Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh in the context of "Catholic Emancipation"

The Treaty of Chaumont was a series of separately-signed but identically-worded agreements in 1814 between the Austrian Empire, the Kingdom of Prussia, the Russian Empire and the United Kingdom. They were dated 1 March 1814, although the actual signings took place on 9 or 19 March. The treaty was intended to draw the powers of the Sixth Coalition into a closer alliance in case France rejected the peace terms they had recently offered. Each power agreed to put 150,000 soldiers in the field against France and to guarantee for twenty years the European peace (once obtained) against French aggression.

Following discussions in late February 1814, representatives of Austria, Prussia, Russia, and the United Kingdom reconvened a meeting at Chaumont, Haute-Marne, on 1 March 1814. The resulting Treaty of Chaumont was signed on 9 or 19 March 1814 although it was dated 1 March by Emperor Alexander I of Russia, Austrian Emperor Francis II (with Prince Metternich), King Frederick William III of Prussia, and British Foreign Secretary Lord Castlereagh. The treaty called for Napoleon to give up all conquests and thus to revert France to its pre-revolutionary borders in exchange for a ceasefire. If Napoleon rejected the treaty, the Allies pledged to continue the war. If Napoleon accepted, he would be allowed to continue to rule as the Emperor of the French and to keep a dynasty. The following day, Napoleon rejected the treaty, which ended his last chance of a negotiated settlement.

The Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 (also known as the Convention of London; Dutch: Verdrag van Londen) was signed by the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the Sovereign Principality of the United Netherlands in London on 13 August 1814.

The treaty restored most of the territories in the Moluccas and Java that Britain had seized in the Napoleonic Wars, but confirmed British possession of the Cape Colony on the southern tip of Africa, as well as portions of Dutch Guiana in South America. It was signed by Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh, on behalf of the British and diplomat Hendrik Fagel, on behalf of the Dutch.

George Canning (/ˈkænɪŋ/; 11 April 1770 – 8 August 1827) was a British Tory statesman. He held various senior cabinet positions under numerous prime ministers, including two important terms as foreign secretary, finally becoming Prime Minister of the United Kingdom for the last 119 days of his life, from April to August 1827.

The son of an actress and a failed businessman and lawyer, Canning was supported financially by his uncle, Stratford Canning, which allowed him to attend Eton College and Christ Church, Oxford. Canning entered politics in 1793 and rose rapidly. He was Paymaster of the Forces (1800–1801) and Treasurer of the Navy (1804–1806) under William Pitt the Younger. Canning was foreign secretary (1807–1809) under the Duke of Portland. Canning was the dominant figure in the cabinet and directed the Battle of Copenhagen, the seizure of the Danish fleet in 1807 to assure Britain's naval supremacy over Napoleon. In 1809, he was wounded in a duel with his rival Lord Castlereagh and was shortly thereafter passed over as a successor to the Duke of Portland in favour of Spencer Perceval. He rejected overtures to serve as foreign secretary again because of Castlereagh's presence in Perceval's Cabinet and he remained out of high office until after Perceval was assassinated in 1812.

Ernest Bevin (9 March 1881 – 14 April 1951) was a British statesman, trade union leader and Labour Party politician. He co-founded and served as General Secretary of the powerful Transport and General Workers' Union from 1922 to 1940 and served as Minister of Labour and National Service in the wartime coalition government. He succeeded in maximising the British labour supply for both the armed services and domestic industrial production with a minimum of strikes and disruption.

His most important role came as Foreign Secretary in the post-war Labour government, 1945–1951. He secured Marshall Aid, strongly opposed communism and was the main drive behind the creation of NATO. Bevin was also instrumental to the founding of the Information Research Department (IRD), a secret propaganda wing of the British Foreign Office, which specialised in disinformation, anti-communism and pro-colonial propaganda. Bevin played an important role in the end of the Mandate of Palestine and was strongly opposed to the establishment of the State of Israel. His biographer Alan Bullock said that Bevin "stands as the last of the line of foreign secretaries in the tradition created by Castlereagh, Canning and Palmerston in the first half of the 19th century".

The term "great power" has only been used in historiography and political science since the Congress of Vienna in 1815. Lord Castlereagh, the British Foreign Secretary, first used the term in its diplomatic context in 1814 in reference to the Treaty of Chaumont. Use of the term in the historiography of the Middle Ages is therefore idiosyncratic to each author. In historiography of the pre-modern period, it is more typical to talk of empires.

Gerry Simpson distinguishes "Great Powers", an elite group of states that manages the international legal order, from "great powers", empires or states whose military and political might define an era.