Battle of Leipzig (Battle of the Nations)

Date

16 to 19 October 1813

Category

Military & conflict

Region

Saxony (Leipzig)

Era

Modern

Significance

Fought from 16 to 19 October 1813 around Leipzig in Saxony, the Battle of the Nations was the largest engagement of the Napoleonic Wars and one of the largest in European history before the twentieth century, involving more than half a million soldiers.

The Sixth Coalition armies of Austria, Prussia, Russia and Sweden, commanded by leaders including Schwarzenberg, Blücher and the Russian tsar, converged on Napoleon's outnumbered French and allied forces. Over four days of grinding combat that produced around 130,000 casualties, the Coalition decisively defeated Napoleon, marking the first time he was beaten in a major set-piece battle. The result broke French control over Germany, dissolved the Confederation of the Rhine, and drove Napoleon's shattered army back across the Rhine into France. Leipzig opened the road to the invasion of France and Napoleon's first abdication the following spring, making it arguably the decisive battle of the war.

Empires active in 16 to 19 October 1813

• Russian Empire
  1721 CE to 1917 CE
• British Empire
  1583 CE to 1997 CE
• Qing Dynasty
  1636 CE to 1912 CE
• Spanish Empire
  1492 CE to 1976 CE
• Portuguese Empire
  1415 CE to 1999 CE
• Mughal Empire
  1526 CE to 1857 CE

Related military & conflict events

• Napoleon's invasion of Russia
  June to December 1812
• Battle of Waterloo
  18 June 1815
• Haiti declares independence after a successful slave revolution
  1 January 1804
• First Opium War and the Treaty of Nanking
  1839 to 1842 (Treaty of Nanking, 29 August 1842)
• The Taiping Rebellion
  1850 to 1864
• American Civil War and the abolition of slavery
  1861 to 1865 (Emancipation Proclamation 1 January 1863; 13th Amendment ratified 6 December 1865)

Essential reading

• The Great Irish Famine
  1845 to 1852
• Emancipation of the serfs in Russia
  3 March 1861 (19 February O.S.)
• The Franco-Prussian War, German unification and the Paris Commune
  19 July 1870 to 10 May 1871; German Empire proclaimed 18 January 1871
• Qing conquest of the Dzungars and the creation of Xinjiang
  1755 to 1759

Further reading

Conquerors: How Portugal Forged the First Global Empire

The wider story

Conquerors: How Portugal Forged the First Global Empire

Roger Crowley

Fast-paced narrative of Portugal's seaborne empire.

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