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Published by: Institute of History, Research Centre for the Humanities, Hungarian Academy of Sciences

2022_2_Erdélyi

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“Let These be our Colonies: Dalmatia, Bosnia, Herzegovina!” Rezső Havass and the Outlook of Hungarian Imperialism at the Turn of the Century

Mátyás Erdélyi
Research Centre for the Humanities
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Hungarian Historical Review Volume 11 Issue 2  (2022): 359-386 DOI 10.38145/2022.2.359

Hungarian imperial thought after the fall of the Habsburg Monarchy became a fantasy of past times, and thus the imperial propaganda of Rezső Havass was long irrelevant by the time of his death in 1927. In spite of this, Havass was called the “wholehearted devotee of Hungarian imperialism” in his obituary, a man who believed in further Hungarian expansion with the faith of prophets and whose goal was to resurrect the imperium of Louis I of Hungary. The present study analyzes the career trajectory of Rezső Havass and his multiple and overlapping identities in order to uncover the different faces of Hungarian imperialism before the Great War. Havass was a “bourgeois citizen,” a “Hungarian fanatic,” “a scholar,” and a “clerk and chairman of business companies,” or in other words, he had an array of identities which made him capable of using historic, legal, political, and economic arguments to aid the advancement of Hungarian imperialism. For Havass, the Hungarian Kingdom was undoubtedly a would-be-colonial empire with well-defined political goals (the colonization of Dalmatia), and his texts mixed and vulgarized elements of the sciences subordinated to political goals. For instance, it is relevant that the empire was a facilitating factor for geographical scholarship in the case of Havass, besides the obvious political leanings. My main research question concerns the modalities of imperial thought in Hungary through the case study of Rezső Havass. What did it consist of? How did it compare to other notions of imperialism and economic expansionism? And how widespread was it in the public sphere in Hungary?

Keywords: Habsburg Monarchy, imperialism, imperial propaganda

Other countries have overseas possessions, colonies, which provide comfortable income for those who cannot succeed at home. Let these be our colonies:
Dalmatia, Bosnia, Herzegovina!1

The idea of the Magyar imperium seemed a fantasy of old times after the dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy, and similarly, the expansionist propaganda of Rezső Havass had become obsolete by the time of his death in 1927. Nonetheless, Havass’ work provides us a broader perspective from which to understand the nature of Magyar imperialism at the turn of the century.2 Though fantasizing about the Magyar imperium became pointless in the interwar period, Havass’ necrology described him as “a sincere devotee of Magyar imperialism”3 who believed in the expansion of the Hungarian Kingdom with the faith of prophets and whose primary aspiration was to reestablish the empire of Louis I of Hungary.4 As the necrology stated, Havass was also a “prolific writer” and a “warm-hearted scientist.” Kálmán Lambrecht, a paleontologist and researcher at the Hungarian Royal Geographical Institute (Magyar Királyi Földtani Intézet), emphasized, by contrast, Havass’ multiple affiliations and ties. Havass was a “bourgeois in the sense of the civis romanus,” “a fanatic Magyar,” “a scientist,” “the creator and promoter of new thoughts,” and also a man who worked in the management of several joint-stock companies.5 Together with his multiple and overlapping identities, Havass’ imperial prophetism, therefore, provides excellent empirical material which sheds light on the nuances and mechanisms of imperial ideology in Hungary in the last decades of the Habsburg Monarchy.

Havass was longtime employed at the First Hungarian General Insurance Company (Első Magyar Általános Biztosító Intézet) as the head of the mathematical department, until his retirement in 1904. He then became a supervisory board member at several joint-stock companies.6 In 1910, he was still the vice president of the Hungarian Geographical Society (Magyar Földrajzi Társaság), vice president of the Elizabeth People’s Academy (Erzsébet Népakadémia, an association to promote public education in Hungary), and an elected member of the National Council of Museums and Libraries (Muzeumok és Könyvtárak Országos Tanácsa).7 In 1902, Havass was awarded the honorary title of royal councilor (királyi tanácsos),8 and he was a long-time member of the legislative committee (törvényhatósági bizottság) in Budapest. Thus, he belonged to the Budapest bourgeoisie at the turn of the century. He was familiar with the contemporary historical, legal, political, and economic fields and he readily applied this expertise in the “practical sciences,” to use a contemporary expression, to help the cause of Magyar imperialism with regard to the question of Dalmatia.

Walter Sauer’s description of Austrian historiography and the Austrian public image concerning the colonial past is true for Transleithania. According to Sauer, there is an alleged abstention from any discussion of colonial intervention, imperialism, and expansionism when considering the common past of Austria-Hungary, in spite of the fact that Austria-Hungary was not an anti-colonial state and numerous attempts to establish formal and informal colonies have been described in the secondary literature.9 Following Sauer’s line of thought, many historians have recently addressed the past of the Habsburg Monarchy as a colonial past, particularly from the perspective of postcolonial theory.10 For instance, Habsburg rule in Bosnia and Herzegovina is no longer interpreted in the contemporary narrative of a “civilizing mission” or a “humanitarian intervention.” Instead, the province is examined as a “colony” of the Habsburg Empire and analyzed in the framework of postcolonial theories, with a focus on both cultural and economic processes.11 In this vein, the present paper looks at the work of Rezső Havass as an explicit part of Hungary’s colonial past: Havass’ objectives were not achieved (and thus remained very much imaginary), but they exemplified the conceptual framework of colonial thinking in Hungary before World War I and demonstrated wide public support for such endeavors.

Rezső Havass was trained as a geographer, but his texts under discussion here are not scientific works. In his propaganda for the re-annexation of Dalmatia, Havass vulgarized scientific arguments and provided kindling for the public image of Magyar colonial prospects. Still, the case of Havass shows that the relationships between science, politics, and empire were not hierarchical or one-way relationships.12 His travelogues retained scientific findings (in geography and history) and turned them into a political means of producing colonial propaganda, but geographical and historical research, for instance, also profited from Hungary’s colonial prospects in the Balkans. In other words, the empire used science as a means of furthering its political goals—one obvious example is the Kronprinzenwerk—yet the sciences also profited from the visions of the empire. In this case, the empire served as a “facilitating” space for researchers: the imperial space provided opportunities for mobility within and outside the empire, and the empire itself provided a large geographical area for research.

The most obvious examples with which to illustrate this relationship are Adolf Strausz and Rezső Havass. Their sphere of scientific activity was inherently connected with the very existence of the Habsburg Monarchy and the Kingdom of Hungary. It is quite illustrative that both suddenly halted their previous scientific and public engagements after the dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy. Adolf Strausz (1853–1944) was a professor at the Oriental Academy of Trade (Keleti Kereskedelmi Akadémia) in Budapest, and he published manifold works on the Balkans from cultural, political, and economic perspectives. The last publication by Strausz before 1914 dealt with the geopolitical situation in the Balkans and the role Turkey should play in restructuring the region.13 After the Great War, however, Strausz ceased his scientific activity in this field and, in the interwar period, he published only one monograph, a work on the history of the Jewish congregation in Rome.14 The dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy represented a sudden rupture in Strausz’s academic career on another level as well. The Oriental Academy of Trade, which provided his livelihood when he taught there as a professor between 1891 and 1918 and provided financial support for his research trips to the Balkans, was closed down and the faculty was dismissed after 1920.15 1918 thus represented a sudden halt in Strausz’s career. The same picture goes for Havass. He published over 100 articles, papers, and essays between 1878 and 1916 but only four titles in the last decade of his life, including three papers in A tenger (The sea) and a commemorative volume on the fiftieth anniversary of the Hungarian Geographical Society.

The main goal of the present paper is to look at the conceptual grounds of Hungary’s colonial objectives through the lens of Havass’ propaganda concerning the reunification of Hungary with Dalmatia. This, of course, entails a change in perspective: I look at Hungary not as a colonial power, which it was not, but as an unsuccessful would-like-to-be colonial state with well identified colonial goals. I am particularly interested in the ways in which different fields of knowledge interacted with one another, transgressed disciplinary frontiers, and were vulgarized by Havass and others. Between the turn of the century and the outbreak of the Great War, colonial ideas and concepts had become an integral part of the public imagination through continuous repetition in the daily press, commemorative books, tourist guides, and even school trips. For Havass, the Hungarian Kingdom represented a colonial empire with well-defined political goals (i.e., the colonization of Dalmatia), and his scholarship mixed elements of the sciences subordinated to political goals (and also an approach to the sciences that followed its own logic). My main research question concerns the modalities of imperial thought in Hungary through the case study of Rezső Havass. What did it consist of? How did it compare to other notions of imperialism and economic expansionism? How widespread was it in the public sphere in Hungary? I approach these questions in three smaller case studies. First, I analyze the components of Havass’s economic expansionism and the place of Dalmatia within it; then, I turn to the most important means of economic expansionism, the railways, and describe how new railways lines were meant to aid the Magyar imperium. Lastly, I analyze the cultural and historic arguments for the re-annexation of Dalmatia.

Economic and Territorial Expansionism

The most quoted article by Rezső Havass is a manifesto entitled “On Magyar imperialism,” which was published in Budapesti Hírlap (Budapest Herald) in 1902.16 Havass argues that the principal goal of Magyar imperialist politics is to revive the power and authority of the Kingdom of Hungary at the time of the Árpád dynasty and the House of Anjou. The most often repeated trope is the importance of reclaiming the territorial integrity, the political power, and the authority of the kingdom as it stood at the time of Louis I. Yet the main issue for the contemporary observer is the country’s economic dependency and under-development vis-à-vis Austria. For Havass, the solution must therefore be economic: no further expansion could be done in the port of Fiume (today Rijeka, Croatia), and there was no other way to nurture the increasing flow of trade and transportation. The Hungarian economy therefore desperately needed to establish other port cities for its economic expansion, and the Hungarian re-annexation of Dalmatia could provide a solution. The coastal cities and ports of Dalmatia were mostly underdeveloped and unexploited, so their integration into Hungary’s trade network might represent the geopolitical foundations for Hungary’s greater economic expansion. In short, these ideas represented Havass’s patriotic mission and his public endeavors aimed at promoting the re-annexation and articulating the necessary geographical, cultural, and historical arguments. To quote Havass,

the advocates of Magyar imperialism do not want to create daydreams in front of the Hungarian nation, rather, they aim to profit from those factors that could be used to bring about the cultural and material improvement of the Magyar nation and to further glorify her, without engaging in adventurous undertakings, based on the legal grounds from the nation’s history, and without weakening the power status of the Monarchy.17

Havass’ stance vis-à-vis the Habsburg Monarchy is very clear: he was not searching for territorial expansion outside the Monarchy but rather was seeking to reconfigure the power balance within the monarchy. The underlying economic strategy involved active economic interventionism and industrial policy in the Balkans, the expansion of railway lines to fit the needs of Hungarian trade and industry, and the introduction of new trade policies more beneficial for Hungarian producers. Havass wrote in detail about the role of the railways, a subject to which I return in the second part of this paper.

Havass evaluated efforts at the trialist reorganization of the Dual Monarchy in view of the above programmatic article, and the dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy was not sought for either in this case. In a lecture at the national assembly of the Hungarian Geographical Society in Nagybecskerek (Zrenjanin, Großbetschkerek, today in Serbia) in 1909, Havass characterized the idea of trialism as a conscious effort to weaken Hungary within and outside the monarchy. With the aid of trialism, the goal of the “Austrians” was to “weaken our national forces” and “annihilate our economic independence.”18 The south-Slav state created in this way would not be sustainable as the third, “dwarf” member of the Habsburg Monarchy. In the case of the south-Slave state, national unity would be also missing, even though national unity was also missing in the case of Hungary, Havass admitted. But Hungarians formed a “cultural nation” (kultúrállam) and were well positioned to solve this problem:

The fact that Hungary geographically forms a closed area and that it has a historical past and also the numerical, material, and intellectual force of ten million Magyars ensure the leadership of the Magyar nation and rule out any competition.19

The second issue is that the planned south-Slav state would be dependent on the neighboring “Magyar Empire” from the perspective of trade and transportation. The south-Slav territories of the Habsburg Monarchy therefore belong to Hungary in a geopolitical sense: “If Bosnia and Herzegovina, which belong to the body of the Magyar Empire, came into the possession of Austria, it would be as absurd as attaching Tirol to Hungary.”20 The arguments against trialism are similar to the motifs for the re-annexation of Dalmatia. The connection between Hungary and the south-Slav states was imagined in a hierarchical way but presumed to be productive for both parties. Although Hungary had a clear economic superiority, Hungarians should share the “fruits of civilization” with the south-Slav region:

For us, who are the stronger, the bigger, it is an obligation to approach the south-Slav region in the spirit of old, traditional Magyar politics. […] We have to bring the very tissue of Magyar culture to the South-Slavs and to the Adriatic coast so that its light could gather the people in the region around us.21

The program was rather phantasmal, as was well expressed in the lack of reactions on the other side of the Leitha and in the apathy of the Hungarian political elite, but this political apathy was in contrast with infrastructural investments and trade policies in the region that attracted close attention from both Vienna and Budapest.

This points to another element in the ideology of imperialism: the civilizing mission of the colonizer and the hierarchical relationship between center and periphery, colony and colonizer. This civilizing mission was well described in the first part of a play, a trilogy by Havass entitled Fényben (In the light):

We should be all one in our singing! The rivers flow together and become a sea, a great, magnificent, and unconquerable sea. Our peoples merge in this way into a magnificent whole. My princess, to remember my visit today, I shall build a tower here which will indicate until the end of times that the Hungarian king was here, as a good friend, who is a builder and giver and not a conqueror who destroys and takes. You shall live according to your old laws and customs, no one should disturb them. But I expect from you to act with brotherly love and loyalty vis-à-vis the Hungarian king and his people.22

 

The benevolent nature of Hungarian rule in Dalmatia—which allegedly resulted in centuries of loyalty to Hungary—was emphasized by other influential figures. The historian Henrik Marczali wrote that “The cities of Dalmatia would never forget the centuries that they lived under Hungarian protection while preserving their absolute freedom.”23 Dalmatians remember these centuries as the “savor of sweet honey.” Havass found seeds for this argument in Lajos Thallóczy’s essays. Thallóczy found out that, in 1783, an anonymous writer sent a memoir to the chancellery arguing that Dalmatia legally belonged to Hungary. Although the chancellery agreed with the conclusions, they hid the memoir because it could have caused diplomatic conflict with Venice.24 Thallóczy was more candid in another publication:

[The cities of Dalmatia] welcomed Austria with joy because they were fed up with Venetian rule. The secret archives of Vienna and documents of the Council of War prove that citizens, the clergy, and the educated did not forget the rule of the “Hungarian crown,” and Austria meant Hungary for them. In Split, the esteemed party turned to the palatine to be able to rejoin the Hungarian crown. It became a considerable campaign, as the Hungarian coat of arms was set up in cities and on islands, priests proclaimed their loyalty to the Hungarian king in the pulpit. Thugut, the minister of foreign affairs at the time, however, prevented the annexation of Dalmatia to Hungary.25

This passage pleased Havass so much that he quoted it countless times in his texts on Dalmatia.26 In terms of the reference to historic rights, Havass was not alone in reclaiming the possession of Dalmatia. In a book about the public law status of Dalmatia, László Dús emphasized that Dalmatia belonged to the Hungarian crown, the main reason being that the Hungarian crown had never renounced its connection with Dalmatia.27

Another pamphlet, entitled “Dalmatia and Hungarian industry and trade,” describes in detail the essence of this Hungarian economic expansionism.28 The point of departure was that the economic stagnation and crisis in Hungary threatened Széchenyi’s prophetic famous contention that, “while many think that there once was a Hungary, I wish to believe that there will yet be a Hungary.” The remainder of the article details the advantages of the enforcement of Act XXX of 1868, which proclaimed the re-annexation of Dalmatia to Hungary.29 Mining, especially asphalt and coal production, had not yet been exploited in the province. Natural resources and infrastructure were available to establish a large-scale aluminum industry. The cement industry had promising potential and could compete with producers in the West. Unexploited natural resources were abundant in the province, such as hydropower (through the exploitation of waterfalls), viniculture, pomology, and fishing, and the local conditions could make tea production possible in the region. Dalmatia was currently at a disadvantage because, according to Havass, the Österreichischer Lloyd neglected the development of trade and transportation on the Adriatic Sea. At the time, there were only four banks and two savings banks in the province, so Hungarian financial institutions could easily establish new branches. Havass’ agenda represented an economic colonialism that proposed to exploit Dalmatia’s resources after re-annexation. This strategy was also intended to improve the economic situation of both parties. According to one of the most quoted arguments against Austrian “rule” in Dalmatia, “Vienna” had failed to care for the province since having acquired it, and it had failed to make significant cultural and infrastructural investments.

The Dalmatian ports offered the most significant potential from the perspectives of economy and trade. There were many reasons behind their growing importance. First, there were 56 cities on the Dalmatian coast, all of them potential ports unexploited by the Dual Monarchy. Second, the Suez Canal had transformed trade routes in general, and from the moment it had opened in 1869, the ports on the Mediterranean Sea became capable of engaging in trade with Asia. The monarchy, however, had failed to profit from its favorable position. In terms of the volume of transportation on the Suez Canal, English, German, French, and Dutch trade all significantly surpassed trade by the Habsburg Monarchy, in spite of the fact that Trieste and Split (Spalató) were more easily accessible. Naturally, “Austrians” refused to give up Dalmatia, because in doing so, they would have completely relinquished to Hungary control of and access to the Balkans. For Havass, the re-annexation of Dalmatia would bring about economic independence for Hungary in the long run, which was much needed after the (future) establishment of an independent customs territory. To sum up, the importance of Dalmatia lay in the abundance of natural resources, potential trade connections and developments, and the fact that Dalmatia could be a potential target for Magyar emigrants.30

The idea of economic expansionism was widespread among Hungarian economists and public figures debating Balkan politics,31 and as historian Gábor Demeter has persuasively argued, “[g]eography was already, before 1914, a promoter of economic and then territorial expansion.”32 In this regard, Havass was a typical exponent of Magyar imperial thought. The concept of economic expansionism relied on various sets of arguments, including legal arguments (such as the reference to Act XXX of 1868), references to historic rights (the conquest of Hungary by the Árpád dynasty and Louis I of Hungary), allusions to geographical cohesion or closeness, economic needs (especially as regards international trade), geopolitical considerations (vis-à-vis Vienna but also Russia, Turkey, and Italy), and cultural and humanitarian appeals. Havass differed from such figures as Dezső Szegh33 and Adolf Strausz34 in the sense that the latter two did not envision territorial expansion as part of economic expansion. The means of expansionism remained strictly economic and cultural: a railway strategy to foster and further Hungarian trade because, now, “our own favorable trade position is utilized by other countries in relation to Eastern trade.”35 Significantly, Strausz was a professor at the Oriental Academy of Trade in Budapest, and he participated in forming the next generation of tradesmen in the Balkans at the turn of the century. Havass could also find an ally in Pál Hoitsy who, as the editor of Vasárnapi Újság (Sunday Newspaper), disseminated different forms of Magyar imperial thought to the greater public. Hoitsy argued that, from the perspective of geography, Hungary, which was pressed between East and West, was forced to pursue expansionist politics ad infinitum. Romania and Serbia had to be occupied to regain Hungary’s old glory and to enable the Magyar nation to assimilate the nationalities within its borders.36

For Havass, the numerical growth of Magyars was closely connected to the economic power of Hungary, and he examined nationalist arguments from this perspective. The lecture entitled “The Slovakization of Upper Hungary” started as follows: “Who could deny that the more numerous its population becomes, the greater the power of the nation will be.”37 Following the lead of József Kőrösy’s similarly entitled study,38 Havass argued that the so-called Slovakization of some of the counties in Upper Hungary (the territory of Slovakia today) was obvious, and the Magyar nation had lost some 100,000 people in Pozsony, Nyitra, Bars, and Hont Counties. Statistical findings indicated the decrease of Magyar population and prompted immediate action. In another article, Havass addressed the phenomenon of “pseudo-Magyarization.” At the turn of the century, the spread of Hungarian as the official language and the language in everyday use took place primarily in cities and towns, as had been emphasized in the 1899 lecture. Havass argued that, in contrast to declarations made by people when the census was taken, “half of the population prefer not to use Hungarian in Budapest.”39 Havass highlighted the situation on the outskirts of the capital: he visited Pomáz, where everyone spoke Serbian and German, although they were all locals. For Havass, it is not “chauvinism to speak up against these conditions, it is rather self-defense.” He contended that, “[i]f the national spirit could permeate society in the capital, there would not be any people speaking foreign languages in Budapest.”

For Havass, the best tool with which to achieve these national goals was economic expansion, and the scientific foundation of this expansion was to come from geography. The Hungarian Geographical Society established the Department of Economic Geography in 1912. The department was intended to promote economic interests from the perspective of geography, and economic interests were to benefit the “national goals” first and foremost.40 For Havass, the “vivacity of the Magyars,” by which he meant the numerical growth of the Hungarian-speaking population, was inseparable from Hungarian economic expansion. In this way, Dalmatia as a potential target of emigration would help maintain the numerical growth of Magyars, because the future colony (Dalmatia) could preserve the migrants for the Magyar nation, in contrast to overseas migrants, who began using different languages and were thus “lost,” as it were, to the Hungarian nation.

The problem with the Tisza government, in the eyes of Havass, was that it failed to control or influence the direction of emigration. In addition, more than 30 years after the Compromise of 1867,41 the government had failed to make friends in the Balkans or among the non-Magyar nationalities in Hungary. Hungarian emigrants were left without guidance and thus were lost to the Magyar cause in the long run. In a rather condescending tone, Havass declared that “they had not even abandoned our Slovaks [tótjainkat] in such a despondent way.”42 The most important issue with the Hungarian ruling elite, however, was that it had neglected the development of the “Magyar imperium.” Past governments had not encouraged the annexation of Bosnia and Herzogovina to the Kingdom of Hungary and had not taken the opportunity to move settlers into Bosnia, especially Székelys. Havass asks a pointed question: “]d]id we work to create a situation in which Bosnians and Herzegovinians would themselves ask to get the advantages of Hungarian citizenship?”43 He concludes his article with an invitation to pursue imperial policies: “Let us raise the flag of Hungarian imperial politics. Let us give the Magyar nation ideals that fit the fight of its soul. Hungary is entitled to have Dalmatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina.”44

Two issues must be emphasized concerning the economic expansionism envisioned by Havass. First, the most important difference that distinguished his views from other Magyar ideas was that it involved explicit territorial expansion, namely the incorporation of Dalmatia into Hungary. However, this territorial expansion was imagined within the framework of the Dual Monarchy and via the transformation of the power balance between the two states of the Habsburg Monarchy. Austria, thus, became Hungary’s most important “competitor” and the (only) threat to Hungary’s economic independence. Secondly, Havass mixed up nation and empire in the ideology of economic expansionism. The principal goal was to elevate the standing of the Hungarian crown and Hungarians, but by “Hungarians,” Havass understood mostly people who both spoke Hungarian as a native tongue and allegedly identified as part of the Hungarian nation. For instance, economic development in Hungary should contribute to the growth of the Magyar (Hungarian-speaking) population and not to the growth of other ethnic communities within the territories of the Hungarian crown. The goal was thus to further the growth and prosperity of the Hungarian nation. Yet, the re-annexation of Dalmatia, according to public law, could only take place with Dalmatia as part of Croatia-Dalmatia-Slavonia, thus within the framework of a Magyar empire and not the Kingdom of Hungary. The compromise between Hungary and Croatia in 1868 and specifically the passage that declared Dalmatia’s re-annexation envisaged the re-annexation to the Hungarian empire (as part of Croatia) and not to Hungary proper. The Croatian historian Ferdo Šišić emphasized this idea in his book on the Dalmatian question.45 The Croatian parliament requested several times the re-annexation of Dalmatia, but they always meant re-annexation to Croatia.

Economic Policy Instruments: Railways in the Service of Economic Expansion

The re-annexation of Dalmatia was not on the agenda of the political elite in Vienna or in Budapest, but the construction of railways was discussed and carried out in the province. In practice, Act XLVIII of 1912 regulated the construction of a railway line between Ogulin and Knin46 based on a compromise reached at the common ministerial council and the 1907 financial compromise between the two delegations. The latter stated that the two governments agreed that a railway line was going to be constructed from Rudolfswerth via Möttlingen to Karlovec, and a direct line would be built between Ogulin and Knin. The construction of the latter was to be completed by December 1911. Another important point of the 1907 compromise was that tariff policies would be set in parity between the two states of the Habsburg Monarchy regarding transit traffic to Dalmatia.47 This agreement was welcomed by Havass, but it did not meet with unanimous approval by the Hungarian public. Critics stated that the costs were excessive and the Austrian economy benefitted most from the future direct connections between Vienna and Dalmatia.

For Havass, the railway connection between Dalmatia and Hungary was a means with which to further the economic expansion of Hungary and an utterly necessary step forward: “[i]t is peculiar that other nations make war to take possession of seashores and maritime transportation is used to enhance their economic independence and development: whereas our longing for the sea consists only of rallying cries which sound nice but are never acted upon.”48 Charles Loiseau and Guiseppe Gentilizza49 were quoted to suggest that the destiny of Dalmatia was crucial for the status of Hungary as a great nation. Loiseau, however, was much more critical of the Habsburg mission in the Balkans than he seems in Havass characterization of his ideas. For instance, Loiseau called attention to the abuse of power against non-Magyars in Hungary, in particular concerning parliamentary elections. From his perspective, Hungary could only delay the political rise of Romanians, Slovaks, Serbs, and other national minorities, and the right way of state building would be federalism instead of the proclamation of a unified Hungarian political nation. The conclusion of the article was oracular: “And yet, we need it, the Slav pressure—and they [the Hungarians] know it!”50

On another occasion, Loiseau drew attention to the potential economic and political consequences of Habsburg expansion in the Balkans.51 The Habsburg Monarchy planned to construct a railway line between Sarajevo and Mitrovica that could potentially transform trade networks in the region. This railway line would also help lay the way for the construction of direct line between Vienna and Salonika and badly hurt the economic interests of Italy. Loiseau, here, gave a succinct summary of the civilizing mission:

To bring this barbaric country [Macedonia] a caress of civilization—and why would only one great power have the privilege of doing this good work?—is, first, to open schools. […] It is also to spur economic relations. […] It is to form a new generation of Italians, lay and clerks, to better know the history and language of Schkipetare. […] Finally, it is to help bring about the development of the postal services.52

Loiseau also expressed his opinion concerning Hungary’s customs policies, which in his assessment were imperial and served to further exploitation by Hungary of the import of Serbian pork: “[a]nd on this market, this great power [Hungary] dictates the law through customs tariffs, railway tariffs, and through the exercise of—often unfair—public health regulations.”53 Loiseau himself was thus far from sympathetic to the cause of Austria-Hungary.54

Contrary to Loiseau’s assumption, there was controversy between Austria and Hungary and inside Hungary as well concerning the choice of the railway line through Dalmatia. For instance, the Österreichische Rundschau55 questioned the rationale of building a line between Ogulin and Knin (the so-called Lika line) instead of a line between Novi and Knin (the so-called Una line in Bosnia), because the former heavily favored Hungarian interests and strictly Hungarian tariff policies could be applied on this line. Hungarian experts also criticized the choice of the Lika line. It was a region with limited access to water, and this significantly raised construction costs. The Lika line was 55 kilometers longer and over 100 million Kronen more expensive than the Una line. In their eyes, it was problematic that the Lika line traversed thinly populated and agriculturally unproductive regions, and, finally, it favored Austrian interests by furthering trade via Vienna and Trieste.56

Havass naturally refuted these contentions and pointed out that with the construction of the Una line, Hungary would lose its influence on tariff policies for Dalmatian transportation. The ultimate motive, though, concerned imperialism. First, the Lika line would “bring culture, at last” to Lika-Krbava County in Croatia-Slavonia. Second, “the main goal is after all to connect Budapest and Hungary with the Dalmatian coast.”57 In a significant way, Havass turns to Friedrich Ratzel to support Hungary’s imperial expansionism. The German geographer, nowadays known for laying the foundations of the concept Lebensraum, wrote in Anthropogeographie that, “Umgekehrt es ist verheissungsvoll, wenn ein eingeschlossenes Volk sich eine Lücke in den Gürtel bricht, der es umgibt, oder sonstwie seine Expansionskraft bezeugt.”58 Ratzel took the example of the political rallying cry “Tengerhez magyar, el a tengerhez” (“To the sea Hungarian, to the sea,” originally the title of an 1846 article by Hungarian politician Lajos Kossuth) to prove that such an “expansion power” can have political consequences. At least, the development of the Lika line was, according to Havass, necessary to halt the expansionism of Austrian trade, even at the expense of Hungary’s economic development.

Havass called attention to Austria’s efforts to curtail Hungary’s economic expansion. The planned construction of the “island railway” (this line would combine a steam ferry and railway lines through Istria, Pag, and so forth to Zadar) in Dalmatia would simply be a means of economic expansionism for Austria.59 Austria also aimed, according to Havass, to monopolize maritime trade through the connection between Vienna and Split. The subvention of the Österreichische Lloyd, the establishment of a port on the Istrian coast, next to Fiume, were all part of this strategy.60 Havass would repeat what had been already stated concerning the Lika line:

The railway line to Split must belong to the Hungarian railway jurisdiction and must be a Hungarian line, for it will be profitable, for it bears important political and economic interests, and it can contribute to the protection of Rijeka.61

The investment would yield remarkable profits. The port of Split was closer to the Suez Canal than Trieste, Genova, Marseille, or Hamburg, and thus it could assume an important role in trade with the East. But there were other resources in the region. The waterfalls along the Cetina River could provide industrial electricity, Brač (an Island close to Split) was a major producer of high-quality marble, there was a burgeoning cement industry in Split, as well as a spa, wine exports, and so forth.62 These assets ensured the importance of rail connections between Split and Budapest. Havass’ call did not go unnoticed. A critical review appeared in Vasuti és közlekedési közlöny (Railway and transportation gazette) claiming that it was not economically rational to oppose the construction of the Split-Vienna line. The main goal of the Austrians was to develop Split (and potentially alleviate the traffic going through Trieste) and not to create a competitor for Fiume. Hungarians, rather, should concentrate their efforts on developing Fiume, which could not become a competitor, as it lacked the appropriate infrastructure. The anonymous writer completely dismissed Havass’ contentions as propaganda and proposed a more rational approach:

We have so many things to do, more directly and more urgently, that we don’t have time to wander in a foreign land. We are deeply sorry that Dalmatia is a foreign country, but today, to think about its re-annexation and especially to plan our transportation policies in view of this idea would not be far-sighted or economically rational behavior.63

 

Dezső Szegh, an influential economist and prolific writer on economic expansionism in the Balkans,64 also opposed the establishment of the Lika line in favor of the Una line, as the latter would be shorter, cheaper, more profitable, and more efficient. In addition, the Una line better fit Hungary’s existing trade policies with regards to trade with the East. Szegh proved this statement with references to “objective facts, so to speak, on a mathematical basis.”65

In his response, Havass rejected the notion that the re-annexation of Dalmatia would be a “utopian enchantment” because all parties (including Dalmatians and Croatians) were in favor of this constitutional change. He also reiterated the need to construct the Ogulin-Knin line on the territory of the Hungarian Kingdom and make it a “Magyar” railway.66 In 1908, the Austrians suddenly got interested in Dalmatia, for they feared that Hungary would re-annex it. Like many of his contemporaries, Havass believed that it was Austria that benefitted mostly from the Dual Monarchy. Cisleithania had a positive trade balance vis-à-vis Transleithania and wanted to maintain the economic dependency of Hungary, in his assessment. The goal for Hungary, in contrast, was to free itself from this dependency through enhanced trade relations with the rest of the world. The port of Fiume was not sufficient (with its mere 20 square kilometers). The solution could be found in the ports of Dalmatia and in the training of Magyar sailors who would work for Magyar economic independence and Magyar economic expansion.67

As in the case of cultural belongingness (see below), Havass was not the only public figure to write in favor of the railway line between Ogulin and Knin. For instance, Iván Polgár, a Cistercian monk, historian, and professor at the Cistercian Gymnasium in Székesfehérvár, described the Dalmatian railways as a crucial component of Hungarian railway investments. For Polgár, railway investments should be profitable in the sense that the income generated by new lines would cover the interest on the capital and make further investments possible. The rationale behind the construction of the Ogulin-Knin line (as planned by Act XLVIII of 1912) was to direct the traffic to the lines of the Hungarian State Railways (MÁV) and open up new trade networks for Hungarian products.68 Dalmatia should belong to Hungary by “historical law,”69 yet the construction of railway connections between Hungary and Dalmatia was in the interest of Hungarian economic growth, regardless of whether Dalmatia would be annexed to Hungary as stipulated in Act XXX of 1868 or not.

