Rady , Martyn The Habsburgs: The Rise and Fall of a World Power (review)

Abstract

SEER, 99, 4, OCTOBER 2021 764 Rady, Martyn. The Habsburgs: The Rise and Fall of a World Power. Allen Lane, an imprint of Penguin Books, London, 2020. xvii + 397 pp. Maps. Tables. Illustrations. Notes. Further reading. Index. £30.00. Facing the daunting challenge of chronicling the fortunes of a dynasty whose rule once spanned the globe, Martyn Rady has responded with a balanced, incisive and eminently readable account of the Habsburg family and its significance. Beginning with the dynasty’s obscure origins in the extreme southwestern corner of the German lands, he traces its ups and downs through the centuries. He follows the Habsburgs as they moved the centre of their power into Central Europe, raised their prestige by gaining the title of Holy Roman Emperor, and expanded their reach globally with the addition of Spain and its possessions in the New World and the Pacific. With the crowns of Hungary and Bohemia added to their Austrian titles, the Habsburgs faced the challenge of the Protestant Reformation and the pressure of the Ottoman Turks, but the dynasty’s good fortune in its marriages ran out for the Spanish branch in 1700, and the world-wide footprint of the Habsburgs shrank back to European dimensions. Narrowly escaping the fate of their Spanish cousins, the Central European Habsburgs survived the wars of the eighteenth century, the French Revolution and Napoleon, eventually transforming their realm into the composite Austrian (after 1867, Austro-Hungarian) Empire. In that form, it weathered the revolutions of 1848 and the rise of nationalism until, along with the other empires of Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe, it succumbed to the strains of the Great War of 1914–18. Rady, Emeritus (formerly Masaryk) Professor of Central European History at University College London, accomplishes this feat in a narrative of just over three hundred pages, accompanied by detailed family trees and wellselected illustrations. Each of the twenty-nine chapters is focused largely on one member of the dynasty (some, particularly in the more recent periods, feature in more than one chapter), but this is not merely a modern version of a ‘great man (or woman)’ approach to history. Rady weaves the personal foibles and accomplishments of the subjects into a wider context, without ever losing the focus on the dynasty and the evolving understanding its representatives had of their place in history and mission to rule. To accomplish this, he draws on a wide range of international scholarship in multiple languages. While the narrative includes high politics and warfare, Rady also brings in art, literature, the sciences and music, embedding his Habsburg subjects in a richly pictured networkofbroadersocialandintellectualdevelopments.Withaneruditionthat sits lightly on the narrative, he draws on unexpected examples and connections, from Emperor Maximillian’s colour-coded allegories, the Hermetic court of Rudolph II, the automata that prefigured the ideal of bureaucracy to Maria REVIEWS 765 Theresa, the vampire craze of the early eighteenth century, to Franz Joseph’s electric cigar lighter. Rady enlivens the text with telling anecdotes and effective quotations that humanize his subjects and help create a work that holds the reader’s attention. That reader would do well to have some familiarity with general European history, not only because the Habsburg dynasty is so intimately involved in so much of it, but also because Rady has chosen to keep his focus on the dynasty and its representatives. As a result, the major challenges and influences the Habsburgs faced — whether the Protestant Reformation, the Thirty Years War, the Enlightenment, the rise of modern nationalism, or something else — receive attention primarily insofar as the Habsburgs had to cope with them. That said, Rady creates a fascinating series of portraits reminiscent of the Heraldic Wall of St George’s Church in Wiener Neustadt mentioned in the text, or the panoply of portraits of illustrious ancestors on the walls of a castle gallery. In their cumulative impact, these portraits provide an insightful panorama of European and even global history as refracted through the prism of this famous dynasty. The family’s legacy may still be noticed throughout much of Europe, Central and South America, the Philippines and even Taiwan, but it is perhaps most strongly present in Central Europe. There the...