How has Liechtenstein Managed to stay Independent?
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- čas přidán 3. 05. 2024
- Liechtenstein is the fourth smallest country in Europe, and also one of the richest. It's Prince is perhaps the most powerful monarch in Europe. But how has this small, rich principality stayed independent for all these years?
Some Sources:
Liechtenstein: History and Institutions of the Principality
by Raton, Pierre
The Sovereignty of Liechtenstein by Walter S. G. Kohn
www.liechtenstein.li/en/count...
www.inyourpocket.com/vaduz/th...
www.napoleon.org/en/history-o...
www.liechtensteinusa.org/page/...
Music:
Sneaky Snitch by Kevin MacLeod
Link: incompetech.filmmusic.io/song...
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Thanks for watching! Let me know other small countries you want me to cover.
CORRECTION: the castle liechtenstein shown in the video is in Wuttenburg, Germany. The one I meant to put is in Austria. My mistake.
Yes, I also got confused by that in my research of the family. I corrected the mistake before putting it down in any written form though. (I do most of my work in my head.)
Rob is my o
San Marino!
Andorra.
It's called Württemberg and not Wuttenburg 😅
The castle that you have shown as the "Castle of the Liechtenstein Family" is in fact lying in Württemberg in germany and is named "Lichtenstein" - after a novel by the German Autor Wilhelm Hauff. It was built in the middle of the 19th century by a second born of the house of Württemberg. So it has nothing to do with "Liechtenstein" as a country.
qq
Liechtenstein:
-didn't have an army
-most memed for its army suffering negative casualities in a war
It did once have an army. Sporting 12 soldiers. They went off and returned with 13. They picked a guy up who joined them. It became then clear that the idea of having an army is pointless and it was abolished.
@@bensteven3091 Liechtenstein army had 80 soldiers. There last war was the prussia-austriaof 1866. And after that war it was 81 soldiers.
@@bensteven3091 I heard that story countrless times and xyou managed to even get the numbers wrong.
This never happened.
In the austro-prussian war we were ally to the Habsburgs of Austria - they wanted to send our military to prussia but we refused fighting fellow germans in a war we havent started.
In the end they sent our 82 men to a mountain pass in italy, where, after no fighting broke out, we were escorted back home by an austrian general.
The woman, the elder and the children who counted the men while marching back upon arrival counted 83 and were confused.
They hoped for 82 and got one more, this is how this legend started.
Money is the strongest weapon
A component you missed in the Austrian connection: The Houses of Habsburg-Lorraine and Liechtenstein were staunchly Roman Catholic, whereas the German Empire was unified under the Protestant Prussians.
Yes, this is a very important point. It explains a lot of European borders such as Ireland and Northern Ireland.
yeah thats kinda a huge foundational piece of this story he left out
Yes, but in that part of the world the big religious wars were fought 200 years earlier. Big parts of South and West Germany are Catholic, that didn't matter when creating the Empire.
Religion did not really come into the creation of the Prussian dominated German Empire as Bavaria was and is very much catholic but was a major player in the empire
This channel deserves a much larger audience for the quality!
good overview but you missed a couple of things regarding the Rheinbund, Liechtenstein did not join it, not really anyways. At the time the prince of Liechtenstein was the Commander of the Austrian army. Napoleon respected his skills as such and out of that respect he included Liechtenstein into the Rheinbund but Liechtenstein never signed the the documents, since the prince was at war with napoleon.
The castle illustrated at 2:47 is Lichtenstein, not Liechtenstein, and it is in Baden-Wurttemberg, not Austria. It's a great place. Also, it was built in the 1800s.
Germany.
I LOVE your youtube channel! I love your art and how you explain things, I haven't seen other channels talk about these things and you do it in such a easy to understand and entertaining way! I really hope you keep making more great videos
Another great video, thank you for making this content!
I stumbled onto this side of CZcams and ended up subscribing 😂
I … guess it’s interesting info and I love when the drawing lifts his hand and closes his eye in each video. It’s like a literary “mic drop” you’re about to drop some knowledge on us
So Liechtenstein is basically the feudal bordergore you end up making at some point in a CK3 game, and it survives over the ages as an eyesore until it just ends up as an independent state.