Culture and History in the Service of Imperialism

One important pillar of Havass’ propaganda was the cultural and historical relations between Dalmatia and Hungary. The richly illustrated monograph, entitled Dalmatia, included all the cultural monuments and memories that illustrated Dalmatia’s earlier attachments to Hungary.70 One such case is the preservation of the remains of Katalin and Margit, daughters of Béla IV of Hungary, at the cathedral in Split. According to the report, “the royal relics were kept in garbage and dirt,” and this was a clear sign of anti-Magyar sentiments in the province. Havass rejected this claim, because the unusual condition of the tomb was due to the refurbishment of the cathedral at the time, and the Dalmatian sense of fraternal attachment to Hungary was unquestionable.71 Havass attempted to prove that Dalmatia and the Magyar nation belonged together culturally by citing cultural-historical examples that were repeated for decades, in some cases even in the interwar period. For Split, it was the royal tomb. For Zadar, the capital of Dalmatia, it was St. Mary’s Church, which had been erected partly by Coloman of Hungary and the conquest of the region by Louis I. For Trogir and Klis, the important event was Béla IV of Hungary’s escape from the Tartar invasion. These historical events served as encouragement for contemporary Hungarians to visit Dalmatia, as explained in 1901 in Vasárnapi Újság,72 and the places were the backdrop for the aforementioned drama Fényben.73 The goal of the trilogy was to draw attention to Hungary’s glorious past so that the present generation could gather strength from this example in the unfortunate age of the interwar period.

The public image of Dalmatia was very similar to what Havass recounted many times, at least from the perspective of school field trips to Dalmatia. Reports of field trips to Dalmatia specifically mentioned visits to attractions in the province that were somehow related to Hungarian culture of history. In the case of Zadar, student groups stopped at St. Mary’s Church and St. Simeon’s Church, and they would observe the Roman-style tower of the former, erected to remember the Coloman’s parade in the city, and the silver casket in the latter, offered to the city by Elizabeth of Bosnia, the wife of Louis I. A Catholic Gymnasium in Budapest issued the following report of the silver reliquary: “Seeing this invaluable piece of rare perfection gives us an understanding of the power, richness, and glory of our country at the time of Louis I.”74

Other mentions include Klis (Clissa), a small village which provided shelter for Béla IV when he fled the Tartar invasion. The teacher reports that on the visit to this stronghold, “we sang the National Anthem and our Kurutz songs with such emotion!”75 Efforts to nurture these “historical reminiscences”76 would continue in Split with visits to the tomb of the daughters of Béla IV in the cathedral and to Trogir, where Béla IV also stayed in 1242. Havass’ drama entitled Dalmáczia (Dalmatia) was also not ignored by the schools. In 1903, several schools reported to have watched the “patriotic drama” at the Urania theater following a request by the pedagogical council.77

Havass’ distinctive imperial agenda was echoed by teachers on the field trips. The stenography teacher at a trade school in Budapest rambled on about the prospects of Magyar foreign trade in his introduction to the report “Magyar world trade. A desire of all true Magyars.” This was followed by a rhetorical question: “But is Magyar world trade not a dream, a reverie or a castle in the air?”78 The answer was a firm no, as demonstrated by the school trip itself. Others gave a more explicit description of Magyar imperialism in Dalmatia. For József Andor (cited above), the goal of the trip to Dalmatia was to show students “the ancient places of the old Magyar empire.”79 The Magyar empire lost its old glory for a reason: “the decline of national virtues and the empowerment of national defects led us to lose this fairy province.”80 What remained of Magyar imperialism in the province was remarkable, however, because the material remnants of Magyar rule in Dalmatia were almost invisible, and we would look for them in vain as “a sign that Magyar rule was not violent and did not leave its mark on anything.”81 A field trip description by the Gymnasium in Trsztena (Trstená), a Slovak town at the northern border between Upper Hungary and Galicia, offered further proof of the benevolent nature of Hungary’s imperial past.

Once the wind was glowing a Hungarian tricolor on Orlando’s Column in front of St. Blaise’s Church. Under the protection of this tricolor, Dubrovnik lived in security, in wealth with privileges, and in peace. And Dubrovnik had its heyday under the protection of this tricolor.82

Other travel reports replicated these tropes without the imperialist voice. The architect János Bobula Jr. described Dubrovnik in 1911 in exactly the same way as Havass spoke about Dalmatia. The portrait of the coastal city started with a reminiscence about Magyar rule in the province. The traveler wondered, while strolling through the alleys of the old town, whether a knight of Béla IV or Ladislaus I of Hungary would come and block his way, and he imagined how Sigismund of Hungary, the Holy Roman Emperor, would watch animals and plants from the window of the monastery, just like visitors in the early twentieth century did.83 But Bobula dismisses these thoughts with a melancholy sigh:

Let’s not pass time with these reminiscences, because we can only get depressed by knowing our weakness. Knowing that we have to tolerate silently that the “pearl of the Adriatic,” which the Árpáds brilliantly put on the Holy Crown of Stephen, is today under foreign rule, without any historic rights.84

Not surprisingly, the most important landmark in the city is the cathedral that contains the relics of St. Stephen. Others were just describing Dalmatia as a touristic destination. A handbook for travelers by Sándor Paulovits, a senior clerk in Tolna County, copied most of the information from Havass’s book on Dalmatia without references to the annexation.85 Lajos Czink, a teacher at a secondary trade school, described Lissa with the necessary references to Coloman of Hungary, Béla IV, and Louis I but without any mention of Dalmatia’s re-annexation.86 Béla Dezső, a Gymnasium teacher, recalled the times of Béla IV but again did not make any contentions concerning how Dalmatia belonged Hungary.87 The linguist Béla Erődi gave a comprehensive summary of Dalmatia’s touristic destinations and only reinforced the idea that it was, now, a foreign country. The remains of Béla IV’s two daughters were mistreated in Split because of “ethnic hatred,” and the bishop refused to transport them to Hungary because the Magyars had not built a direct railway line between Split and Budapest.88

Conclusion

The case of Rezső Havass offers persuasive support for the notion that empire and nation are not binary oppositions in the case of the Habsburg Monarchy89 and they worked together well in Havass’ imperialist ideology. For the Magyar nation, economic expansionism as a form of imperialist politics was a means to develop and sustain Hungarian political and cultural influence. The idea of a Magyar imperium was thus not alien to the thinking of Havass and his contemporaries.90 On the contrary, it was shared and practiced by many. It might have seemed little more than a daydream a century after the dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy, but it was a political program espoused by many around 1900. The imperialist ideology of Havass was present both in discussions about the establishment of new railways (namely in the case of the Ogulin-Knin railway line) and in the reconsideration of Hungary’s trade network and transportation routes. Naturally, it was also present in the image of Dalmatia from a historical and cultural perspective. School trips and tourist guides characterized Dalmatia as a former colony of the Hungarian Kingdom and were guided by the cultural and historic reminders of Hungarian rule in the province. Respected historians like Henrik Marczali and Lajos Thallóczy were equally interested in the distant past of Dalmatia as a source of historical rights for the Hungarian crown. This was, of course, the Magyar perspective. The argument concerning historic rights could support claims to the region both by Cisleithania and by Transleithania, not to mention Italy and Croatia.91 Foreign travel handbooks mentioned Hungarian relics, but they presented a much more nuanced picture of the common past and present. Maude M. Holbach’s travel book only mentions one Hungarian relic, “the marvelous silver-gilt sarcophagus said to contain the body of the Simeon of the Presentation in the Temple” offered by Queen Elisabeth of Hungary to the Church of St. Simeon.92 Another travel report bluntly criticized Hungarians:

It [Dalmatia] also suffers from imperial politics, the absolutely necessary connection of its state railway at Knin with the Austrian system being persistently vetoed by Hungary, which hopes thus to coerce it into supporting the Magyar party in the Diet.93

Hungarians might have been alone in thinking that Dalmatia should belong to their kingdom, but they imagined this settlement in the framework of the Habsburg Monarchy. Havass and others like him harshly criticized “Austria” as the main competitor with and enemy of Hungary’s economic development and the country that did the most to curtail Hungarian independence, yet they remained in the Dualist framework and envisaged only a reconfiguration of the power balance within the monarchy. Robert Musil, in The Man Whitout Qualities, might have written that Austrians were primarily nothing at all and there was no such thing as Austria in the imagination of the peoples of the Habsburg Monarchy. For Hungarians like Havass, “Austria” very much existed, and it was the country that connoted the Habsburg empire. But this empire contained in itself another empire, the Magyar imperium.

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1* This work was supported by the National Research, Development and Innovation Office (NKFIH), grant number 128978.

Havass, Dalmáczia és a magyar ipar, kereskedelem, 49.

2 Many historians treated Havass’ work as part of discussions concerning Hungary’s imperial past: Holec, Trianon; Demeter, A modernizációtól az expanziós törekvésekig, a liberalizmustól a turanizmusig; Varga, “The Two Faces of the Hungarian Empire”; Bali and Pap, “A magyar ‘Fiume és Adria kutatás’ néhány történeti aspektusa, különös tekintettel Havass Rezső munkásságára.”

3 Leidenfrost, “Havass Rezső †,” 59–60.

4 Louis I of Hungary, also known as Louis the Great (Nagy Lajos), was the king of Hungary and Croatia between 1342 and 1382 and the king of Poland between 1370 and 1382. The rule of Louis I represented one of the “greatest” periods of Hungary’s history in the imagination of nineteenth-century historiography. His “historical greatness” was often portrayed by romantic poets in the nineteenth century, for instance Dániel Berzsenyi (1776–1836) and Sándor Petőfi (1823–1849).

5 Lambrecht, “Havass Rezső. Emlékbeszéd,” 105–6.

6 The address and housing registry in Budapest gave the following information about Havass in 1910: he was a supervisory board member at the Nemzeti baleset-biztosító részvénytársaság (National Accident Assurance Company Limited), the Egyesült budapesti fővárosi takarékpénztár (Unified savings bank in Budapest), and the Budapesti általános villamossági részvénytársaság (General electricity limited company in Budapest). He was also a member of the directorate at the Gschwindt-féle szesz-, élesztő-, likőr- és rumgyár részvénytársaság (Gschwindt’s factory of spirits, yeast, liqueur, and rum limited company). Budapesti czim- és lakásjegyzék 1910, 502, 515, 537, 548.

7 Ibid., 365, 541.

8 “Új királyi tanácsos.”

9 Sauer, “Habsburg Colonial.”

10 Most recently in Hungary: Csaplár-Degovics, “Nekünk nincsenek gyarmataink és hódítási szándékaink.” Magyar részvétel a Monarchia gyarmatosítási törekvéseiben a Balkánon (1867–1914). For a comprehensive historiographical account of the issue, see ibid., 14–40.

11 Aleksov, “Habsburg ‘Colonial Experiment’ in Bosnia and Hercegovina Revisited.” Born and Lemmen, Orientalismen in Ostmitteleuropa, Diskurse, Akteure und Disziplinen vom 19. Jahrhundert bis zum Zweiten Weltkrieg; Donia, “The Proximate Colony. Bosnia-Herzegovina under Austro-Hungarian Rule.” Feichtinger et al., Habsburg postcolonial; Gingrich, “The Nearby Frontier”; Gingrich, “Kulturgeschichte, Wissenschaft und Orientalismus. Zur Diskussion des ‘frontier orientalism’ in der Spätzeit der k.u.k. Monarchie.” Heiss and Feichtinger, “Distant Neighbors: Uses of Orientalism in the Late Nineteenth-Century Austro-Hungarian Empire.” Šístek, Imagining Bosnian Muslims in Central Europe.

12 Arend, Science and Empire in Eastern Europe; Ash and Surman, The Nationalization of Scientific Knowledge in the Habsburg Empire, 1848–1918.

13 Strausz, Az új Balkán félsziget és a török birodalom.

14 Strausz, A római ghettó.

15 Erdélyi, “A Keleti Kereskedelmi Akadémia és az orientalisták.”

16 Havass, “Magyar imperializmus.”

17 Ibid.

18 Havass, “A trializmus földrajzi szempontból,” 382.

19 Ibid., 382–83.

20 Ibid., 388.

21 Ibid., 390.

22 Havass, Fényben... Három magyar-dalmát történeti kép; Színmű, 23.

23 Marczali, Az Árpádok és Dalmáczia, 102.

24 Thallóczy, “Pray György, a magyar korona melléktartományai,” 523–24.

25 Thallóczy, Magyarország és Raguza.

26 Havass, “Dalmáczia Magyarországhoz való vonatkozásaiban tekintettel Fiuméra,” 72; Havass, “Dalmácia” (1903) (the same article was published in three daily papers); Havass, “Magyar emlékek Dalmáciában,” 1; Havass, “A magyarok tengeri politikája,” 115.

27 Dús, Dalmátia a magyar közjogban.

28 Havass, Dalmáczia és a magyar ipar, kereskedelem.

29 The re-annexation of Dalmatia was not the most pressing topic in the daily press, but Havass was not the only person asking for the implementation of Act XXX of 1868. As early as 1872, A Hon (The Homeland) published an article entitled “Those who divide Hungary” (Törs, “Kik osztják fel Magyarországot.”). The article complains that nothing has been done to implement the law, although five years had passed since Francis Joseph had taken the oath. In contrast, Pester Lloyd started to mobilize public opinion against the re-annexation of Dalmatia. According to the critics, Dalmatia did not want to rejoin Hungary, and this step would dangerously increase the proportion of the Slav population in Hungary, and the infrastructural burden of the state would also increase dramatically. For the writer of A Hon, naturally, the return on the investment, in a couple of decades, would surely cover the costs.

30 Havass called attention to this program on several occasions in daily journals: Havass, “Dalmácia,” Budapesti Napló, January 14, 1903, 1–2; Havass, “Dalmácia,” Budapesti Hírlap, December 5, 1905, 4; Havass, “A dalmát kérdés”; Havass, “Dalmácia és a fölirat”; Havass, “Dalmácia visszacsatolása,” Magyarország; Havass, “Kereskedelmi érdekeink Dalmáciában”; and so forth. For a complete bibliography of Havass’ works, see Leidenfrost, “Havass Rezső †,“ 113–15. For a comprehensive bibliography on Dalmatia and the Hungarian-Dalmatian question, see Fodor, “Dalmácia és a Magyar-dalmát kérdés földrajzának hazai bibliográfiája.”

31 For a comprehensive account: Demeter, A modernizációtól az expanziós törekvésekig, a liberalizmustól a turanizmusig.

32 Ibid., 137.

33 Dezső Szegh wrote mostly on Albania: Szegh, Magyarország a Balkánon; Szegh, “Gazdasági feladataink Albániában.”

34 Strausz, Bosznia és Herczegovina politikai, gazdasági és földrajzi leírása; Strausz, Az új Balkán félsziget és a török birodalom.

35 Szegh, “Gazdasági viszonyunk Bosznia-Herczegovinához,” 830, quoted by Demeter, A modernizációtól az expanziós törekvésekig, a liberalizmustól a turanizmusig, 83.

36 Hoitsy, Nagymagyarország; Demeter, A modernizációtól az expanziós törekvésekig, a liberalizmustól a turanizmusig, 136.

37 Havass, “A Felvidék eltótosodása,” 56.

38 Kőrösy, A Felvidék eltótosodása; Pozsony, Nyitra, Bars, Hont, Nógrád, Pest, Gömör, Abauj, Zemplén és Ung megyék területéröl.

39 Havass, “A főváros magyarsága.”

40 Havass, “A földrajzi elem a magyar nemzeti célok szolgálatában.”

41 Havass, of course, referred to the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, which created the Dualist Monarchy.

42 Havass, “A magyar imperium,” 1.

43 Ibid., 2.

44 Ibid.

45 Šišić, A mai Dalmácia földrajzi fejlődése és a visszacsatolás kérdése.

46 For a description of the railway line, see Gönczy, “A magyar-dalmát vasút.”

47 Radó, “Ogulin-Knin”; Polgár, “Uj vasut az Adriához”; Polgár, “Vasuti politikánk fontos kérdése Dalmáciában.”

48 Havass, A magyar-dalmát összekötő vasút jelentősége, 1.

49 Gentilizza, Il Mare Adriatoci e la Questiona Balcanica, 14.

50 Loiseau, “Le magyarisme à la salle Wagram,” 590.

51 Loiseau, “Les chemins de fer.”

52 Ibid., 219.

53 Ibid., 221.

54 Two monographs by Loiseau also expressed this attitude: Loiseau, Le Balkan Slave et la crise autrichienne; Loiseau, L’ équilibre adriatique (l’Italie & la question d’Orient).

55 Österreichische Rundschau (July 1910): 69–71. Quoted by Havass, “A magyar-dalmát összekötő vasút jelentősége,” 75–76.

56 Ibid., 76.

57 Ibid., 80.

58 Ratzel, Anthropogeographie, 116.

59 Havass, “A dalmáciai szigetvasút,” Magyar Külkereskedelem; Rezső Havass, “A dalmáciai szigetvasút,” Gazdasági Mérnök.

60 Havass, “A budapest-spalatói vasút,” 35–36.

61 Havass, “A budapest-spalatói vasút,” 37.

62 Ibid., 38–40.

63 N., “A budapest-spalatói vasut,” 299.

64 Demeter, A modernizációtól az expanziós törekvésekig, a liberalizmustól a turanizmusig.

65 Szegh, “A dalmát vasuti összeköttetés,” 613.

66 Havass, “A dalmát kérdés és a Budapest-spalatói vasut.”

67 Havass, “Ausztria mozgalma Dalmáciáért.”

68 Polgár, “Vasuti politikánk fontos kérdése Dalmáciában.”

69 Ibid., 166.

70 Havass, Dalmácia.

71 Havass, “A spalatói magyar ereklye.”

72 Havass, “Képek Dalmácziából.”

73 Havass, Fényben... Három magyar-dalmát történeti kép; Színmű.

74 Andor, “Dalmáczia és Montenegró,” 13–14.

75 Hauschka, “Tanulmányutunk Dalmáciába és Boszniába,” 38.

76 Székely, “Tanulmányútunk,” 41.

77 “Adatok az iskola történetéhez,” 6.

78 Székely, “Tanulmányútunk,” 15.

79 Andor, “Dalmáczia és Montenegró,” 10.

80 Ibid., 9.

81 Ibid., 13.

82 Ágoston, “Dalmácia,” 12.

83 Bobula, “Raguza,” 149.

84 Ibid., 150.

85 Paulovits, Ragusa és környéke tájékoztatója.

86 Czink, “Lissa (Vis).”

87 Dezső, “A magyar-horvát szigettenger.”

88 Erődi, “Tanulmányi kirándulásom Dalmácziában.”

89 Judson, “‘Where Our Commonality Is Necessary….’”

90 See: Varga, “The Two Faces of the Hungarian Empire.”

91 See: Šišić, A mai Dalmácia földrajzi fejlődése és a visszacsatolás kérdése.

92 Holbach, Dalmatia, 38–39.

93 “Snaffle,” In the Land of the Bora, 62.

 

2022_2_Turóczy

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Hungarian Freemasons as “Builders of the Habsburg Empire” in Southeastern Europe

Zsófia Turóczy
Leipzig University
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Hungarian Historical Review Volume 11 Issue 2  (2022):329-358 DOI 10.38145/2022.2.329

In the 1890s, Hungarian Freemasonry began to expand its sphere of influence in southeastern Europe. The establishment of lodges in the southeastern border areas and even outside the Kingdom of Hungary exemplifies this expansion. When devising explanations for this policy, the Hungarian Freemasons made use of colonial and imperial discourses to justify expansion into the “Orient” with reference to the alleged civilizing role they attributed to Freemasonry. They divided the world into two parts from a cultural-civilizational point of view: one where Freemasonry was already established and flourishing and another where this form of community and social practice was not yet known or established. This discourse was entangled with political, economic, and academic practices that were prevalent among the Hungarian Freemasons. Masonic activities and discourses therefore merit consideration in the cultural and social context of their time and analysis from the perspective of new imperial histories, especially since the importance of the discourses and political symbolisms used in the expansion and maintenance of imperial structures has already been pointed out by many historians and scholars of cultural studies within the framework of New Imperial History and postcolonial studies
With a view to the undertakings of Hungarian Freemasons in the Balkans, this paper asks whether Hungarian Freemasons can also be considered “Builders of the Habsburg Empire.” This question is particularly relevant given that Freemasonry was only permitted in the Hungarian half of the Dual Monarchy. Thus, Hungarian Freemasons acted as both national and imperial actors, and they did so independently of Vienna. As the framework for my discussion here, I focus in this article on the discourses and activities of the Symbolic Grand Lodge of Hungary and the contributions of the most relevant actors, such as the Turkologist Ignácz Kúnos and the journalist and deputy director of the Hungarian Museum of Commerce, Armin Sasváris.

Keywords: freemasonry, Balkan Peninsula, Budapest, empire building

Introduction

In the 1890s, Hungarian Freemasonry began to expand its sphere of influence in southeastern Europe. The establishment of ties to Ottoman, Greek, and later Bulgarian Freemasons and of lodges in the southeastern border areas and even outside the Kingdom of Hungary (for instance, in cities such as Belgrade, Sarajevo, and later İzmir) exemplifies this expansion. Thus, the Hungarian Freemasons made use of both transnational fraternal as well as colonial and imperial discourses, justifying their policy of expansion into the “Orient” with reference to the civilizing role they attributed to Freemasonry. These discourses were entangled with the political, economic, and academic practices that were prevalent among the Hungarian Freemasons.

Against this backdrop, this paper aims to analyze the networks of Hungarian Freemasonry from the perspective of New Imperial History. Austria-Hungary has already been analyzed by historians and scholars of cultural studies within the framework of New Imperial History and postcolonial studies, especially since researchers began calling attention to the importance of the discourses and symbolic politics used in the expansion and maintenance of imperial structures.1 However, Hungary’s role as an independent actor in these processes has not yet been investigated in the international historical research. Indeed, Hungary was not an independent geopolitical actor. Nevertheless, Ignác Romsics has written about the “Hungarian imperialist idea,” referring both to the hoped-for shift of power to Budapest and the aspired expansion of Hungarian positions in the Balkans.2 Recently, Krisztián Csaplár-Degovics and Gábor Demeter considered Hungarian ideas concerning penetration into the Balkans in the nineteenth century and the first decade and a half of the twentieth.3 Both Csaplár-Degovics and Demeter elaborate on Hungarian endeavors in the European “Orient” and the imperialist aspirations behind these endeavors. They also take a stand in the historical-theoretical debate concerning whether one can even speak about imperialism or colonialism in relation to Austria-Hungary, let alone Hungary. Moreover, the imperialist policies of the colonial powers were not always focused on geographical expansion but rather on economic penetration (one might think, for example, of the British in the Ottoman Empire). In this sense, as Demeter argues, it is possible to speak about Hungarian imperialism, as Hungary was involved in similar undertakings in the Balkans.4 Furthermore, Csaplár-Degovics draws attention to informal Hungarian foreign affairs, which can be considered Hungarian imperial policy.5 I start from his theoretical vantage point and take into consideration the functions of imperial discourses and practices in culturally or economically asymmetrical relations, and I also consider the uses of colonial discourses and practices in relation to Masonic expansion.

This study is based on Jessica L. Harland-Jacob’s investigations into British Freemasonry’s connections with imperialism and colonialism. Harland-Jacob sheds light on the reciprocity of Freemasonry and imperialism, calling the British Freemasons “Builders of Empire.”6 Following Harland-Jacob, this paper asks whether Hungarian Freemasons can also be considered “Builders of the Habsburg Empire” with a view to the endeavors of the Hungarian Freemasons in the Balkans. This question is particularly relevant, given that Freemasonry was only permitted in the Hungarian half of the Dual Monarchy. This also meant that Budapest and not Vienna was the center of Habsburg Freemasonry, and this created a reciprocal situation between the Austrian Crown Lands and Hungary. This becomes even more apparent when one considers the situation of the so-called Austrian border lodges. After 1867, the Symbolic Grand Lodge of Hungary (SGLH) also offered Austrians opportunities to found their own lodges on the territory of the Hungarian Kingdom in the vicinity of the Austrian border. However, the Austrian Freemasons had to orient themselves towards the Hungarian capital and accept the leading power of the Hungarians in Freemasonry in the Habsburg Monarchy. Thus, Hungarian Freemasons were acting as both national and imperial actors. Against this background, the strivings of Hungarian Freemasons in the Balkans, which after 1867 became the target of Austro-Hungarian imperialism,7 gain more relevance. In this paper, I analyze the discourses used by the SGLH and the activities in which the SGLH engaged. I also consider the contributions of the relevant lodges and some prominent actors, including Turkologist Ignácz Kúnos (1860–1945), who served as director of the Oriental Academy of Commerce (Keleti Kereskedelmi Akadémia), which was supposed to further the spread of Hungarian products to the East through the training it provided.8 I also take into consideration the contributions of Armin Sasvári, a journalist and deputy director of the Hungarian Museum of Commerce. I take a closer look at the lodges and Masonic relations, but I also put the networks into a larger context and analyze them from the perspective of imperialism as policy, practice, and discourse. On the meta-level of academic discourse, my findings are also intended further a nuanced answer to the following question: how should new findings regarding Austria-Hungary’s behavior in the Balkans be interpreted from the perspectives of New Imperial History?

Freemasonry in the Habsburg Monarchy and Austria-Hungary

Freemasonry was established in England early in the eighteenth century, but its origins can be traced back to the local fraternities of the fourteenth century.9 Modern Freemasonry spread quickly all over the continent. It was a melting pot of intellectuals and the middle class on a spectrum of political ideologies that ranged from progressive to radical revolutionary. The secret to the efficiency of the lodges lay in the fact that they united the followers of the Enlightenment ideals and thus helped the existing political tendencies break through.10 While Freemasonry in Anglo-Saxon countries maintained a relationship of trust with the respective dynasty and state,11 Freemasons in continental Europe were perceived by the rulers and religious authorities as people who challenged the existing class society and state order around the time of the French Revolution.12 This perception, together with the fact that the Freemasons did indeed have many goals which diverged from the goals of the ruling classes, is one of the primary reasons why Freemasonry in France, Italy, and Europe’s eastern stretches was always more politically active (so-called Latin lodges) than it was in Great Britain, Germany, and Scandinavia.

The Brotherhood entered the Habsburg Monarchy in various ways with the help of English, Prussian, and, later, French lodges in the mid-eighteenth century. The transfer of masonic ideas and structures was closely linked to the mobility of certain intellectual groups. Reform-minded aristocratic state officials, officers, doctors, students, university professors, and even clergymen brought Freemasonry to Central and Eastern Europe.13 The Habsburg dynasty’s dealings with the lodges were dynamic: while the fraternity enjoyed the relative protection of the dynasty in its initial phase (1740s), the subsequent period up to the end of the eighteenth century was characterized by ever-increasing state control and growing mistrust.14 This contrasted with the fact that most lodge members were unwilling to participate in revolutionary activities, both because of their social position and because of the prohibition laid down in basic Masonic law.15 The state distrust for the brotherhood stemmed from Freemasonry’s function of testing the mechanisms of a democratic, bourgeois society in the protected space of the lodge.16 With the sense of community created by the rituals and secrecy, the practiced principle of equality, and their civic ideal of equality, the Freemasons challenged the traditional social structure and thus indirectly also the ruling structure of absolutism.17 As Reinhard Koselleck aptly describes this inherent contradiction of Freemasonry, “Directly apolitical, the mason is indirectly political.”18 In 1795, Emperor Franz I ordered the lodges to stop operating because some Austrian and Hungarian freemasons were thought to have been involved in the uprising against Austria. The suspected rebels were executed, and Freemasonry was banned for the next 72 years.19 After the Civic Revolution and War of Independence of 1848–1849, the first Hungarian freemason networks were developed as a consequence of the fact that many of those who had taken part in the revolution were forced to flee the country.20 They tried to explore the political potential of Freemasonry in the hope that this kind of an international organization would be helpful for the Hungarian cause, and they joined lodges in Italy, Switzerland, England, France, and the United States.

As a result of the Compromise of 1867, the Habsburg Monarchy was transformed into the dual state of Austro-Hungary. Hungary became autonomous with self-rule over internal matters. This constitutional restructuring paved the way for the golden age of Hungarian Freemasonry. The first prime minister, Baron Gyula Andrássy, himself a Freemason, overturned Franz I’s ban after 72 years.21 While Freemasonry was used as a means of organizing resistance after the struggle for freedom, after the Compromise, it became the stronghold of a political elite that saw Hungary’s future in loyalty to the Habsburg dynasty. This loyalty was reflected in the “respect for the law of the land”22 demanded by the basic document of Hungarian Freemasonry and in the frequent references to Emperor Franz Joseph in lectures and writings.23 Nonetheless, the independent Hungarian Freemasonry that emerged after 1867 had its spiritual kinship through its context of origin with the generally more radical, actionist so-called Latin lodges.24 This meant that the aforementioned Symbolic Grand Lodge of Hungary, which was founded in 1886 as the main institution of Hungarian Freemasonry, supported virtually all the positions that mattered to the liberal and radical bourgeoisie. Politically, socially, ethno-nationally, and denominationally it united the most diverse parts of society in the Hungarian half of the empire and evolved into the motor of various socio-political developments.25 The different socio-cultural circumstances (the liberal nationalism of the nineteenth century, the later formation of the bourgeoisie, and the delayed processes of democratization) led the Freemasons in Hungary to become politically active and induced them to offer possible solutions to social problems.

Lodges were closed societies in which rules applied that differed from the rules in the outside world. The structural criteria of the society were abolished. Ethno-confessional and social differences played no role in the interactions within the lodge or in the admission of new members. On the contrary, the mixing of different social classes and ethno-confessional groups was an explicit wish of the SGLH.26 It is important to emphasize this practice of inclusion, as the lodges hosted many multilingual citizens of Austria-Hungary.27 These people belonged mostly to the new elite of Germans of Jewish origin who in the 1880s began joining the lodges in growing numbers. Therefore, Hungarian Freemasonry was linked to the rise of a new economic elite whose large number had very successfully modernized by collaborating with the Magyar nobility.28 The lodges favored the organic fusion of the new and old elite into a new bourgeois upper and middle class, since the decisive factors for membership were performance and character rather than origin. In particular, the Jews of Hungary took advantage of the symbolic resources of freemason networks and the inclusiveness of the lodges in order to achieve a social role which corresponded to their economic strength.29 Ultimately, they were the ones who turned with “patriotic enthusiasm”30 to the southeast to develop new markets under the slogan of economic nationalism, and as multilinguals, they proved perfect mediators of Freemasonry in the European “Orient.”31

Hungarian Freemasonry in the Balkans

Despite the boom in Hungary, Freemasonry remained banned in Cisleithania. Since it was allowed to exist officially only in the territory of the Hungarian Kingdom, the SGLH had a monopoly within the multi-ethnic Austro-Hungarian Empire and could develop without competition. By 1896, there were 2,805 members in 40 lodges.32 Moreover, unlike Hungarian political institutions, the SGLH was able to act as an autonomous player in the international arena of Freemasonry. This was the initial period of Masonic internationalism,33 when relations among the European Masonic umbrella associations were intensifying under the aegis of universally understood fundamental values. Around 1900, the lodges and grand lodges built up a dense network of correspondence. Their members visited one another across state borders, and the first international Masonic conferences were organized. This was accompanied by a lively exchange of ideas reflecting ideational motivations, pragmatic motivations, and conflicts.34 In the process, masonic Grand Lodges attempted to draw into their own spheres of activity areas like the “Orient,” which had not yet been opened up to Freemasonry.

Lodges had occasionally been founded in southeastern Europe and the eastern Mediterranean as early as the eighteenth century, but it was not until the 1860s that their number began to increase notably.35 The Ottoman Empire and the new states that had seceded from its territory were considered “free prey” for foreign grand lodge authorities, which did not have their own masonic grand authorities that would have taken control over the foundation of new lodges. Therefore, the founding of new lodges was mostly initiated by foreigners and inspired by foreign grand lodges.36 This changed to some extent after the establishment of the first domestic grand lodges in the last third of the nineteenth century. These lodges tried to establish themselves within but often also beyond their own national borders.37 As a result of these developments, southeastern Europe and the eastern Mediterranean region became an area in which an array of interests collided when the SGLH came on the scene in 1886, and this lasted into the first decades of the twentieth century.38 Therefore, while the SGLH was able to carry out its activity as a sole actor within the Dual Monarchy, in the “European Orient,” it entered an arena of competing foreign grand lodges, where it tried to expand its sphere of influence over the course of its more than three decades of existence.

