Karl, imperial baron vom und zum Stein summary

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Karl, imperial baron vom und zum Stein, (born Oct. 26, 1757, Nassau an der Lahn, Nassau—died June 29, 1831, Schloss Cappenberg, Westphalia), Prussian statesman. Born into the imperial nobility, he entered the civil service in 1780. As minister of economic affairs (1804–07) and chief minister (1807–08) to Frederick William III, he introduced wide-ranging reforms in administration, taxation, and the civil service that modernized the Prussian government. He abolished serfdom, reformed the laws on land ownership, and helped reorganize the military. Anticipating war with France, he was forced to resign under pressure from Napoleon (1808) and fled to Austria. As an adviser to Tsar Alexander I (1812–15), he negotiated the Russo-Prussian Treaty of Kalisz (1813) that formed the last European coalition against Napoleon.

prime minister Summary

Prime minister, the head of government in a country with a parliamentary or semipresidential political system. In such systems, the prime minister—literally the “first,” or most important, minister—must be able to command a continuous majority in the legislature (usually the lower house in a

Two serfs and four oxen operating one medieval agricultural plow, 14th-century illuminated manuscript, the Luttrell Psalter.

serfdom Summary

Serfdom, condition in medieval Europe in which a tenant farmer was bound to a hereditary plot of land and to the will of his landlord. The vast majority of serfs in medieval Europe obtained their subsistence by cultivating a plot of land that was owned by a lord. This was the essential feature

Prussia Summary

Prussia, in European history, any of certain areas of eastern and central Europe, respectively (1) the land of the Prussians on the southeastern coast of the Baltic Sea, which came under Polish and German rule in the Middle Ages, (2) the kingdom ruled from 1701 by the German Hohenzollern dynasty,

land reform Summary

Land reform, a purposive change in the way in which agricultural land is held or owned, the methods of cultivation that are employed, or the relation of agriculture to the rest of the economy. Reforms such as these may be proclaimed by a government, by interested groups, or by revolution. The