Even on the inside it's bordergore. Just look at the administrative divisions map.
bordergore? thank you for teaching me a new word!
Your animations are delightful. keep up the great work
I was there in the summer of 1980, touring with a concert choir...it was lovely!!! Can't wait to visit again!!!
I’ve been to Liechtenstein 🇱🇮 twice, mainly as a stopover either going to or coming back from Switzerland 🇨🇭. I didn’t even know I was in Liechtenstein if it were not for our tour guide declaring “Welcome to Liechtenstein.” It’s very quaint and quiet though. After watching this video, now I know why they like it that way, quaint and quiet.
Awesome video and great content I hope to see more videos soon! :)
Thankyou for this video, I always wondered
You make the videos I'd make if I wasn't so shy.
I love them, Thank you.
Thanks for the straightforward info!
A curious little side note is that the current Jacobite pretender to the British throne (silly I know, since after more than 3 centuries on Britain’s throne of the branch of the house of Stuart descended from the youngest daughter of James I’s eldest daughter, instead of the youngest daughter of his youngest son, this is about as arcane a topic of conjecture as you can get, and frankly ain’t gonna happen anyway) is the Duke of Bavaria. And his eldest daughter (he has no son) is married to the heir of the current ruler Hans Adam. And they have a son. So at some point the Jacobite pretender will have this very little principality to rule and call his own.
Did someone say Liechtensteiner-British Union War?
I believe we have casus belli!
- said no one ever
nice video, very well articulated.
Greetings from Brazil. Excellent video!
Nicely and entertainingly explained 😊👍
Fascinating, thanks!
Loved the video
A friend once asked me to help him find the address of the Liechtenstein embassy in the U.S. This was the early Internet days, so I went online and the closest thing I could find found was the Liechtenstein Desk of the Swiss Consulate in New York City.
I realized two things: Liechtenstein indeed is largely absorbed into Switzerland in terms of diplomacy, and I want to work at that Liechtenstein Desk. Gotta be an easy job.
Very educational and well told..
A story about Andorra or San Marino would be nice
I learned a dozen years ago or more that Liechtenstein had at least SOME industry inside the principality. I noticed embossed in naturally tiny letters within the Neutrik XLR connectors our company bought the words "Made in Liechtenstein". Who knew!
Generally interesting and good video! But im sorry I couldn’t make it through this one in one go. Tour accent had me torn between lmao and cringing. 😂🤣
But thanks for the great vid! 💕
Greetings from Germany.
Excellent! You made a bland topic very interesting!
Liechtenstein is that small kid who whenever a fight starts in class goes to a corner and just observes along with his best buddy, Switzerland.
A great information channel
Prince Hans-Adam II has published a provocative book called “ The State in the Twenty First Century.” Fascinating reading for political theorists.
Funny how literally every time Liechtenstein is talked about, "Little Liechtenstein" has to be said atleast once
2:37 You got the image wrong mate, that was Castle Lichtenstein in Wurttemburg, Germany. But indeed the one you're referring to, Liechtenstein, is in Austria.
Ah, you are correct. That's my bad. Thanks so much for pointing it out
Also, „der 7 jährige Krieg“ lastet 7 years, not weeks.
@@frax520l I'm sure he didn't mean the 7 years war of the 1756-1763 which also pitted Austria vs Prussia, but the Deutscher Krieg in 1866 which is called 7 weeks war in the english language amongst others.
@@frax520l that's not the 7 years war xD
@Krista it's called Württemberg and not Wurttemburg 😉.
Wow, I learned so much from this video on Liechtenstein! It's amazing how such a small country has such a rich and complex history. If you're interested in learning more about Liechtenstein, I highly recommend the book
'A Journey Through Liechtenstein's Fascinating History' by Lea Marie Nigg.
It's a beautiful and informative book that offers a unique perspective on Liechtenstein's history
Liechtenstein's coat of arms is totally unrelated to the land itself, but a depiction of the princely family's title and succession claims.
it uses the middle shield to represent "Prince of Liechtenstein", Q1 for Silesia which "Duchy of Opava and Krnov" is partitioned off from, Q2 for the Kuenringer family which have appointed them as their successors, Q3 for Opava, bottom corner for Krnov and Q4 for the County of Rietberg.
nothing about "Vaduz", "Schellenberg" or "Hohenems family" got to be mentioned anyhow,
Fun fact: Liechtenstein is one of only two doubly-landlocked countries, the other being Uzbekistan.
