Darstellung der Reichsproposition vom 10./20. Jan. 1663

Description

The copperplate engraving shows the ceremonial opening of the Reichstag (Diet) in the Town Hall and the hierarchical seating arrangement of the imperial estates in the hall. At the front wall of the hall underneath a canopy is the emperor or respectively his deputy, the principal commissioner. To his right and left, as well as opposite him are the electors. On the benches along the two side walls sit the ecclesiastical and secular princes and the representatives of the free imperial cities on the benches in the back of the hall. After the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, the emperor had convened a Reichstag for the second time in 1663 (the first took place in 1653) in Regensburg to negotiate with the imperial estates about the financing of campaigns against the Ottoman Empire (“Türkenhilfe” or help against the Turks). The imperial estates, however, insisted that first of all the controversial and unresolved issues from the Peace of Westphalia should be discussed. Negotiations on these issues went on so that no rapid agreement could be reached. The Reichstag was to develop into the “Perpetual Diet”, which for the next 143 years helped to steer the destiny of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation and remained in Regensburg until the dissolution of the empire in 1806.