The expansion of Hungarian Freemasonry began when Hungarian lodges encouraged the local elites in the southeastern borderland to become Freemasons and establish their own lodges. In 1889, the Lodge Stella Orientalis was founded with the support of the Hungarian Lodge Árpád in Semlin/Zemun (today a district in Belgrade) and later in Pancsova/Pančevo.39 Both cities were border towns in the Habsburg Monarchy on the Danube River, very close to Belgrade. This is why “all the prestigious circles of Belgrade were represented” in the Stella Orientalis, such as the merchants Stojko Obradović and Izsó Neumann.40 This is true of another lodge in Belgrade, Pobratim, on the other side of the Danube River in the Kingdom of Serbia. It was founded as the first lodge of the SGLH outside the Habsburg Monarchy one year after the Stella Orientalis in 1890.41 The two lodges played a key role in Serbian-Hungarian relations. Because of their proximity to each other and their common institutional affiliation, their members, who were predominantly Serbian (though the members from Pancsova were citizens of the Dual Monarchy, while the others were citizens of the Serbian Kingdom), were able to maintain contact and interact without any problems.42 Thus, the members of the two lodges saw an advantage in Freemasonry and their affiliation to the SGLH. However, the question arises as to what motivated the SGLH to promote the founding of lodges outside the monarchy.

It was the lodge Demokrácia (Democracy) in Budapest that had a particularly strong interest in targeting territories in southeastern Europe for Hungarian Freemasonry. It belonged to one of the largest lodges and one that actively worked for social progress. Its program included education of the common man, the promotion of the peasantry, the question of workers, and universal suffrage. It supported the Free School of Social Sciences (Társadalomtudományok Szabadiskolája) and the Galilei Circle (Galilei kör), both of which were meeting places for members of the young intelligentsia.43 The members of Demokrácia were mostly lawyers, journalists, businessmen, bankers, or merchants related to the “Orient” in some way.44 The most important actors among them regarding networking in the Balkans and the Ottoman Empire were the journalist and secretary of the State Industry Association (Országos Iparvédelmi Egyesület) Mór Gelléri (1854–1915), the secretary and later deputy director of the Trade Museum Ármin Sasvári (1853–1924), and the founder and first director of the Orient Trade Academy, the internationally known aforementioned turkologist Kúnos. The first two were also involved in the foundation of the Lodge Pobratim.45 Their connection to some key figures among Serbian academics, politicians, and businessmen, such as politician and literary scholar Svetomir Nikolajević (1844–1922), made the affiliation with the SGLH possible. The first Serbs were admitted to the Hungarian Masonic Union on October 5, 1890 during a celebration which was reported on in detail by Gelléri, who was also the editor of the Masonic magazines Kelet and Orient.46 This meeting took place under the motto of Masonic brotherhood and “Serbian-Hungarian friendship.”47 Sasvári welcomed them with the following greeting:

It is not with suspicion that we look at the progress of Serbia, but we are pleased when it jealously preserves and expands its national character [...]. And again you [the Serbs] turn to us, to your old ally, with whom you fought against the Crescent.48

 

In the meanwhile, the SGLH considered the foundation of the Pobratim as the first step in an expansionist policy of Hungarian Freemasonry into the “Orient.” It referred in its documents to the conquest of Serbia by and for (Hungarian) Freemasonry.49 It believed that “with the Masonic opening of this Lodge a new era will dawn not only in Serbia, but perhaps in the whole Orient for Freemasonry, which will conquer new territories for the victory of our philanthropic principles.”50 The use of terms familiar from colonial discourses, such as “conquest” of the “Orient” and “suitable terrain,” indicated power-based cultural relations. The Hungarian nation was presented in the discourse as bringing “light” in the form of Freemasonry, as well as lofty and progressive principles, to the Serbian soil.51 Thus, the argumentation mixed thinking styles of colonialism and Masonic ideals such as fraternity to justify expansionist undertakings and aims.

In the new century, the intention among Hungarian Freemasons to expand into southeastern Europe was even more explicitly in the foreground. From 1906 onwards, expansion was included as a goal in the annual “work program,” a kind of declaration of intent of the SGLH:52

The most effective factor of masonic ideas is the establishment of new workshops in those Orients [i.e. places] where there is not yet a Lodge, each Lodge shall consider it one of its main tasks, as soon as it is sufficiently strengthened, to unfurl up our flag on the pinnacles of new castles.53

To achieve this goal, the Grand Lodge called upon the Lodges to launch a campaign to acquire the leading men of the society.54 Thus, the SGLH created a suitable climate for further initiatives to found new lodges, such as in Sarajevo, which in the wake of the Austro-Hungarian annexation (1908) was home to a large number of state bureaucrats.55 There, because of the Austrian prohibition, Hungarian Freemasonry again had the privilege to integrate the local elite into the economic and cultural cycle of the Empire, while Austria had to accomplish this task without this effective tool. The SGLH tasked the Budapest Lodge Demokrácia with the foundation of the lodge in the new territory of Austria-Hungary.56 Its members systematically searched for state employees who had been sent to Bosnia and Herzegovina and were open to Freemasonry, such as Mór Gerő, the Director of the Hungarian Commercial Bank in Sarajevo, and Ernő Borda, a Bosnian government engineer.57 The SGLH showed a strong interest in masonic development in the new area, and this clearly reflects the importance of these initiatives. The SGLH did not leave the task of organizing the new lodge to the Zagreb Lodge Ljubav bližnjega, which was also subordinated to the SGLH and wanted to take the foundation of the Sarajevo lodge into its own hands with the permission of the SGLH.58 In this sense, during the preparations in Sarajevo, Demokrácia spoke of “preparing the ground accordingly for further work,” or in other words, “preparing the lay population of these countries for our ideas and institutions [...].”59 After two years of intensive preparations, however, all mention of the Sarajevo project disappears from the archival sources. Further research needs to be done to find out the reasons of its failure. For the moment, all that can be said is that it was related to mobility dynamics.

As a result of the annexation of Bosnia, there was a cooling off between the Serbian and Hungarian Freemasons. Where the preparations were being made to found a lodge in Sarajevo, the members of Demokrácia were busy with another issue regarding the “Orient”: the establishment of a Hungarian-Ottoman masonic network. The exchange between the Hungarian and Ottoman Freemasons began in 1908 with the Young Turk Revolution and the establishment of the Ottoman Grand Orient in 1909.60 These two events were closely intertwined with each other and resulted in a forced change of elites with the rise of the Committee of Union and Progress, the Young Turks’ more and more centralistic and nationalistic branch of power. Since most of the members of this committee were Freemasons in Saloniki and Constantinople/Istanbul (people such as Mehmed Talaat, Midhad Şükrü, and Malıye Nazırı), the establishment of friendly relations with the new Masonic authority was not only a Masonic but also a political act.61

Hungarian-Ottoman Masonic relations intensified at the end of 1909 as a result of a visit of Ottoman Masons to Budapest. In autumn 1909, an Ottoman delegation was traveling through Europe promoting their new government. Many of the Ottomans who were part of this delegation were also Freemasons. Riza Tevfik led the delegation, which included journalists Hasan Tahsin and Samuel Levy and the CUP officer Kâzim Nami Duru. On the Hungarian side, the Grand Master and internist Árpád Bókay, Ignácz Kúnos, the politician and writer Pál Farkas, the chemist Ignácz Pfeiffer, and the aforementioned Ármin Sasvári gave speeches in honor of the guests in Turkish and French. 62 While of course working in the interests of achieving the official aims of their trip, these men were also striving to have the young Ottoman Grand Orient recognized by the European masonic authorities. They also spent a week in Budapest from October 21 to 27, where they were invited to a banquet “in honor of the Ottoman Freemason” at the Hungarian Grand Lodge.63 The meeting resulted in a mutual commitment to cooperation inside and outside the lodges in future. Kâzim Nami Duru, an Ottoman Freemason and an emblematic figure of the Young Turk movement, held an enthusiastic speech to the Hungarian Freemasons in Turkish:

Give us more light! Where should we take this full light from, if not from you, dear Hungarian blood comrades, to whom we are tied indissolubly and inseparably not only by the general and eternal ideas of Freemasonry but also by the relationship of race and language. Come to us, be it to Saloniki or to Istanbul! Our brotherly arms will await you there, long live the Turkish-Hungarian brotherhood, freedom, and equality!64

The view of the Ottoman Freemasons, who considered the Hungarian Freemasons their Hungarian brothers and teachers, corresponded with both the Freemason concept of transnational fraternity and the Hungarian nationalist aspiration to identify the Hungarians as a cultural nation. As a cultural nation, the Hungarian people could assert its claim to the right to play an allegedly civilizing role vis-à-vis its southeastern neighbors. At the same time, this role gave them the right to economic penetration into the areas where they transmitted culture understood in Western terms.65 I discuss this in greater detail below.

The political transformations of the Balkans over the course of the Balkan wars directed the attention of the Hungarian Freemasons to the new states in southeastern Europe. A long article in a 1913 edition of Orient by Ármin Sasvári, one of the best connoisseurs of the region, offers ample testimony to the strong interest among Hungarian Freemasons in the “Balkans.”66 Sasvári had been a student of the famous orientalist and Turkologist Ármin Vámbéry, and he later had worked as a journalist. In 1875, he reported as a war correspondent during the uprising in Herzegovina.67 In 1890, he became the secretary of the Hungarian Trade Museum, where he headed the newly established information office. In 1907, he was made deputy director.68 In Orient, Sasvári analyzed the Balkan Wars and the political developments from the point of view of Hungarian Freemasonry. He also reported on the visit of the Albanian Freemason and politician Dervish Hima (1873–1928), who had conversations with the Hungarian Grand Master and other officials in the Hungarian Freemasonry organizations and pleaded for support for Freemasonry in Albania and an Albanian state against Serbian territorial claims. In this conversation, the Hungarian Freemasons offered to allow the Albanian lodges to work under the SGLH until the establishment of their own grand lodge, and they also provided him with additional contacts in the political sphere.69 This meeting represented the beginning of official Albanian-Hungarian Masonic relations, and the article describes a hitherto unnoticed chapter in Albanian-Hungarian relations as well. Thus, it can be claimed that the SGLH was one of the political puppet masters of Albanian-Hungarian rapprochement, which certainly corresponded with foreign policy developments within the Dual Monarchy,70 since Albania’s independence had been recognized by the great powers at the London Ambassadors’ Conference on July 29, 1913, after long negotiations and with the help of Austria-Hungary.71

On the eve of World War I, a Hungarian freemason lodge called Zoroaster was established in Izmir/Smyrna.72 The city was not only one of the most important trading centers in the Ottoman Empire in the early twentieth century but also a multicultural metropolis73 where many Masonic lodges existed.74 How did a Hungarian lodge get into the Ottoman Empire? The Zoroaster was founded by Christians and Jews of the Ottoman Empire, Austria-Hungary, and Germany and was affiliated with the SGLH.75 The link between Budapest and the Freemasons in Izmir was Josef Kármán, the head of the Hungarian Commercial Bank Inc. Towards 1912, he became the branch director of the bank’s new branch in Izmir. By that time, he had joined the lodge “Neuschloss, a régi hívek” in Budapest,76 whose members were engaged, as he was, in the financial sector.77 All other founding members switched to Zoroaster from the French lodge of the city, which consisted for the most part of Jews.78 According to the Zoroaster member list, its founding members were part of the upper middle class: a doctor, a lawyer, merchants, and Armenian dragomans.79 The Armenians in Izmir maintained a large communication network which linked the various empires, and they controlled trade with Persia.80 New members who joined the lodge in the following years were mostly merchants from Austria-Hungary or Germany or employees of the Hungarian Commercial Bank Inc.81 The lodge was a sort of mixture of an intellectual club and a charitable association where the German-speaking elites of the city gathered. On the other, however, it was a social interest club, where social, spiritual, and even business practices could be cultivated.

Imperial Freemasonry?

What does imperial Freemasonry constitute? Several aspects of Freemasonry in Austria-Hungary suggest that it should be understood as imperial Freemasonry. The first is simply its expansionist undertakings, i.e., the establishment of lodges outside the state borders. The Pobratim, the Zoroaster, and the failed attempt to found a lodge in Sarajevo are examples of this. These practices were accompanied, on the one hand, by discourses of egalitarian Masonic brotherhood and, on the other, by discourses of cultural superiority and a civilizing mission. The inclusive principle of fraternal equality made the Masonic lodges attractive for non-Hungarians too, both in an ethnic and political sense, as the lodges seemed to function at least in part as sites where elites could come together and exchange ideas regardless of ethnic-national, confessional, or social boundaries.

At the same time, Hungarian Freemasonry cherished the claim of ethical-intellectual leadership. They divided the world into two parts from a cultural-civilizational point of view: one in which Freemasonry was already established and flourishing and one in which this form of community and social practice was not yet known or established. One recalls the passage cited earlier in this essay form an article Orient according to which the “South Slavic” parts of the monarchy were “a prototype of such civilizational neglect.” This imagined cultural hegemony led the Hungarian Freemasons to see the “Orient” as a culturally fallow area that was eager to be cultivated. Hence, they interpreted the foundation of the first Hungarian lodges in the southeastern territories of the monarchy and outside as “conquests” for “the royal art.”82 This interpretation made Freemasonry compatible with the colonial discourse of the Dual Monarchy, which justified expansion by reference to an alleged civilizing mission.83 While the Dual Monarchy quickly abandoned its colonialist goals in Africa, it clearly pursued imperialist goals in the “European Orient” through political influence and economic-cultural practices.84 These undertakings and discourses used in various bodies in Austria-Hungary with regards to the lands on its southeastern borders have been examined in the secondary literature under the banners of micro-colonialism,85 border colonialism,86 and Orientalism.87

However, exclusively Hungarian endeavors can be identified by means of Freemason sources that go beyond Freemasonry. They were characterized by cultural or economic asymmetric relations, and thus they can be interpreted as imperial practices. Indeed, the informal politics practiced by Hungarian Freemasons, especially towards the “European Orient,” reached its peak in the High Imperialism in the years before and during World War I.

Despite the (narrowly interpreted) ban on politics, independent Hungarian Freemasonry interfered both in domestic and foreign affairs in the interests of Hungarian politics. The prerequisite for this was that by the turn of the century the SGLH had become a significant player both in Hungarian society and in Central and Southeastern Europe. It acted with other Masonic major authorities as well as with actors from other fields to achieve certain common political goals, such as the secularization of the state.88 This can be seen in the fusion of political motives with Masonic ones in the Hungarian-Ottoman Masonic friendship. The same socio-political goals and similarly understood political ideals played an important role in the fact that a relationship of trust quickly developed between the two Freemasonries. For instance, the Freemasons took up the cause of secularism in Hungary and in the Ottoman Empire.89 In addition, there was also a strong connection understood culturally, historically, and economically that went beyond the Masonic concept of brotherhood. And again, it was Sasvári who talked about the Hungarian-Turkish (Ottoman) relationship and about the potential for future cooperation between the two nations on the basis of Masonic ideas and this strong friendship:

 

We proclaim Turkish-Hungarian solidarity. When the nation, being the defensive wall of Christianity, reaches out to the Turkish nation, which strides on top of the Mohammedan word, so it gives a shining example for Freemasonry, which will be universal, if all the nations embrace one another without race and faith.90

 

In this extract, as in the abovementioned speech given by Kâzim Nami Duru (who spoke about “Hungarian blood comrades”), the idea of Turanism resonates, and this was an idea which, given its cultural and economic overtones, received a strong boost at the time in Hungary.91 Turanism formed the ideal basis of Turkish-Hungarian Masonic rapprochement. Scientific, political, and idealistic arguments concerning the alleged common “descent,” common national interests, and shared masonic philosophy intertwined. The purpose of Turanism was to strengthen the Hungarian cultural, political, and especially economic presence in the Balkans and in the Ottoman Empire, or, as historian Balázs Ablonczy notes in his monograph, “to colonize with love.”92 It meant the alleged mutual strengthening of common interests and treating the Ottoman Empire and Balkan states as equals. In the scholarship on Turanism, it has been presented as a kind of “Hungarian imperialism.” 93

This rapprochement, the prelude to which was the Ottoman-Hungarian Masonic meeting in Budapest in 1909, took place without consultation with Vienna. On the official political level, such a meeting between Hungary and the Ottoman Empire would have been unthinkable, first and foremost because of Hungary’s legal status but also because of the international political mood after the annexation crisis (1908), in the wake of which Austria-Hungary found itself increasingly isolated. Thus, despite the cultural and economic aspects, the rapprochement of the Masons of the two nations (the Hungarians and the Ottoman Turks) has to be evaluated primarily as a political act. There are other arguments in favor of a political reading of Ottoman-Hungarian Masonic relations. Even if, on the Hungarian side, high-ranking political officials were only indirectly involved in this Freemason network, the network certainly gave them greater political agency. In addition, deputies such Pál Farkas (1878–1921), who was later the “representative” of the Ottoman Grand Orient, were active players in the rapprochement. Farkas was an assimilated Jew and belonged to the circle around István Tisza and his conservative-nationalist party, Nemzeti Munkáspárt, or National Workers’ Party. In the literary field, he published in Új idők (New Times), a journal edited by Ferenc Herczeg (and founded by his stepfather’s publishing house), and later Magyar Figyelő (Hungarian Watchman), which represented conservative, nationalist political, social, and artistic values.94 Farkas prepared and nurtured the cooperative initiatives by making himself available as a contact person between the two major authorities.95

The entanglement of politics and Freemasonry in the Ottoman-Hungarian Masonic network became even more evident during World War I, when the two states became official allies.96 World War I also showed the political impotence of Freemasonry, which was unable to use Masonic ideals to transcend these frontlines. The international Freemason landscape shifted dramatically. Different camps emerged along the frontlines, and the Grand Lodges of the opposing states engaged in war propaganda.97 Hungarian Freemasonry was no exception.98 Only when the new emperor of Austria-Hungary adopted a new policy aimed at making peace was Hungarian Freemasonry able to carry out its political activity behind the scenes, exploring the conditions of a special peace with the help of its international networks.99

At the Ottoman-Hungarian Freemason meeting in 1909, the Freemasons of the two Empires promised to support each other inside the lodges and in the economic sphere. These pledges were not merely empty rhetoric, as revealed by a journey taken by a Hungarian to Istanbul and Saloniki, which included masonic meetings.100 This shows that many Freemasons, who were industrialists, factory owners, representatives of particular interest groups, and economic experts and who formed a prominent part of Hungary’s new bourgeois elite, used their transnational Masonic networks to improve Hungary’s economic position within the Monarchy.101 Through the informal channels of freemasonry, they were able to circumnavigate the “matters of common interest” that were supposed to ensure a common economic policy directed from Vienna. Furthermore, mutual visits by the Ottoman and Hungarian Freemasons (for instance in 1909 and 1910) served to further “Masonic fraternization,” and, in connection with this, to strengthen economic ties. Gelléri was again on this trip, and he reported on the results to the Hungarian Masonic audience and the whole journey. While the report in Orient was about the Masonic meetings, where the most important representatives of the Ottoman politics and economic life were also present,102 the report for the lay readership was about the practical implementation of the “Hungarian-Turkish friendship,” especially in the field of economics and education:

 

I will only say that the Young Turks, as well as the leaders of the government and the authorities, have always emphasized that it is time not only to promote Hungarian-Turkish friendship in words, but to realize it practically in the field of the economy, for the benefit of both nations. Men such as Nazim Bey, Riza Tevfik, Kiazim Nami Bey, Taxim Bey, Adil, Huszni, and others who are leaders of public life in Saloniki and who hold the political and social leadership of the Young Turkish Movement in their hands, have expressed their fullest support for this.103

The practical implementation of “Hungarian-Turkish friendship” in the “field of the economy” corresponded with the plans of the SGLH after the trip, which organized the training of many Ottoman and later Albanian youths in Hungarian industry. This was clearly the result of this cooperative endeavor, which Hungarian Freemasons not only organized, but also made possible financially.104

Conclusion

Following Harland-Jacobs, in this essay I have considered the extent to which the Hungarian Freemasons could be considered builders of the Habsburg Empire. There was a fundamental contradiction in Hungarian Freemasonry from this point of view: a tension between national and supranational ambitions, as it was structurally doubly embedded in the Hungarian political nation and the Dual Monarchy. Therefore, Hungarian Freemasonry was closely connected with both imperial and national traditions. Freemasons from all over the empire gathered in the lodges regardless of ethnic-confessional or national affiliations, and this was perceived as something which enriched the federation. The members felt committed primarily to their respective political nations, but the imperial framework was never questioned. It accepted as a given context which allowed greater room for movement and development in business, politics, education, and so on. The rhetoric and actions of many lodges and freemasons show that they wanted to strengthen Hungary’s position within the Monarchy, but at the same time, they staged Hungary as an imperial player in geopolitical terms in particular toward the Balkans and the Ottoman Empire while still functioning within and not challenging the dualist framework. This interpretation corresponds with the findings of much of the research in New Imperial History, which examines “imperializing nation-states” and “nationalizing empires,” because both forms of rule appropriated elements of power maintenance and expansion from each other..105 Thus, it calls into question any strict distinction between empire and nation-state in the nineteenth century.

The networking and the founding of lodges of the SGLH in the “Orient” were interpreted as acts of Masonic fraternization but also as a way of “bringing light” to the cultures on the periphery. Thus, they corresponded with the soft-colonial and imperial discourses and practices of the monarchy. The difference was that it was the Hungarian, not the Austrians, who were the leading power in the Freemasonry in the Habsburg Monarchy, and the Freemason center was Budapest, not Vienna. The Hungarian freemasons were agents of Masonic diplomacy. In this context, the personal discursive entanglements as well as the entanglements of practices among freemasonry, politics, economics, and culture toward the “Orient” reveal the very imperialistic attitude of Hungarian Freemasonry.

So, can the Freemasons be considered “Builders of Empire”? My answer to the question is that the Hungarian Freemasons saw themselves as the “Empire Builders” of a specific Hungarian imperialism. They neither sought nor intended to break the balance that had been created by the Compromise of 1867, because they saw their existence within the Monarchy, but they still demanded more and more independence, and they used the Masonic networks to pursue national interests. A history of Hungarian Freemasonry which examines these entanglements can convincingly demonstrate tendencies and aspirations for more autonomy without necessarily exaggerating them. Although the Hungarian political elite, which liked to see in Dualism the myth of independence and the equal status of Budapest and Vienna, apparently did not use all the tools at its disposal to help shape foreign policy, its activities along the unofficial channels of Freemasonry, especially from the beginning of the twentieth century, reveal clearly that it nonetheless made some efforts in this direction. Thus, I would suggest that future studies on Austria-Hungary should perceive Hungary as an actor within the framework of New Imperial History and should draw on new sources, beyond the classical sources of diplomacy and politics, that have not been considered so far.

Archival Sources

Magyar Nemzeti Levéltár Országos Levéltára [Hungarian State Archive] (MNL OL)

P 1083-38-XLVI Demokrácia

P 1106-1 Demokrácia. Ügyviteli iratok

P 1083-38-XLV Idegen jelzetű iratok

P 1083-38-VIII Neuschloss, a Régi Hívek (Budapest)

P 1083-38-CXXI Zoroaster (Smyrna)

 

Newspapers and journals

Honi Ipar

Kelet

Orient

Pesti Napló

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1 Jörn Leonhard and Ulrike Hirschhausen and also Pieter M. Judson in his “new history” of the Habsburg Empire write about “imperializing nation-states” and “nationalizing empires.” They argue against a strict distinction between empire and nation-state in the nineteenth century. Kerstin Jobst, Julia Obertreis, and Ricarda Vulpius argue in their article for a multifocal rather than a two-dimensional view of Eastern European empires, while Claudia Kraft, Alf Lüdtke, Jürgen Martschukat, and, elsewhere, Johannes Feichtinger call for rethinking colonialism and imperialism from the perspective of Eastern European state structures. By introducing the concept of micro-colonialism, they want to break down dichotomies such as center-periphery. They consider that there was not a single empire-wide colonial discourse, but different bearers of power. In the same volume by Claudia Kraft et al., Anna Weronika Wendland makes Orientalism as a form of cultural colonialism fruitful for her argumentation in order to show the relativity and constructedness of metropolis and periphery. See Jobst et al., “Neuere Imperiumsforschung in der Osteuropäischen Geschichte”; Judson, The Habsburg Empire; Kraft et al., “Einleitung: Kolonialgeschichten”; Feichtinger et al., Habsburg postcolonial; Feichtinger, “Komplexer k.u.k. Orientalismus”; Wendland, “Randgeschichten?”

2 Romsics, “A magyar birodalmi gondolat,” 124.

3 Demeter, “A modernizációtól a kolonizációs törekvésekig”; Csaplár-Degovics, “A századfordulós Közép- és Délkelet-Európa értelmezési lehetőségei globális perspektívából”; Csaplár-Degovics and Jusufi, Das ungarisch-albanische Wörterbuch von Zoltán László (1913).

4 Csaplár-Degovics, “A századfordulós Közép- és Délkelet-Európa értelmezési lehetőségei globális perspektívából,” 154; Demeter, “A modernizációtól a kolonizációs törekvésekig,” 287.

5 Csaplár-Degovics, “A századfordulós Közép- és Délkelet-Európa értelmezési lehetőségei globális perspektívából,” 154.

6 Harland-Jacobs, Builders of empire.

7 Donia, Islam under the Double Eagle, 9; Schöllgen and Kießling, Das Zeitalter des Imperialismus, 3.

8 Erdélyi, “A Keleti Kereskedelmi Akadémia és az orientalisták: tudomány, a gazdaság és a politika interakciója.”

9 Reinalter, “Die historischen Ursprünge und die Anfänge der Freimaurerei“; Bogdan and Snoek, Handbook of Freemasonry.

10 Reinalter, Die Freimaurer, 128–29.

11 On the early development of modern Freemasonry, see Bogdan and Snoek, Handbook of Freemasonry.

12 L. Nagy, Szabadkőművesek, 15–16.

13 Aigner, A szabadkőművesség története Magyaraországon; Berényi, A szabadkőművesség kézikönyve, 101–3.

14 For a general view of the Habsburg Freemasonry at the time of Enlightens, see Seewann, “Freimaurer (Ungarn).”

15 According to the Constitution of James Andersen (1723/1738, London), the members of the lodges were not allowed to politicize within the lodges. Budde, Blütezeit des Bürgertums, 18; Reinalter, Die Freimaurer, 53–54; Bogdan, “The Sociology of the Construct of Tradition and Import of Legitimacy in Freemasonry,” 218–19.

16 Budde, Blütezeit des Bürgertums, 15–17; Michaud, “Felvilágosodás, szabadkőművesség és politika a 18. század végén.”

17 Seewann, “Freimaurer (Ungarn),” in Lexikon Zur Geschichte Südosteuropas, 240.

18 Koselleck, Kritik und Krise, 68, 74.

19 Berényi, A szabadkőművesség kézikönyve, 82–84.

20 Vári, “Magyar szabadkőművesség külföldön.”

21 L. Nagy, Szabadkőművesek, 54.

22 Ibid., 51.

23 “A nyolcvanéves király.” Kelet, August, 1910, 295.

24 The lodges in non-Protestant countries began to interfere in politics in the nineteenth century through manifestos and acts committed under the banner of liberal nationalism and secularism. This caused conflicts and fractures in the international Masonic landscape. In 1815, the Grand Lodge of England amended Andersen’s constitution to make belief in an explicitly Christian God a condition of membership. As a result, a great dispute arose over faith. This resulted in the Grand Orient de France amending its own constitution in 1877 to remove any reference to faith. L. Nagy, 48–49.

25 L. Nagy, 55.

26 “Oda kellene törekednünk, hogy társadalom minden rétegéből igyekezzünk az alkalmas anyagot kiválasztva, ügyünknek megnyerni.” [We should strive to select the appropriate material from every social stratum and win it for our cause]. “Marcel Neuschloss XII. Rendes közgyűlés” Kelet, April, 15, 77.

27 Buchen and Rolf, “Eliten und ihre imperialen Biographien,” 14–15.

28 Patai, The Jews of Hungary, 195.

29 Karády, “Asszimiláció és társadalmi krízis. A magyar-zsidó társadalomtörténet konjunkturális vizsgálatához”; Karády, “Elitenbildung im multiethnischen und multikonfessionalen Nationalstaat.”

30 McCagg, A history of Habsburg Jews, 192.

31 Sdvižkov, Das Zeitalter der Intelligenz, 231.

32 “Bericht der Symbolischen Großloge von Ungarn über das Jahr 1896.” Orient, March, 25, 1897, 31.

33 Berger, “Europäische Freimaurereien (1850–1935)”; Berger, “‘un institution cosmopolite?’ Rituelle Grenzziehungen im freimaurerischen Internationalismus um 1900.”

34 Berger, “Europäische Freimaurereien,” 25–30.

35 See Lennhoff et al., Internationales Freimaurer-Lexikon; Grimm, “Freimaurer (SO-Europa ohne Ungarn)”; Boogert, “Freemasonry ın Eıghteenth-Century Izmir?”; Beaurepaire, “Le cosmopolitisme maçonnique.”

36 Paul Dumont writes of Ottoman Freemasonry in the nineteenth as a “by-product of Western penetration.” Cf. Dumont, “Freemasonry in Turkey: a by-product of Western penetration,” 481–82.

37 Marković, Freemasonry in Southeast Europe; Dumont, Osmanlıcılık, ulusçu akımlar, ve Masonluk, 93.

38 Conti, “From Brotherhood to Rivalry. The Grand Orient of Italy and the Balkan and Danubian Europe Freemasonrees”; Žugić, “I Garibaldini e la fondazione della prima Loggia in Serbia,” 84.

39 The Árpád, located in Szeged, organized Freemasonry in several towns in southern Hungary, such as Szabadka, Zombor and Orsova. “Bericht der Symbolischen Großloge von Ungarn über das Jahr 1889.“ Orient, March, 1890, 93–94; Péter, “A szabadkőművesség Szegeden,” 265.

40 A “‘Stella Orientalis’ páholy felavatási ünnepélye.” Kelet, January, 24, 5. Palatinus, A szabadkőművesség bűnei, 245.

41 “Eine neue Loge in Belgrad.” Orient, October, 1890, 224.

42 Kelet, 12, no. 1 (1900): 5.

43 Pataky and Dzubay, “A szabadkmves szervezetek levéltára,” 107. Demokrácia Páholy, 117, 119.

44 MOL P 1083-I-38-XLVI Demokrácia Páholy, Névjegyzék 1912.

45 MOL 1106-1 Demokrácia Tagok felvételi kérelmei, anyakönyvei (Életrajz, jellemzések) no.292; Mór Gelléri, “Eine neue Loge in Belgrad.” Orient 12, no. 10 (1900): 222–26.

46 Ibid.

47 Orient 12, no. 10 (1900): 223.

48 “Nicht mit Misstrauen Blicken wir auf den Fortschritt Serbiens, sondern wir freuen uns, wenn es seine nationale Eigenart eifersüchtig bewahrt und erweitert […]. Und wieder wendet ihr [die Serben] an uns, an eurem alten Verbündeten, mit dem ihr gemeinsam gegen den Halbmond gestritten.” Orient 12, no. 10 (1900): 225.

49 “Bericht der Symbolischen Großloge von Ungarn über das Jahr 1890.” Orient 3, no.1 (1891): 10

50 “mit der fr[ei]m[aure]rischen Eröffnung dieser Loge nicht nur in Serbien, sondern vielleicht im ganzen Orient eine neue Aera für die Fr[ei]m[aure]rei heranbrechen werde, welche zum Siege unserer menschenfreundlichen Prinzipien neue Gebiete erobern wird.” Orient 3, no. 1 (1891): 10.

51 “Wie wir [die ungarische Freimaurerei] in ihr [in der Pobratim] nicht nur eine neue Loge sehen, sondern weil hier davon Rede ist, dass wir das für die Fr[ei]m[aure]rei so geeignete serbische Terrain unserer kön.[igliche] Kunst erobern“ sondern “im benachbarten Königreiche eine neue Aera eröffnen.” Ibid.

52 “Arbeitsprogramm 1906.” Orient, October 20, 1906, 255; “Arbeitsprogramm.” Orient September 30, 1907, 223.

53 “Der wirksamste Faktor der freimaurerischen Ideen ist die Errichtung neuer Werkstätte in solchen Orienten [d.h. Orte], wo es noch keine Loge besteht, jede Loge betrachte es als eine ihrer Hauptaufgaben, sobald sie genügend erstarkt ist, unsere Fahne auf der Zirne neuer Burgen aufzupflanzen.” Arbeitsprogramm, 20. Oktober 1906. Orient October 20, 1906, 255.

54 Ibid.

55 Malcolm, Geschichte Bosniens, 175–76.

56 “Aus dem Jahresbericht der Loge Demokrácia.” Orient January 18, 1909, 50.

57 MOL P 1083-38-XLVI Demokrácia Páholy, A Demokrácia páholy jelentése az 1909. Évről. Bp, 1910, 23; MOL P 1083-38-XLVI Demokrácia Páholy, member list 1912.S 8, Palatinus A szabadkőművesség bűnei, 103.

