List of maps. 1. Background. 2. The accession of crisis and its consequences. 3. Recovery 1612-20. 4. Poland and the protestant cause 1620-28. 5. The great decision 1628-30. 6. Reforms: domestic. 7. Reforms: naval and military. 8. The sinews of war. 9. The path to the summit. 10. The plentitude of power. 11. Finale. 12. Prospect and retrospect. Bibliographical essay. List of dates. Maps. Index.

Gustavus Adolphus (1594--1632) dominated his age: he made Sweden the leading power of Northern Europe, was the principal upholder of the Protestant cause in the Thirty Years War, and was a great administrator as well as a brilliant soldier. His toleration and reforms helped define the development of the modern state. This concise study of his career, by the doyen of modern historians of the North, appeared in 1973. Long unavailable but now revised, expanded, updated and reset, it makes a welcome return in Profiles in Power.