Congress of Vienna

The Congress of Vienna of 1814 to 1815 was a series of international diplomatic meetings held to agree a new political and constitutional order for Europe after the downfall of the French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte. Representatives of all the European powers other than the Ottoman Empire attended, and the congress was chaired by the Austrian statesman Klemens von Metternich, meeting in Vienna from September 1814 to June 1815. Its objective was a long-term peace settlement reached through negotiation rather than simply the restoration of old boundaries: the great powers sought to resize themselves so as to balance one another while acting as guardians for smaller states, and conservative leaders such as Metternich also sought to restrain the revolutionary and liberal movements that had upended the old European order. France, weakened by Napoleon's recent defeat, had to give up all of his conquests, while Prussia, Austria and Russia made major territorial gains; the congress also ratified the creation of the new Kingdom of the Netherlands as a buffer between the German Confederation and France. Negotiations continued through Napoleon's brief return to power during the Hundred Days, and the congress's agreement was signed nine days before his final defeat at Waterloo on 18 June 1815.