58 “Sitzung des Bundesrates am 18. Januar 1909” Orient January 18, 1909, 14.

59 “Boden für die weitere Arbeit entsprechend zu bearbeiten […] die profane Bevölkerung dieser Länder auf unsere Ideen und Institutionen vorzubereiten […].“ Brief der Loge Demokrácia an die Loge Pobratim P 1106-1.

60 “Sitzungen des Bundesrates am 26 April.” Orient April 26, 1909, 143; Letter from the Ottoman Grand Orient to the SGLH on November 16, 1909. MOL P 1083-38-XLV Idegen páholy jelzetű iratok.

61 For the entanglements of Freemasons and the CUP, see Hanioğlu, “Freemasons and Young Turks”; Iacovella, Gönye ve hilal İttihad-Terakki ve Masonluk; Koloğlu, Ittihatçılar ve masonluk; Hanioğlu, The Young Turks in opposition, 39.

62 “Festrede zu Ehren der türkischen Brüder.” Orient, October 22, 1909, 274–84.

63 Ibid.

64 Orient, October 22 ,1909, 277.

65 Hidvégi, Anschluss an den Weltmarkt, 341.

66 Orient, February 3, 1913, 47–54.

67 “A szandzsák megszállása 1879 augusztus havában.” Pesti Napló, November 3, 1912, 38.

68 Szinnyei, “Sasvári Ármin.”

69 Orient, February 3, 1913, 52–53.

70 Milo, “Politika austro-hungareze ndaj Shqiperisë nëvitet 1914–1918,” 21; Csaplár-Degovics, “Lajos Thallóczy an Albanian Historiograpphy,” 122–23; Csaplár-Degovics, “Az első magyar–albán szótár születése.”

71 Scheer, “Österreich-Ungarns Besatzungsregime in Südosteuropa im Ersten Weltkrieg und Albanische Fragen,” 294.

72 “A szabadkőműves országgyűlés.” Kelet May, 1914, 7. For a first analysis, see Turóczy, “Freimaurerei: ausgrenzende Entgrenzung?”

73 Nezihi and Üyepazarcı, İzmir‘in tarihi; Smyrnelis, Smyrne, la ville oubliée?

74 Dumont, Osmanlıcılık, ulusçu akımlar, ve Masonluk, 88.

75 MOL P 1083 38./CXXI, Zoroaster.

76 MOL P. 1083-38-VIII Neuschloss, a Régi Hívek.

77 Pataky and Dzubay, “A szabadkőműves szervezetek levéltára,” 39.

78 MOL P 1083 38./CXXI; Dumont 2000, S. 88.

79 The members were: Angelo Margulies, Josef Kármán, Stephan Avedikián, Jules Szilvassy, Josef Margulies, Bernath Burger, Albert Tarica, Vadis Bardisbanian, Jaques Ungar, Ornik Zakian, and Max Watzke. MOL P 1083 38./CXXI.

80 Schmitt, Levantiner, 223.

81 MOL P 1083 38./CXXI, Zoroaster, 51.

82 Orient, January, 1891, 10.

83 Loidl, “Europa ist zu enge geworden,” 9.

84 Bilgeri, “Österreich-Ungarn im Konzert der Kolonialmächte.”

85 Wendland, “Imperiale, koloniale und postkoloniale Blicke auf die Peripherien des Habsburgerreiches.”

86 Gingrich, “The Nearby Frontier: Structural Analyses of Myths of Orientalism.”

87 Kraft et al., “Einleitung: Kolonialgeschichten”; Ruthner, “Kakakniens kleiner Orient.”

88 “Sitzung des Bundesrates am 6. März.” Orient, March, 6, 1905,86–87; “Protokoll der am 7. Und 8. April 1906 abgehaltenen XXI. Ord. Grossversammlung der Symbolischen Grossloge von Ungarn.” Orient, April 8, 1906, 8–9.

89 The speech held by Rıza Tevfik offers one example. Tevfik was a Bektashi leader and Freemason as well. In his speech, he made the following proclamation: “We want to put an end to the secular rule of the church and we strive to make religious conviction a private matter of every citizen.” [Wir wollen die weltliche Herrschaft der Kirche ein Ende machen und wir streben danach, daß die religiöse Überzeugung zur Privatsache jedes Bürgers werde.]. Orient, October 22, 1909, 281. For the Hungarian attitude, see A Demokrácia páholy jelentése az 1909. évről. MOL P 1083-38-XLVI Demokrácia, 23.

90 “Verkünden wir also die türkisch-ungarische Solidarität. Wenn die Nation, die so viele Jahre lang die Schutzmauer der Christentheit gewesen ist, dem an der Spitze der mohammedanischer Welt schreitenden türkischen Volke die Hand reicht, dann geben sie der Freimaurerei ein glänzendes Beispiel, die nur dann universell werden wird, wenn alle Völker der Erde einander umarmen, ohne Unterschied der Rasse und des Glaubens!” Orient, October 22, 1909, 277.

91 Turanism, an idea of that the Turkic peoples once had a common homeland, has its origins among the Hungarian Orientalists, especially Lajos Thallóczy and Ármin Vámbéry. In the nineteenth century, Turanism was an idea which meant different things to different people, but it was definitely a “hit,” not only in the Ottoman Empire but also among the (allegedly) related peoples. The strongest voice was from the Turáni Tásrsaság, or “Turanian Association,” which was founded 1910 and which enjoyed the support of the Hungarian government. Ablonczy, Keletre, magyar!; Fodor, Hungary between East and West The Ottoman Turkish Legacy; Fodor, “A Konstantinápolyi Magyar Tudományos Intézet,” 413–16. For more research on the Hungarian-Ottoman relationship in the main years of the “Turanian vision,” see Fodor, “A Konstantinápolyi Magyar Tudományos Intézet megalapítása.”

92 Ablonczy, Keletre, magyar!, 61.

93 Demeter, “A modernizációtól a kolonizációs törekvésekig,” 315.

94 Balázs, Az intellektualitás vezérei, 40.

95 “Sitzung des Bundesrates am 25 April.” Orient, April 25, 1909, 143; Farkas Staatsstreich und Gegenrevolution in der Türkei, 31–33.

96 Ağaoğlu, Müttefik devletlerin büyük localar toplantisi Berlin 1918.

97 Berger, Mit Gott, für Vaterland und Menschheit?, 266–81.

98 Bókay, “Die ungarische Freimaurerei und der Weltkrieg. Rede des Grossmeisters in der Grossversammlung der Symb Grossloge von Ungarn am 30. Oktober 1915.” Orient, October 30, 1915, 2.

99 Berényi, “A magyar szabadkőművesség béke-kísérletei.”

100 “Aus dem Bundesrate am 25. Mai 1910. Besuch in türkischen Logen.” Orient, May 25, 1910, 137–39.

101 Sasvári, Ármin Balkán szerződéseink és iparunk, Honi Ipar, Oktober 1, 1908, 4.

102 “Gelléri, Mór, Ungarische Brüder in der Türkei.” In: Orient 22, no.5 (1910): 148–150.

103 Mór Gelléri, “Ausflug ungarischer Industriellen und Händler in die Türkei.” Magyar Ipar, May 15, 1910, 465.

104 MOL P 1106-1 Demokrácia ügyviteli iratok; Brief von Gelléri Mór an den Großmeister der Symbolischen Großloge von Ungarn. Öffentliches Rundschreiben; ibid. Török ifjak elhelyezésének terve; Gelléri Mór, “Bosnyák, török és albán ifjak a magyar iparban.” Honi Ipar, January 4, 1914, 7–8.

105 Leonhard and Hirschhausen, Empires und Nationalstaaten im 19. Jahrhundert, 12.

2022_2_Sven Mörsdorf

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The Prochaska Affair Revisited: Towards a Revaluation of Austria-Hungary’s Balkan Consuls

Sven Mörsdorf
European University Institute, Florence
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Hungarian Historical Review Volume 11 Issue 2  (2022):305-328 DOI 10.38145/2022.2.305

Consuls and consular diplomacy in the long nineteenth century are enjoying a growing interest across various historiographies. This article explores the prominent case of the Austro-Hungarian consul Oskar Prochaska in an effort to offer insight into consular officials as actors of diplomacy and empire in a Habsburg setting. Prochaska, who famously got caught up in a major diplomatic crisis during the First Balkan War in 1912, has never been studied as a protagonist in the events that came to be known as the Prochaska Affair. This calls for an analysis of Prochaska’s diplomatic activity as consul, understood here as his social interaction with his counterparts and adversaries on the ground in Prizren, Kosovo. Adopting a local perspective on a crisis of European and global importance, the article argues for a revaluation of consuls and their bureaucracy as a promising subject for cultural and social histories of the Habsburg Empire and its foreign policy, both in the Balkans and around the world.

Keywords: diplomacy, consuls, Balkan Wars 1912–13, Serbia, Austria-Hungary

Story

It began with a mistake. When Oskar Prochaska, the Habsburg representative in Prizren, heard of the approaching horrors of the battlefield, he should have known better than to write any letters home. In the early days of the First Balkan War, the consul should have realized that his courier could be intercepted and his correspondence seized. This is indeed what happened on October 24, 1912 on the road between Prizren and the post office at Ferizovik (Ferizaj, Ferizović/Uroševac).1 That afternoon in Kosovo, the finer points of diplomatic custom did not impress a Serbian cavalry patrol. Nor did civilian concerns have much bearing on the soldiers’ superiors. They broke the seals and read the letters. Any resistance, any information that could aid the enemy, had to be suppressed.2 With his own written words, the consul, too, had revealed himself to be an enemy.

A week later, when Serbian forces finally reached Prizren, Prochaska may have anticipated what was coming. Unlike his Russian colleague, the only other foreign consul who had stayed behind, Prochaska did not greet the new rulers at the gates, nor did he show up at their celebrations of victory, waiting instead for instructions from Vienna to arrive. As time went by, none would. The Serbian military now controlled all lines of communication between the war zone and the world. Or rather, all means except for word of mouth. Rumors spread through town and country: Had the Austrian consul organized resistance, handed out weapons to the locals? Had shots been fired from the attic of his consulate, had the consul even fired at the Serbian soldiers himself? In Prizren, there were people willing to attest to this, and Prochaska’s silence seemed to confirm his guilt. So did his hiding behind the consulate’s high walls and his refusal to visit with the new commanding general, Božidar Janković, or any Serb official.3 With his own lack of action, the stranded diplomat had isolated himself even more.

Meanwhile, the consul’s lost letters traveled up their captors’ chain of command, from desk to desk and from Kosovo to Belgrade, and briefly even to Saint Petersburg.4 The many officers, government officials, and diplomats who saw them never publicly acknowledged their existence. What precisely it was that Prochaska wrote to his mother in Vienna and his brother in Brno (Brünn) is not known, but a Serbian internal report summarizes what irritated the letters’ unintended audience so much: “Mr. Prohaska [...] says that our army bombed and set fire to Priština and massacred its inhabitants, that Serbs and Montenegrins are die Wilden, and many other untruths.”5 This says it all. Frank in expression and careless in delivery, Prochaska’s words betrayed his private feelings to a very partial public in the Serbian military and government, convincing “the savages” as he called them that the rumors of his scheming must be true.

But the consul Prochaska is not remembered only for having penned these outrageous letters. He is remembered as the man who caused the Prochaska Affair, a major diplomatic crisis on the European stage.6 Much like the precise contents of his letters, the details of his activity on the ground have remained elusive, and the local roots of the conflict remain unexplained. Cut off as he was from the world beyond Prizren, Prochaska found himself on his own and, as we will see, unable to cope. The world, in turn, began to wonder what had happened to Prochaska. Once again, rumors arose, but this time in Austria-Hungary and in the press, and now it was the consul who was portrayed as the victim. Had Prochaska been detained, insulted, injured, even executed? Had he—the most sensational claim of all—been castrated by the Serbs?7

For several weeks in the winter of 1912, war over the consul’s sad fate seemed imminent and necessary to many in the Dual Monarchy. The passions stirred across the Habsburg Empire, and across Serbia in defiant reply, had turned a matter of diplomatic discretion into a raging public spectacle.8 While the two governments’ internal investigations were conducted behind closed doors, Europe looked on in sympathy with one side or the other. By the time it transpired that Prochaska was well and unharmed, just as the Serbs had always maintained, the public agitation so long in the making would not simply go away. It turned against the Habsburg elites, especially the foreign minister and his top officials, who appeared as warmongers and bullies against their tiny, innocent neighbor. Indeed, the pressure that Vienna had put on its adversaries in Belgrade forced them to back down. The Serbian government issued a public apology for its share in the escalation and quietly abandoned its most coveted aim, which was to gain a harbor on the Adriatic.9 In effect, however, this momentary victory cost the Habsburgs dearly. It antagonized the Serbs even further and deepened the impression already prevalent, both among European diplomats and in the public eye, that the Dual Monarchy always tried to cheat and manipulate its smaller Balkan rivals.10

Context

The Prochaska Affair shaped the political outcome of the Balkan War of 1912 for Austria-Hungary and Serbia and thus brought both one step closer to the Great War of 1914. Accordingly, Prochaska’s name is found in many histories of Austro-Hungarian foreign policy, Habsburg-Serbian relations, and the build-up to World War I, though it is usually mentioned only in passing.11 Apart from scattered references, very little original and in-depth work on the Prochaska Affair was published over the course of the past century. Moreover, there has hardly been any interest in Oskar Prochaska (1876–1945), the man and diplomat, so much so that he does not appear as a historical actor in the scholarship, or even just as an active participant in his own story.

Most traditional histories of Austro-Hungarian foreign relations and the power politics of empire, even if they consider seemingly remote and unimportant places such as Prizren at all,12 would still not pay much attention to people like Prochaska because he was merely a consul.13 The reasons for this neglect seem to lie in the late-Habsburg period itself. Even though, by the turn of the twentieth century, consular activity had long since become essential to the conduct of diplomacy, with hundreds of imperial-and-royal consulates dotting the globe,14 consular officials generally could not hope to be perceived as fully competent diplomats. As members of a predominantly bourgeois institution, most consuls were separated from their blue-blooded superiors by a wide social gulf in a division that reflected Habsburg society at large.15 Later observers, frequently drawing on anecdotal evidence, were led to believe that the rigid social hierarchies that pervaded the Habsburg foreign service precluded most consuls not only from socializing with their aristocratic “betters” (which is accurate)16 but also from engaging in actual diplomatic work.

Today, as actor-centric and socially-informed biographic approaches to diplomacy are gaining traction, historians are finally ready to perceive consuls as diplomats and actors of empire.17 Social practices and micro-level interactions come into focus, raising large-scale questions about the relations between “society,” “state,” and “empire” beyond the outdated national paradigm.18 Further inspiration can be found in new histories of the state administration. Here, too, scholars increasingly study state officials as actors, both individually and collectively.19 All three branches of the Habsburg foreign service (the central ministry; the diplomatic service; and the consular service) were part of the same bureaucratic organization and, as such, must be studied together. The hundreds of foreign-service officials employed in Vienna; at embassies and diplomatic missions; and at consulates answered to a common hierarchical structure and worked towards shared objectives, at least ideally.20 That said, the foreign service was anything but lifeless and monolithic.21 Consuls, whose numbers grew rapidly from the mid-nineteenth century onwards, added to the diversity of this bureaucracy and the Habsburg civil service at large with their varied backgrounds, skills, and career trajectories.22

There is now a growing interest in consuls across different historiographies.23 Notably, in the context of the Balkans in the long nineteenth century, Holly Case’s argument that the activity of foreign consuls in the Ottoman Empire led to a “quiet revolution” of the international order deserves wide discussion.24 When it comes to Austria-Hungary, however, studies focused specifically on consular diplomacy, the consular bureaucracy, and consuls as agents of formal and informal empire are still few and far between. A quick review of important exceptions (Nicole Phelps writing on transatlantic migration and international law, Alison Frank Johnson on emotions and honor codes, Barbara Haider-Wilson on transnational entanglements, and Ellinor Forster on intermediaries and knowledge production) serves to underscore the potential of the field.25

Given that the primary direction of Austria-Hungary’s imperial ambitions faced to the southeast, any exploration of Habsburg consuls as political actors should take into account the Balkan-Mediterranean region in which Prochaska and his colleagues were engaged.26 So far, the great importance of this region to the k.u.k. imperial project contrasts with a dearth of in-depth studies on Habsburg consuls, whose names are usually limited to the footnotes (where their reports are cited) or who are portrayed as the featureless chess pieces of their distant masters. Once again, there are important exceptions: among them, Tamara Scheer’s book on the Habsburg “presence” in and around Taşlıca (Plevla, Pljevlja) just north of Kosovo sheds much light on everyday life and local diplomacy at an Austro-Hungarian consulate;27 an article by Krisztián Csaplár-Degovics traces in detail how consuls built local networks of informants and political clients in central Albania;28 and Dušan Fundić’s recent monograph on Austria-Hungary and the creation of the Albanian state offers a complex view on consular activity.29 It is no coincidence that these three works investigate the same part of the world and that two of them tackle the same context, specifically, the Habsburgs’ cultivation of relations with Albanians. Indeed, by 1900, this had become the primary political task for Prochaska and his colleagues in the central Balkans. Nevertheless, it bears repeating that consuls’ political roles were varied and not limited to this region alone.

The final academic work that needs to be discussed here is also the most important contribution on the Prochaska Affair. In the 1970s, the renowned Habsburg historian Robert Kann explored the topic in a lecture that was later published as a booklet.30 This, in itself, was already fortunate. Without the help of Kann’s erudite and stylish account, the Prochaska Affair might have faded from the memory of Habsburgists altogether. But Kann’s short text also has its limitations. It remains firmly centered on Vienna and pays exclusive attention to elite actors at or near the foreign ministry. With much of the given space devoted to a discussion of the press coverage and public opinion, Kann’s account offers little information on Prochaska in Prizren. On the contrary, Kann uses every opportunity to belittle the consul, depicting him as more of a curiosity than a serious subject of inquiry.31 While Kann’s study offers considerable insight into the political events of the day and manages to place the Prochaska Affair in its diplomatic context on the highest level, it falls short in its overall failure to take a local dimension into consideration as well. To date, Kann’s essay remains the only dedicated study of the Prochaska Affair, and while it continues to be highly useful and relevant, it should by no means be seen as definite.

It seems unsatisfactory, then, that we know nearly nothing about the situation in Prizren, where everything began. Let me therefore pose the simple question: What did Prochaska do during the Prochaska Affair?

A Local Affair

Events unfolded rapidly in Kosovo during the first weeks of the war. On October 17, 1912, Serbia joined its allies and declared war on the Ottoman Empire. Soon thereafter, Prochaska’s letters were seized en route to the post office (as mentioned above) and the first detachments of the Serbian forces reached Prizren and captured it without a fight. Well before the end of the month, telegraphic contact between Vienna and its three consulates in Kosovo had been lost.32 On November 5, General Janković arrived in Prizren and established his administration. On November 8, the Serbian envoy in Vienna demanded that Prochaska be immediately recalled, leading the Ballhausplatz to push for an investigation that would allow an Austro-Hungarian consul to travel to Kosovo.33 It took several weeks to agree on the particulars, during which time the Serbs began to gather information for their own purposes. Vienna spoke of deliberate delaying tactics, while the Pašić government blamed an uncooperative military.34 In the end, both procedures ran parallel and separate from each other in another sign of the two governments’ mutual distrust.

As part of the Serbian investigation, General Janković filed a first report on Prochaska’s alleged activity on November 20.35 This preliminary report mostly consisted of a long list of unlikely rumors and unfavorable interpretations of the consul’s daily work with political clients, but it also included several points that seem more plausible. Four of them involve Nikolai Alekseevič Emelianov, the Russian consul, who had probably raised these allegations himself. According to the first one, Prochaska had stopped an Ottoman officer in the street shortly before Prizren was captured and berated him in public for his intention to seek Emelianov’s protection. Prochaska had then led the officer (and the 6,000 lira he had intended to take to the Russian consul) to his own consulate. Another allegation notes how Prochaska had publicly exclaimed on two occasions (once in the presence of an unnamed foreign consul, who must have been Emelianov) that he was opposed to the offensive alliance of Montenegro and Serbia and that “Austria will never allow it!,” meaning its success.36 Finally, the third and fourth allegations contrast the two consuls’ reactions to the arrival of the Serbian administration: Emelianov had established personal and official relations by visiting the general two times within 24 hours and had also taken part in a celebratory church service, whereas Prochaska had refused any contact whatsoever.37

Complaints about Prochaska’s discourteous behavior also set the tone in the general’s second and longer report, dated December 19, with which the Serbian investigation came to a close.38 After several pages which mostly repeated the previous allegations against Prochaska and added supporting testimony by townspeople, Janković’s account took a sudden turn to the personal: “Apart from the above,” wrote the general, “I consider it necessary that, for a more accurate assessment of the incorrect actions of Mr. Prohaska, I present his attitude towards me, as the commander of the army and the occupied area, and my relationship with him.”39 The remainder of the report suggests that Janković felt truly offended by Prochaska’s every action: that the consul had not introduced himself, neither in an official capacity nor in private; that he had treated one of Janković’s officers, whom the general had sent with what amounted to a formal invitation to meet, rudely; and overall, that Prochaska had refused to recognize the Serbian administration but at the same time had pestered Janković with all kinds of petitions in writing and by sending his consular messenger-interpreter (dragoman).40 The general, in turn, took a corresponding stance and refused to deal with Prochaska’s complaints. Instead, Janković informed his adversary through the dragoman that he was simply not acquainted with Prochaska on a personal level and that there was also no legal procedure in force that could compel him to acknowledge the consul’s presence in an official capacity. He then let Prochaska know that this would not change until the consul visited with him directly.41

Faced with the general’s ultimatum, Prochaska announced himself for November 17. This is how Janković described their meeting:

That same day, at 11.30 am, finally, after a whole thirteen days of demonstrations, Mr. Prohaska presented himself—a short, chubby, squinting, unsympathetic figure. As soon as my adjutant reported him, I let him in. When he entered the room, he introduced himself to me; I received him politely and seriously, greeted him with a handshake, building on the power of a benevolent God, as far as this was possible with this type. However, the following was characteristic of the man’s upbringing and arrogance: as soon as I shook his hand and while I had not yet offered him a seat or sat down, he immediately sat down on the first chair closest to him, while I remained standing, looking at him from above with a questioning regard, which he fully understood and, embarrassed, he stood up [again]. Only after this fiasco of his, I offered him to sit down and did so as well, and then our conversation began.42

The rest of the meeting, according to Janković, brought only further embarrassment to Prochaska, since the general had the upper hand on all questions. (This impression is reinforced by Prochaska’s own reportage, which only devoted a few inconclusive lines to their conversation.43) Janković, it is obvious, had many reasons to mistrust Prochaska and found his suspicions confirmed in the consul’s antagonistic behavior and rudeness in personal relations. There is a strong element of contempt in Janković’s descriptions of Prochaska’s person throughout his report. To give another example, when Prochaska decided to leave Prizren, Janković withdrew one of his higher-ranking officers from the military escort after he learned that the consul would be traveling with his “mistress.” He also reported with visible satisfaction that Prochaska had been chased out of Prizren by an angry mob on the day he left town.44

In sum, relations between the two officials were strained from the outset and only deteriorated when they met face to face. Prochaska made the worst possible impression on Janković by fumbling the rules of both official procedure and social courtesy. While Janković might have been biased against Prochaska, the representative of a hostile power, it seems that the consul, at least during this encounter, did not display the polished manners that were expected of a gentleman and diplomat. With that being said, Prochaska was also the victim of unfavorable circumstances. When the fog of war had cleared, the Serbian government acknowledged that its military had acted inappropriately when it hindered the consul’s work and barred him from communicating with his colleagues and superiors.45 There is also reason to believe that Prochaska’s Russian counterpart, Emelianov, was in fact a bitter rival and in cahoots with Janković. In Prochaska’s subsequent reportage, we read the following about the first days of the Serbian occupation:

Local Russian representative Emelianov did not return my three consecutive visits, by now completely ignores this consulate and apparently regards himself not as a Russian representative but as a Serbian agent.46

Prochaska felt humiliated and enraged by what he perceived as unjustified slander and chicanery against his person by Emelianov and especially the Serbs.47 He was convinced that it had been the general and his officers who had arranged for the group of people who had harassed him in the street.48 Even a decade later, writing in retrospect, Prochaska still felt very much aggrieved:

I was abused, threatened, marauding soldiery and komitadjis rioted in front of the consulate and threatened to put it on fire, I was blockaded inside, savaged soldiers were quartered (as guards!) in the consulate, who threatened to shoot if I left the house, my horses were stolen, every night those arrested during the day were massacred behind my garden, in short, those were three upsetting weeks, and I was cut off from the outside world and, due to the constant agitation in newspapers and pamphlets, in growing danger of life. At my departure, I was led like a prisoner right through a lane of soldiers and wild rabble, who kept screaming, among the worst abuse against the Monarchy and myself, that I should be killed, hurling large pebbles, petrol tankards and such against my carriage, so that it is a miracle that I got out alive. I can say without exaggeration that—at least before the World War—no consul has ever been treated like this.49

Placed side by side, both the consul’s and the general’s comments about their mutual relationship express remarkably similar emotions.50 What, then, are we to make of the two men and their grudge against each other? Recent works on diplomatic representation and interpersonal communication as well as “face-to-face diplomacy” suggest some analytical themes for further study.51 More attention should also be paid to the third main protagonist, the Russian consul Emelianov, among many other local actors in the shared urban setting of Prizren.52 All this requires adding a decidedly local view to Prochaska’s story and its diplomatic significance, which I have tried to sketch in brief and in only one of the many possible ways.53 After all, if Prochaska and Janković had been ministers meeting in a palace or gilded drawing room, we would already have many volumes of analysis and portraiture.

This does not mean that only sources locally produced in Prizren are relevant. For example, historians have sometimes interpreted Prochaska’s antagonistic behavior as a deliberate, officially sanctioned tactic to spark a diplomatic conflict.54 Judging by the Habsburg foreign ministry’s internal files, however, this ran counter to its intentions. In response to the Serbian complaints about Prochaska that had reached Vienna in early November, the ministry had immediately issued new instructions to its consuls in the occupation zone: “The situation brought about by the war,” they began, “is merely de facto and lacks recognition under international law.” Although the consuls were never to fail to observe this, they were also instructed to act in their own interest and “get in touch with the factual rulers and strive to maintain the best possible relations.” The only line not to cross was to commit “acts that could be interpreted as the direct recognition of the sovereignty of any of the Balkan states or the annexation.” Moreover, while all “contractual and customary rights” that consuls enjoyed under the Ottomans continued to be in force, exceptions might be tolerated on account of the ongoing war. In case of problems, consulates were to turn to the foreign ministry and their supervising embassy in Constantinople.55 In other words, these were extremely flexible, practical guidelines. They insisted in principle on upholding the status quo ante but also acknowledged the demands of the evolving situation, encouraging consuls to interact with the new authorities in an amicable way.

Unfortunately for Prochaska (and Janković), this good advice never reached Prizren. Does this mean that Prochaska’s poor performance can be excused because he simply did not get the circular? In order to answer this question, we have to take a brief look at his colleagues in neighboring consulates and how they portrayed their own actions at the time. This is because Consul Heimroth in Üsküp (Shkup, Skopje, Skoplje) as well as Vice-consul Tahy and his Chancellery Secretary Umlauf in Mitrovica were cut off from communications in much the same way and faced similar difficulties, but seem to have managed much better.

One advantage that Consul Heimroth had was the benefit of collegial company in Üsküp, the provincial capital. After the Ottomans had lost the Battle of Kumanovo on October 23–24 and retreated in chaos, the remaining foreign consuls formed a provisional government council to try to maintain order and organize humanitarian relief. The consuls also ventured outside the city to meet the advancing Serbian army in the field and offer to surrender without bloodshed.56 In their various ad-hoc measures, the consuls exceeded their mandate as neutral observers, choosing instead to rely on their combined authority to avert even greater disaster. There were also some tricky situations that Heimroth had to tackle on his own. Early on, a deputation of local notables asked the consul to hoist the flag of Austria-Hungary over the city, hoping that this would spare it from being shelled, but Heimroth refused on the grounds of international law. He also opened the doors of the consulate to refugees. When a group of Ottoman officers begged him for shelter, he allowed them in, too, but felt relieved when they changed their minds and left, since their presence might have compromised his own position. After the arrival of the Serbian army, Heimroth consented to the placement of a military guard inside his consulate, knowing that a refusal would put him in danger.57 Overall, Heimroth’s various choices seem quite appropriate and may have prevented further escalation.

In Mitrovica, a small town bordering Serbian territory, Ladislaus von Tahy (Tahvári és Tarkeői Tahy László) found himself in an isolated position that is quite comparable to Prochaska’s situation farther south. Tahy also experienced similar difficulties with the new Serbian administration. Unlike Prochaska, however, Tahy paid a visit to the Serbian military commander as soon as the latter had arrived on October 27.58 During this meeting, Tahy argued that, as a diplomat accredited to the Ottoman authorities, he was not permitted to establish any official relations with the Serbian military but that he intended to carry on with his duties until new instructions would arrive. Unfortunately for Tahy, however, his initiative was not crowned with success. In the days that followed, his Serbian counterpart did not return the visit, which humiliated Tahy and caused him lasting emotional distress.59 The Serbian authorities began to prevent the consul and his personnel as well as their clients from entering and leaving the consulate. Tensions rose to the point that Tahy decided to leave and return home on November 7.60 In doing so, he probably chose wisely, since his regular activity had become impossible and his attempt to reach a compromise had obviously fallen on deaf ears.

Tahy left behind a caretaker, Chancellery Secretary Umlauf, who would rise to the occasion and display remarkable diplomatic capabilities.61 Umlauf’s daily chronicle from that time gives the impression that he was aware that any argument or other small occurrence might cause trouble and create another diplomatic incident. Far from remaining passive, though, Umlauf acted on his newfound role as the sole representative of the Dual Monarchy in Mitrovica. As such, he entered into a protracted conflict with the local Catholic priest, who tried to shift away from Habsburg protection to a pro-Serbian course. Umlauf’s quiet struggle with Don Nikola Mazarek culminated one Sunday towards the end of November. The consul went to attend mass and noticed that the Austria-Hungarian flag had been removed from its usual place near the altar. In response, Umlauf stood still in the middle of the church and did not take his seat until the priest had the flag brought back in. Other examples could be added, such as the skillful way in which Umlauf used procedural arguments during a meeting with the Serbian consul Milan Milojević to assert his position as a serious consular representative in all but official rank.62 In sum, Umlauf, the experienced chancellery official, used his understanding of a consul’s ceremonial role and his technical knowledge to stand his ground successfully in an unprecedented situation.

This quick comparison of Prochaska’s actions with those of his colleagues indicates that there were indeed different paths that the isolated consuls could take. Success required active communication and an ability to judge when proper procedure should be followed and when flexibility was preferable, which is exactly what the instructions from Vienna that never reached Kosovo had tried to suggest early on in the conflict. When the Ballhausplatz’s internal investigation concluded in mid-December 1912, it did so with a mixed picture: clearly, Prochaska had been wronged on multiple occasions by the Serbian military, but he had also added to the tensions himself, and in some cases the picture remained quite murky.63 In Belgrade, Minister Stephan von Ugron (Ábránfalvi Ugron István) thought that “calm cold-bloodedness and a tactful demeanour” on part of Prochaska and Tahy might have prevented the worst, and cited Heimroth’s much more favorable example.64 Likewise, Consul Heinrich Wildner, also in Belgrade, believed that his two colleagues should have met their adversaries with “tact and adaptability” to “repair” their strained relations with them. According to both Wildner and Ugron, the special privileges that foreign consuls enjoyed under Ottoman rule had given them an inflated sense of status and made them inflexible; indeed, perhaps it would be wise to recall the old guard and send fresh faces to the Balkans.65

Conclusions

In this article, I have used the case of a single individual to try to make a larger point about Habsburg consuls as important but understudied actors of diplomacy and empire. In retrospect, Prochaska’s lack of caution, social courtesy, and, altogether, diplomatic skill in the high-stakes setting of a town under military occupation created a cascade whose magnitude the consul himself could not even begin to comprehend while the communication blockade lasted. Prochaska cannot be held responsible for what others outside Kosovo—soldiers, diplomats, politicians, journalists—made of his predicament in pursuit of their own varied motives. The consul was, however, very much responsible for how it all had started, and he could have taken steps to defuse the situation later on. Therein lies his agency as a diplomat and his appeal as a subject of history-writing.

