Habsburg Research Articles

The archaeozoology of the Făgăraș fortress during the Habsburg period

The archaeozoological material discussed in this article came from one feature (Cpl. 2) located in the southern outer courtyard of the fortress investigated in the summer of 2020. The collected artefacts date mainly to the 18th and 19th centuries, therefore to the Austrian era, although some of them had been in use even earlier during the 17th century. The feature, most likely with the initial phase in the middle of the 17th century, has functioned as a latrine pit in which all sorts of remains were gradually thrown away, including faunal ones. Given that the faunal material analysed comes from a single archaeological feature, the conclusions are quite limited. Conclusions cannot be generalized, but they show a trend probably close to reality. We would like to make this clear because during the older or newer archaeological investigations, in various areas of the Făgăraș fortress, numerous animal bones were discovered, with or without a clear dating context, which could not be collected or analysed. The fauna studied in this article offers a glimpse on the diet of the human community that served the Făgăraș fortress, in general, during the Habsburg period. We observed that cattle hold an overwhelming ratio NR-wise, dominating the faunal spectrum. MNI-wise, although cattle hold second place after ovicaprids, they still have the highest importance in terms of the meat ratio, compared to other domestic animals. The game has an extremely low ratio, with medium-sized species (roe deer) and small species (hare) identified. The study of the slaughter ages and the distribution of the anatomical elements/ skeletal parts in the case of the domestic animals suggest the consumption of subadult and adult animals with less tender meat, some of the animals being at the age of reform (especially the old ones) suggesting that they were part of the daily food of the fortress staff (soldiers, civilians and administration). Although not very large in terms of quantity, the importance of the sample from the Făgăraș fortress is also given by the fact that such studies of archaeozoology dedicated to the Habsburg period are extremely rare in Romania. Future archaeozoological research will certainly help us to better understand the diet of the population in the Habsburg era.

The Emergence of Habsburgs in Early Works of Joseph von Hormayr

The paper deals with the issue of emergence of the Austrian historical myth in the early 19th century. The identity crisis in Austria, Holy Roman Empire and Habsburg possessions due to the French revolution and collapse of the “Old empire” brought a discussion on loyalty towards dynasty, throne, and the state. Relations of Habsburgs with their non-Germanic realms also underwent a transformation connected with the creation of the Austrian empire in 1804. Intellectuals in the early 19th century Vienna were faced with the challenge to revisit the remains of the old model of identity and relationships between the state and the society in a new context. The new model combining romanticism and conservatism pursued to find a model of “natural” relations between the sovereign, state and society. Joseph von Hormayr was the author of concepts for Austrian history, Habsburg dynasty, and its relations with the society in the early 19th century. He justified them with legitimism, dynastic patriotism, and general historical memory. “The Austrian Plutarch” made an impact on Austrian historical memory in the 19th century. The images of early Habsburgs were supposed to demonstrate the role of monarchy in the success of the state, social stability, and European balance. The essays showed the moral right of the dynasty to leadership in Germany and Central Europe. Hormayr disseminated the concepts of “Austrian freedom” in the Empire, “putting an end to the anarchy”, consistent centralization of Southern-eastern German areas, and its support from estates. The sovereigns appeared both in the image of mobilization figures for the duchy and neighboring countries, and possessors of the personal features turning Austria into the Empire later.

The Image of the Habsburg Dynasty in Czech Nationalist Thinking in the 1860s and at the Beginning of the 1870s (on the Example of the Sokol Movement)

This article analyses the image of the Habsburg dynasty in Czech nationalist thinking in the 1860s and at the beginning of the 1870s. This complex and changing image is explored through the case of the Sokol movement, which combined Czech nationalism with gymnastics. The research is based on the analysis of newspapers and other primary sources. The complexity of the analysed image derives from the existence of three interrelated currents of monarchist thought in the socalled Czech lands. The traditional current can be described as paternalistic, imperialist, and Catholic. The constitutional current was related to the emperor’s acceptance of the limitation of his power. The third current was Czech nationalist monarchism characterised by the link between the concept of Czech historical state right and the prospect of Franz Joseph I’s coronation as King of Bohemia. Among the main principles of Czech nationalist thinking was totalism, which in this case meant conceiving the nation as the supreme value. Among the consequences of putting Czech national interests over everything else were the merging of nationalist and constitutional currents of monarchist thought, the differential attitude towards Franz Joseph I’s predecessors, and the alternation of anifestations of loyalty and disloyalty. Among the latter were the decisions of the Prague Sokol society not to take part in the emperor’s visit to Prague in June 1868 and to purchase the copy of his rescript dated 12 September 1871, which contained the unfulfilled coronation promise. The totality of nationalism as a political religion and the existence of different interpretations of Austrianness led Czech nationalists to take it as simultaneously their anti-identity and subsidiary identity. Austrianness as the Czech subsidiary identity was related to the idea of multinational monarchy and the concept of Austro-Slavism, while the anti-identity was incited by the German and supranational interpretations.

