The edict of Nantes, signed in April 1598 in Nantes (France) by King Henry IV of France, was a decree authorizing freedom of conscience and a freedom of worship limited to Calvinist Protestants. The promulgation of this edict put an end to the Wars of Religion that convulsed France during the sixteenth century.
The Peace of Augsburg, also called "Peace of the religions", was a treaty signed by Ferdinand I of Habsburg, brother and representative of Emperor Charles V, and the forces of the League of Esmalkald on September 25, 1555 in the city of Augsburg in Germany, by which the religious conflict of the Protestant reform was resolved.
The term of Peace of Westphalia refers to the two peace treaties of Osnabrück and Münster, signed on May 15 and October 24, 1648, respectively, the latter in the Hall of Peace of the municipality of Münster, in the historic region of Westphalia, with which ended the Thirty Years War in Germany and the Eighty Years War between Spain and the Netherlands. In these treaties the emperor of the Holy Roman-Germanic Empire (Ferdinand III of Habsburg), the Spanish Monarchy, the kingdoms of France and Sweden, the United Provinces (the Netherlands) and their respective allies among the princes of the Holy Roman-Germanic Empire participated. .
These events gave rise to the first modern diplomatic congress and initiated a new order in central Europe based on the concept of national sovereignty. Several historians assign a major importance to this act, since in Westphalia the principle was established that territorial integrity is the foundation of the existence of the states, against the feudal conception, of which territories and peoples constituted a hereditary heritage. For this reason, it marked the birth of the nation state.