The unusual prominence of Prochaska’s case and its relevance to multiple historiographies make clear why consuls deserve our full attention. In my own work, I follow an actor-centric and practice-based approach, but the true strength of the contemporary scholarship on the Habsburg Empire lies in its polyphony and openness to experimentation.66 Other methods and perspectives, and less obviously striking cases than the Prochaska Affair, should also be explored to allow us to gain a deeper and more varied understanding of Habsburg consuls as part of the foreign service and the imperial bureaucracy as a whole. If the same scrutiny and erudition that the best traditional diplomatic scholarship has produced were also to be applied to the study of consuls and extended to the broad variety of contexts beyond courts and capitals in which they were active we would glean many new insights into the local (or regional or “provincial”) life-worlds of diplomacy and empire.67 In the Balkans, Austria-Hungary’s ambitions depended on its ever-widening network of consuls, and much the same can be suspected of its growing engagement across the world as an “empire without overseas colonies.”68 Prochaska, for instance, concluded his tarnished career at the consulate-general in Rio de Janeiro,69 out of harm’s way but still as a member of an imperial bureaucracy with a global presence and outlook.

There is a rich source tradition on which a cultural and social history of consuls and consular diplomacy in the Habsburg Empire could be founded. This includes both consular reports, which are already a principal source in nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century Balkan history,70 and administrative papers, such as the consuls’ personnel files. These often very messy boxes are rarely examined and always full of surprises. Prochaska knew this, too. Near the top of his personnel file, we find a request from 1922 in which the former consul asked if “possibly existing ‘evrak i muzire’—harmful papers” stemming from the Prizren incident could be removed from “this mysterious folder.” As a native of Moravia, Prochaska had become a Czechoslovak citizen (although he later opted for Austria), and he feared that his old file, when handed over to Prague, might get him in trouble again.71 The bulk of the paperwork that the Prochaska Affair had generated in the foreign ministry had, however, already been collected separately.72 It is quite possible that previously unknown documents could still be found, especially in the administrative collections, which diplomatic historians have usually not taken into account. Although archived separately from each other, political and administrative papers were produced by the same group of people in a shared bureaucratic setting.73 When analyzed together, the two types sometimes complement and sometimes subvert each other, bringing diplomacy to life.

Over the course of the past century, generations of historians who took note of the Prochaska Affair never cared to portray the consul at its center as a complex protagonist and veritable (albeit catastrophic) diplomatic actor. I have attempted to offer a different perspective. In doing so, I have also tried to tell a good story.74 Thanks to a thriving community of scholars, the stories we tell of the Habsburg Empire are transforming: studies on consuls and diplomacy can add to this common project.75 My sincere hope, therefore, is that the curious case of Oskar Prochaska, dusted off a little, will inspire historians of the Habsburg Monarchy from various backgrounds and with varying interests to consider giving consuls a try in their work as well.

“For many years, we have lived without knowing that a certain Mr. Prochaska represented us,” wrote Pesti Napló on its front-page on November 27, 1912, at the height of the crisis. “One day, we reach for the newspaper and find that we have a new hero named Prochaska, whose shed blood calls for vengeance.”76 Today, a diplomatic history freed from narratives of pride and pain can contribute essential insight into empires and nation states by recognizing the many and diverse people who inhabited and built them. It can dissolve strict dichotomies of thought, endeavoring to overcome rather than perpetuate divisive political and academic traditions. For many years, we have lived without knowing what a certain Mr. Prochaska could represent to us, and I hope that one day, we may reach for a new kind of Habsburg diplomatic history and find out so much more.

Archival Sources

Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv, Vienna (HHStA), Ministerium des Äußern (MdÄ)

Politisches Archiv (PA)

XII Türkei 385, 386, 415

Administrative Registratur (AR), Fach 4

Personalia 272

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1 See the reports written by Prochaska and forwarded via telegraph by his immediate superior Consul Heimroth in Üsküp to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, November 26–27, 1912, no. 104, 106–107. These became part of a voluminous internal dossier which can be found in Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv Vienna, Politisches Archiv (hereafter cited as HHStA PA) XII 415; for the three reports, see fol. 101–106 and 117–120.

2 Circulating information on violent transgressions (whether real or alleged) was common during the Balkan Wars, as belligerents sought to mobilize support for their own causes and condemn their opponents; see Çetinkaya, “Atrocity Propaganda.” On the heightened brutality of the conflict, which displayed “elements of a civil strife,” see Delis, “Violence and Civilians.” The political function of violence during and after the Balkan Wars in a broader perspective is discussed in Biondich, “Balkan Wars.” For a long-term perspective on everyday violence in Ottoman Kosovo up to and including 1912–13, see Frantz, Gewalt und Koexistenz.

3 General Janković in Prizren to Army High Command in Skoplje, November 7–20, 1912, no. 661. DSPKS, vol. 5/3, no. 255.

4 Passages in DSPKS, vol. 5/3, no. 255 and 464 indicate that Prochaska’s original letters and/or copies passed from the hands of General Božidar Janković (Third Army) via Živojin O. Dačić (civil servant and author) to Crown Prince Aleksandar (First Army) and later, after an excursion to Russia, to Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Nikola Pašić, who intended to keep them. In addition, there are several documents in Miloš Bogičević’s edition of Serbian sources (Boghitschewitsch, Auswärtige Politik) which detail how the letters were sent in secret between Serbia and Russia. They also contain a passage in which Pašić writes that “we will, if necessary, make use of them [i.e. Prochaska’s letters], but of course only if we can say that we found them accidentally and not that they have been taken from the courier.” (Ibid., vol. 1, no. 227–229, 232–234, quote on 234.) One must add, however, that Bogičević, a disgraced former Serbian diplomat, is known to have manipulated and falsified documents in his edition very frequently, which calls into question the assumption that the passages on Prochaska’s letters are genuine. Nonetheless, the underlying intention to keep and use them seems credible enough and shines through in the much more reliably edited documents in DSPKS as well.

5 See the previously cited report by Janković, point 9 and annex point 19. DSPKS, vol. 5/3, no. 255.

6 A useful overview can be found in the online encyclopedia article by Hall, “Prochaska Affair.”

7 On the Prochaska Affair in two important Viennese newspapers, see Gulla, Prestigeverlust oder Krieg?, 64–82. The notions of “civilization” vs. “barbarism” in the press coverage of the Balkan Wars in a broader perspective are explored in Keisinger, Unzivilisierte Kriege, a short English version of which appears in Geppert et al., Wars, 343–58.

8 As Tamara Scheer has pointed out, issues of Austro-Hungarian domestic and foreign policy were closely intertwined both in government thinking and the press coverage of the Balkan Wars; the public perceived the events as anything but distant; see Scheer, “Public Sphere,” 301–19.

9 The larger foreign political context is explored from an Austro-Hungarian and German perspective in Kos, Interessen. Prime Minister Pašić paid a personal visit to the Austro-Hungarian representative in Belgrade, Ugron, to express his regrets about the incident and also confided that his government had already resolved internally to give in on the harbor question. See Minister Ugron in Belgrade to Foreign Ministry in Vienna, December 21, 1912, no. 186 A–C. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 215–223.

10 For example, as late as July 21, 1914 in St. Petersburg, the French president Poincaré alluded to the Prochaska Affair (together with the similarly inflammatory Friedjung Affair of 1909) in a public exchange of words with Szapáry, the Austro-Hungarian ambassador to Russia. See Paléologue, Ambassador’s Memoirs, vol. 1, 18.

11 Although offering different interpretations, various authors underscore the crisis’s “manipulative” character (i.e. its alleged orchestration by various interest groups) as well as its place in the run-up to the First World War. See for example, Friedjung, Zeitalter, vol. 3, 222–27 (pro-war circles and the governments on both sides are to be blamed for fueling and delaying the resolution of the Prochaska Affair, while the Viennese press deliberately scandalized it in order to attack the Ballhausplatz’s changed press policy). Seton-Watson, “Murder at Sarajevo,” 491 (“the imaginary Prochaska incident was invented [by the Austrians] to prepare opinion for a war”). Ćorović, Relations, 553–56 and 575–76 (Prochaska was biased by his “hatred for the Serbs” and “these incidents were welcomed and deliberately exploited” by his government). Clark, Sleepwalkers, 283 and 445 (“a modest but inept exercise in media manipulation that provided further ammunition for those who claimed that Austria always argued with forged documents and false accusations”). Scheer, Minimale Kosten, 71–72 (given their “mistrust against Serbia” that had been nourished by years of alarming political reports, Habsburg officials were “certain that abuse [against Prochaska] could actually have occurred”). Rauchensteiner, First World War, 104 (“incompetence and a targeted campaign” resulting in a “loss of prestige and credibility” for the Habsburgs, a development which their rivals happily exploited). Bjelajac, “’Humanitarian’ Pretext,” 133–35 (biased reportage created by Prochaska and his colleagues contributed to the spread of misinformation and atrocity propaganda against Serbia).

12 Compare the comprehensive argument for “previously overlooked forms, venues, geographies, and levels” of international/diplomatic history from an Ottomanist perspective in Alloul and Martykánová, “New Ground.”

13 As exemplified by Helmut Rumpler’s brief and rather superficial but subsequently frequently cited assessment that the consular service had no form of political or diplomatic mandate and was therefore largely irrelevant except with regard to matters of trade. See Rumpler, “Rahmenbedingungen,” 48–50. On the misrepresentation of consuls in a broader historiographical perspective, see Leira and Neumann, “Past Lives.”

14 To give precise numbers, in 1900, Austria-Hungary maintained 414 consular representations around the world, most of them honorary offices. Among the 77 effektive Ämter (i.e. those staffed by salaried state officials), there were 24 consulates-general, 40 consulates, eleven vice-consulates, and two consular agencies. See Agstner: “Institutional History,” 39–40.

15 On the social and cultural history of the Austro-Hungarian foreign service (albeit with relatively few remarks on consuls), see William D. Godsey’s pathbreaking work in Godsey, Aristocratic Redoubt and Godsey, “Culture of Diplomacy.”

16 One popular anecdote comes from Paul von Hevesy (Hevesy Pál). In 1912, the year of the Prochaska Affair, Hevesy arrived at the Austro-Hungarian embassy in Constantinople as a newly appointed attaché. When Hevesy started spending time with colleagues from the consulate as well, his peers at the embassy intervened: “Either you socialize with us or with them.” This anecdote appears in works by several authors, including in Matsch, Auswärtige Dienst, 92.

17 On actor-centric and biographical approaches to diplomatic history and the history of empires, see e.g. Mösslang and Riotte, Diplomats’ World; Thiessen and Windler, Akteure der Außenbeziehungen; Tremml-Werner and Goetze, “Multitude of Actors”; Buchen and Rolf, Eliten im Vielvölkerreich; Hirschhausen, “New Imperial History?”; Nemes, Another Hungary.

18 For a comprehensive discussion of practice-based approaches to diplomatic history, see the introduction to Hennings and Sowerby, Practices of Diplomacy.

19 Adlgasser and Lindström, Habsburg Civil Service; Deak, Multinational State; Göderle, “De l’empire des Habsbourg”; Heindl, Bürokratie und Beamte.

20 For a study of intra-imperial policy rivalries in which consuls play a part, see Callaway: “Battle over Information.”

21 See Godsey’s works (as cited above) and more recently also Somogyi, “Influence of the Compromise.”

22 In recent years, two voluminous handbooks have been published by the most prolific scholars of the Habsburg consular service, Rudolf Agstner (posthumously) and Engelbert Deusch. Their many works are of mixed quality and reliability, as the two authors generally did not seek to place the rich source material they unearthed over many years in a larger context of analytical questions and academic debates. That said, both have created indispensable preconditions for further research, especially with their handbooks. See Agstner, Handbuch and Deusch, Konsuln.

23 For an introduction to new approaches to consular history, see Ulbert and Prijac, Consulship and Melissen, “Consular Dimension.”

24 Case, “Quiet Revolution.”

25 Phelps, U.S.-Habsburg Relations; Frank, “Bureaucracy of Honor”; Haider-Wilson, Friedlicher Kreuzzug; Forster, “Mapping and Appropriating.”

26 For an example of newer studies on this topic, see Brendel, “Drang nach Süden.” An overview of the political role of Austria-Hungary’s consuls in the Balkans is given in Kammerhofer, “Konsularwesen.” Further material on consuls as actors of empire can be found in Gostentschnigg, Wissenschaft.

27 Scheer, Minimale Kosten. While not formally a consulate, the Austro-Hungarian “civil commissariat” in Taşlıca was always headed by a consular official and performed the regular duties of a consulate (on this, see ibid., 107–18).

28 Csaplár-Degovics, “Interessendurchsetzung.”

29 Fundić, Austrougarska i nastanak Albanije.

30 Kann, Prochaska-Affäre. The text is 39 pages long.

31 Ibid., 1 and especially 36–37.

32 Minister Ugron in Belgrade to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, October 19, 1912, no.112. HHStA PA 385. When Prochaska forwarded Tahy’s report that Mitrovica was being cut off by the Serbian military, this was apparently also the last of his own telegrams to make it through to Vienna; see Consul Prochaska in Prizren to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, October 23, 1912, no. 74. HHStA PA 385.

33 Foreign Minister Berchtold in Vienna to Minister Ugron in Belgrade, November 8, 1912, draft. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 2–3.

34 On the protracted negotiations from the Austro-Hungarian point of view, see HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 2–17 and 39–41. The conflictual relationship between the Serbian civil government and the military is discussed in Newman, “Hollow Crown.”

35 This is the previously cited DSPKS, vol. 5/3, no. 255.

36 DSPKS, vol. 5/3, no. 255, annex points 10 and 14.

37 Ibid., annex point 20–21.

38 General Janković in Prizren to Army High Command in Skoplje, December 6/19, 1912, no. 796. DSPKS, vol. 5/3, no. 464.

39 Ibid.

40 Ibid.

41 Ibid.

42 Ibid.

43 Prochaska’s report in Consul Heimroth in Üsküp to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, November 27, 1912, no. 106. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 104, 106.

44 DSPKS, vol. 5/3, no. 464.

45 The negotiations that resulted in the Serbian government’s public apology are an interesting topic on their own: see various documents towards the end of the dossier on the Prochaska Affair in HHStA PA XII 415.

46 Prochaska’s report in Consul Heimroth in Üsküp to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, November 26, 1912, no. 104. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 103.

47 Prochaska’s report in Consul Heimroth in Üsküp to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, November 27, 1912, no. 107. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 118–9.

48 Ibid., fol. 119.

49 Letter, Prochaska in Brno to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, December 28, 1922. HHStA MdÄ AR F4 272 Personalia Prochaska-Lachnit, Oskar.

50 Compare Prochaska’s report (ibid.) with the entire second half of Janković’s final report (DSPKS, vol. 5/3, no. 464).

51 Rack, Unentbehrliche Vertreter; Steller, Diplomatie von Angesicht zu Angesicht; Holmes and Wheeler, “Social Bonding”; Holmes, Face-to-Face Diplomacy; Trager, Diplomacy, especially “The Fruit of 1912 Diplomacy,” ibid., 151–73.

52 For an approach that places diplomatic actors in a shared urban social context, see Do Paço, “Trans-Imperial Familiarity.” Cities as sites and consuls as actors are discussed in Leira and Carvalho, “Intercity Origins.”

53 Compare the discussion in Ghobrial, “Global History and Microhistory.”

54 See e.g. Bjelajac, “’Humanitarian’ Pretext,” which echoes traditional Serbian historiography.

55 Foreign Minister Berchtold in Vienna to Minister Ugron in Belgrade, November 8, 1912, no. 5042. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 4–6.

56 Consul Heimroth in Üsküp to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, November 18, 1912, no. 125–126. HHStA PA XII 386, fol. 509–218 and 521–524.

57 Ibid.

58 Tahy’s official daily chronicle (Amtserinnerung), November 6, 1912. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 20–24.

59 Minister Ugron in Belgrade to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, January 9, 1913, no. 17. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 301–302.

60 Tahy’s official daily chronicle (Amtserinnerung), fol. 24.

61 Chancellery Secretary Umlauf in Mitrovica to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, January 3, 1913, no. 1 secret. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 260–274.

62 Ibid., fol. 269–271.

63 Compare the marginal notes that Consul Theodor Edl added to an edited copy of Prochaska’s previously cited three reports. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 145–50. Edl had been entrusted with carrying out the Ballhausplatz’s investigation and had visited the Kosovo consulates to make his own appraisal. The debriefing meeting for which he prepared these notes took place on December 15 back in Vienna. The following day, the foreign ministry released a short, amicably-worded communiqué in which it informed the public that the conflict had been settled. On the disappointment and public outrage that followed, see Kann, Prochaska-Affäre, esp. 8–9 and 18–33.

64 Minister Ugron in Belgrade to the Foreign Ministry in Vienna, December 13, 1912, no. 400 res. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 143–144.

65 Consul Wildner as quoted in letter, Minister Ugron in Belgrade to Section Chief Macchio in Vienna, January 21, 1913. HHStA PA XII 415, fol. 323–324.

66 For a general perspective, see Feichtinger and Uhl, Habsburg neu denken and for various approaches to the history of diplomacy and international relations, Haider-Wilson et al., Internationale Geschichte.

67 Regrettably, consuls do not play any noticeable role in the most recent, highly detailed surveys of Habsburg foreign policy in the Dualist period; see Rauscher, Fragile Großmacht and Canis, Bedrängte Großmacht.

68 For a recent discussion of global approaches to late-Habsburg history, see Hirschhausen, “Habsburgermonarchie in globaler Perspektive?” side by side with Judson, “Global Empire”; and compare Sauer, “Habsburg Colonial.”

69 Deusch summarizes and comments on Prochaska’s time in Brazil and his return after World War I in Konsuln, 538–42.

70 On the value of consular reports as a source for Balkan history, see the introduction to Frantz and Schmitt, Politik und Gesellschaft.

71 Typed extract from letter, Prochaska in Adamov (Adamsthal) to Consul-general Kraus in Vienna, June 25, 1922. HHStA MdÄ AR F4 272 Personalia Prochaska-Lachnit, Oskar.

72 In the previously cited dossier in HHStA PA XII 415.

73 Future studies on histories of knowledge in the Austro-Hungarian foreign service may find it useful to consult Wiedermayer, “Geschäftsgang” and to consider the methodological reflections with a special emphasis on Austrian/Habsburg archival contexts in Hochedlinger, Aktenkunde.

74 I believe that, for historians, engaging in storytelling (trying to tell engaging stories) is more than a matter of personal taste, but rather a professional responsibility and skill that we should actively seek to develop and experiment with; compare the extended reflections offered by Cronon, “Storytelling.”

75 See Judson, Habsburg Empire and, on the need for renewed interest in matters of “statecraft,” diplomacy, and foreign policy, Cole, “Visions and Revisions.”

76 Pesti Napló, November 27, 1912, 1 (my translation of Kann’s German translation of the Hungarian original as given in Kann, Prochaska-Affäre, 32).

 

2022_2_Csaplár-Degovics

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Austro-Hungarian Colonial Ventures: The Case of Albania

Krisztián Csaplár-Degovics
Research Centre for the Humanities
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Hungarian Historical Review Volume 11 Issue 2  (2022):267-304 DOI 10.38145/2022.2.267

In his unpublished 1955 doctoral dissertation, Johann Wagner persuasively argued that certain members of the leading political, economic, and military circles in Austria-Hungary were very interested in the possibility of global colonization.1 Furthermore, as the data gathered by Evelyn Kolm clearly shows, in the last decades of the nineteenth century, joint Ministers of Foreign Affairs Gusztáv Kálnoky and Agenor Gołuchowski and joint Minister of Finance Benjámin Kállay promoted the idea of creating a competitive military fleet, and they were ready to offer political support for the economic interest groups that insisted on the necessity of colonialism.2 Two out of these three people initiated and played a crucial role in the 1896 Vienna Conference, where they decided to adopt and implement a new Albanian policy.
This Austro-Hungarian Albanian policy was shaped in part by new colonial ambitions and was not merely the result of a one-time decision made in response to singular circumstances. The new Albanian policy harmonized with the general aspirations of the 1890s: Gustav Kálnoky and Agenor Gołuchowski, as heads of Ballhausplatz, made political and institutional attempts to include, in some form or another, the practice of global colonization as part of the foreign policy profile of Austria-Hungary. One of their allies in these efforts was Benjámin Kállay, who, as the governor of Bosnia-Herzegovina, was well-versed in both the theoretical and the practical issues of colonization.
This study presents the context and consequences of the 1896 conference from a transnational perspective. It also draws attention to two things. First, historical research on the question of colonization should be extended to the Balkan peninsula in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Second, Austria-Hungary’s new Albanian policy was based not only on international models but also on its own experiences in Africa.

Keywords: Albania, Austria-Hungary, colonialism, Balkan Peninsula

Introduction

Historians have paid little attention to the fact that in the 1890s, the ministers of common affairs of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy made a concrete attempt formally to include colonialism in the Austro-Hungarian foreign policy portfolio.

The unusual constitutional structure of Austria-Hungary made this a challenging task. According to the laws on which the Compromise of 1867 rested, Emperor and King Franz Joseph’s realm was divided into two large public entities, the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary, each of which had its own government and parliament. The joint ministers of foreign affairs, finance, and war in Vienna were only allowed to deal with common matters as defined in precise terms by the representatives of the two halves of the new empire in 1867. Formally, they did not form a government for the whole empire. The two parliaments could only deal with the joint ministers separately, through delegations of their own envoys. The acceptance of an open portfolio for colonial endeavors was a major political and social challenge for the joint ministers because any kinds of ambitions in this direction could easily have undermined the stability of the dualist system, which had been achieved at no small cost. Colonial policy, after all, raised a number of questions that touched on public law. Who would be responsible for colonization, the empire as a whole or a separate Austria and a separate Hungary? Who would finance the costs of colonial ventures, and who would benefit from these investments? Would colonial issues come to constitute a new, fourth common affair?

Since the study of Austria-Hungary’s colonial past has so far been mainly limited to case studies and the study sites have for the most part been found in eastern and southeastern Europe, as far as I know, no conceptual context has emerged that has marked the place of the Dual Monarchy in Europe’s colonial past in the global context. This study therefore undertakes to examine, in the order and logic of the unpublished archival sources in the National Archive of Vienna, the global strands of history that can be connected to the Albanian policy of the joint ministry of foreign affairs, also known as Ballhausplatz. The study connects a number of issues and facts which have been part of hitherto unrelated, parallel historical narratives (including consuls, cult protectorate, competition with other powers, the Sudan policy of Ballhausplatz, and imperial pressure groups).

In this inquiry, I focus on a joint ministerial conference held in Vienna in 1896 at which the decision was reached to launch a new Austro-Hungarian Albanian policy. I also consider the consequences of this conference. Going beyond the historical publications on the conference, including the views of Teodora Toleva,3 I claim that the new policy had an imperial character but also an equally significant colonial character, since it was a long-term goal of joint ministers Agenor Gołuchowski and Benjámin Kállay to bring the territory and inhabitants of geographical Albania in the Western Balkans under the political, economic, and cultural influence of Austria-Hungary in an asymmetrical relationship. Drawing on unpublished archival sources and the secondary literature on international colonial practices at the time, I seek to determine why the term colonial can be reasonably applied to the new Austro-Hungarian policy towards Albania launched at the end of the century. I begin by offering a brief summary of the attitudes in Austria-Hungary towards colonialism in 1890s. I then provide a broad overview from a transnational perspective of the historical context of the conference where the new Albanian policy was adopted. I analyze the minutes of the conference, examine the personalities and roles of the participants, describe the main features of the new Albanian policy, reveal the hitherto unknown roots (e.g. African aspects) of this policy, and present the imperial interest group that managed to keep the new Albanian policy in operation for two decades, in spite of the fact that the people filling the roles of common ministers were constantly shifting.

Finally, it is worth clarifying the concepts used as a basis for a colonial interpretation of the Austro-Hungarian ventures in Albania. Though Albania was far from the only colony of the Monarchy on the eve of World War I, the colonial expansion pursued by the Ballhausplatz towards the territories inhabited by Albanians was a kind of mixture of “border colonization” and “construction of naval networks” described by Jürgen Osterhammel.4 Albanian politics was at once a border colonialism, as geographical Albania lay in the immediate vicinity of Austria-Hungary. On the other hand, it was also part of the strategies involved in the construction of naval networks, as the target area was surrounded by a wreath of huge mountains towards the Central Balkans, so the region was most easily approached from the sea.

Another source on which I draw in my interpretation of Austro-Hungarian expansionist efforts in Albania as an essentially colonial venture is an article by Trutz von Trotha on colonialism. According to Trotha, the distinctions historians draw among colonies should be based more on the forms of expansion and the goals set by the colonial power with respect to each individual colony than on classifications according to type (colony, protectorate, or mandate). Thus, building on this idea, I suggest that historians would be well to examine imperial expansion in Eastern Europe as a form of colonial expansion.5

The Ballhausplatz’s Colonization Efforts in the 1890s

Based on the monograph of Stephen Gross, Export Empire, we have reasons to suggest that the colonial policy pursued in the 1890s by the two Austro-Hungarian foreign ministers, Gustav von Kálnoky and Agenor Gołuchowski, was originally inspired by the work of the German chancellor Leo von Caprivi.6 Under Caprivi, the state became the most dominant actor in German (informal) colonialism. Caprivi sought to make Germany a much more active participant in the global project of colonialism than it had been in Bismarck’s time, but he did not seek to achieve his aims through a great power policy. He used the organizing power of the state and soft power policies to win the active support of German economic interest groups for his policies. Furthermore, he considered it necessary to win the support of broad sections of German society for the cause of colonialism. In order to do this, he gave active political support to the mass social organizations of the upper and middle classes which promoted colonialism, including, for instance, the Deutsche Kolonialgessellschaft (German Colonial Society).

Kálnoky and Gołuchowski started taking preparatory steps in the 1890s to transform Austria-Hungary into an openly colonial power. In the Austro-Hungarian foreign ministry, the questions of colonialism and emigration were entrusted to a separate organizational unit independent within Ballhausplatz. Gołuchowski also provided political support for Austrian civilian organizations which, through their lobbying and publishing activities, urged the participation of the Dual Monarchy in the colonial partition of the world. Finally, Gołuchowski strove to win the support of the political elites of the two empires: the two parliaments and the two delegations debated Gołuchowski’s ideas concerning possible colonial ventures during the annual negotiations concerning the joint budget (1898–1901).

In 1891, at Kálnoky’s instructions, Adalbert Fuchs, who worked in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was entrusted with the management of overseas and emigration affairs. In 1894, the reorganization of Fuchs’ office was ordered. However, the new organizational system, which was based on new departments or Referatur, was only put in place under Agenor Gołuchowski, who assumed the position of joint Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1895. The new III. Referatur, or third department, headed by Fuchs as section chief (Sektionschef), was entrusted with an array of tasks, including colonial policy and the emigration question (Kolonialpolitik und Auswanderungsfrage).7

This third department was created first and foremost because of economic considerations. The Austrian Empire enjoyed a flourishing period of industrial and commercial development at the turn of the century, and this naturally led to the emergence of new types of lobbying organizations. These organizations included a group of large banking consortia (Bodenkreditanstalt, Wiener Bankverein) and chambers of commerce and industry. Although these lobby groups did not have financial assets or backing that would have made them competitive in the spaces under the control of the great powers, they had enough spare capital to look for investment opportunities in Africa, Latin America, and even the Far East. They soon began to take a growing interest in the question of emigration. Many of their publicists who were engaged in propaganda in support of colonial ventures believed that, as was the case in other European states, the issue of emigration should be linked to the economic interests of Austria-Hungary on the African and Latin American continent. In other words, without active state involvement, the big Austrian banks and the chambers of industry and commerce did not dare take serious independent action. The creation of the third department was thus partly in the interests of the new lobby organizations.8

In 1894, Ernst Franz Weisl founded the Österreichisch-Ungarische Kolonial-Gesellschaft, or Austro-Hungarian Colonial Society, on the model of the German Colonial Society. The Society was established to promote the foreign economic interests of the Dual Monarchy and to win social support for the third department of Ballhausplatz. The society was under the political wing of Gołuchowki, and in the 1890s, it worked together with the Ballhausplatz consular network on several African endeavors (Rio de Oro, Morocco). The joint minister either maintained direct contact with them through the head of the third department or held personal meetings with their leaders. Gołuchowski encouraged his officials and consuls to serve as active figures in the society.9

In the delegation meetings and the parliamentary sessions held in both halves of the empire at the turn of the century, the possibility of Austro-Hungarian participation in global colonialism was raised during debates concerning the development of the navy and the budget of the joint ministries. It also came up in connection with the Spanish-American War and the suppression of the Chinese Boxer Rebellion.10 The majority of the Hungarian MPs consistently voted in favor of covering the expenditures of the navy fleet, despite the debates concerning public law. The minutes from meetings of the House of Representatives reveal that Hungary’s elected representatives opposed the idea of colonial policy in principle but not in practice. After 1867, most Hungarian deputies, both those of the governing coalition and the opposition, did not rule out the possibility that sometime in the distant future, if the conditions were favorable, Austria-Hungary or even Hungary might join the ranks of the powers who were leading the colonial division of the world, whether through force of arms or economic influence. By “favorable conditions,” they meant that Hungarian foreign trade and industry would share in the various opportunities and anticipated benefits in proportion to the so-called quota (the rate at which Hungary and Austria contribute to the costs of common affairs between the two states) or on a parity basis. It is also worth noting that, while supporters of a possible Austrian colonial project would have ventured into Africa, Latin America, or the Far East, the attention of those who were kindling visions of Hungarian imperialism was focused primarily on the Balkans, the peninsula where, according to the consensus of the members of the Budapest House of Representatives, Austria-Hungary already had a colony: Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Drawing on domestic political and public law considerations, the Hungarian prime ministers and the Budapest parliament managed to prevent Ballhausplatz from espousing an open and long-term colonial policy in Africa and the Far East at the turn of the century. Ministers of common civilian affairs drew a number of lessons from this failure. One of these lessons was the need to launch and finance, when the circumstances were auspicious, concrete colonial ventures without, however, calling political attention to their endeavors.

Ballhausplatz’s New Albania Policy

In the second half of the nineteenth century, Albania (understood as a geographical territory) began to play an increasingly important role in Ballhausplatz’s visions for the Balkans, primarily for reasons of foreign trade and foreign policy. The strategic importance of the region grew to such an extent for the empire that, at the turn of the century, the joint Viennese ministries announced a new Albanian policy. This was seen as necessary first and foremost to prevent the emergence of a Russian “iron ring” running alongside Austria-Hungary, from the German-Russian border to the Adriatic. But the new Albanian policy was also intended to help keep Italian and Serbian ambitions for the Eastern Adriatic at bay and to prepare the Dual Monarchy for the eventual collapse of the Ottoman Empire.11

The direct cause of the new Albanian policy on the eve of the turn of the century and a clear sign of the impending collapse of the Ottoman Empire was a memorandum written in early 1896. The memorandum was written by Muslim Albanian nobleman and later grand vizier of the empire, Ferit Bey Vlora of the Great House of Vlora (grand vizier: 1903–1908).12

In the 1890s, Albanian Muslims along the coast of Albania who earlier had been loyal Ottoman subjects were becoming increasingly convinced that the Ottoman Empire would soon disintegrate. Out of concern for the future of the Albanian territories and fearing the ambitions of the neighboring nation states, prominent Albanians who held high civil service or military positions in the capital formed a secret organization. Soon, several similar associations were formed in central and southern Albania. One of the goals of these associations was to cultivate the mother tongue (Albanian) and, through it, the national idea. Members of these circles were increasingly convinced that the Albanian people would never be able to create national and state unity on their own, given their cultural backwardness, their social and ideological fragmentation, the threats posed by neighboring peoples, and the sultan’s repressive policy towards the Albanian national movement. In their assessment, it would only be possible to create national and state unity with the help of a benevolent European great power.

In the early spring of 1896, Ferit Vlora, the leader of the Albanian nationalists in Constantinople, met with Austro-Hungarian ambassador Heinrich Calice to inquire about Ballhausplatz’s plans for Albania and to share his thoughts. He said that, thanks to its policy towards Muslims in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Austria-Hungary had managed to win the trust of Albanian Muslims. During the visit, Ferit Vlora gave Calice the abovementioned memorandum. It would be hard to overstate the importance of this document. A leading official of the Ottoman Empire was asking Austria-Hungary, a Christian European power, for protection for the Muslim-majority Albanian people.13

Ferit Vlora’s memorandum was essentially a detailed political plan, and it ended up serving as the basis of the program of the Vienna Conference of 1896 (where it was discussed) and the so-called Albanian Action Plans that were a product of the conference. Ferit Vlora asked Ballhausplatz to play a role as protector against the Balkan Slavs and also to launch a consistent policy of intervention against the sultanate in support of Albanian nationhood. This interventionist policy was to have a military side and an economic side. Ferit Vlora proposed that Austrian warships appear in Albanian ports as often as possible and that the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy acquire railway construction and operation concessions on the eastern Adriatic.14 In 1897, in a telegram to Ballhausplatz, Ferit Vlora’s younger brother Syrja Vlora went even further in his proposals: he called for the establishment of an independent Albania as an Austro-Hungarian protectorate.15

Ballhausplatz took the invitation seriously but also with measured caution. The Vlora brothers came from southern Albania, or in other words not from the traditional area of interest for Austria-Hungary. Until 1896, within the framework of the Catholic cult protectorate, only the Catholic Albanians living in the northern regions of geographical Albania belonged to Vienna’s jurisdiction. According to the treaties signed with the Ottoman Empire in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and the concordat signed with the papal state in 1855, the duties of the cult protectorate included the protection of the free exercise of religion by local Catholics; the maintenance and operation of churches, schools, and other church buildings; providing training for the Albanian Catholic clergy; preventing taxation of the Church by the state; building new denominational schools and churches; providing financial and humanitarian assistance; and generally providing finances for the operation of the local Catholic Church and providing it with legal protection from the Ottoman authorities. The Vlora brothers were essentially calling for the political and economic extension of this sectarian and humanitarian protectorate power to all Albanians. While it kept this request secret from the outside world and from public opinion in both halves of the empire, Ballhausplatz embarked on a long-term policy of intervention.