Letters from Spain: A Seventeenth-Century French Noblewoman at the Spanish Royal Court by Marie Gigault de Bellefonds, Marquise de Villars

Reviewed by: Letters from Spain: A Seventeenth-Century French Noblewoman at the Spanish Royal Court by Marie Gigault de Bellefonds, Marquise de Villars Gabrielle Verdier Gigault de Bellefonds, Marie, Marquise de Villars. Letters from Spain: A Seventeenth-Century French Noblewoman at the Spanish Royal Court. Ed. and trans. Nathalie Hester. The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series, 80. Iter Press, 2021. Pp [i]-xi; 100. ISBN 978-1-64959-010-7. $41.95 (paper). ISBN 978-1-64959-011-4 (eBook). Bellefonds-Villars, as Nathalie Hester calls Marie Gigault de Bellefonds, Marquise de Villars to distinguish her from her husband, the Marquis Pierre de Villars, Ambassador to Savoy and Spain, was a member of the illustrious coterie of female letter writers in seventeenth-century France that included Madame de Sévigné. Unlike them and Madame de Coulanges (wife of Sévigné's first cousin) to whom she addresses thirty-seven letters from her time in Madrid (November 1679-May 1681), Bellefonds-Villars occupied a perilous position at a sensitive time in Franco-Spanish relations, one that had worldwide implications. She joined her husband at the royal court in Madrid several months after the ambassador had arrived to prepare the marriage of Marie-Louise d'Orléans, Louis XIV's niece, to the king of Spain, the disabled Carlos II. Would the French princess produce a successor to the Habsburg dynasty in Spain? Who would inherit the vast Spanish Empire, from Peru to the Philippines? As a woman, Bellefonds-Villars had special access to the young Queen's private spaces, which was denied the ambassador in the strictly gendered Spanish court. Bellefonds-Villars's writing is as delicate as her position at court, as Hester so deftly analyzes in her twenty-page introduction. Though ambassadrice (the title given to the wife of the ambassador), she should in no way be perceived as influencing the French princess in her new role as queen of Spain at a court and with a king who hated the French. Yet Louis XIV expected her to watch, guide, [End Page 194] and report on eighteen-year-old Marie-Louise who turned to her mature compatriot for company and comfort. Bellefonds-Villars's familiar letters to her friends in France thus become subtly diplomatic letters that inform while concealing by omission, indirection, and irony. The writer invites her readers to read between the lines, even to understand the opposite of what she writes. The unusual relation between Carlos and Marie-Louise—his probable impotence, her flourishing health, their paltry amusements, prescribed travels to three royal palaces, suffocating court etiquette and intrigues, worsening economic misery in Spain, and deadly boredom—all must be understood on several levels, including what is left unsaid. Hester's rich notes uncover these layers of meaning. Since letters to individual correspondents were read out loud in the salons and beyond, Bellefonds-Villars's information was bound to reach the Sun King. At stake were her own reputation and the Villars's future, as she suggests in apprehensive comments. Indeed, what she feared would come to pass. Complaints about the ambassadrice, attributed to Carlos II, reached Louis XIV; to maintain diplomatic relations at all costs, the Sun King recalled his ambassador, and Bellefonds-Villars was scapegoated. She left Madrid in May 1681; her husband followed in August of the same year. While anchoring Bellefonds-Villars's letters within seventeenth-century French women's social epistolary writing, Hester rightly highlights their unique nature, their diplomatic role. Bellefonds-Villars was the only épistolière who was also an ambassadrice. Not only does she observe—and influence—historical figures, the Villars endure the hardships of ambassadorial life with a miserable income in Spain and frequent hostile attacks on their person and household. Thanks to such revelations and their exquisite style, Bellefonds-Villars's surviving letters to Mme de Coulanges were published posthumously in 1759 by Denis-Marius Perrin, the editor of Mme de Sévigné's letters, and reprinted several times. In the nineteenth century, they were included in three collections, along with letters by Mmes de La Fayette, de Tencin, de Coulanges, and Ninon de l'Enclos. Alfred de Courtois's comprehensive scholarly...

