The Revolutions of 1848
Explore the Revolutions of 1848 — the 'Springtime of Peoples' when nationalist and liberal uprisings swept across Europe, challenging monarchies everywhere.
The Revolutions of 1848, called the 'Springtime of Peoples,' were the most widespread revolutionary wave in European history. Beginning in France in February and spreading within weeks to the German states, the Austrian Empire, Italy, Hungary, Poland, and beyond, they represented the explosive convergence of liberal demands for constitutional government, nationalist aspirations for self-determination, and working-class anger at economic inequality.
The immediate triggers were economic crisis — the potato blight and industrial recession of 1847 — combined with political frustration at the conservative order established after Napoleon's defeat at the Congress of Vienna (1815). In France, the revolution overthrew King Louis-Philippe and established a republic. In Vienna, Chancellor Metternich — the architect of European conservatism — was forced to flee. In Berlin, the Prussian king promised a constitution. Hungarians, Czechs, Italians, and Poles all rose up demanding national independence.
Yet by 1849, almost all the revolutions had been suppressed. Conservative forces regrouped, armies remained loyal to monarchs, and the revolutionaries were divided by conflicting class interests and national aspirations. But the revolutions were not without lasting impact: serfdom was abolished in the Habsburg lands, political consciousness was permanently raised, and the nationalist energies unleashed in 1848 would ultimately produce the unification of Italy and Germany within 25 years.