Thus, in the name of an influential Muslim group, Ferit and Syrja Vlora, sought the active intervention of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in Ottoman internal affairs in the interest of the Albanians against their legitimate ruler, the sultan. When a group of subjects in Africa or Asia sought the active and long-term intervention of a foreign European power in order to assert their interests against their ruler and settle a local, internal political conflict, this is regarded in the secondary literature as the beginning of the establishment of the intervening European state as a colonial power. This type of request, after all, was one of the most important sources of legitimacy for the establishment of colonial rule at the time.16

Regrettably, none of the surviving sources contain information concerning Ferit Vlora’s views on contemporary European colonial issues. However, drawing on contemporary Ottoman sources, Leyla Amzi-Erdoğdular suggests that the occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina was as much an anti-colonial experience for Muslims in the Ottoman Empire as the loss of other lands which belonged to the empire in Asia and Africa. According to Amzi-Erdoğdular, in the eyes of the Muslims of the Ottoman Empire, the loss of European territories was qualitatively no different from the colonial annexation of Asian and African provinces.17

It would be worth noting, in connection with the independent political initiative taken by the Vlora brothers that they were not the only people to embark on this kind of undertaking among the Albanian pressure groups. In 1901, Haxhi Zeka Mulla, the political leader of the so-called League of Peja, which was a supra-confessional organization which urged Albanian national development, repeated the request, as did influential Kosovo landowner Jashar Erebara in 1903. Zeka and Erebara represented two Muslim Albanian pressure groups which had considerable influence in rural Albanian areas. Like the Vlora brothers, they believed that the fall of the Ottoman Empire was nigh, and Albanians would only be able to prosper under the protection of a great European power. Given of the tolerant policy shown by the Monarchy towards Muslims in Bosnia, both Zeka and Erebara saw Ballhausplatz as a suitable protectorate. Thus, Austro-Hungarian intervention was sought not only by a group of Constantinople officials and intellectuals with roots in southern Albania, but also by the leaders of political groups with influence in the Albanian vilayet of Kosovo.18

On November 17, December 8, and December 23, a conference was held to discuss the foundations of the new Albanian policy.19 The meetings were attended by the two aforementioned joint ministers, Agenor Gołuchowski and Benjámin Kállay, and several experts were also invited. Head of Department Eduard Horowitz, the leading official in the joint Ministry of Finance, managed affairs concerning Bosnia and Herzegovina and was also involved in Kállay’s activities in connection with the World Expositions. Julius Zwiedinek von Sündenhorst, a former student at the Academy of Oriental Languages in Vienna (which trained consuls, interpreters, and economists), was the leading official at Ballhausplatz. He was recognized not only as an expert on Albanian affairs, but also as an international authority and publicist on the Ottoman Empire, trade in the east, the Levant, and Syria.20

Norbert Schmucker, another former student at the Oriental Academy, had served in various Albanian consulates between 1881 and 1893. He was invited to the conference in part because he had served as Consul General of Austria-Hungary in Bombay from 1893 to 1896, he was familiar with the Indian subcontinent, and he had been a member of the Austro-Hungarian Colonial Society since 1896 and was one of its liaisons to the Foreign Ministry.21

The aforementioned Adalbert Fuchs, head of department for colonial policy, was invited by the common foreign minister. Earlier, Fuchs had been responsible for an array of tasks, including keeping an eye on the territories (mostly in Africa and Asia) to which the Habsburg dynasty or the Common Foreign Office had internationally acknowledged religious, economic, or political claims. He was also responsible for organizing, on request, communication and shipping ties with the regions that had caught the interest of politicians in the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy who were eager to pursue colonial ventures.22

Four additional experts were later invited to assist with the implementation of the decisions reached at the conference. Kállay brought in Lajos Thallóczy as an expert on Orientalism, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Albania.23 Consul General in Shkodra (Northern Albania) Theodor Ippen was called on by the Joint Foreign Minister, partly because of his experience as a civilian envoy in the Novi Pazar Sanjak. Although Ballhausplatz did not include Austria-Hungary’s experiences in the sanjaks (which contemporary historian Tamara Scheer has interpreted as informal imperialism)24 among the colonial ventures, the secondary literature on British Punjab (North-West Frontier Province) suggests that it might well be worth regarding them as such.25 The Novi Pazar Sanjak in the Balkans and the Punjab in India served very similar functions. While there were differences in the international legal status of the two territories and in the titles of possession, these were the two regions through which the Dual Monarchy and the British Empire could reach the interior of the Ottoman Empire and Central Asia and pursue their ambitions to conquer and control more territory. The tasks and functions of the military occupation regimes, administration, civilian commissioners, and railway construction plans in the two regions are largely comparable.

After graduating from the Academy of Oriental Languages, Julius Pisko served as a consul in Belgrade, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and (geographical) Albania.26 He trained himself to be an expert in colonial affairs precisely under the influence of his experiences in Albania. In 1902–1903, he took part in the SMS Zenta mission to Africa and Latin America, which had three objectives: to demonstrate Austria-Hungary’s great power status, to demonstrate the Monarchy’s military capabilities on the ocean, and to make trade policy surveys and gather statistics. As a participant in the military mission, Pisko visited the British, French, German, Portuguese, and Belgian colonies in Africa and studied them as a trade correspondent for the common foreign office. He also assessed possibilities for Austro-Hungarian economic colonization on the African continent. He regularly sent reports both to the joint ministries and to the Austrian and Hungarian governments. On the basis of his work as a publicist, Pisko seems to have identified, in the course of his travels, with the supremacist, racist views which undergirded the British and French colonial projects. Like all the Austro-Hungarian consuls who later took part in the ventures in Albania, he became a member of the Flottenverein (in 1906). The Flottenverein was a mass Austrian social organization which, on behalf of its several thousand members, demanded of the joint ministries and the governments of the two halves of the empire that the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy play an active role in the colonial partition of the world.27

Heinrich Calice recommended to the conference organizers that they also invite Albanian monk Prenk Doçi. Doçi had taken part in the League of Prizren’s uprising against the Ottoman Empire (1878–1881). He escaped execution by fleeing to Rome with the help of the Austro-Hungarian consular service, which turned to Propaganda Fide to help Doçi escape. In Rome, Doçi became secretary to Cardinal Antonio Agliardi, a papal diplomat, who took him first to Canada and then to India as apostolic delegate between 1884 and 1889. During his two major trips to India, Agliardi was entrusted with the task of reorganizing the hierarchy of the Catholic Church in the complex political, administrative, ethnic, and sectarian context of the subcontinent and preparing a concordat on the local modus vivendi with Portugal. He developed a close working relationship with Doçi, one of the consequences of which was that, during the Balkan wars, as nuncio in Vienna, he often presented himself as one of the papacy’s experts on Albania.28 It is perhaps worth noting that, in August 1913, the cardinal, who had visited India, referred to the Austro-Hungarian protectorate in Albania as the jewel in Franz Joseph’s crown.29

As part of the Albanian initiatives, Doçi wrote a memorandum for the common foreign ministry in 1897 in which made concrete suggestions concerning the potential organization of Albania as a state. If one examines his proposals, which included a Catholic Principality in northern Albania as an autonomous administrative unit which would be formally dependent on the sultan but practically dependent on Austria-Hungary, it seems quite possible that Doçi drew on Indian examples when drafting his memorandum.30

The Role of Benjámin Kállay in Launching Operations in Albania

The minutes of the conference reveal that the Joint Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Joint Ministry of Finance played different strategic roles in shaping the new Albanian policy. Foreign Minister Agenor Gołuchowski was looking primarily for answers to logistical and political questions, for instance where and with whom the so-called “Albanian actions” should be carried out and how the Albanian consulates should be reorganized. In contrast, Benjamin Kállay, the Joint Minister of Finance, wanted to implement the new policy within the framework of a complex great power operation. Kállay determined first and foremost the means which would be used to influence the Albanians and the practical tasks which would need to be carried out in support of Albanian nation building. His main proposal was for Vienna to draft an organizational charter for a future Albanian principality which would lay the foundations for a state which would be formally independent but would practically function as an Austro-Hungarian protectorate.31

The strategy adopted by Kállay in 1896 was based largely on his experiences as governor of Bosnia-Herzegovina and his knowledge of British colonial practices. In order to assert the interests of the Monarchy as a great power, Kállay proposed that the plan of action should include the distribution of arms and ammunition to the Albanians and that Ballhausplatz should openly take the side of the former in the recurring Albanian-Montenegrin border disputes. In his assessment, these two steps would offer an immediate sign of the strength of the protections being offered by Austria-Hungary and would win allies for Vienna. Kállay also suggested that some influential Albanian political and military leaders should be provided with financial subsides from time to time through the consulates.32

According to Kállay, an active economic policy was indispensable for the Albanian actions to succeed. In his view, the Austro-Hungarian press should pursue active propaganda to increase trade with the Albanian territories. Albanian merchants, he felt, should be able to bring their goods to Vienna, as this would help win their support. Furthermore, he felt that a trading house should be established to carry out the essential functions of mediation in order to nurture trade between the Dual Monarchy and Albania. Kállay also considered it important that, instead of relying on smaller shipping companies, Ballhausplatz get the Trieste-based Austrian Lloyd, the largest Austrian shipping company, for “special and regular service to Albania.” Head of the colonial department Adalbert Fuchs, who organized shipping connections with Albanian ports, was entrusted with this task. Within a few years, the transport link between Austria-Hungary and Albania was established. The aforementioned Austrian Lloyd and Ungaro-Croata, the largest Hungarian steamship company (Fiume), operated the ship services.33

Although historians have only rarely made the economic expansion of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and its trade relations with the eastern Adriatic between 1896 and 1914 the focus of their studies, unpublished archival sources reveal that an Austrian businessman and banker named Paul Siebertz established a department store and printing press in the southern Albanian port town of Vlora in the early years of the twentieth century and even bought a hotel at some point. The infrastructure created by Siebertz furthered the interests of Austro-Hungarian imperial expansion because it physically linked the center to the periphery at a historic moment when not only Ballhausplatz but also the Austrian Industrialists’ Association was aiming to acquire Vlora, together with Thessaloniki. Siebertz’s endeavors also helped consolidate pre-capitalist conditions in the region.34

We also know that Zef Curani, an Albanian from the city of Shkodra in northern Albania who had studied at the Vienna Commercial Academy, was one of the Albanian merchants who came into contact with Ballhausplatz as a consequence of the new policy. Curani’s principal tasks in the implementation of operations in Albania included information gathering, propaganda, arms smuggling, nation building, and the creation of a single Albanian alphabet. Ballhausplatz rewarded Curani for his services with regular subsidies. The joint foreign ministry also gave him a financial incentive in the development of Austro-Hungarian-Albanian trade relations: in the summer of 1913, for example, he handled all the shipments of goods between Oboti and Shkodra (northern Albania) on the Buna River to and from the Monarchy (he enjoyed a monopoly), and he received a share of the profits from these shipments. The relationship between Ballhausplatz and Curani offers a clear example of the kind of soft power imperialism described by Stephen Gross in his aforementioned monograph Export Empire.

In connection with the idea of supporting Albanian nation building, Kállay had two fundamental questions in mind. First, he sought to strengthen the social groups and organizations that were capable of shouldering the burden of modern nation building and on which Austria-Hungary could rely. Second, he wanted to nurture national sentiment among Albanians who belonged to social strata which had hitherto been indifferent to the national idea. Kállay wanted to use the new subsidy policy to exert an influence on three social groups: members of the Albanian Catholic Church, Muslim beys from impoverished but respectable families of noble birth, and members of the Albanian diasporas abroad.35

Kállay wanted to transform the Catholic Church into a national church. While it was true that the episcopacy in Albania was indeed comprised of Albanians, most of the lower clergy and monastic orders consisted of Italians or pro-Italian priests who were involved in political propaganda in the interests of Italy. Kállay therefore proposed that, in cooperation with the Vatican and the Jesuit order, the noviciates who were being sent to the Albanian territories would in the future be chosen from among young people of Albanian nationality who were studying theology in the seminaries in Austria-Hungary. With this proposal, Kállay sought, in essence, to reconcile the interests of the Catholic Church with Austria-Hungary’s foreign policy interests so that the latter would dominate. Kállay made two demands that he expected to be met in exchange for more financial support through the institution of the protectorate: the clergy should actively spread pro-Albanian national propaganda and, politically, it should be loyal to Ballhausplatz’s visions. Otherwise, the subsidies would drop or be cut off, or Vienna could even find a way to compel a given monastic order to leave the region.36

Kállay agreed with Ferit Vlora’s memorandum, and he felt it was important to make the Albanians understand that Austria-Hungary was not supporting a denomination, but rather hoped to further the creation of an independent Albania where Catholics and Muslims would strive together to achieve national goals. He urged the participants in the conference to harness the ambitions of influential beys to reach these goals. The quantities and frequency of the subsidies given to individuals, he felt, should depend on the extent to which the beneficiaries took clear political stances.37

The method suggested by Kállay (and later adopted) of selecting the beys is reminiscent of the ways in which the British Empire in West Africa drew distinctions between “good” and “bad” Muslims. Formally, Ballhausplatz strove to maintain a neutral attitude towards the various Muslim groups in Albania, but it supported and strengthened the power, economic sway, and influence of the social stratum of beys who cooperated with it. The Austro-Hungarian consular network, furthermore, was increasingly willing to engage in conflicts with the group of officials running the Ottoman administration when their endeavors threatened the sustainability of the social order. The disruption of the social status quo would have had repercussions which would have been felt on the international stage.38

Kállay also suggested that the planned operations should be extended beyond the Albanian territories and that subsidies should be provided to influence the cultural organizations of the Albanian diasporas in Bucharest and Sofia. The print materials published by these cultural organizations in Albanian and then smuggled into the territory of the Ottoman Empire could be used to propagate a national Albanian idea that was also pro-Austrian. The conference adopted and implemented Kállay’s proposals.

When Albania declared its independence in 1912, of the four large groups of the founding fathers (members of the so-called great houses, refugees, beys, and intellectuals who belonged to the diasporas), the latter two became influential political factors in Albanian society, both because of the unusual political circumstances and to no small extent thanks to the support they were given by Austria-Hungary.39

If one considers Kállay’s proposals from the perspective of the prevailing colonial practices at the time, the new subsidy policy seems to have functioned in part as a tool with which to maintain the diversity of Albanian society by creating a new hierarchy between and within groups which was then controlled and overseen through subsidies. The creation of a national Catholic Church meant that, within the new hierarchy, some orders (Jesuits) enjoyed conspicuously more support, while others (Franciscans) had to make do with less. The deal offered to the Catholic Church in 1896 meant unequal conditions and political subordination for Propaganda Fides on Albanian territory, since the amounts of the subsidies received through the Austro-Hungarian protectorate were also determined by the political reliability shown to Ballhausplatz.

The same logic was applied in secular society to the funding provided for the selected Muslim beys. The Austro-Hungarian consular network identified bey families which, fundamentally because of their economic circumstances, had drifted into the camp of internal opposition to the Ottoman Empire. Their opposition had become an important means of expressing their commitment to the Albanian language and the Albanian national movement (one could mention, for example, the Toptani family in central Albania). As a reward for their political loyalty to Austria, Ballhausplatz began to strengthen the economic position of this social group and its place in Albanian society. Austria-Hungary’s ability to use the beys as tools to achieve its ends was limited, however, by the fact that Italy, in pursuit of its own imperialist interests, also began to finance this social group, as well as the members of the lower priesthood, who were partly Italian.40

All in all, the implementation of the new Albanian policy was successful and remained secret partly because it was possible to avoid calling any attention to the measures among political circles by bypassing the two parliaments on the issue of funding. There was always enough money for the Albanian policy without it appearing anywhere as a separate budget item. Through the item of “Catholic churches in Levant,” Ballhausplatz could use monies provided for the common ministries to pursue its aims in Albania. In addition, since 1864, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had been handling the so-called “united Oriental funds,” which were pooled from the assets of two civil foundations (the Sklavenredemptionsfond and the Orientalische Missionsfond). The pooled funds were basically used to run Catholic schools and missions in the Ottoman Empire. If additional funds were needed for the new Albanian policy, these budgets could be increased without attracting notice.41 (For a thorough account of the concrete details and statistics concerning the use of these funds, see the monographs by Schanderl, Schwanda, Toleva, Deusch, and Gostentschnigg.)

The monarch also regularly used monies from the private funds of the Habsburg family to support the Catholic archdioceses in Albania. The sources contain no concrete indication of the Emperor and King having used these funds to finance political enterprises in Albania, but it is worth noting that as early as 1858, Franz Joseph had given permission to finance specific colonial projects, such as Wilhelm Tegetthoff’s expedition to the Red Sea, by secretly using state funds through the private funds of his brother Archduke Maximilian.42

Pax Austro-Hungarica

The participants in the Vienna Conference of 1896 thus adopted a policy of subsidies intended to ensure that, in time, the eastern Adriatic would come under the sway of a prince who would rule under an Austro-Hungarian protectorate. Since the minutes of the conference do not reveal what pattern the protectorate would follow, it is worth keeping in mind that two great powers, Russia and Great Britain, had already used this form of rule not far from the Albanian territories. In the eastern Balkans, Russia had held the Romanian principalities (1830s) and Bulgaria (1878–1885) under its power as a protectorate. Similarly, in the nineteenth century, the so-called Septinsular Republic (1797–1812) in the Ionian Islands near the Albanian coast enjoyed protections as a British protectorate, as did Malta (1800–1813) and Cyprus (1878–1914) in the Mediterranean. In each of these territories, the role of the British Empire as protector was a sort of next step to colonization: United States of the Ionian Islands (former Septinsular Republic) was under British colonial rule from 1815 to 1864, and Malta became a Crown colony in 1813, followed by Cyprus a century later, in 1922.43

For Ballhausplatz, of the two protectorate models, the Russian was preferable, as the Ballhausplatz officials envisioned a prince and principality in Albania after the possible collapse of the Ottoman Empire rather than an administration led by a governor or administrator.

Kállay proposed that an organizational statute be drafted for the future Albanian principality, a suggestion which indicates that he may have been drawing not only on the models of Wallachia and Moldavia, but also the smaller Ottoman units with administrative autonomy and mixed Muslim-Christian populations. These units—Samos (1834), Lebanon (1860–1864), Crete (1868, 1898), and Eastern Rumelia (1878)—had been given an organizational statute (reglement/statut organique) in the nineteenth century with international assistance. As the Austro-Hungarian delegate, Kállay had participated in the drafting of the latter’s organizational statute.

In the formulation of concrete action programs, or in other words, the operations that it was hoped would lead to the creation of a protectorate, the participants in the 1896 conference drew heavily on the example of Syria. The activities of the French consuls in Syria after 1861 and the new methods they had developed to exert an influence on the local population were incorporated into the practices of Austro-Hungarian consuls. But alongside the international models, Ballhausplatz drew at least as much on its own imperial experiences and practices. Ballhausplatz adopted practices which had been used in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in the Novi Pazar Sanjak, and it took into consideration and learned from the experiences of the Austro-Hungarian consulate in Khartoum in Sudan (see below).44

After the conference, the various tasks were divided up among the joint ministries. Under the influence of the theoretical and practical guidance of Lajos Thallóczy, the focus of Kállay’s line was primarily on nation-building tasks. They decided to publish a textbook in Albanian on Albanian national history for Albanian ethnic schools. To further the creation of a uniform Latin alphabet, literature programs were launched in Vienna, Borgo Erizzo (or Arbanasi in Croatian and Arbneshi in Albanian, where the population was Albanian-speaking) in Dalmatia, Brussels (where the French-language journal Albanie was published), Bucharest, and Sofia. Several Albanian-language publications were published as part of the program. The joint Ministry of Finance also strove to put forward economic and trade action plans.

The Gołuchowski line undertook political tasks: preparing the Albanian elite and intellectuals for the state-building project; logistical and financial support for the Albanian national movement; and the development of a consular network able to carry out the new tasks.

Although the idea arose of creating a separate department within the joint foreign ministry for the oversight and organization of the new Albanian policy, ultimately, the operations were carried out by the Albanian experts at Ballhausplatz, who worked within the existing organizational structure.45 (Unfortunately, the sources reveal little concerning what the actual responsibilities of this Albanian department would have been.) Lajos Thallóczy selected the consul candidates for the program from among the students at the Academy of Oriental Languages in Vienna, where Thallóczy himself was also an instructor. After having completed their studies at the academy, the candidates attended a six to twelve month continued training course on site, i.e., at the Albanian consulates, where they learned Albanian and acquired knowledge of the circumstances on the ground. Training courses were also organized for these emerging Albania experts in Borgo Erizzo. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs worked together with the Dalmatian governorate to organize Albanian language courses in the local schools in part for Austrian and Hungarian citizens who voluntarily sought, either as civilians or as soldiers, to participate in the implementation of the new Albanian policy. Those who received training in these schools included Heinrich Clanner von Engelshofen, for instance, who was a confidante of Joint Chief of Staff Conrad and the most important intelligence officer for Joint Staff and Ballhausplatz in Albania.46

The allotment to the consuls of the tasks involved in the Albanian operations was the result of a concerted effort by the two joint ministries. The preservation of the territorial integrity of the Ottoman Empire was still a primary interest for Austria-Hungary, and the preparations underway for the creation of an Albanian state were merely a cautionary step in anticipation of the imminent collapse of the empire, so the consuls had to operate in secret.

Thus, the consuls could not do anything to alter the organizational system of the Ottoman state administration, and they had to build their policies on local structures. Ballhausplatz gave them a free hand in this and did not exercise close supervision over them. Nonetheless, even if the Albanian policies were broken down to the level of the sanjak, they were to be implemented in a coordinated manner. The consuls had to be fluent in Albanian and familiar with local customs and conditions, and they had to build up their own networks of contacts by traveling regularly within the territories of their offices. The consul was expected to build a network of contacts to ensure that, through him, Austria-Hungary would gain prestige as a protector power and would be able to propagate its vision of the values of civilization. The consuls had to prevail on the Albanian beys to turn to them with their complaints and to seek them out as representatives of their interests and sources of advice, and not the state administration or state officials. The Austro-Hungarian consuls took this pattern from the practice of the French consuls in Syria. The primary means used to build a network of contacts were the distribution of gifts and distinctions of various kinds, regular or temporary subsidies, personal visits (e.g. extended stays with the bey families), measures taken against the state authorities, support for education in Albanian, and cultural and financial support for the Albanian national movement. Ballhausplatz also provided logistical support for the leaders of the national movement: they could bypass the controlled communication channels of the Ottoman Empire by using the local branches of the Austrian Post and Austrian Lloyd, which meant that the secrets contained in their letters were safe.47

All in all, the responsibilities and tasks of the consuls described above, the push for the transformation of the Albanian social hierarchy, and the efforts to promote economic expansion were little more than a west Balkan, Austro-Hungarian adaptation of the everyday practices used by the so-called indirect rule protectorates, which were based essentially on the British models in Africa and Asia. The fact that the Joint Chiefs of Staff allowed the military fleet to make regular demonstrations of force in Albanian ports in Ottoman territorial waters buttresses this claim. Indeed, an annual show of military force was one of the features of the British indirect rule in West Africa.48

For as should be noted, Ballhausplatz’s new Albanian policy also enjoyed the support of the joint staff. In a memorandum of April 2, 1897, Chief of the General Staff Friedrich Beck pushed for the creation of an independent, pro-Vienna Albania, which he supported with reference to allegedly “vital” reasons.49 He considered it important to have a strong presence on the eastern Adriatic coast for two reasons from a military point of view. First, control of the area would ensure free passage for Austria-Hungary’s military and merchant fleets to the Mediterranean through the Otranto Strait. Second, it would give the Monarchy a strategic position just to the south of Serbia and Montenegro.50 In effect, Beck’s plan would have meant the creation of a cordon sanitaire in Albania that would have protected the sea route, the free use of which was essential if Austria-Hungary sought to maintain its status as a great power. The chief of the General Staff (and Ballhausplatz) was merely adopting a common practice of colonial great powers: the British Empire, for example, surrounded its sea routes to India with a network of British protectorates in order to ensure that these routes remained safe for its ships.51

Beck adopted a committed imperialist policy: he asked the Austro-Hungarian consuls in Albania to gather geographical, cartographic, and infrastructural data. He was prepared, furthermore, to carry out independent military operations in Albanian territory, and he accepted the proposal which had been made by Ferit Vlora and allowed units of the joint navy to make regular demonstrations of force. One of the primary tasks of the units of the fleet that were deployed was to give Albanians a tangible demonstration of Austria-Hungary’s military capabilities and the protections they enjoyed as a kind of protectorate. The first such demonstration was held in 1902, when the SMS Monarch (1895), SMS Wien (1895), and SMS Budapest (1896), three vessels which belonged to a relatively new class of battleship, docked in Durrës, a coastal city with the largest port in Albania.52

In the first decade of the twentieth century, Austria-Hungary’s new Albanian policy led to serious great power rivalry between the Monarchy and Italy over the assertion of influence in Albania. To this day, the secondary literature on the subject has reduced this great power rivalry, which unfolded in the ecclesiastical, economic, and cultural spheres, to the phenomenon of informal imperialism.53 Yet the interests of the two great powers collided in another fringe territory of the Ottoman Empire, namely the Sudan. North Africa was an important cornerstone not only of Austria-Hungary’s Balkan policy but also of Italy’s.

Ballhausplatz’s Experiences in the Sudan

Historians who have done research on the Austro-Hungarian empire’s policy in the Balkans have paid little attention to the fact that Ballhausplatz’s ambitions in southeastern Europe went hand in hand with its presence in North Africa in the 1880s and 1890s. As early as the British occupation of Egypt and the 1882 Constantinople Conference to address the resulting Egyptian uprising, it had been perfectly clear to joint Foreign Minister Gustav von Kálnoky that any shift of power in Egypt would automatically give rise to international tensions in the Balkans, thus making it difficult to stabilize the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina and hampering Austria-Hungary’s efforts to position itself in southeastern Europe. Furthermore, the conflict in Egypt threatened Austria-Hungary’s economic markets in the Levant. This was primarily why Ballhausplatz took an active political stance in North Africa during these two decades. In the great power rivalry, Ballhausplatz took part in diplomatic negotiations in support of British foreign policy interests.54

But how did Ballhausplatz end up getting involved in affairs in the Sudan? From the outset, in the 1840s, the Catholic missionaries from the Habsburg Empire, while spreading the faith and fighting the slave trade, very consciously sought to acquire economic markets for the empire in the region. In 1850, the Khartoum consulate was established to provide political protection for the missions. The Habsburg Consulate and the Catholic missions (Apostolic Vicariate of Central Africa, 1846) immediately developed a symbiotic relationship with each other, and under their oversight, religious and ecclesiastical affairs became completely intertwined (“indivisibiliter ac inseparabiliter”) with commercial and political affairs. That was in part a consequence of the support shown by the Franz Joseph for the Catholic missions founded by the subjects of the Habsburg Empire in 1851. A letter written in 1850 by the Slovenian Father Ignacij Knoblehar, who headed the missionaries, suggests that the monks involved in the mission were aware that, with their work, they could help further the process of colonization.55

The symbiosis between the missions in the Sudan and the Habsburg Consulate in Khartoum was so strong and their commercial ambitions so encouraging that Charles Augustus Murray, the British consul General in Alexandria (and also a man who acquired a reputation as an author of fiction), initiated the establishment of a British consulate in Khartoum. At Murray’s suggestion, in 1850, John Petherick was appointed consul. Petherick was a merchant and mining expert with a strong knowledge of Arabic and the local conditions. In his reports to the Foreign Office in the 1860s, Petherick repeatedly accused Austria of using its local representatives to organize a colony at the confluence of the White and Blue Niles. Even if Ballhausplatz had entertained this idea, in the 1890s, political colonization had long since ceased to be one of the Dual Monarchy’s aims in the Sudan.56

When developing the new Albanian policy, which of its experiences in the Sudan did Ballhausplatz learn draw on? The consulates in Khartoum and Albania were able to work closely with the denominational structure of the protectorate under the same conditions because they were all formally subject to the same international agreements. The Ottoman sultans had consented to the establishment of Habsburg Catholic missions and consulates in the Sudan and in the Albanian territories in the Treaty of Passarowitz in 1718 and the Treaty of Belgrade in 1739.57

The Austro-Hungarian consulates in the Sudan and Albania had one important thing in common: the consults sent by Ballhausplatz to both areas were well-qualified, multilingual, and had studied at the Academy of Oriental Languages in Vienna. This stood in sharp contrast to the practices of other great powers, which appointed people from very mixed backgrounds to similar posts.58

Although state interests and the interests of the Catholic Church were traditionally intertwined in the practices of the Austro-Hungarian foreign policy missions in the Ottoman Empire (the ambassador and consuls in Constantinople were also officials of the cult protectorate), the situations of the consulates in Khartoum and Albania differed from the situations of the other consulates. The Common Foreign Office coordinated its policies in the Balkans and North Africa in the last two decades of the nineteenth century: in order to appear as a successful great power in the former, it abandoned its previously acquired positions in the latter and supported the British Foreign Office. Albania and the Sudan, however, were on the periphery of the Ottoman Empire, where the various great powers had conflicting interests. In the Sudan, the British, French, Italian, and Egyptians competed to assert their interests. In Albania, Ottoman, Italian, Austro-Hungarian, and French ambitions collided.

The experiences in the Sudan were also useful in the development of the new Albanian policy because the work of the consulate in Khartoum was intertwined not only with the management of the protectorate but also with the efforts to handle the political tensions that had developed with Italy over the operation of the protectorate. These tensions stemmed essentially from the two problems discussed below, each of which also affected the work of Propaganda Fide.

Although 90 percent of the missions were financed by the Monarchy or the recently unified Germany, the institutions where the next generation of missionaries was trained were still in Italy (which also had unified in the meantime), in territories which had belonged to the Habsburgs. With the birth of the modern Italian state, Italian missionaries became increasingly committed to serving their government’s aspirations for power. While the Ballhausplatz consuls and the personal commitment of Franz Joseph provided political protections for the missions in the Sudan and the missions were financed almost entirely by the German-speaking regions of Europe, many Italian missionaries were increasingly supportive of Italy’s great power aspirations. They were encouraged in their work by the ambitions of the Italian state in neighboring Ethiopia and Somalia. According to Walter Sauer, the missionary order in the Sudan, which was created by Daniele Comboni, pursued a similar nationalist church policy.59

The other conflict of a legal nature related to the cult protectorate concerned the exercise of consular functions. In international relations, it has long been accepted that each state has formalized the right to protect its citizens in foreign affairs affecting its citizens. For many missionaries, the creation of a unified Italy means a change of nationality (or more precisely, citizenship). One could think of the aforementioned Daniele Comboni (1831–1881), for instance, who was one of the most prominent leaders of the Vicariate of Central Africa and who, from one moment to the next, went from being a Habsburg subject to being a subject of the House of Savoy. For decades, the Austro-Hungarian and Italian consuls struggled in their day-to-day workings with the legal complexities of this change of citizenship. Some Italian consuls were also sometimes eager to intervene in the affairs of Catholic clergy who, although Italian nationals, were Austrian citizens.60

The activities of missionaries of Italian nationality and Italy’s great power ambitions in North Africa created lasting friction between Ballhausplatz, the Consulta (the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs), and Propaganda Fide (1866–1890). These frictions may have played a role in the decision of the papacy to work together with Austria-Hungary in its ecclesiastical policy in the Albanian territories at the turn of the century. The events which had taken place in the Sudan were repeated: this was why, in part, Balhausplatz sought to replace members of the lower clergy and the orders in Albania who were of Italian nationality with Albanian priests educated in Austria.