Maria Theresa’s reign and Hungary

In 1762, Maria Theresa awarded the rank of academy to the School of Mining and Metallurgy (Bergschola), established in Selmecbánya in 1735, whose name was Academy of Mining and Metallurgy (Bergakademie) from this time on. This paper commemorates the monarch on the 260th anniversary of making the school an academy. I strive to give a brief but comprehensive overview of the 18th century history of Hungary, the interconnectedness of the fate of the Habsburg dynasty and Hungary as well as the forty years’ reign of this outstanding queen. Her judgement – just like that of the Habsburg Empire – has changed through time both in public opinion and in historiography but in this paper, my aim is not primarily to present special literature findings.

Iconography of Kinship. The Holy Family and Attems Family in the Holy Virgin’ s Church at Zagorje near Pilštanj

Memorializing his family was a key concept of Ignaz Maria Count Attems’ visual propaganda. The role of personal iconography has been recognised mainly in his secular fresco commissions. This paper focuses on the analysis of the ceiling painting and furnishings of the pilgrimage church of the Holy Virgin at Zagorje near Pilštanj in Styria (Slovenia) and decodes the interweaving of Virgin (Madonna with Grapes, Assumpta, Regina Coeli, the Immaculate Conception), Holy Family, Holy Kinship and other saints worship with representations of the Attems family. In 1708 and 1709, the church was frescoed by Matthias von Görz, and in the following years, it obtained the main Virgin’ s altar and the altars of St Joseph and St Dismas in the lateral chapels. The Baroque decoration followed a unified iconographic concept in which the family memoria systematically builds on and complements the theological programme. Attems presented himself in the imitatio of the Holy Family, following the example of the Habsburg family.

The Ladins and their history of legal resilience

The Ladins of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol are an ethnic minority with an ancient history, located in the Dolomites Mountains, a place associated with extreme beauty and rugged land. Under the Italian Constitution, Ladins have acquired several legal rights connected with their language and history.Ladins have a history dating to the Roman Empire. Located in a strategic place, with Alpine valleys and mountain paths that connect the Italian Peninsula with Central Europe, several Germanic tribes after the end of the Roman Empire invaded and established themselves in the zone, enforcing their customs and laws. Those so-called “barbaric laws” together with Carolingian and Ecclesiastical law gave birth to a particular system of law during the Middle Ages.Afterward, Ladins became part of the Holy Roman Empire, and later, part of the House of Habsburg. During the aftermath of World War I, Italy obtained the region from the Austrian-Hungarian Empire in the peace treaty of Saint Germain-en-Laye of 1919.The Italian experience with the Ladins started soon after World War I with several publications taking the task of understanding the origins of their language and its people. Ever since, Italian interest in the Ladins has not ceased. In 1998 the Italian Constitutional Court recognized the Ladin people their right to be represented in regional institutions, answering to the historical and social reality of Alto Adige/Südtirol.Consequently, the legal resilience of the Ladins gives testimony of a long history of peaceful victories for their rights, associated with the Ladin language, in the context of judicial procedures, political participation, and legislation.In comparison, Ladins living in other regions of Italy like Veneto and Friuli Venezia Giulia have not reached the same level of autonomy and privileges as those in Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol.

Libros de viajes. A study of Castilian travel accounts from the 15th century on the eve of the great geographical discoveries

At the beginning of the 15th century, Castile, like other countries located on the Iberian Peninsula, was struggling with a range of internal problems. Before it reached - together with Aragon - greatness as the Monarchy of the Catholic Kings, it had already taken an active interest in far-away lands, and its representatives made distant journeys, which they described in detail in their travel accounts. Over the course of the 16th and 17th centuries, Spain became a great power both externally and internally, and this period is often called the Golden Ages (siglos de oro) of Spanish literature. This was undoubtedly the period in which literature written on the Iberian Peninsula itself reached its highest level of excellence. Moreover, some literary genres, especially historiography and accounts of travels, conquests, and discoveries, became a tool of Charles V’s and Philip II’s official propaganda: they glorified their empire and passed on the message of Spain’s special role in the world and the greatness of its discoveries and conquests. Against this background, the article discusses the role and history of the publication of two fifteenth-century Castilian travel accounts, or libros de viajes, which report the expeditions of Ruy González de Clavijo and Pero Tafur. Their narratives were key elements of the image Spanish rulers crafted for themselves during both the Habsburg dynasty of the 16th and 17th centuries and the Bourbon dynasty of the 19th century.

