The Congress of Vienna as imagined by Jean-Baptiste Isabey. Metternich is standing sixth from left.
Books about diplomatic history are not my cup of tea. But I made an exception for Adam Zamoyski's Rites of Peace: The Fall of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna. This was because I enjoyed Zamoyski's 1812 (about Napoleon's invasion of Russia) and because I've long been fascinated by the Congress of Vienna, and its leading lights, the Austrian Chancellor Metternich, Britain's Foreign Secretary Castlereagh, Russian Tsar Alexander I, and the French Foreign Minister Talleyrand.
The Congress, which largely took place in 1814-15, was a gathering of European rulers, statesmen and soldiers who, in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars, sought to re-order Europe. Orchestrated by Russia, Britain, Prussia and Austria, the Congress imposed a continental political settlement and security system. This became the foundation of modern Europe and a root cause of many of its subsequent troubles.
Most historians would have written worthy but dull accounts of meetings attended and documents drafted. Zamoyski writes a good diplomatic narrative, but he also brings the Congress to life by exposing the horse trading and double-dealing, the land grabbing rapaciousness, the sexual licence and moral depravity that stewed beneath a courtly veneer. The Congress was as much a glittering social occasion, with grand balls, festivals, hunts, even an imperial sleighing party, as an august political summit. It was closely watched by Metternich's secret police, whose reports provide historians with a wealth of information about political manoeuvres and daily dalliances.
Zamoyski illuminates the lives, loves and concerns of the protagonists with gripping character sketches. At crucial times the randy Metternich was distracted by his love affairs - during one important meeting he sat forlornly in a corner writing a letter to a lover who had spurned him for a dashing cavalry officer. Meanwhile, Alexander lived out fantasies of youth and martial vigour on the dance floors of Vienna:
"He mostly dressed in the uniform of Colonel of one of the Russian Guard regiments, which no longer suited him, as he had grown a little plump over the past year, and the tight coat made his arms hang in front of his body like an ape's, while the skin tight breeches stressed the outline of his fattening bottom. Yet he continued to affect the dash of a young buck."
Like the Congress itself, Rites of Peace goes on a little too long. But I recommend it as a scholarly yet racy history of a seminal event in Europe's history.