It is worth keeping in mind, in the interests of understanding the broader context, that, in connection with the cult protectorate, in the last decades of the nineteenth century, Austria-Hungary was confronted in North Africa and Albania not only by Italy but also by France. The French state had an older protectorate over Catholics in the Ottoman Empire dating back to the sixteenth century. Furthermore, in the nineteenth century, the French cult protectorate also went beyond its denominational borders and became an instrument with which France could pursue political aims. Between 1878 and 1903, the governments in Paris attempted to take the position of the Austro-Hungarian cult protectorate in the Albanian territories from the papacy.61

At the same time, as the French colonial ventures got closer and closer to the Austrian mission houses in the Sudan, the French Catholic Church wanted to annex the Vicariate of Central Africa too. It made its first attempt to do in the 1860s, when Franz Binder from Transylvania was serving as consul in Khartoum. The second attempt came during the Mahdi uprising, when Europeans were forced to flee the Sudan. Charles Martial Allemand Lavigerie, cardinal of Carthage and Algiers and Primate of Africa, was laboring ambitiously to Christianize the continent. With the help of Propaganda Fide, Lavigerie was able to get his hands on the two most important Austrian mission houses, Gondokoro and Heiligenkreuz. After the British put down the Mahdi uprising, the two mission houses were returned to the Vicariate of Central Africa. They were returned not only because the British sought to push the French out of the region. The events were also shaped by the fact that British General Charles Gordon, who was leading the efforts to consolidate the Sudan politically, was working alongside Rudolf Carl von Slatin, an Austrian colonial figure who had entered British service (and who had been raised to the rank of Pasha by the Ottomans).62

Finally, it is worth considering why it was possible for the Monarchy to benefit directly in Albania from its experiences in the Sudan. This was due primarily to the simple fact that, since the early 1880s, however Ballhausplatz’s internal organization (the grouping of cases and referrals) shifted, the European, Asian, and African territories of the Ottoman Empire and its vassal states in Europe and Africa were always in the hands of the same referent. In 1896, this was Julius Zwiedinek, who was entrusted in part with developing concrete plans for the Albanian operations (the other person in charge of the Albanian action plans was the aforementioned Norbert Schmucker, who at the time was the Austro-Hungarian consul general in Bombay).63

Another clear indication of the ways in which the cult protectorate policies in the Sudan and Albania had an impact on each other after 1896 is the fact that, in accordance with Ballhausplatz’s system for managing documents, the consulate in Khartoum received extracts or copies of some of the statistics concerning payments related to operations in Albania. Accordingly, duplicates of certain cult protectorate documents relating to Albania (understood as a geographical region) were also filed under the heading “Africa” in the Austrian State Archives.64

Later evidence that Ballhausplatz’s Balkan and Albanian policy was not completely divorced from its approach to North Africa is found in the person of Aristoteles Petrović. Petrović left his post as consul general in Alexandria to become the Austro-Hungarian delegate to the International Control Commission for Albania, which was formed in 1913. Petrović was also one of the experts in charge of colonial affairs for and a confidant of Leopold Berchtold, the joint foreign minister.65

The Albanian Lobby

In time, the people responsible for the implementation of the decisions reached at the 1896 conference and the participants in the operations in Albania formed a lobby which, by the year of annexation, had grown into an imperial interest group. Kurt Gostentschnigg devoted an entire monograph of several hundred pages to a detailed presentation of the activities of this lobby, including the ways in which it influenced Ballhausplatz’s Albania policy, so in the discussion below I limit myself to the most important features of this interest group.66

The Albania lobby never formally organized into an association. It was very heterogeneous, as it was made up of loosely connected subgroups. Members were recruited from different social strata and ethnicities, and they joined the lobby for varying reasons and with varying aims. However, the interest group did have a strong Catholic, aristocratic character. The subgroups consisted of diplomatic officials, military officers, aristocrats, scientists, scholars, journalists, and one official-historian. For the most part, they were indifferent to Albania. In their eyes, the Albanian cause was little more than a means of demonstrating the strength and unity of Austria-Hungary as an empire, both to the outside world and domestically. In the last decade and a half of the Dual Monarchy, they came together to form a supranational lobby which, step by step, brought Ballhausplatz’s Albania policy under its influence.

The lobby was both the driving force behind Austro-Hungarian policy towards Albania and the source of expertise on the culture and region. The interest group functioned within the sphere of the joint Foreign Ministry. Some of its members were also ministry officials or consuls. In time, they emerged as experts on the Albanian question in the eyes of the relevant policymakers. Step by step, they instrumentalized the foreign ministry and, through it, the consular network. They participated in Albanian nation-building and state-building as external ethnic entrepreneurs.67 This was possible because the changes in personnel at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not drastically hamper the work of the lobby and its pursuit of the original program. The Albanian beys and the diaspora communities involved in Vienna’s project and the various political and cultural operations undertaken in the service of this project were able to count on continuous subsidies from Vienna over the span of some two decades. In the first decade of the new century, some members of the lobby were also continuously recruiting new members who were committed to the imperialist Austro-Hungarian Albanian policy: experts in the Foreign Ministry who had been in charge of Albanian affairs since 1896 were joined at Ballhausplatz for the most part by new young people selected and appointed for this purpose from among the students at the Oriental Academy by Lajos Thallóczy (including, for instance, Carl Buchberger and Konstantin Bilinski Jr.).

In addition to the work of the lobby, another important part of the background of Vienna’s aspirations and operations in Albania was the birth of Albanian studies as a modern, scientific discipline in Austria-Hungary. In the 1850s, Habsburg consuls serving in Albanian territories began, purely out of their own interests, to pursue scholarly research in which they examined questions concerning the linguistic, ethnographic, and historical aspects of the almost unknown Albanian people.68 In time, their research was published in book form. As the great powers began to take an increasing interest in Albania, some of the most eminent Balkan historians of the time also started studying Albanian history, including for instance the Czech historian Konstantin Jireček, the Croatian Milan Šufflay, and the aforementioned Thallóczy.69 By the turn of the century, modern Albanian studies had claimed its place as one of the philological sciences. By supporting this new discipline, Ballhausplatz gained another opportunity to increase the support it enjoyed among the activists of the Albanian national movement, much as it also gained new opportunities to arrive at clearer assessments of the economic potential of the Albanian territories and to arrive at a more precise scholarly and statistical understanding of Albania.

Though the new discipline of Albanian studies was not the product of great power politics, it nonetheless was in a closely symbiotic relationship with the politics of Ballhausplatz after 1896 and with members of the Albanian lobby. Officials in the common foreign ministry regarded Albanian studies as an imperial discipline. In 1911, Head of Department Karl Macchio noted in a summary for internal use that the study of Albanian culture and history played the same role for Austria-Hungary as Egyptology did for France and Mesopotamian studies for Britain. All three disciplines were important because of the interests and aims of the great powers in the east, and the financial support that was provided was an indispensable part of great power politics. It is worth noting, however that unlike Egyptology and Mesopotamian studies, Albanian studies not only gained an institutionalized form in Austria-Hungary.70

Conclusion and Epilogue

Though the archival sources that I have drawn on in the course of this inquiry avoided the use of the contemporary colonial terminology, in my view, one can confidently regard the new Austro-Hungarian Albanian policy of 1896 as a fundamentally colonial policy. On the one hand, the Austro-Hungarian ventures in Albania fit Osterhammel’s concepts of “border colonization” and “construction of naval networks” and Trotha’s interpretational perspective on colonialism. Coastal Albania before World War I was a perfect example of an ideal potential colony according to the turn-of-the-century definition. It was relatively close to the Dual Monarchy, which meant that formally, the new Albanian policy formally fell into the category of so-called border colonization.71 Albania was separated from the interior by high mountains and was therefore most easily accessible by sea, which means that from a certain perspective it could have been considered an overseas territory. Almost all of Albania’s coastline was splotched with swamps that were breeding grounds for malaria. This strip of land which belonged to the Muslim East was practically unknown in Europe. There was a considerable cultural difference and distance between the potential colonizer and the colonized. In 1896, the Dual Monarchy began diligently acquiring scientific knowledge of the region and its culture, a project that enjoyed the support of the joint ministries, the scientific institutions in both halve of the empire, and the joint Austro-Hungarian General Staff.72

On the other hand, the unpublished sources cited in this study (the memoranda written by the Vlora brothers, joint Chiefs of Staff Friedrich Beck, and Head of Department Karl Macchio and the minutes of the 1896 conference) very clearly reveal that Ballhausplatz’s operations in Albania were aimed at establishing an unequal, asymmetrical relationship with the Albanian territories: geographical Albania was to be made dependent on Austria-Hungary politically, economically, and culturally. Through a policy of subsidies and an indirect form of rule adapted to the circumstances in the western Balkans (based in part on military and economic influence), Ballhausplatz sought to transform and control the hierarchy of Albanian society and the Catholic Church; and through the Albanian nation-building project, Ballhausplatz wanted gradually to transform and replace the local cultural mindset, which essentially had been under the influence of the Muslim, oriental Ottoman Empire, with the Central European, Christian values of the “civilized” empire of Austria-Hungary.

The fact that Adalbert Fuchs, who was the head of Ballhausplatz’s colonial affairs department, took part in the launch of the operations in Albania further confirms that the empire’s Albania policy was indeed a fundamentally a colonial undertaking, as does the fact that the Austro-Hungarian consuls involved in the day-to-day shaping of Albanian policy (as did many of the members of the Albanian lobby, including Friedrich Beck, Ferenc Nopcsa, and Leopold Chlumetzky) were all members of the Austrian Flottenverein. The contemporary British and French analogies in Syria, West Africa, and India also lay bare the colonial character of Albanian politics.

The final stop, as it were, of the Austro-Hungarian policy towards Albania in 1912–1914 was the complete economic exploitation of the emerging independent state of Albania. The propaganda efforts of the Albanian lobby between 1896 and 1912 had successfully mobilized society in the two halves of the empire. In Austria, in 1913, inspired by the formation of the British Albanian Committee, an Albanian Committee was formed consisting of aristocrats and leading figures from large industrial and financial interest groups. The primary objective of this committee was to bring the financial affairs of the new Balkan country under its control through the organization of the Albanian National Bank. In an interesting episode in the evolution of colonial thinking in Austrian public opinion, when a revolt broke out in Albania against the princely power in June 1914, civil activists began to recruit a so-called Albanian Legion in Vienna in defense of public order and the interests of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The goal of the recruiting office was to organize independent fighting units consisting of volunteers who would travel to Albania at their own expense and fight against the rebels in central Albania with their own weapons. According to unpublished archival sources, within 24 hours, 2,000 people had signed up, and according to the Vienna police, nearly 10,000 more were expected to arrive the following day. In the end, this office, with which the Austrian Albania Committee was in direct contact, was closed by the Vienna police at the request of joint Foreign Minister Berchtold. Despite the Foreign Ministry’s prohibition, however, several dozen volunteers still traveled to Albania to take part in the fighting.73

As for Hungary, the establishment of Albania went hand in hand with the birth of independent Albanian studies in Hungary, which served Hungary’s imperial aspirations of Hungary at the national level.74 More important was the fact that an Austro-Hungarian-Italian negotiating committee agreed to divide Albania economically into three spheres of interest in November 1913 (50 percent for Italy, 25 percent for Austria, and 25 percent for Hungary). Key to the Hungarian success was, first, that the members of the Asiatic Society of Hungary (the Turanian Society), as Hungarian state-officials, play a significant role in the imperial and colonial actions of Ballhausplatz in Albania and Anatolia between 1912 and 1914. Second, the Hungarian Prime Minister István Tisza pressured Leopold Berchtold to win acceptance for the Budapest government’s national aspirations.75

Ultimately, the way in which Albania was economically partitioned reveals that colonialism did not become a fourth common cause within the Habsburg Empire. Austria and Hungary acted as separate colonizing parties. In talks with the Italian representatives, a joint team of economists of Austrian and Hungarian nationality took part in the negotiations. In other words, the international negotiations were conducted at the level of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The signing and of the agreements and their parliamentary approval, however, were the responsibilities of the respective Austrian and Hungarian authorities. Formally, this never actually took place, as the January 1914 coup d’état led by the Young Turks took events in Albania in an entirely new direction.

Archival Sources

Österreichisches Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv (ÖStA HHStA)

Administrative Registratur (AR)

F4: Kt. 99, 450, 456,

F 27: Kt. 8, 28-30,

(I.) Allgemeines

(2. Geheime Akten) Kt. 473,

(7. Delegationsakten) Kt. 573,

(8. Generalia) Kt. 685, 710,

(19.) Nachlässe

Nachlass Kral, Kt. 1,

Nachlass Kwiatkowsky, Kt. 1-2,

Nachlass Mérey, Kt. 15,

Politisches Archiv

XII. Türkei, Kt. 419,

XIV. Albanien, Kt. 21, 64,

Kriegsarchiv in Vienna (KA)

AOK-Evidenzbureau

Kt. 3498,

Militärkanzlei Franz Ferdinand (MKFF)

Kt. 203,

Operationsbüro, Fasz. 46,

Magyar Nemzeti Levéltár Magyar Országos Levéltára [Hungarian State Archive] (MNL OL)

K 255 Pénzügyminisztérium, elnöki iratok

Z 41 Pesti Magyar Kereskedelmi Bank Rt., Okmánytár (PMKB)

Országos Széchényi Könyvtár [National Széchényi Library] (OSZK)

Kézirattár, Fol. Hung. 1677

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1 Wagner, “Österreichisch–ungarische Kolonialversuche.”

2 Kolm, Die Ambitionen, 17–21.

3 Toleva, Der Einfluss Österreich-Ungarns.

4 Osterhammel, Colonialism, 4–10.

5 Trotha, “Colonialism,” 433.

6 Gross, Export Empire, 35.

7 ÖStA HHStA, AR, F4/450, no. 69–70, “Kanzleiverordnungen.”

8 Loidl, “Kolonialpropaganda,” 38–43.

9 Jahresbericht der Österreichisch-Ungarischen Colonial-Gesellschaft 1896; “Kolonialpolitik,” 18–19.

10 Kolm, Die Ambitionen, 24–25.

11 ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Kwiatkowsky, Kt. 2, 1: Albanien in der Politik der Großmächte.

12 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, Ferit bey’s memorandum; ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Kwiatkowsky, Kt. 1, Manuscript, 179–181; ibid., Kt. 2, Orange-Pallium, 180.

13 ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Kwiatkowsky, Kt. 1, Manuscript, 179f.

14 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, Ferit bey’s memorandum.

15 Clayer, Në fillimet e nacionalizmit shqiptar, 526–27.

16 Hofmeister, Die Bürde des Weissen Zaren, 33.

17 Amzi-Erdoğdular, Afterlife of Empire, 50–51.

18 ÖStA HHStA, I/8, Kt. 685, Akten 1895–1904, Varia 1901, report of Führer, August 27, 1901, 1–3; Verosta, Die völkerrechtliche Praxis der Donaumonarchie, 112–13.

19 Schwanda, Das Protektorat Österreich–Ungarns, 31; Toleva, Der Einfluss Österreich–Ungarns, 51–93.

20 Zwiedinek, Syrien und seine Bedeutung; Hof- und Staats-Handbuch, 88, 117, 1005.

21 Jahresbericht der Österreichisch–Ungarischen Colonial-Gesellschaft 1896, 4, 38.

22 Wagner, “Österreichisch–ungarische Kolonialversuche,” 203; ÖStA HHStA, AR, F4/99, Adalbert Fuchs; ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Mérey, Kt. 15/273, A private letter written by Pasetti to Mérey, Ischl, August 26, 1895. Callaway, “The Battle over Information,” 278–87.

23 Csaplár-Degovics, “Ludwig von Thallóczy,” 141–64.

24 Scheer, “Minimale Kosten, absolut kein Blut,” 241.

25 McCrone Douie, The Panjab, 188–200, 212–19.

26 Jahrbuch des K. und K. Auswärtigen Dienstes 1903, 265.

27 Die Flagge 2, no. 2 (1906): 12; Pisko, Berichte der commerciellen Fachberichterstatters; Pisko, Die Südhalbkugel im Weltverkehr.

28 ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Kwiatkowsky, Kt. 2, Kwiatkowski: Lebenslauf, 64; ÖStA HHStA PA, XII/419/e/Prinz Achmed Fuad, Pálffy’s report to Berchtold, no. 26 A-B, Rome, August 14, 1913, 1–11; Kőszeghy, “A Balkán-protektorátusról,” 178–81.

29 ÖStA HHStA PA, XII/419/e/Prinz Achmed Fuad, Pálffy’s report to Berchtold, no. 26 A-B, Rome, August 14, 1913, 3.

30 ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Kral, Kt. 1, Promemoria – Monsignore Primo Dochi’s über Albanien, Vienna, March 14, 1897, 1–15.

31 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, minutes of the conference on on November 17, 1896, 6; Behnen, Rüstung–Bündnis–Sicherheit, 361.

32 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, minutes of the conference on November 17, 1896, 8, 10–12.

33 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, minutes of the conference on December 8, 1896, 22–25; ibid. minutes of the conference on December 23, 1896, 7; Der Österreichische Lloyd und sein Verkehrsgebiet.

34 ÖStA HHStA, I/7, Kt. 573, letter from the Alliance of Austrian Industrialists to Gołuchowski, no. 1634, Vienna, May 10, 1898, 4; Kolm, Die Ambitionen, 18; Gostentschnigg, Wissenschaft im Spannungsfeld, 309–16, 480.

35 MNL OL, PMKB, Z 41, 458/3230, Letter written by Handels- und Transport-AG to Weiss, 3230/-1, Vienna, August 1, 1913, 6; Csaplár-Degovics, “A dalmáciai Borgo Erizzo,” 6–7; Csaplár-Degovics, “Österreichisch–ungarische Interessendurchsetzung,” 181; Gostentschnigg, Wissenschaft im Spannungsfeld, 472, 583–84, 609, 650, 658–60, 677–78; Gross, Export Empire, 12.

36 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, minutes of the conference on November 17, 1896, 17–18; ibid. Minutes of the conference on December 8, 1896, 15, 17, 19–20; ibid. Minutes of the conference on December 23, 1896, 2–4.

37 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, minutes of the conference on December 8, 1896, 4–6.

38 Reynolds, “Good and Bad Muslims.” To the distinction of “good” and “bad” Muslims in contemporary Austria, see Gingrich, “Frontier Myths of Orientalism,” 106–11.

39 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, minutes of the conference on November 17, 1896, 19–20; ibid., Minutes of the conference on December 8, 1896, 16, 18; ibid., Minutes of the conference on December 23, 1896, 4–5; Csaplár-Degovics, “Der erste Balkankrieg und die Albaner.”

40 Csaplár-Degovics, “Österreichisch-ungarische Interessendurchsetzung.”

41 Deusch, Das k.(u.)k. Kultusprotektorat, 623–27.

42 Wagner, “Österreichisch–ungarische Kolonialversuche,” 58–59.

43 Egner, Protektion und Souveränität, 59–79, 62–63, 312–19.

44 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, Fol. 517–736, Pisko, Elaborat über die Consularämter, Beilag: 9, Üsküb, January 25, 1897; Toleva, Der Einfluss Österreich-Ungarns, 102–29, 427–31.

45 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, Fol. 517–736; Pisko, Elaborat über die Consularämter, Üsküb, January 25, 1897, 5.

46 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, Fol. 517–736, Pisko, Elaborat über die Consularämter, Üsküb, January 25, 1897. 3–4; Csaplár-Degovics, “A dalmáciai Borgo Erizzo.”

47 ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, Fol. 192–516, Calice’s report to Gołuchowski, no. 658, Constantinople, February 18, 1897, 1–10; ibid., Private letter written by Calice to Zwiedinek, Constantinople, March 3, 1898; ibid., Reverta’s report to Gołuchowsky, no. 8 D–K, Rome, March 20, 1897; ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, Fol. 517–736; Pisko, Elaborat über die Consularämter, Üsküb, January 25, 1897. 1–6, and Beilag, 1–45; ibid., The Information Bureau’s report on Doçi’s memorandum, Vienna, March 29, 1897, 1–13; ÖStA HHStA, I/2, Kt. 473, Fol. 517–736, Die albanesische Action im Jahre 1897; ibid., Der Stand der nationalen Bewegung in Albanien (1901); ibid., Memoire über Albanien; ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Kwiatkowsky, Kt. 1, Manuscript, 178–191; ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Kwiatkowsky, Kt. 2; Kwiatkowski: Lebenslauf, 30–79; Toleva, Der Einfluss Österreich-Ungarns, 427–31.

48 Crowder, “Indirect Rule: French and British Style”; Green, “Indirect Rule and Colonial Intervention”; Power, “‘Individualism is the Antithesis of Indirect Rule’: Cooperative Development”; Grishow, “Rural ‘Community,’ Chiefs and Social Capital,” 70; Spear, “Neo-Traditionalism,” 4; Nwabughuogu, “The Role of Propaganda”; Fisher, “Indirect Rule in the British Empire”; Reynolds, “Good and Bad Muslims”; Ruthner and Scheer, Bosnien-Herzegowina, 36–42, 228.

49 KA Operationsbüro, Fasz. 46, no. 29, Beiträge zur Klarstellung der bei einer etwaigen Änderung des status quo auf der Balkanhalbinsel in Betracht zu ziehenden Verhältnisse.

50 Schanderl, Die Albanienpolitik Österreich-Ungarns, 64.

51 Krause, Das Problem der albanischen Unabhängigkeit, 26–27; Hecht, “Graf Goluchowski als Außenminister,” 125–27, 140; Onley, “The Raj Reconsidered,” 44–62.

52 ÖStA HHStA, Nachlass Kwiatkowsky, Kt. 2, Kwiatkowski: Lebenslauf, 44–45.

53 Behnen, Rüstung–Bündnis–Sicherheit; Gostentschnigg, “Albanerkonvikt und Albanienkomitee,” 313–37; Komár, Az Osztrák–Magyar Monarchia, 26, 29, 194; Schanderl, Die Albanienpolitik Österreich-Ungarns, 22–23, 71, 117–27.

54 Komár, Az Osztrák–Magyar Monarchia, 26, 29, 194.

55 ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/8, a letter written by Knoblecher to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, December 6, 1850. Sauer, “Ein Jesuitenstaat,” 23; Agstner, Das k. k. (k. u. k.) Konsulat für Central-Afrika, 10, 13; McEwan, A Catholic Sudan Dream, 43–44; Hill, Egypt in the Sudan, 98.

56 ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/29/1/IIc, Die österreichische Mission von Central-Afrika 1894, 8–9; Santi and Hill, The Europeans in the Sudan, 174–75; McEwan, A Catholic Sudan Dream, 42.

57 ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/30, Huber’s report to the Ministry of Trade, no. 528, Alexandria, August 6, 1850; ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/8, Übersetzung eines Fermans für den Generalvikar von Centralafrika, Constantinople, early April, 1851; Agstner, Das k. k. (k. u. k.) Konsulat für Central–Afrika, 6–17.

58 McEwan, A Catholic Sudan Dream, 35–36, 85.

59 ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/28/2/I; ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/29/1/II: 1871–1911/d–j; McEwan, A Catholic Sudan Dream, 85, 93, 120, 126, 133, 137; Sauer, “Ein Jesuitenstaat in Afrika?” 61.

60 Benna, “Studien zum Kultusprotektorat,” 33–35; Gstrein, Unter Menschenhändlern im Sudan, 25.

61 ÖStA HHStA, I/8, Kt. 710, Umfang und Art der Ausübung des französischen Kultusprotektorates, 1–175; Ippen, “Das religiöse Protektorat,” 296, 299–300; Deusch, Das k.(u.)k. Kultusprotektorat, 635–36.

62 ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/28/2/I, Africa 2a, a letter written by Reverta to Kálnoky, no. 46, Rome, December 31, 1889, 5.

ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/28/2/I, Africa 2b, Centralafrikanische Mission and Abgrenzung des Sudan Vicariats; ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/29/1/IIc, Die österreichische Mission von Central-Afrika 1894, 26; Hill, Slatin Pasha; McEwan, A Catholic Sudan Dream, I, 74–76, 116–17, 120.

63 ÖStA HHStA, AR, F4/450, no. 69–70, “Kanzleiverordnungen”; ÖStA HHStA, AR, F4/456, Referats- und Geschäfteinteilungen.

64 ÖStA HHStA, AR, F27/28/2/I, Africa 2b, Abgrenzung des Sudan Vicariats, Subventionen III–VI.

65 Jahrbuch des K. und K. Auswärtigen Dienstes 1914, 378–79; Bridge, “Tarde Venientibus Ossa,” 319–30.

66 Gostentschnigg, Wissenschaft im Spannungsfeld.

67 Gostentschnigg, “Die albanischen Parteigänger Österreich–Ungarns,” 119–70; Csaplár-Degovics, “Österreichisch-ungarische Interessendurchsetzung,” 180.

68 Hahn, Albanesische Studien.

69 Thallóczy, Illyrisch-albanische Forschungen; Thallóczy et al., Acta et diplomata res Albaniae.

70 ÖStA HHStA PA, XIV/21, Äußerung betreffs der materielle Unterstützung des […] Werkes “Acta et diplomata res Albaniae med. Illustrantiam,” Vienna, October 25, 1911.

71 Trotha, “Colonialism,” 433; Wendt, Vom Kolonialismus zur Globalisierung, 234; Osterhammel and Jansen, Kolonialismus, 1–8; Osterhammel, Colonialism, 4–10.

72 Ruthner, Habsburgs “Dark Continent,” 45–48.

73 ÖStA HHStA, XIV/64/26, Löwenthal’s report to Berchtold, No. 51A-B/P, Durazzo, July 11, 1914. KA MKFF, Kt. 203, Haberl’s report, no number, Vienna, June 27, 1914. KA AOK-Evidenzbureau, Kt. 3498, Hranilovic: Albanien 1914, Anwerbung von Freiwilligen für Albanien; OSZK, Kézirattár, Fol. Hung. 1677, Bosniaca IX/6, a letter written by Berchtold to Tisza, Vienna, June 27, 1914. Freundlich, Die albanische Korrespondenz, XXXVII, 499–500.

74 Csaplár-Degovics and Jusufi, Das ungarisch-albanische Wörterbuch, 73–98.

75 MNL OL, K 255, 672/6 (1913), no. 4926/P.M./1913, “II. rész; Elnökség,” [Part II. Presidency], Budapest, December 19, 1913, 1–5.

2021_4_Eszik

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A Small Town’s Quest for Modernity in the Shadow of the Big City: The Case of Senj and Fiume

Veronika Eszik
Research Centre for the Humanities
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Hungarian Historical Review Volume 10 Issue 4  (2021):706-736 DOI 10.38145/2021.4.706

Most of the theories concerning modernization and a number of trends in the historiography treat the big city as the most important arena of modernization, an arena which, thanks to our grasp of an array of social and economic transformations, can be made the ideal subject of studies on the processes and consequences of modernization. From this perspective, the small town becomes a kind of abstraction for backwardness, failed attempts to catch up, or a community that simply has remained unaffected by modernization. Thus, the study of the dynamics of modernization in smaller urban settlements from a new perspective which attributes genuine agency to them may well offer new findings and insights. In the historiography concerning the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, the recent imperial turn has shown a perfectly natural interest in the peripheries of the empire, as it has striven to untangle the intertwining strands of local, regional, national, and imperial loyalties found there. The research on which this article is based, which focuses on Senj (Zengg), a small seaside Croatian city, is shaped by this dual interest. Senj’s resistance and adaptation to top-down initiatives of modernization can be captured through its conflict with the city of Fiume (today Rijeka, Croatia), which is not far from Senj and which before World War I belonged to Hungary. In this story, Fiume represents the “mainstream” manner of big-city modernization: it became the tenth most active port city in Europe over the course of a few decades. The area surrounding the city, however, was not able to keep up with this rapid pace of development. In this article, I present the distinctive program for modernization adopted by the elites of Senj, as well as their critique of modernization. Furthermore, the history of the city towards the end of the nineteenth century sheds light on the interdependencies among the cities of Austria–Hungary, interdependencies which were independent of legal or administrative borders. By analyzing relations between Senj and Fiume, I seek to offer a nuanced interpretation of the conflict between the two cities, which tends to be portrayed simply as a consequence of national antagonisms.

Keywords: anti-modernism, scaling urban modernity, urban history, Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, Fiume, Senj

For both contemporaries and historians, the explosion of urbanization in the second half of the nineteenth century seemed a fundamental process the study of which, it was hoped, would yield insights into the essence of the great transformation called modernization. The industrializing metropolis, which was expanding at an unprecedented rate, was seen by scholars (sociologists, social psychologists, historians, urbanists) as a kind of laboratory. With regards to the writing of history, this understanding of the big city has survived to the present day in an array of trends in the historiography.1

Regardless of their actual size, small towns figured in this modernization-discourse only as the counterexample of or counterpoint to the metropolis: as an ideal type, they represented everything against which urban modernity could be defined. In the eyes of critics of the big city, they offered a cohesive community instead of an atomized society, a space of serenity instead of overstimulation, breathing room instead of congestion, a human scale instead of exaggeration, a stable value system instead of a crisis of values, or in other words, a space which was thriving from the perspectives of health care, intellectual and moral prosperity. In contrast, in the eyes of admirers of urban modernity, the small town was defined by its shortcomings. As a space that had been left out of the process of modernization, it was seen as stagnant or in decline. These two visions2 thus idealized or, by simply applying the label “backward,” ignored the specific trajectories of small-town development. Apart from the top predators in the urban networks (i.e. the most rapidly developing), other cities seemed motionless, doomed to stagnation, or frozen in the pose of preservation of values, and historical scholarship rarely sought to uncover the distinctive dynamics of their processes of modernization.

In 2008, the Journal of Urban History devoted a thematic issue entitled Decentering Urban History to the problem of small towns. In the introductory study to the issue, James J. Connolly criticized the secondary literature on urban history for focusing predominantly on metropolises and for having “failed to distinguish between the metropolis and the smaller, more peripheral cities in meaningful ways.”3 In other words, according to Connolly, while there is no shortage of case studies on cities that occupy a secondary place in the urban hierarchy, many of these studies either describe these cities as counterexamples to the big city or simply insist on difference in size. And yet it was precisely the process of urbanization in the second half of the nineteenth century that made it essential to draw a conceptual distinction between “small” and “big.” In theoretical works on modern urban life, this separation of settlements into big city or small city appears at the same time as the process itself, i.e. towards the end of the nineteenth century. The long-standing topos of the opposition between nature and city (a topos often attributed to Rousseau) was enriched with a new shade of meaning when the modern metropolis began to become such a striking phenomenon in the European urban network. It was no longer simply a matter of the ways in which, in contrast with the rural lifestyle, the huge crowds thronging into the cities allegedly exerted a corrupting influence and city life in general was physically unhealthy. Now, the industrializing city was seen as a threat to urban values themselves.4 It thus became necessary to consider what made a city good and how the modern city could be good to live in. The arguments used in the discourses against city life shifted away from praise of rural communities and towards a positive reassessment of the small town, and the array of theoretical works on urbanization began to raise questions concerning the ways in which the city could be improved or perfected.5

This theoretical body of work, however, in no way compensates for the dearth of historical research which describes the settlements which fell on the lower levels of the urban hierarchy as communities which were capable of taking action. Small towns reacted to change in a variety of ways: their strategies depended on their experiences, resources, and demographics, as well as on the trades and professions in which their populations specialized. These towns offered an array of different economic imaginaries,6 mindsets that were highly dependent on the settlements’ intellectual capital. The town under investigation in this paper showed willingness to take initiative. Senj’s (Zengg by its Hungarian name)7 reaction to radical transformation was twofold: on the one hand, the town’s intellectuals turned to an idealized past to find support for their community and reinforce their identity in times of transition. This anti-modern gesture was complemented, however, by their plans for the future, an alternative vision of urban modernity which included a critical perception of the dominant model: Fiume’s (today Rijeka, Croatia) way of development. When facing change, Senj showed both resistance and adaptation, and its strategies drew on both traditionalism and innovation. The aim of this article is to examine these complex techniques, which made the town resilient to the potentially destructive forces of modernization.

Over the course of the past two decades, researchers focusing on the history of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy have realized that very little attention has been paid to distinctive patterns and strategies of small-town modernization, and they have also realized the potential insights the study of these patterns and strategies might yield. Naturally, representatives of the so-called imperial turn8 in the historiography have looked with interest at the peripheries of the empire, as they have striven to untangle the intertwining strands of local, regional, national, and imperial loyalties found in these regions. Research which has adopted this perspective as its point of departure found less that was of interest in the development of the large imperial or national capitals than it did in the histories of the diverse regional centers on different levels of the urban hierarchy. Vienna, Budapest, Prague, and Zagreb came to be seen as “cosmopolitan cities with a small range of influence,”9 and they gradually acquired the accoutrements of major international cities. At the same time, smaller urban centers which did not follow the patterns of globalizing urbanism had the potential to reveal more about the functioning of the multiethnic empire.10 From the perspectives of ethnic, denominational, and occupational makeup or culture and urban planning, they may have been more colorful in the Central European context in which one of the defining elements was heterogeneity, a heterogeneity of which the homogenizing centers offered the least evidence.

