The Old Swiss Confederacy a "de facto" independent state throughout the early modern period, although still nominally part of the Holy Roman Empire until 1648 when the Treaty of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years' War. The Swiss Reformation divided the confederates into Reformed and Catholic parties, resulting in internal conflict from the 16th to the 18th centuries; as a result, the federal diet () was often paralysed by hostility between the factions. The Swiss Confederacy fell to invasion by the French Revolutionary Army in 1798, after which it became the short-lived Helvetic Republic. The adjective "old" was introduced after the Napoleonic era with ,
Treaty of the Pyrenees princess entered France. In addition, the English received Dunkirk, although they elected to sell it to France in 1662. The Treaty of the Pyrenees was the last major diplomatic achievement by Cardinal Mazarin. Combined with the Peace of Westphalia, it allowed Louis XIV remarkable stability and diplomatic advantage by means of a weakened Louis II de Bourbon, Prince de Condé and a weakened Spanish Crown, along with the agreed dowry, which was an important element in the French king's strategy: All in all, by 1660, when the Swedish occupation of Poland was over, most of the European continent was at