The Beginnings of the Cooperation of Free Royal Towns in the Kingdom of Hungary in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries

The study presents the possibilities and framework for cooperation between towns in Hungary through the operation of the Town League of Upper Hungary. The cooperation of towns in the Kingdom of Hungary happened primarily through regional relations. At first, the basis for cooperation was provided by common economic interests, but this area broadened considerably in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. After the battle of Mohács (1526), the towns of Hungary became full members of the Hungarian Estates. The Kingdom of Hungary, which was part of the Habsburg Monarchy, gained considerable autonomy in internal politics. This was based on a compromise with the Habsburg rulers to ensure protection against the Ottoman Empire. The free royal towns were the least influential members of this country that had strong Estates. Nevertheless, cooperation between the towns became nationwide. The diets provided the forum for all free royal towns in the country to represent their common interests in a coordinated way. There are traces of this nationwide cooperation as early as the mid-sixteenth century, but it was from the early seventeenth century that it was the strongest. The reason was that in those decades state taxes were becoming heavier and more burdensome for towns. This nationwide cooperation was not only manifested in the field of taxation, but from the first quarter of the seventeenth century onwards, it increasingly extended to religious matters. In the background, there was the increasing recatholization of the Habsburg Monarchy. In this special matter, close links were forged also with the otherwise strongly anti-urban lower nobility.

Zrínyi VII. Miklós részvétele a harmincéves háborúban (1642‒1644)

The estates of the Hungarian-Croatian Kingdom, as it is well known, took an active role in the struggles of the Thirty years’ War (1618‒1648) on the Habsburg dynasty’s side. At the request of the monarch, many aristocrats and wealthy noblemen, who had been trained in the so-called small wars (German Kleinkriege) practised along the Ottoman border, raised especially light cavalry units and conducted them to the territory of the Holy Roman Empire. Nicholas VII. Zrínyi/Zrinski (1620‒1664) the Croatian-Slavonian ban-to-be (1647–1664) himself recruited cavalry companies in three successive years (1642–1644), at the head of which he fought in Bohemia and Moravia against the Swedes as well as in upper Hungary against the troops of George I. Rákóczi, the Prince of Transylvania (1630–1648). Moreover, he was appointed as the supreme commander of the Croatian-type cavalry two times. The present gap-fi lling paper primarily aims to clear the chronology of Zrínyi’s field operations in these years. It also reveals his probable motives, the characteristics of the negotiations with the imperial high command as well as the gathering of the troops. The case study will enable us to draw conclusions about the military entrepreneurship of this kind, giving an impetus to the research of this neglected field of early modern military history.

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

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...

Butterwick , Richard The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, 1733–1795: Light and Flame (review)