I can’t get my head around the definition, why isn’t Luxembourg considered one.
@@dylanmurphy9389 doubly landlocked countries are bordered only by other landlocked countries. Luxembourg's bordering countries all have coastline.
Very interesting.
It would be great if a documentory history series of Liechenstein and how they reacted when world 1 and 2 broke out and their reaction when they were the only medieval family to ruled a land
Definitely a difficult time for them with their monarch married to a member of the Guttmann Jewish banking dynasty
Small heads up : the picture you show at 2:40 is of the Schloss Lichtenstein im Land Baden-Württemberg, which never belonged to the Liechtenstein dynasty.
That General Assemblee is not a diet but a deet, pronunciationwise that is. Although you write Diet. The 'e' straight after the 'i' (so 'ie') means an elongated full vowel. So not "i" as in "this" but "ee" as in "sweet". Swiet, Diet etc. The spelling rules in German and Dutch speaking countries differ somewhat from the English speaking ones.
He is American and his pronunciation is correct.
When you make Switzerland seem big...
Underrated comment 😂
My wife is from the Island of Grenada, W.I.
...I thought IT was a 'thumbprint' in the middle of the ocean.
Been there once, wasn't much to see (har har). All I remember was getting there through a one lane tunnel that had one of those automatic red light-green lights systems.
Europe a continent where if you are small enough and don’t move no one will bother you.
5:47 “exclave”
🤷
Used to go there often in the mid-1990s.
Yoooo so THAT'S how it stuck around. Been kinda wondering 10 years easy but never taken time to research.
Nice goin' Liechtenstein!
Oh and thanks for the video!
Funfact, before asking USA about to buy Alaska the Tsar of Russia first ask the monarch of Liechtenstein, but he declined.
Liechtenstein and Luxemburg are the last former Imperial German principalities (excluding Austria, Switzerland, Holland, Federal Germany and Belgium because they're more sizable and less continuous) , they exist because they were never mediased.
You're doing the Holy Roman Empire dirty by not including northern Italy.
Hi from Liechtenstein!👋
Listening to your explanation of feudal roots, lands ruled by small 'noble' families, I am reminded of large swathes of the southern US. Boss Hogg is a cultural meme for a reason, after all, as is the tendency of Americans to lynch inconvenient outsiders.
I’ve been to Lichtenstein... beautiful country
The castle is not located in Austria, but in Germany, and it’s called Lichtenstein:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lichtenstein_Castle_(W%C3%BCrttemberg)
maybe i misunderstood, but if liechtenstein would have joined germany, it would have been an exclave, not an enclave
Fun Fact: The Spencer Family to whom Lady Diana Spencer was born to are heirs body to sovereign princes in the Holy Roman Empire who held a seat in the Imperial Diet - the Princes of Mindelheim granted to John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough. John did not have a male heir and his English titles were passed down to his grandson Charles Spencer, son of The Earl of Sunderland and Princess Anne Churchill of Mindelheim. His imperial title went extinct as the empire strictly follows the salic law of succession.
...and the saxon-gotha and coburg still rule UK.
@@hansberger4939 Yeah they do until Her Majesty's death and then the Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburgs will then rule in their place.
@@hansberger4939Now it's the house of Gluksburg but the Royal family will never publicly acknowledge that.
@@lightyagami3492 They also never tell us how close his parents were relate.d
@@hansberger4939 Correct. The royal family only publicity acknowledged that Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip were 3rd cousins through Queen Victoria but they are also 2nd cousins once removed through King Christian IX of Denmark.
I once visited Liechtenstein. We ate an ice cream there. There is really nothing to experience. There are no tourists. While we ate an ice cream, the police wanted to see our papers. With the vehicle papers they walked around our car and caravan for half an hour. When our ice cream was finished we could continue. There was clearly nothing to do.
