AHC/WI: German Peasants' War Succeeds

I know zilch about medieval Europe, but this question momentarily interests me. How could it have succeeded, or at least not totally failed, and what would've happened in such a case?
 
Success would be rather hard to define given the amorphous nature of the rising. The most organised groups were, on the one hand, millenarians (whoi by definition won't win because the world keeps going) and the Swabian/Francoanian armies basing their demands on the 'Twelve Articles' and the Maximilianic reforms. The latter stand a ghost of a chance of partial success, I'd say, but only if there is an imperial centre willing to use them.

These are the demands: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Articles

I think with a moderately cooperative sovereign, some of them are possible.

- Election of pastors: yes, though within limits. Reformation is as yet in ferment, there is nothing inevitable about the Lutheran Staatskirche

- Reform of the tithe: yes, but ultimately it won't matter given the tax system would be radically altered anyway.

- Personal freedom: yes, other states did it, some territories within the empire had it and were expanding it at that exact time. Also, territorial government has nothing to gain from serfdom, and the landholding minor nobility is being mediatised.

- Hunting and fishing: probably not, or only within tightly set limits.

- Return of commons pasture and woodland: unlikely, given the value it represented for territorial governments

- Reduction of corvee: possible, though likely a temporary thing.

- Fair leases: temporarily possible, but in the long run unlikely, given population pressures

- regulated fines and penalties: yes, that is in the interest of the government anyway

- Abolition of inheritance fee: possible, though likely to be replaced rather than abolished for good in the long run.

THe problem is that all of this would depend on the peasants having an ally within the system of the Empire. The most natural ally was the emperor (most rebels had a romantic view of the office and deplored the weakness of the imperial centre). Charles V, of course, has zewro incentive to either strengthen the office or get personally involved. I doubt Francis I, assuming he was elected, would either, but if politics of the day made it seem worthwhile (say a move to weaken Habsburg?), he might.
The alternative would be major territorial lords. They had their own issues with the free nobility and cities, and could use the peasantry as allies. Note that conditions for the peasants were often better in larger, more cohesive states than in the small, immediate holdings that made up much of Franconia and Swabia.
But who in 16th-century Germany has that kind of foresight?
 

Redhand

Banned
They were completely outclassed militarily once the nobles martialed their forces and Luther renounced their violence. This gave them few allies and little chance for long term success.
 
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