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 horrors of the twentieth century have tended to cast a nostalgic glow over memories of the Habsburg centuries, since what came after was so much worse. It may be damning with faint praise that Rady’s final evaluation of the Habsburgs, viewed in the shadow of the depressing developments of recent decades in Central Europe, is to agree with a Hungarian colleague, that ‘a Habsburg would have done no worse’ (p. 329). History Department Hugh L. Agnew George Washington University Butterwick, Richard. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, 1733–1795: Light and Flame. Yale University Press, New Haven, CT and London, 2020. xxiii + 482 pp. Maps. Glossary. Gazetteer. Notes. Further reading. Index.£30.00. Richard Butterwick’s The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: 1733–1795 offers an important new narrative synthesis of eighteenth-century Polish history, which notably integrates into the story Butterwick’s own recent research on religion and politics, published in 2012 as The Polish Revolution and the Catholic Church, 1788–1792. The current volume could have been styled as ‘The End of the Commonwealth’ or ‘The Age of Stanisław August’, as the SEER, 99, 4, OCTOBER 2021 766 reign of Poland’s last king occupies some three-quarters of the book, and roughly half the book is dedicated to the short but politically crucial period from the opening of the Four-Year Sejm in 1788 to the Kościuszko insurrection in 1794 and the final partition of Poland in 1795. Politics and religion lie at the centre of Butterwick’s discussion, and the tensions between monarchism and republicanism are traced through the period with particular attention to the problem of their reconciliation in the Constitution of 3 May 1791. The analysis of the Four-Year Sejm stresses ‘the turn from hard-line noble republicanism towards limited parliamentary monarchy’ (p. 208). While the intervention and domination of foreign powers is obviously crucial for the period of the partitions, Butterwick studies the complex political functioning of the Stanislavian state as important in its own right, in spite of compromised sovereignty and imminent collapse. He probes the efforts of Stanisław August to reform the Polish state, while also exploring other dimensions of the reign: from the avoidance of national costume at the coronation, to the manifestations of the king’s artistic and architectural vision, to the humiliating circumstances of his abdication in the context of the final partition. Butterwick follows not only the parliamentary convocation of the Sejm at regular intervals during this period, but also the more intricate concerns of the ‘sejmiki’, the local dietines — important institutions of Polish-Lithuanian republicanism — that preceded and chose representatives for the Sejm. He offers interesting insight into the opposition to Stanisław August, following figures such as the Grand Hetman Franciszek Branicki whose strategic advocacy of republicanism against the crown also intersected with his Russian connection as...

Documents of the Austrian State Archives about the History of Habsburg Diplomatic Relations with Russia: Research Potential

This article considers the formation of archival funds about Austro-Russian relations in the late seventeenth century in one of the four departments of the Austrian State Archives (the Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv of the Habsburgs). The analysis demonstrates that the archival funds formed alongside the development of the archive’s structure. The sources referred to include documents dedicated to the foreign policy contacts of the Habsburg dynasty with Russia in the late seventeenth century. The authors focus on the period when, because of the Ottoman threat, interactions between Vienna and Moscow intensified, which manifested itself in the active exchange of embassies and correspondence. The authors reveal the main type of structure of the archival funds mentioned. The collection contains several types of historical sources, among which the authors single out official letters (der Brief), instructions (die Instruktion) for Viennese representatives sent to Moscow, authentications (die Beglaubigung), decrees, minutes of audiences, envoy accounts (der Gesandtenbericht), and reports (der Bericht) of the Viennese envoys in Moscow. The characterisation of archival documents by fund and type demonstrates the deep research potential of the sources. The authors reveal that despite the long development and numerous military conflicts that influenced the preservation of the funds, the Haus-, Hof-, und Staatsarchiv are an institution of supranational importance, accumulating the historical heritage of Austria and Russia. The archive department contains a large array of documents shedding light on various aspects of diplomatic relations between Vienna and Moscow in the second half of the seventeenth century, making possible a comprehensive study of Habsburg contacts with Russia. This makes it necessary to consider introducing the source base into scholarly circulation.

Výběr středoevropských rytířů do Řádu zlatého rouna za regentství španělské královny Marie Anny Habsburské (1665-1675)

The death of Spanish King Philip IV in 1665 and the young age of his only legitimate son, Charles II, led to the governorship of Mariana of Austria during the years 1665-1677. This matter significantly influenced the relationships between Vienna and Madrid because Austrian siblings represented the Habsburg family's policy. The relationship between Emperor Leopold I and his older sister Mariana of Austria determined for this period not only foreign policy of their monarchies but the Spanish Habsburgs also lost their upper hand against the younger line of the Habsburg family. For Leopold I, his sister represented the most crucial agent in Madrid besides his ambassador. Mariana of Austria became an important source of benefits for the Central European nobility, which traditionally hoped for financial and other support from the Spanish King. Mariana of Austria even influenced one of the most male dominated spaces in the early modern world, which represented the Order of the Golden Fleece because, as a woman, she could choose the new owners of the Insignia of the Golden Fleece.

Carlos II of Spain, ‘The Bewitched’: cursed by aspartylglucosaminuria?

Carlos II of Spain (1661–1700), last of the Spanish Habsburgs, was known as The ‘Bewitched’ due to his multiple medical issues and feeble nature. He suffered from a range of...