You know a country really has nothing to see when the tourist becomes a tourist attraction to the locals.
@@gazpachopolice7211 Haha indeed, you are right about that. :-)
Perhaps another reason it’s been able to stay independent is that Liechtenstein is so hard to pronounce that whenever neighboring generals would go over invasion plans they would get to Liechtenstein, start to try and say it, give up and move on to a larger, easier to pronounce country. Just sayin (or trying to...)
That’s pretty damn funny.
Both neighboring countries of Liechtenstein are German speaking. And as a German speaker I can tell you that Liechtenstein is really easy to pronounce for us. So, your theory is only funny for non-German speakers.
Big Big error !
The castle shown in the video is not the castle of the country Liechtenstein in Vaduz it is the castle Lichtenstein in the federal state Baden-Württemberg in Germany.
You have to change the animation to fix it, actually I live in the small town of Lichtenstein so I am pretty sure about this mistake.
And yes I also think our castle is prettier... but it was build as a hunting castle after a romantic novel by Wilhelm Hauff went popular with the title The Lichtenstein.
prettier than the castle liechtenstein near vienna? that one is also historism.Built 1808.
My little story, I spent three weeks in Liechtenstein waiting for a job application to be processed, when asked about where I had spent my three weeks outside of Switzerland, I replied 'Liechtenstein' my fremden politzi started laughing, told me Liechtenstein is independent in name and a couple of banking laws only. lol
By chance did he actually ask "what country did you stay in?" Seems yo mke more sense.
@@shonenjumpmagneto Yes but in an off hand way, relaxed conversation, we got along very well, nice fellow I forget his name tho.
Interestingly, Liechtenstein is a lot closer culturally to Switzerland than to Austria now
I chose to believe Monty Python... Any way great work.
Liechtenstein DID have an army. However it disbanded it after the dissolution of the German Confederation in 1866. Andreas Kieber, the last surviving solider of the Liechtenstein army, often would pose in uniform, appearing on a variety of postcards, until his death in 1939.
Also note there is story ogten repeated, that during the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, not only did all of Liechtenstein's 80 soldiers return home, they actually found a friend they recruited along the way, so they had *negative* war casualties.
The Holy Roman Emperor. In 800, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne Emperor of the Romans, reviving the title in Western Europe after more than three centuries, thus creating the Carolingian Empire, whose territory came to be known as the Holy Roman Empire.
After the dissolution of the Carolingian Dynasty and the breakup of the empire into conflicting territories, Otto I became king of Francia and worked to unify all the German tribes into a single kingdom and greatly expand his powers.
The title of Emperor was again revived in 962 when Otto I was crowned by Pope John XII, fashioning himself as the successor of Charlemagne and thus establishing the Holy Roman Empire.
The Imperial Diet. Those nobility who attended the Diet were educated and trained in the duties of ruling their states. Many had to work themselves to have income. Democracy is in our modern worls where we elect an oligarchy of often uneducated to rule. The unelected bureaucracy runs the government. We don't vote on policy or legislation. Others do it.
Lichtenstein even tried to get back areas and castle that are now in the Czech Republic.
But the Czechs said no.
In the communist era these all went to the Czech state.
The area used to belong to Austria.
neat.
As an American who resided 15 years in Luxembourg, few things irritated me more than when people confused the two places.
Austria: So, you want to join us?
Liechtenstein: Naw.
Austria: No big whoop. Have a nice day.
You missed the opportunity to talk about it being double landlocked
If it was bigger, it would need an army and air for e to protect itself. How wealthy would it be after that?
Liechtenstein will never merch with switzerland. We‘re just too proud for that
I was looking for a Lichtensteiner in the comments. Almost didn't expect to see one. May your country last forever.
It was my understanding that the general public had recently voted the monarchy into supreme power disbanding the Parliament altogether as well as having a small volunteer army?!?
Based
you heard wrong mate, in 2003 they just voted to expand his power
No and no. There was a referendum on cutting his powers but that was rejected, so nothing changed and parliament wasnt affected at all by this. And no, we do not have an army. I am a Liechtenstein Citizen in case you question the authenticity of my comment.
