Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle — End of the War of Austrian Succession
The Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (October 1748) ended eight years of the War of Austrian Succession. Its key provisions: Prussia kept Silesia (the wealthy province seized from Austria in 1740); Austria recovered Lombardy and the Austrian Netherlands from France; France returned its conquests in Flanders (much to French public anger at getting nothing for their military efforts). Maria Theresa was recognised as Empress and her husband Francis Stephen as Holy Roman Emperor. The peace was universally acknowledged to be inadequate and temporary. Maria Theresa wrote bitterly that she was signing 'to my greatest sorrow, a peace which is in truth only a truce.' The unresolved animosity between Austria and Prussia over Silesia, and Austria's determination to reverse the result, drove the Diplomatic Revolution of 1756: Austria allied with its old enemy France, Britain shifted to Prussia, and the resulting Seven Years' War (1756–63) became a global conflict that redrew the world map. Voltaire observed that France had fought to give Silesia to a Protestant Prussian king while exhausting herself and gaining nothing: 'Bête comme la paix' ('Stupid as the peace') became a French proverb.
- Year: 1748 CE
- Category: Political
