Is this history’s most misunderstood king?

Portrait of Augustus with the star of the Polish Order of the White Eagle (detail, c.1716), by Louis de Silvestre
Portrait of Augustus the Strong with the star of the Polish Order of the White Eagle (detail, c.1716), by Louis de Silvestre

For as long as I can remember, there have been puritanically-minded historians who have said that we should stop writing about kings and queens. In the old days they told us to write about social movements and economic factors instead; now it’s gender, race and the environment. All are worth studying, but the idea that we should ignore actual rulers in past centuries is preposterous.

Kings and queens matter, because until quite recently they were the ones who really made things happen. We can overestimate their power, as they themselves often did. But in most European states from the Middle Ages to the early 19th century, the royal will was the largest single factor affecting government, diplomacy and the waging of wars. Indeed, up to the middle of the 18th it was still normal for kings to lead their troops into battle.

Augustus the Strong, ruler of Saxony and King of Poland (1670-1733), seemed well equipped for such a leadership role. His nickname referred to his ability to break horseshoes with his bare hands; he was an excellent marksman, and by the age of 23 had fought in five military campaigns. When he succeeded his elder brother as ruler of Saxony in the following year, he must have seemed perfect for the job: an exuberant, larger-than-life character (his appetites for drink and women were certainly larger than most), but also an art lover, and someone with a real interest in promoting industry and commerce. What could possibly go wrong?

The answer, as Tim Blanning’s brilliant new biography explains, was: almost everything. Augustus’s first error was also his greatest, and set up the conditions for all that went wrong thereafter. When the King of Poland, John Sobieski (famous for riding to the rescue when Vienna was besieged by the Ottomans in 1683) died suddenly in 1696, Augustus mounted a political campaign to become his successor; after issuing a torrent of expensive bribes, and converting – with blatant opportunism – to Roman Catholicism, he was finally elected to the Polish throne. This gave him a proper royal title, and nominal power over the biggest country in Europe apart from Russia. But the phrase “poisoned chalice” would not begin to describe the prize he had won.

A statue of Augustus the Strong in Dresden
A statue of Augustus the Strong in Dresden - Universal Images Group Editorial

Poland was the most ungovernable state in Europe. Real power belonged not to the King but to the nobility and quasi-gentry, who formed a kind of mass oligarchy. Yet even they had little power to make things happen; their great strength lay in their ability to stop things from happening, by the use of a “free veto”, which was liberally applied to any reforming or centralising measures. As a result their army was feeble for a country of such a size, and the entire state budget came to less than 3 per cent of that of Louis XIV’s France.

This might not have mattered if the rulers of neighbouring states had been placid and benign. But Augustus’s Polish reign coincided with the rise to greatness of two unusually strong-minded and aggressive figures: Peter the Great of Russia, and Charles XII of Sweden. Fatefully, Augustus agreed to join the former in an attempted carve-up of the latter’s Baltic territories. The Swedish army turned out to be a killing machine in a class of its own, and Charles XII pursued Augustus like an avenging fury, eventually driving him out of Poland and placing his own puppet ruler on the throne.

In some parts of the book, inevitably, more limelight falls on those two dynamic monarchs than on our accident-prone hero. Charles comes across as a cold-blooded maniac, who spent his entire reign fighting wars because that was what he enjoyed. A brilliant tactician and a lousy strategist, he eventually led an entire army to its destruction in Ukraine, and had to spend the next five years as an exile in Ottoman territory. Peter, meanwhile, was methodically taking over the eastern Baltic region; a pledge to give one large chunk of it to his erstwhile ally Augustus (now back in Warsaw) was, as Blanning nicely puts it, “laid to rest in the capacious graveyard of his broken promises”.

Augustus the Strong is published by Allen Lane
Augustus the Strong is published by Allen Lane - Penguin Random House

Polish historians have not given Augustus a good press. His misjudgments in war and diplomacy did indeed lead to death and destruction on a large scale. Modern sensibilities may also be offended by his constant philandering, though Blanning reduces the number of bastard children from the rumoured 354 to a mere 8. Even more offensive, possibly, is his devotion to absurdly cruel sports, which included tossing foxes, badgers and beavers in blankets until they died – he was, we are told, “a keen tosser”.

Yet, as Blanning also points out, Saxony under Augustus enjoyed a cultural golden age, thanks to his generous patronage, fine artistic sensibility and irrepressible energy. Musicians and painters flourished; jewellers and goldsmiths could hardly keep up with him; Meissen began to produce its exquisite porcelain and his capital, Dresden, was gradually turned into one of the most beautiful cities in Europe.

Much of this was for Augustus’s personal pleasure; but, far from retreating into a closed world of elite court culture, he welcomed in the crowds, and held huge festivities for their benefit. His desire to improve the whole country was genuine, and extended as far as inviting Jewish merchants and insisting – against some opposition – that they be allowed to hold their own religious services.

Blanning’s narrative is based on a command of all the relevant literature in German, Polish, Swedish and Russian – an impressive showing in our increasingly and depressingly monoglot academic culture. Scholarly quarrels are largely avoided, and the writing remains fresh and spirited throughout. I don’t quite agree with the Penguin blurb, which calls it a “riotous” biography: that seems to downplay the serious arguments that run through this carefully structured book. But “rollicking” might do. There were quite a few pages here where I counted myself well and truly rollicked.


Augustus the Strong is published by Allen Lane at £30. To order your copy for £25, call 0808 196 6794 or visit Telegraph Books