@@bensteven3091 OMG, öbr uss liechtestei! die gseht me au nid jede daag!😃
👍🏾👌🏾
History lessons must be dream in Lichtenstein.. especially compared to England or France. 1 family, 200 years, done
Well, being surrounded by Switzerland and Austria is all that needs to be said.
Cool, Switzerland has it's own little sibling.
Money!!! Money!!! Money!!!
For heaven’s sake, the phrase is SET foot!
He's blonde, he's cute, he wears an amour suit /
Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein /
He's hot, he's strong, his winning streak is long /
Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein /
He's smart, he's funny, he makes a lot of money /
Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein /
He's quick, he's mad, he comes from Gelderland /
Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein /
He's hot, he's pissed, he'll see you in the lists /
Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein!
Holy Rome once had 1000 fucking Provinces?!
God damn!
How to stay independent as a small country: 1) keep your head down and 2) do NOT have significant natural resources that others would covet.
1 of only 2 double land locked contries in the world.
fun fact: In ww2 their war causality was -1
wrong. The war you are talking about wasn't ww2 but the austria-prussian war, mentioned in the video. Shortly after that war, the army was disbanded. (I am from Liechtenstein)
How? Did a soldier bear a child soldier? Seriously, how did that happen?
@@whatkenyan7684 They picked a guy up on their return and so they returned with 13 soldiers, but initially left with 12.
@@bensteven3091 wrong. They left with 80 men and came back with 81. However, the 81th wasn't an italian friend or something similar, but rather just an austrian officer that accompanied them back
@@bensteven3091 not 12...it was 80 !!! and then 81....
Castle Liechtenstein is in Württemberg not in Austria.
sweet
They even use the Swiss money. Not euro
You just LOVE saying Austria yea? Like its not just the 20th of the size you show there
He that controls the money makes the rules. That's why they don't need an Army.
I always wanted postage stamps from Liechtenstein many years ago.. 😄
Smaller would be better for all if it could be achieved.
Comment for algorithm
Pocket-sized history :)
When I look at the geopolitics of Europe, particularly in the context of the past 3-4 centuries, I can’t understand how it is not a smoldering ruin, trashed by the natural decay of failed authoritarians. The fact it functions at all as the European Union is frankly staggering. Can you even imagine the various, inept, tribal fiefdoms of ‘America’ merging ideologies to function politically as, say, a ‘United States’ in the same period of years?! I know, I know. That’s extreme, but I hope it makes my point.
The EU was a consequence of those ruins, because for the first time since recorded history and only a brief moment, there were actually politicians at work who didn't want to continue the forever wars. Now the regular crop of politicians are back again and are trying to undo all of it, but that takes a bit of time.
That's exactly what it was in 1945.
It is their massive nuclear arsenal that keeps them safe.
2:28 the video shows castle Liechtenstein, that has NOTHING to do, with the dynastie of Liechtenstein.
This was the wrong castle but the family has connections to the one in Austria.
@@peterg.8941 "liechtenstein" is not a rare name. And the castle has nothing to do,with that familiy and also nothing to do with the middle age. Its a building of the 19th centuriy.
Poor research. Poor knowledge.
But why doesn't the royal family there?
Why have you drawn borderlines on the Bodensee/Lake Constanze? Make dotted lines or no lines at all, because this is extremely political
as a liechtensteiner hearing you saying liechtenstein could possibly join switzerland at some point shows that you don't know anything more about the country and its people than wikipedia aricles told you... i appreciate that your effort for making this video, but this is kinda offensive... by the way we had a small army once haha
Even as somone from Switzerland, I have to say, that won't happen anytime soon for several reason.. For one, Switzerland dosent want Liechtenstein as a canton.. We already declined Vorarlberg when they wanted to join.. Why would want Liechtenstein.. And I doubt your Monarch would allow a merger.
I'll always chuckle every time an American calls it "Licktenstein."
That's the correct pronunciation in Standard American English. As a German speaker I realize that's not how it's pronounced by its inhabitants. Nonetheless, it's pretentious to pronounce it otherwise when speaking SAE.
@@jonathanjochem7289 Not saying it's wrong, just funny.
Fun Fact: Lichtenstein is a sovereign protectorate.