Revolutions of 1848

The revolutions of 1848, also called the springtime of the peoples, were a wave of uprisings across Europe between January 1848 and October 1849, the most widespread in European history. Beginning in Sicily in January and spreading after the February Revolution in Paris overthrew the July Monarchy, they reached Vienna, Berlin, Milan, Buda and Pest and more than fifty countries. Coalitions of workers and middle-class reformers sought constitutions, nation states, a free press and economic rights, after a food crisis from 1845 to 1847. Most were soon suppressed, with tens of thousands killed, but serfdom was abolished in Austria and Hungary and absolute monarchy ended in Denmark.