important findings are then advanced in the final three thematic chapters, which examine the role of religion in soldiers’ lives (and how these behaviours correlated with social norms), the waging of confessional violence and military attitudes towards death and dying respectively.
When combined, all chapters function as a critical appraisal of existing work on the ‘godlessness’ of early modern soldiers and, more specifically, landsknechts and ‘mercenaries’ (a term which Funke rightly acknowledges as problematic in itself). Furthermore, the chapters as a whole highlight that soldiers and military authorities were more confessionally tolerant than previous histories of early modern conflict have suggested, complementing recent literature on confessional co-existence within sixteenth- and seventeenth-century civic societies. However, Faith in war does more than extend these findings to the military sphere: it reframes early modern soldiers from sole agents of the state to individuals who operated within, and interacted with, contemporary social and military norms. This repositioning is particularly impressive as it allows Funke to achieve a more nuanced interpretation of ‘confessional conflict’ and demonstrate that this period of heightened religious and military change may have facilitated the potential for confessional intolerance and dissension, but soldiers − who had the ability to express their own forms of agency and self-determination − did not necessarily act on confessional differences.
The strengths of Faith in war are many. Of particular interest is the way in which Funke utilises sources frequently used in early modern military histories − including articles of war, legal codes and autobiographical and eyewitness accounts − to raise new historical questions, allowing him to simultaneously add to, but also challenge, existing scholarship. Through a cultural analysis of the language used in the source material, Funke is able to explore how individuals represented themselves and interpreted broader social contexts. Even more interesting is his methodological framework based on Hillard von Thiessen’s recent theory of ‘normative rivalry’ − essentially, the idea that individuals could follow different (and at times conflicting) normative systems depending on the social setting and their individual roles within these contexts. These methodological approaches are most successfully applied to chapters iii and iv. By focusing on the language used in autobiographical accounts, for example, chapter iii demonstrates that soldiers expressed their religiosity in terms of common Christian values rather than specific confessional beliefs. Yet at the same time, soldiers − in much the same way as their civilian counterparts − were willing to engage in deviant behaviours such as blasphemy and licentiousness. In doing so, this chapter highlights how soldiers’ occasional deviation from religious norms were normal in the context of early modern civic society and further complicates the narrative of the ‘irreligious’ soldier.
Autobiographical accounts are utilised again in chapter iv, this time to explore patterns of confessional violence. Funke argues that soldiers rarely made overt statements of religiosity in their accounts and there is little evidence to suggest that their narratives were shaped by confessional concerns. Although previous scholars have interpreted these silences in the record as evidence of soldiers’ ‘godlessness’, Funke provides evidence of the exact opposite by arguing that this omission highlights soldiers’ ability to separate social norms from religious ones. This allows for an interesting paradox that showcases Faith in war’s original contribution to the historiography: whilst early modern soldiers were just as religious as their lay counterparts, for the most part they did not allow their own confessional beliefs to interfere with their military roles. Simply put, soldiers understood that military authorities tolerated confessional differences and mediated their own religious convictions within these professional contexts accordingly. Beyond these compelling chapters, each individual section is skilfully constructed and its conclusions presented as cogently as the last.
Yet Funke’s lack of engagement with literature on other European armies occasionally renders Faith in war vulnerable to historical criticism. At times, for instance, it is not entirely clear how far Funke’s assertion that ‘coexistence was characteristic of everyday military life … Europe’s “religious wars” were fought by armies composed of Christians of all denominations who mostly managed to contain confessional strife both in their own units and across enemy lines’ (pp. 12–13) is specific to the armies of the Holy Roman Empire. Indeed, this statement (and others like it) directly challenge existing literature by scholars like David Trim on the religious motivations of soldiers in more confessionally homogenous armies, such as England. At best, this leaves the reader looking for further clarification; at worst, Funke risks over-projecting his findings and overlooking the disparate nature of early modern armies. Funke makes some attempt to address this point and achieve nuance in his arguments in chapter iv when he proposes that confessional thinking ‘actually appears to have had an impact’ (p. 132) on the Spanish army and the behaviours of Catholic Spanish soldiers, but he falls short of applying this same level of comparative analysis to each individual chapter. Without compromising his focused case study approach, Funke could have further pushed the originality of his arguments by occasionally situating his findings within a broader early modern context.
These minor concerns, however, do not detract from the overall quality of Funke’s arguments, or his skill in demonstrating how soldiers − within the context of the Holy Roman Empire − understood, projected and negotiated their confessional beliefs in the military sphere. If anything, Faith in war invites further research that adopts a more comparative approach to the religious sensibilities of early modern soldiers. Overall, Faith in war does more than just reassess the relationship between religion and the early modern soldier − as Funke rightly asserts, it has broader implications for how confessional wars are understood and analysed, as well as how early modern confessional differences are conceptualised. The breadth of issues covered in Faith in war, and the ease with which Funke links the stories of individual soldiers to larger historical contexts, means that this book will appeal to scholars and students alike, particularly those interested in new cultural histories of the Reformation and early modern conflict. Just as important, Faith in war presents an attractive, convincing and alternative perspective of the lived experiences of soldiers negotiating this period of military and religious change in early modern Europe.
