1653 Imperial election electoral rights in a treaty of 1619, confirmed at the Diet of Regensburg on February 25, 1623. The revolt ignited a broader religious war across Germany, the Thirty Years' War, which would involve not only the states of the empire but also Sweden, the Dutch Republic, France, Denmark–Norway, England, Scotland, Spain and Hungary and which would kill some eight million people before its end. The Peace of Westphalia which ended the war in 1648 revived the principle of "cuius regio, eius religio" established in 1555 by the Peace of Augsburg and established the modern concept of Westphalian sovereignty. It additionally
Seventeen Provinces during the Eighty Years' War (see Generality Lands), which ended with the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648. Artois and parts of Flanders and Hainaut (French Flanders and French Hainaut) were ceded to France in the course of the 17th and 18th centuries. By the mid-16th century, the Margraviate of Antwerp (Duchy of Brabant) had become the economic, political, and cultural center of the Netherlands after its capital had shifted from the nearby Lordship of Mechelen to the city of Brussels. Bruges (County of Flanders) had already lost its prominent position as economic powerhouse of northern Europe. And Holland was gradually