Mindlessly, I put on my armor.

For reason, had little use for armor, but my heart was burning the other comrades for battle.

Frenzy and anger drove me on, and suddenly it seemed a noble thing to die in arms.

Virgil Zeneid, book two. On the 9th of May 1630,

Gustavus of Sweden embarked on the campaign that would cement his legend and create an empire.

By July the 3rd, he captured Stettin, the capital city of Pomerania, along the Baltic coast of

northern Germany. Having declared war throughout June on Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor and his

allies, including Spain, he fortified his

defences, welcoming with open arms the troops who had taken part in the siege of Strasund,

and awaited the opportunity to make his next move.

Having acquired this bridgehead from where he could launch attacks in the future,

Gustavus concerned himself with consolidation, recruitment,

and acquiring winter quarters. The commander of the force left behind by Wallenstein

that was meant to contain Gustavus, elected to sit back and wait rather than make an early

attack against the Swede. He would also have been informed of the goings-on in the city of

Regensburg, where Ferdinand had called the various imperial princes and reps together for a meeting.

It was at this meeting, if you recall from the last episode, that the generalissimo

of Ferdinand's Imperial Army, Wallenstein, was dismissed by the end of August.

Geoffrey Parker in his book The Thirty Years' War notes on the background of these

events and paints a grim picture for the Holy Roman Empire. Quote, instead of solving the

problems confronting Empire and Emperor in 1630, the Regensburg Electoral Meeting had only made

them worse. By sacrificing Wallenstein, Ferdinand lost the one man whose ability

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