Sacred Spaces in Transition: A Glimpse into the Situation of the Evangelical (Lutheran) Church A.C. in Romania

Abstract For sacred spaces, motion/movement means not only the takeover by other denominations, but also denominational changes, such as the Reformation. The article highlights, with varying intensity, the major movements of sacred spaces in the more than 800-year history of the present-day Evangelical Church A.C. in Romania: the Reformation, the Habsburg rule, the consequences of World War II in Northern Transylvania, and the present – with selective recourse to the tools of Memory Studies (Erinnerungsforschung), in order to trace the paradigm shift caused by the Reformation in relation to sacred space, or to evaluate the mass handover/ transfer of church buildings in Northern Transylvania in the horizon of this analysis, and concluding with a brief art-historical and even homiletic consideration.

Marie-Louise von Motesiczky: Re-negotiating the self-portrait as a woman émigré artist in the Nazi era

AbstractBorn in Vienna in 1906 to a wealthy, assimilated Jewish family, the painter Marie-Louise von Motesiczky enjoyed a lively social life among the prominent figures of intellectual and cultural Vienna in the closing years of the Habsburg dynasty. She studied at art schools in Vienna, Paris, and the Netherlands, including with German painter Max Beckmann in Frankfurt. The Nazi rise to power cut short Marie-Louise Motesiczky’s career in Central Europe. She fled Vienna for permanent refuge in England. Like her mentor, Beckmann and her contemporary and fellow émigré artist, Oskar Kokoschka, Motesiczky considered the artistic practice of the self-portrait an occasion for self-questioning, self-affirmation, and self-discovery. Unlike her mentors, from early in her career, Motesiczky’s self-portraits had to negotiate the representation of a female subject. This article will investigate the ways in which Motesiczky’s emigration compelled her to reexamine the gendered parameters of the self-portrait and how that reassessment manifests itself specifically in regard to her engagement with the spectatorial gaze. Her position as an émigré artist will not be analyzed as a burden to be overcome but, rather, as the impetus for reexamining techniques and strategies of female self-portraiture.

0266 The Habsburgs and Public Monuments in 19th-Century Croatia

This paper focuses on the analysis of the ways in which the cult of the Habsburg dynasty was promoted through public monuments in Croatia in the so-called Long 19th Century, from the end of the 18th to the early 20th century. Public sculpture in Croatia at this time was under a strong dominance of the national discourse – it mostly commemorated heroes of the Croatian cultural and sometimes also political history. Compared to the monuments to national heroes, the public monuments dedicated to members of the Habsburg family were smaller in number, and most often more modest in design and size. They can be divided into two basic groups – monuments commemorating events (Ereignisdenkmaler) from Croatian history connected with the Habsburgs, and monuments dedicated directly to individual members of the Habsburg family. The latter type of monuments is defined in this article in terms of what they commemorate and is divided into three groups: 1) monuments commemorating the role of the Habsburg emperors in the implementation of infrastructure projects, 2) monuments commemorating important anniversaries in the lives of individual members of the ruling house, and 3) monuments commemorating visits of Habsburgs to Croatia.

National Rivalry among Hospitallers?

The medieval Hospitaller priory of Bohemia was riven by ethnic divisions and mutually unintelligible languages. The prior’s lieutenant for Austria, Styria, Carinthia and Carniola, who often resided at the important commandery of Mailberg, could have been a nucleus for Austrian independence from Bohemia. The paper edits and discusses a document from 1392 where the prioral chapter deals with a quarrel between Hospitallers in Austria and Styria; their fellow-Hospitallers from the lands of the Bohemian crown (Bohemia proper, Moravia, Silesia) carefully avoided to be offend Duke Albert III of Austria. In the following decades tensions between two rival Habsburg lines in Austria and Styria weakened the position of the Hospitaller lieutenants for the Habsburg lands, especially during the Hussite wars. After the reunification of the Habsburg lands in the early 1460s the commandery of Mailberg was given by Emperor Frederick III and his son Maximilian to their courtiers and creditors, some of whom were not even Hospitallers. With papal support Frederick III tried to transfer Mailberg to his newly-founded military-religious order of St. George at Millstatt in Carinthia. But when the Habsburg rulers became kings of Bohemia and Hungary in 1526, they ceased to be interested in splitting up the Hospitaller priory of Bohemia. In the early modern period this proved to be more important for the future of the priory than “proto-national” identities.

Embers of Empire: Continuity and Rupture in the Habsburg Successor States after 1918

Embers of Empire: Continuity and Rupture in the Habsburg Successor States after 1918