Sometimes timelines get messy…but that’s when they’re most interesting!
Whenever you see a muddle of overlapping events with a common theme, you know you’ve discovered the “zeitgeist” of an era. Zeitgeist comes from a German word that means “the spirit of the times.”
Take, for example, the 61 year period between 1775 and 1836–the Age of Revolution.
If you were born before 1775, you could have witnessed no less that 8 countries changing hands within your lifetime!
Look at the chart above and find the revolutions that are most familiar to most of us–the American Revolution and the Texas Revolution. They’re like bookends, aren’t they?
It would be a mistake, though, to assume that the other revolutions had nothing to do with us just because they happened somewhere else.
The French Revolution put Napoleon in power. To finance his dreams of empire, Napoleon told Louisiana to the United States, kicking off the Westward Expansion and causing American pioneers to look longingly at Texas.
And the Irish Rebellion? The troubles in Ireland went from bad to worse, causing a number of Irishmen to become desperate enough to become Empressarios–land speculators–in Texas.
Finally, find the Mexican Revolution, which lasted eleven long years. During the time that Mexico was distracted, three different expeditions of upstarts with revolutionary ambitions of their own tried to invade Texas and claim it by force.
You can see why we say that the concept of revolution and independence was the “spirit of the times” or “zeitgeist” of this era.
