Franco–Dutch War | |||||||||
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Painting of the capture of Coevorden by Dutch troops commanded by Carl von Rabenhaupt in December 1672 |
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Belligerents | |||||||||
France England (1672–74) Sweden Münster Cologne |
Dutch Republic Holy Roman Empire Spain Denmark-Norway Brandenburg-Prussia England (1678) |
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Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
Louis XIV Vicomte de Turenne † Prince de Condé Abraham Duquesne |
Prince William of Orange Leopold I Count Montecuccoli Johann von Sporck Frederick William Michiel de Ruyter † Duke of Villahermosa |
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Strength | |||||||||
253,000 (1678) | Unknown | ||||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||||
120,000 killed or wounded | 100,000 casualties | ||||||||
175,000 dead |
Peace among France, the Dutch Republic and England:
The Franco-Dutch War (1672–78), often called simply the Dutch War (French: Guerre de Hollande; Dutch: Hollandse Oorlog), was a war fought by France, Sweden, Münster, Cologne and England against the Dutch Republic, which was later joined by the Austrian Habsburg lands, Brandenburg-Prussia and Spain to form a Quadruple Alliance. The war ended with the Treaty of Nijmegen, by which Spain ceded the Franche-Comté and some cities in Flanders and Hainaut to France, while France returned some of its conquests (Maastricht and the Principality of Orange) to the Dutch.
The year 1672, when a full invasion of English, French and German forces took much of the Dutch Republic by surprise, is often referred to as het Rampjaar ("the Disaster Year") in Dutch.
In the 1560s, the future Dutch Republicans formed an alliance with France. The alliance lasted for a century. Louis XIV of France considered the Dutch to be trading rivals, seditious republicans and Protestant heretics – but military allies nevertheless. This was until the Dutch signed the Triple Alliance (1668) with England (against whom they had just fought a war) and Sweden in support of Spain (another recent foe), and countered French expansion in the Spanish Netherlands in the War of Devolution. To Louis, it seemed clear that France had to deal with the Republic before making another move on the Spanish Netherlands.