However, then takes over the country and empire of his neighbor .

's empire brought him incredible wealth including pounds of gold and tons of silver, in which he was able to keep th to th of each ship load.

While he was rich and successful, also felt like he should be the defender of and fought for and against the Empire and the country of

This success also lead to a of Spain. In this era, artists such as and flourished in Spanish painting. In literature, wrote his masterpiece ""

However, the Spanish Empire began to weaken, especially in fighting a war against the who won their independence. The new country formed was called the and their government was a .

Artists also flourished in the with artists such as and .

They were economically successful because of their

However, this was the Age of , which kings and queens were justified by ruling with a belief called a .

The icon of this era was of France

In France gains the throne by converting from to . He had an untimely death by . His son, takes over the country but was not ready to rule, so he appointed to be his chief minister.

increased power to the French crown in two ways by having and take down their .

Since this was an era of changes, a new intellectual movement was started in France called . This was the idea that nothing was known for certain. The two main philosophers of this movement was and .

came to power at age . Since he was too young, another Cardinal, , was brought in to be a regent until this Cardinal's death. officially assumed the throne at age .

did not choose his to have power, but increased the power of his . The key reason for this was that now would come directly to . Louis XIV;s most important appointment was who believed that France should become more .

's nickname became the . He furthered this image and nickname by massively expanding his palace at . This palace cost the French % to build and maintain this palace complex. Some of the facts about this palace include that it has windows and acres of palace grounds. With this palace and other art being created in this era, no one had spend as much on art since . However, the difference with all this art was that this art was all about .

However much like of Spain, of France fought many wars. His biggest was the war of where he tried to place his grandson on the throne of . The biggest winner of these wars was the country of .

In Central Europe, and began to emerge as the two powers in Central Europe in the Age of Absolutism. However, Central Europe began this era with the , which started in by who would eventually be their king.

For the first years of the war, the armies crushed their enemies and plundered villages. 's population went from million to million people. This war ended when of joined together with and of . This mattered because now instead of fighting for religion, countries now fought for their .

After this war, 3 places formed as countries / empires which were , , and . However, all of these countries had major weaknesses. One of the issues with Central/Eastern Europe was that while Western Europe was freeing their , Eastern Europe was restricting them with more laws.

Again the two powerful countries that emerged were and who were ruled by the and families.

The family ruled the empire. The problem with the was the it was very multicultural and would never be united. The greatest ruler of this empire, at this time was who married many of her children into the rest of the royal families of Europe.

On the other hand, was a state in the modern day countries of and . They were ruled by the family. The greatest ruler of this family was .

and fought in wars for more power. Countries that also fought in these wars were and . Again, the country that would make out the best in all of these wars was . While not much power or land changed hands in , but land did change hands in and .

In Russia, came to the throne at age . He became a "" or russian king because he married the last Byzantine princess . However, he is more popularly known as . His wife had an untimely death and he blamed the , or Russian land owning nobles for her death. He then hunted down these . their , their , and their . He also killed his .

After this reign was chosen to rule. This began the dynasty which lasted from to . Their first great would be .

The problems with Russia when came to power were many, especially with the and . When he first became czar, went on the , where he travelled every major . When he came back to Russia, realized he needed to modernize, or .

His three main ways of achieving this were by dealing with the , , and . However, his greatest achievement of his reign was building his new warm water port and capital city where he also built his palace know as .