Lilienthal, Lower Saxony conversion of the Cistercian nuns, it became a Lutheran Women's Convent, and until the end of the Thirty Years' War in 1648 it remained in deplorable conditions. In 1650, the city went through secularization. The land once belonging to the convent, which had become fragmented, developed into the small town of Lilienthal. In 1648, according to the terms of the peace treaty that ended the Thirty Years' War (The Peace of Westphalia), the Prince-Archbishopric was transformed into the Duchy of Bremen, ruled together with the Principality of Verden, which were first ruled in personal union by the Swedish Crown. Queen
Piracy in the Caribbean of the Americas all beckoned to those eager to make their fortunes and a large assortment of Frenchmen and Englishmen began new colonial ventures during the early 17th century, both in North America, which lay basically empty of European settlement north of Mexico, and in the Caribbean, where Spain remained the dominant power until late in the century. As for the Dutch Netherlands, after decades of rebellion against Spain fueled by both Dutch nationalism and their staunch Protestantism, independence had been gained in all but name (and that too would eventually come with the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648). The