My research, which focuses on Senj, a small seaside Croatian city, is shaped by this dual interest: I investigate the town’s resilience and its role in a multilayered urban network. The town’s resilience reminds us that there was life outside of the metropolises, and the role it played in the urban network sheds light on the ways in which local experiences of urban modernity and modernity as otherness can modify macro-level political indicators such as election results. There is ample evidence in the secondary literature showing that nationalist mobilization is more successful when social and ethnic cleavages overlap, but a reverse logic is also of interest. When access to modernization is uneven among different national communities, it soon becomes apparent that modernization is a power tool, and this realization can influence political loyalties as much as national feelings of belonging can.

Senj, a settlement of roughly 3,000 people, is not far from the city of Fiume, which, over the course of only a few decades, became the tenth most active port city in Europe.11 Not surprisingly, the area surrounding the city, the Croatian Adriatic littoral, was not able to keep up with this rapid pace of development. However, Senj’s response, a program of conservation and modernization, went well beyond simple efforts to catch up. Representatives of the community developed a vision which was based on a kind of middle road between the extremes of growth into a bustling metropolis and stagnation. They thus sought to transform the position of the town, which was increasingly excluded from large industry and global trade, into an advantage. This vision had elements of nostalgia and anti-modernism, but it also offered an alternative vision of the future.12 The city also used the most modern tools to propagate this vision, from the budding regional and national press to the cultivation of a thriving array of associations.

The history of Senj at the end of the nineteenth century also sheds light on the close connections among and interdependence of the cities of the Habsburg lands, regardless of legal boundaries. Although Senj was separated from Fiume by an administrative border, as Senj belonged legally to Croatia while Fiume belonged to Hungary within the dual state, its opportunities for growth and development were determined far more by the port city than by Zagreb, which was gradually becoming the Croatian national capital. Vienna and Budapest also had an increasing influence on Senj’s fate, as the two capital cities played a fundamental role in the multilevel decision-making structure of the empire. The tension between Fiume and Senj has usually been characterized in the secondary literature as a consequence of national antagonisms, but it is quite clear that everyday life in cities along the (Hungarian-)Croatian coast was shaped as much or more by their different opportunities and their varying access to the infrastructure than it was by the national question. Thus, the focus of this essay is not on the discourses of nation-building which were prominent at the time, but rather on local discourses and strategies related to modernization.

As the only seaport in Hungary, Fiume played a major role in the national economy, and the Hungarian state made significant investments to improve its infrastructure and industry and make the city competitive with similar port cities across Europe as quickly as possible.13 The rapid growth to which the city bore witness is perhaps most clearly illustrated by the fact that, between 1867 (the year of the Austro-Hungarian Settlement) and 1891, the population of this “merchant, sailor, and fisherman town” tripled, and from the perspective of the population of the city that was engaged in industry and traffic, it was the second most industrialized city in Hungary after Banská Štiavnica (Selmecbánya).14

The secondary literature has attempted to place the city, which was linked to the Hungarian crown as a corpus separatum, in the Hungarian urban hierarchy, although it is difficult to find a single category in the various classifications which adequately describes its role and functioning:

The situation and urban roles of Fiume […] were special in the Dualist era; legally it was an exclave of Hungary and the authority of its administrative institutions did not reach beyond the boundaries of the town. Being the only seaport of Hungary, it enjoyed substantial support from the Hungarian state. […]. As regards the volume of its urban functions, it is at the top of the order of the county centres […] its hinterland was nevertheless not in the neighbouring areas—from which it was separated by administrative borders, orographic obstacles and the lack of transport infrastructure, and even by language differences—but in its far-away motherland.15

This characterization of the city as isolated begs for nuance. The position of Fiume can hardly be assessed simply on the basis of its place in the Hungarian urban hierarchy. After Zagreb, it was the second most industrialized city in Croatia as well.16 More importantly, its modernization had a massive regional influence also. The investigation of the latter makes perceptible the effects of industrialization on the transformation of the urban network across the state-legal frameworks. True, Fiume belonged to the Hungarian crown, but it still played a vibrant role in the network of Croatian cities, and it exerted a strong influence on the seaside settlements in its vicinity.

This influence was mostly a consequence of the fact that all of the infrastructure investments flowed into Fiume. Through its railway connections and the development of its harbor, the city had an unsurmountable advantage over the neighboring port cities, which earlier had been in roughly the same position. Senj was the biggest loser in the concentration of resources. Prior to the construction of the railway that connected Fiume with Zagreb and Budapest (1873), the city had been a major commercial center thanks to the Josephina,17 a historic road which connected Senj with the city of Karlovac (Károlyváros). Senj resold the goods arriving on this route through its flourishing harbor. However, with the spread of the use of steamships, both the commercial and the main industrial profiles of the town were pushed into the background, and the urban elite, which relied largely on shipbuilding, lost its source of income and thus its status. In this difficult situation, the patrician layer in Senj redefined its role and developed various strategies to address the crisis. In the first part of this essay, I focus briefly on the narratives concerning this shift, including specific visions of the path to urban change for Fiume and Senj, and in the second and third sections, I focus on the solutions that were suggested.

As I shall show, the elites of Senj adopted strategies that raised the struggle of the town to national significance in at least two respects. First, Senj and the surrounding Lika-Krbava County became the core area of the Croatian Party of Rights, the main opposition force in the Croatian parliament (the Sabor)18 until the 1880s. The Party of Rights and its leader, Ante Starčević (often called “The Father of the Nation”), advocated for the integrity of Croatian lands and more political and economic independence for the country. The national movement thus found its most loyal voters and adherents in the area under investigation. Second, the Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry, which was in almost continuous contact with decision-making circles in Vienna, Budapest and Zagreb, resolved to advance the cause of small-scale industry. The rescue of the handicraft industry seemed a prudent self-defense strategy for the industrial association of the city, which had been left out of the capitalist manufacturing industry and indeed had even had to deal with issues which had arisen because of abuses and mismanagement in this sector. This strategy was consistently represented at the national level with the mediation of the Zagreb Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

I have drawn primarily on articles from the local press, though I also examine the oeuvre of Vjenceslav Novak, perhaps the most significant writer of the region and age, as well as the documents of the Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Due to the town’s extremely limited opportunities to assert political interests, the chamber came to play a remarkably important political role too. Though no archives of the chamber survived, thanks to its active maintenance of ties and contacts with various decision-making bodies (the Royal Hungarian Maritime Authority, various ministries, the local government, the Zagreb Chamber of Commerce and Industry, etc.), we have an array of admittedly scattered resources on the basis of which we can arrive at a relatively clear understanding of the work of the institution as an instrument for lobbying, to use a word from today’s political parlance.

Perceptions of Senj’s Loss of Position

Though at one point a flourishing hub for commerce and sailing ship-building and also an episcopal and a military center, Senj was plunged into crisis by shifts in trade routes and the increasing use of the steamboat, which slowly came to replace the sailing ship. Traffic on the aforementioned Josephina had begun to decline with the construction of the Trieste railway line, but it dropped dramatically with the completion in 1873 of the railway line between Karlovac and Fiume. As the table below shows, Senj had not recovered from the consequences of this diversion of traffic even several decades later. The city started to see some transitional improvements in 1905, due primarily to the strengthening of a single company, Hrvatsko parobrodarsko društvo, which was founded in 1902. Although the economic crisis of the 1870s and then the agricultural crisis contributed to the sustained decline in traffic, the major factor was quite simply the fact that Senj had lost much of its hinterland: areas that traditionally had transported their goods to the port city were able to reach Fiume more quickly and at less expense.

 

Table 1. Traffic in the Senj harbor, 1859–1910, tons/year19

1859

1862

1875

1901

1905*

1910

109,389

127,159

59,518

118,508

255,903

254,472

 

* Concerning the interpretation of the peak value of 1905, a comparison with Fiume is useful: according to the calculations of Márton Pelles, the total traffic in the Hungarian port in 1905 was 1,500,000 tons. Pelles, “Üzleti és nemzeti érdekek,” 158.

In the meantime, the steamship had completely transformed the world of maritime trade. The fleet of steamships was not only more reliable, faster, and able to carry far heavier loads, it was also very capital intensive.20 It was precisely for this reason that the only shipping companies that were able to remain in business in the empire were the ones which enjoyed some form of state support. The Hungarian state decided to devote most of its support to two large companies based in Fiume: the “Adria” Royal Hungarian Sea Navigation Company, which was engaged in long-distance trade, and the Hungarian-Croatian Steamship Company (commonly known as Ungaro-Croata), which handled coastal shipping.21 The shipping companies which were entirely reliant on private capital in general, including the various consortia of Senj traders, were not able to compete with them. Steamships, moreover, could only be built in shipyards with adequate mechanical and financial resources, and the traditional shipyards, most of which were family businesses, went out of business one by one, not only in Senj but also in Fiume.22

The transformation of traffic patterns and industry also brought about changes in the hierarchy of cities in Croatia. Most of the 17 settlements which were recognized as cities showed only modest growth in the Dualist Era according to all indicators of urbanization. In contrast, Karlovac, Sisak (Sziszek), Senj, and Bakar (Buccari) did not even enjoy modest growth. Karlovac and Sisak were adversely affected by railway policy, while Senj and Buccari by both the advent of the railway and transformations in the maritime sector.23 In the case of Senj, demographic indicators offer clear evidence of this process, and not only in moments of stagnation, but rather as a trend in population decline which lasted until 1890 (see Table 2). Migration to the New World, a common concern for nationalists across the Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia, was proverbially the most striking phenomenon precisely in Lika-Krbava County.

 

Table 2. Population shifts in Fiume and Senj, 1869–191024

 

1869

1880

1890

1900

1910

Growth 1869–1880

Growth 1880–1890

Growth 1890–1900

Growth 1900–1910

Fiume

17,884

21,273

29,494

38,955

49,806

18.95%

38.65%

32.07%

27.85%

Senj

3,231

3,039

2,785

3,182

3,293

–5.94%

–8.35%

14%

3.48%

 

Several of the documents of the Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry, which was searching desperately for solutions to slow the population decline, offered diagnoses of varying lengths of the problems that the city faced. An 1885 letter to Ban Károly (Dragutin) Khuen-Héderváry25 offered a dramatic picture of the situation of the city:

The city of Senj, which was known for its famous and very busy market on the Croatian coast not so many years ago, is facing a rapid decline in trade today and, and deprived of its greatest strength […], the city fears that it will have an even darker future if some change does not save it from the fate of the other seaside harbors which were once engaged in trade but today are dead.26

 

The contrast with the praise which was showered on Fiume in the Hungarian press, Hungarian literature, and Hungarian scholarship is striking.27 Given their very different fates, the two Adriatic cities offered perfect examples of the bustling modern big city on the one hand and the traditional small town which was unable to keep up with its rival on the other. Of course, both smallness and bigness are relational and subjective. We use these categories as they appear in local narratives about the two settlements’ fates, narratives which repeat the abovementioned clichés about modern urban living while also offering local modifications of these general visions.

One of the most elaborate among these narratives can be captured in the literary works of a Senj-based circle,28 mainly in the writings of the most outstanding writer of realist novels in Croatian literature, Vjenceslav Novak, who was born in Senj. His 1899 novel Posljednji Štipančići [The last of the Štipančić line], for instance, offers the story of the decline of a Senj patrician family. Juraj Štipančić, the last son of this family, leaves the family house, and in Zagreb, he cannot “resist” changing his name to the conspicuously Hungarian name György Istvánffy. In several of his works, Novak deals with the problems of his “homeland,” narrowly understood, or in other words, Senj and the Croatian coast.

Particularly interesting from the perspective of this discussion, however, is the mental map that emerges from his works, a map on which the Velebit mountain range, which surrounds Senj, is essentially a line which separates two worlds. The mountains hold Senj, a town which is stuck in its traditions, in their embrace, isolating it not only from the rest of Croatia, but also from the rest of Europe and, indeed, the world. In Novak’s works, Vienna, Bratislava (Pozsony), Prague, and London stand in sharp contrast to the seaside county, the marginality of which is eloquently captured in a Croatian word borrowed from Hungarian, the adjective “varmeđinski,” an adjective which means something like “of the shire” and which comes etymologically from the Hungarian word “vármegyei,” which could be translated as county but which has feudal and provincial overtones.29

What a difference there is between a poor life by the sea and the swirling whirlpool of other human lives! […] Here, man and nature are got to know from the songs and stories born by meager hearths, while there, the human soul besieges the peaks of wealth, the sciences, the arts, and cultivation […]!30

The spaces which acquired symbolic meaning as the embodiments or symptoms of backwardness and the absence of modernity were the closed interiors and ruins of houses that had either been abandoned or were being demolished, spaces from which the realms of fantasy were the only refuge (music, the sciences, or more precisely, the study of Darwinism).31 The Senj of the last son of the Štipančić line emerges as a town from which there is no escape, an insular city (surrounded by a literal wall) with only a narrow grasp of the word outside, a place of passivity and suspicious resentment of anything new. By using this small-town topos, Novak places the city of his birth alongside the small towns of Stendhal, Balzac, Flaubert, or even Chekhov. Thus, nostalgia and the critique of modernization are articulated with the help of modern expressive tools which fit well into the most recent literary trends of the time.

The novel about the small town also offers a portrayal of the slowness of life in the city. The sense of time standing still is again in sharp contrast with the world of the modern industrial city, in which the sense of the fast pace of life is one of the most salient elements, or the sense of rush and hurry,32 which is even more subjective. In the city of Senj as depicted in Novak’s novel, in contrast, the bora (a strong north to northeastern wind) forces the denizens of the harbor town to take shelter in their homes, and it mercilessly tears the sails of the ships, much as it has for centuries. But this century is different from the previous ones, for this century is moving at a breathtaking pace. Senj’s exclusion from all this, of course, is a loss only from a certain perspective. In the depictions of cities in the Senj literature and in some of the local press, traditionalism is an ambivalent concept which includes not simply elements of backwardness but also the preservation of values. In Posljednji Štipančići, the lost golden age has an appealing allure, although the attempts to recapture this allure is sometimes caricature-like. The image of the city as a stronghold with a heroic military past which put up brave resistance to the Ottoman Turks and then flourished as a prosperous commercial center is clearly a lofty vision somewhat distant from the realities of everyday life. According to Valpurga, the mother in the ancient patrician family, the men of Senj were once a good head taller than the men of the city today, and the women took silver buckets with them when they went to the well for water.33 Putting the caricature aside, Senj was home to the established patrician families which had founded, in 1835, the oldest reading circle and printing-house of South Slavic countries, and the other cultural institutions in the town or the active associational life suggest that, as a community, the city did indeed try to preserve genuine values.34 Under the difficult economic circumstances that the city came to face, it fell on the cultural institutions of Senj (or to use the term which has become part of our parlance today, the civil sphere) to safeguard something of the city’s positive self- image, and naturally this local patriot effort to maintain the town’s identity turned to the more beautiful moments of the settlement’s past for affirmation.

Radiša (Brave Worker), a Senj newspaper which was launched in 1875 (but which had gone out of print within a year), published a three-part series of articles entitled “What was the City of Senj Like Then and What is it Like Today?” by theologian, philologist, and grammar school instructor Ivan Radetić. The text strikes a nostalgic tone while also rebuking the denizens of the city who were incapable of moving and who even hampered the growth of the town, “moving in crab-like steps.” Radetić writes with praise of the alleged virtues of the city in the past, including its cohesive power and the tendency to put the individual pursuit of happiness to the side in favor of the common good, a tendency which, Radetić claims, stands in contrast with the individualism of his era. In his assessment of the situation at the time, however, he does not blame the difficulties that the city faces entirely on external factors:

Because of Senj’s position, it is destined to bring commerce to the sea. The sea has raised many cities, but Senj must always have been among the first. But today, trade in the city not only will not grow, it will decline. What is the reason for this? Perhaps the railroads that were built in the area. […] The other cause of the crab-like steps which hinder the development of Senj is the population of the city itself. The old people of Senj were united in everything, they were brave, ready to work, and they lived together like a single big family […]. But now! nothing but dissension, envy, hatred, and conflict.35

 

In Radetić’s narrative, selfishness and the rejection of anything new appear as habitudes the origins of which are essentially the same, habitudes which are caused by a narrow horizon and a lack of culture and cultivation:

With the exception of the few officials and the priest […] the majority does not concern itself with the common industrial worker and merchant class. […] People who have never explored the big world and have never striven to see it through different eyes cannot know anything of the development which is underway in the rest of the world. They sincerely believe that if their selfish and personal aims are achieved, everything is just fine.36

Such people, Radetić seems to suggest, are easy to deceive, because they have no knowledge of the processes going on around them, and they see anyone who wants to bring about change as an enemy. Thus, the more cautious no longer dare mention “development,” as they fear that if they do, whatever initiatives they may seek to take will be severed at the roots. The newspaper saw it as the mission of the Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry to foster a sense of cooperation and to bring about unified, rapid action.

The image one gets of Senj on the basis of the various sources can be described, a bit summarily, as a traditionalist cityscape, with consideration, of course, of all the contradictions in this compound word. The symbolic counterpoint to the city of Senj was Fiume, the glittery, bustling harbor city, which was seen and depicted as such in the spheres of public life in Hungary, in which it was celebrated as the triumphant result of modernization. However, if one considers sources on Fiume that are from the area around the busy harbor town, one stumbles across a very different perception of the city. In these texts, Fiume, which, in contrast with Senj, was enjoying dynamic growth and had been rapidly transformed, with significant state assistance, into a node in the capitalist economy, is not portrayed in unambiguously positive terms. In a memorandum that was composed in May 1886 and was sent by the Senj chamber to the Zagreb government and the Hungarian Royal Ministry of Agriculture, Industry, and Commerce, the development which Fiume was undergoing is characterized as an exaggerated, unnatural, even harmful process. The memorandum called attention to the recurring problems caused by congestion because of the limits of the railway junction, which led to stockpiles of good that did not make it to their destinations, and it drew the following conclusion: “While Rijeka is, to put it in vulgar terms, drowning in its own fat, the harbors in Bakar and Kraljevica are declining dramatically because of lack of use.”37

One finds similar perceptions of Fiume in sources from the city itself. In the periodical La Difesa, which was the first organ of the press published by the Italian Autonomous Party of Fiume (it was launched in 1898), one regularly found articles advocating the interests of local artisans and calling attention to the shift in the mindset of the city:

[…] When commerce with the sailing ship was flourishing, the people of Fiume were frugal, hardworking, and dignified. […] The change in their mentality was attributed to the decline in the use of the sailing ship, and it was believed that they became vulnerable and easy to manipulate as a result of the tensions arising from the precariousness of their incomes and the unfavorable political events. This was the beginning, it was said, of the era of grand inaugural ceremonies, banquets, and political promises, which has lasted now for 30 (!) years. Those who call for autonomy complain that the benefits of the improvements

have been skimmed not by them, but by government confidants: small retailers and artisans are out of work and are compelled, in their penury, to rely on charity, and those who own ships are more likely to register their vessels in Trieste.38

Distasteful luxury investments, signs of excess, and the unhealthy inundation of consumer goods are recurring elements of the negative image of Fiume as the city increasingly came to dominate economic life on the Croatian coast. This narrative differs from the usual criticisms of industrial centers, which tend to focus on neighborhoods allegedly thronging with impoverished, penurious crowds and characterized by unsustainable hygiene and moral depravity. The classic formulation of the latter perception of the urban world is coupled in Lewis Mumford’s work with a critique of the vision of industrialization as an indisputably salubrious development.39

Because of the distinctive features of the local context, a narrative emerged concerning Fiume which differed from this classic understanding of the city. Due to the scarcity of space, the city never really had neighborhoods which were home exclusively to the working class.40 Rather, for the most part, the industrial workforce commuted to the city to work in the factories. As new urban spaces could only be created by transforming parts of the sea into land, the square meters of space that were won through this process served functions both in the local industries and as symbols of the city’s rapid development. The natural surroundings of the city prevented haphazard growth, as there were essentially literal barriers to expansion in every direction. Precisely for this reason, an interesting local variation emerged of the critical perception of the industrial city, which did not simply borrow or recycle the tropes of the anticapitalistic phobia of urbanization which, by then, were well worn and intermixed with several general commonplaces.41

This local variation complained more about the industrial port than about industrial neighborhoods. The widespread use of the steamship instead of the sailing ship was unquestionably a change which was met with a nostalgic-romantic sense of loss and an attachment to the old way of life over the new, even if the new was more efficient and more profitable. A Hungarian doctor on one of the frigates captured these sentiments in his description of the changes that had taken place (he also notes straightforwardly that steamships are simply ugly, as they ruin the cityscape with their chimneys):

As the navy slowly crossed the sailing ships off the “list” of vessels in its fleet, the age of chivalry faded and vanished just as quickly from the sea. […] The mission of the armored ships is also beautiful and glorious […]; but it does not attain the heights of the life of the now bygone era of the sailing ship, which was full of struggle, danger, sacrifice, and hardship, but which was, above all, wondrously beautiful.42

In summary, in the first decades after the Croatian-Hungarian Settlement, the hierarchy of cities in the coastal region was completely rearranged, and this rearrangement led to new readings of Fiume, the city which emerged as the victor of this process, and Senj, which was one of the biggest losers. Both cities bore witness to dramatic changes, and these changes were met with sensitive reactions. Distinctive local versions of the capitalist critique of industrial cities were formed, as was a narrative of the “backward city,” which both bewailed the lack of modernization while at the same time placing emphasis on the alleged importance of preserving values from the past.

“Nest of Grocers, Tailors, and Cobblers” from a Sense of Inferiority to the Strategic Representation of the Craft Industry

The reference to professions in the title above is from Novak’s novel the Posljednji Štipančići. It comes from the mouth of the father figure in the book, and it has a decidedly derisive tone. It is meant as a characterization of the inferiority of Senj, a city in which one could hardly find any truly sophisticated representatives of the new urban class alongside the artisans whose professions are mentioned so dismissively. However, if one ignores the derisive overtones, the characterization is in fact a relatively accurate description of the social composition of the city. According to the 1900 census, the proportion of people who were involved in artisanal trades and commerce in Senj was very high (43.55 percent).43 Since there was only one manufacturing institution—a tobacco factory44 founded in 1894—in the city at the time (and initially it was merely a subsidiary of a parent company in Fiume), handcrafts and artisanal trades really did dominate the city’s economy. If one examines the situation in Lika-Krbava County as a whole, the picture is even clearer. Under the new county law passed in 1886,45 counties were required to submit a comprehensive annual report to the government with the most important statistics affecting the area. In the annual reports of Lika-Krbava County, under the heading “Industry,” most of the time, one finds simply the comment that, “in the absence of a railway junction, there is no industry in the county,” and the permits which were issued are listed, for the most part permits for small-scale industries (such as brewing).

Under the circumstances, the advocacy work of the Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry focused primarily on two areas. First, the Chamber tirelessly composed innumerable submissions and requests for the construction of a railway junction and the modernization of the port, though to no avail.46 Over time, it took on another role, mainly through the work of its most dedicated secretary, Sebald Cihlar. It undertook to protect small-scale, traditional handicrafts from the rise of manufacturing industry. The Chamber also sought to accomplish this mission at the national level. In 1884, for example, when the new law concerning industry was being negotiated by the chambers of commerce and industry, it was the Senj Chamber that pushed for the convocation of another national assembly to be held as soon as possible, where the only topic would be the protection of small industry. The assembly was indeed held, and several issues concerning industry were regulated. The Senj Chamber was given the task of developing regulations for certain professions (for instance chimney sweeping and tavern keeping). Obrtnik (Craftsman), the chambers’ central Zagreb newspaper, regularly reported on the initiatives of the Senj Chamber.47

A law on chambers of commerce and industry was passed in 1868 which applied to Croatia-Slavonia, and a similar law was passed applying to the Military Frontier a year later.48 However, the Senj Chamber did not begin operations until 1876, making it the youngest of this type of advocacy body in the country. One of the reasons for the delay is found in the difficulties surrounding the demilitarization of the Frontier.49 Senj sought to carry out the advocacy work to serve its own interests as a free royal city and as a harbor town, and it was less eager to accept responsibility for the economic problems faced by the communities in the border region. It was thus slow to establish a chamber. The second reason lies in the fact that the city of Bakar was also a possible candidate as the seat for the chamber, so the Senj patricians in the Sabor had to fight to protect their hometown’s status. The issue of the location of the seat of the chamber was important in part because half of the members of the chamber were elected from among the denizens of the city which was chosen to function as the seat. Thus, these representatives would be able to keep local questions on the agenda, and they would be able to form a unified interest group within the chamber.50

As an institution, the chamber “functioned as a link between the state administration and the practical world of everyday life, and the chambers served as legal representative bodies of the interests entrusted to them in opposition to the bodies of state administration.”51 In the sub-dualist system, Croatia had limited autonomy in its handling of its financial affairs. With the approval of the bans, lord lieutenants were put at the head of the counties, as a result they could not really put up much opposition. Given the lack of income, the city leadership hardly had any room for maneuver, so the various forms in which the chambers were able to represent the interests of the trades and the cities constituted the legal channels through which local interests could be communicated to the various organs which actually made decisions. The given organs had to respond to them, in contrast with the problems raised in the local organs of the opposition press.

In 1888, at the request of the Lord Lieutenant of Lika-Krbava County, Chamber Secretary Sebald Cihlar drew up a proposal to deal with the crisis in Senj which was also something of a summary of his ten years of work as a member of the chamber. Though he had previously been involved in the struggle for the modernization of the city’s infrastructure,52 Cihlar clearly considered, according to this proposal, the preservation of the town’s handcrafts and the improvement of the quality of small-scale production a priority, and he did not even mention the situation of railways and ports. He presented his position as a stance in favor of the presentation of values, which he characterized as necessary due to the aggressive expansion of large-scale industry. The crisis in the craft industry was a complex social problem, in his view, because a great wealth of knowledge and expertise would be lost, as would the dignity stemming from mastery of these crafts, a dignity (or to use his word, pride) which earlier had been characteristic of the denizens of Senj and which indeed had helped sustain them (he claimed) in the face of adversity.53

After giving his diagnosis, Cihlar made four suggestions to improve the situation. First, he proposed providing a subsidy or loan of 15,000–20,000 Hungarian forint as a form of emergency aid which could be used by the “local industrial class” for the purchase and storage of raw materials. He also pushed to have the army become a permanent customer of the Senj craft industry, as “army orders would provide permanent business for artisans […]. In addition, it would encourage [them] to unite, and together, they would be better able to compete with big industry.”54 Cihlar also suggested that only artisans with a formal license should be allowed to work, as this would offer some assurance of quality control. Finally, he proposed the establishment of a vocational school, and he offered praise for the development of vocational education in Zagreb, which had been launched at the initiative of Minister of Culture Izidor Kršnjavi. Given the traditions in Senj and the potentials of the city, Cihlar recommended setting up a vocational school for the wood industry.

Calls for the protection of small industry in the face of cheap industrial mass production and its allegedly soullessly uniform production methods are hardly an unfamiliar phenomenon in the history of industry and urbanization. Camillo Sitte based his theoretical ideas concerning modern urban planning on this very notion of preservation of values, and these ideas, originally formulated in 1889, were made well-known by Carl. E. Schorske’s dramatically influential essay concerning urban architecture in Vienna at the turn of the century. Sitte argued against the rationalized space of the big city and in favor of the city community created by the handcraft and artisanal industries (and therefore necessarily less monumental in scale). One of the very clear social implications of this urban development project was the potential safeguards it would provide for the layer of people engaged in small industry, whose source of income was threatened by industrialization. Sitte’s ideas were a source of inspiration for others too. Numerous antimodernist narratives which were critical of the big city drew heavily on his arguments.55

What is most important from the perspective of the discussion here, however, is not the relevance of these considerations in the larger history of ideas so much as the simple fact that both the community of a small city and the administrative body which served as a representative of its interests came to very similar conclusions on the basis of lived experiences. They formulated a distinct vision of urban modernization which took local considerations into account, and they arrived at decisions concerning local interests independently. This bears an interesting affinity with the thoroughly-researched German context, where there was a clear parallel between the decline of the prominence and influence of small, independent artisans and the increasing emergence of a particular ideological-political posture of popular anti-modernism.56

This autonomy suggests that what we refer to as urban modernization is not actually a single, uniform process, but rather a combination of processes which are at times different both in their emphasis and their pace. In the case of Senj, for instance, the town had far more intellectual capital than it did real capital (put simply, money). While the intellectual capital of the city paid close attention to the dynamics of modernization and even worked out alternative paths, attempts to bring real capital to Senj remained largely unsuccessful throughout the period under discussion. If there was a single characteristic of Senj which would throw into question the topos of the small town as a space of stagnation, it was its intellectual and cultural potential. The episcopal seat is a case in point. The four bishops who served between 1868 and 1914 were highly educated, broad-minded intellectuals who represented the grandiose heritage of the episcopate, which had been founded in the fifth century and had functioned continuously ever since. Juraj Posilović, one of the bishops, rose to the position of the archbishop of Zagreb. Another, Antun Maurović, had been the rector of Zagreb University before his appointment to Senj. The fathers of the other two (Vjenceslav Soić and Roko Vučić) were sea captains from the region.57 Two future bishops grew up experiencing the decline of their fathers’ social standing as well as the florescence of the intellectual climate offered by Senj’s schools and churches. These figures show how a town of 3,000 dwellers can be a place of national influence and authenticity at the same time.

The grammar school (which stood out as excellent even on the national level), the very active work of the associations, as well as the literary life and organs of the press all show very clearly that the denizens of the town had access to an array of impulses that formed their economic and political imaginaries. In discussions of the complexity of modernization with regards to other settlements, it may be prudent to devote some study to the disharmonic movement between material and intellectual capital. An imbalance between the potentials of a given community and the actual opportunities it has may be a common feature of urban settlements which find themselves in the second row.

In the texts discussed in this essay, emphasis on the benefits of the handcraft industry is mixed with antimodernist views, or in other words, the advocacy activity of the chambers harmonizes with the critique of large-scale industry and capitalism in the readings of the city presented in the previous section. The case of Senj is hardly without precedent, but it has one distinctive and important feature. The main railway line, which bypassed Senj, was officially built by a “foreign” government, and Senj was separated from its rival (Fiume) by an administrative border. In the final section of the essay, I address the political implications of these factors.

The Success of the Party of Rights in Senj

It is gratifying that the Fiume periodical Bilancia has provided a prominent space for the publication […] of last year’s report of the Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Bilancia has thus made clear that it is of the following view: economic expansion in Fiume has not played even the slightest role in the economic conditions in the territories represented by the Senj Chamber […], and on the basis of the report, it was not capable of drawing any other conclusion than that the circumstances in the area under the jurisdiction of the Chamber are “regrettable and embittering” because the crop was bad.58

 

The sense of indignation in the passage cited above was the dominant tone of Novi List, the periodical published by the oppositional Party of Rights in Sušak (Szusák, direct neighboring city of Fiume, and today part of it, at the time beyond the Hungarian border and thus belonging to Croatia)59. The article captures the frustration with the failure to recognize the process which I have described in this essay: the concentration of capital in Fiume was one of the most important factors in the economic life of the whole region.

It was easy and, to some extent, justified to blame not only capitalism in general but also the economic policy of the Hungarian government for the lag in modernization. The struggle which Senj had waged for decades for a railway connection60 and the similarly fruitless efforts to develop the harbor appeared as problems with nationalistic overtones. According to this narrative, the Hungarian government was discriminating against the settlements on the Croatian coast and had essentially usurped Fiume and made the city a tool in the service of Hungarian nation building. A discourse emerged under sub-dualism which strongly resembled the discourse which was often used by the Hungarian pro-independence opposition in the Austro-Hungarian context: among the peoples of the empire, the ruling nations were at an advantage in an unfair competition in which they controlled the imperial economy to promote their own interests, and in doing so, they prevented the other nations of the empire from developing and flourishing. The implication was obvious: the city could only hope to find solutions to the difficulties it faced if there were some change in the power relations among the major players in the larger political arena. The fact that the town of Senj and the surroundings remained an “oppositional nest” for the entire half-century of the Dualist Era is due in no small part to this insight, which also explains the fact that, by the 1880s, the area had become the most important base of support for the Party of Rights.61

The rhetoric of the Party of Rights never failed to include allusions to Senj’s bygone golden era, and thanks to the efforts of the politicians from the seaside who managed to gain some influence in the larger political framework, a circle emerged in Zagreb which represented the problems faced by the region. At the beginning of 1879, Andrija Valušnik, a representative of the Party of Rights, spoke up in support of providing the resources necessary for the proper maintenance of the seaside roads, and he noted the essential interests of the merchants for whom the railway was both distant and expensive and therefore also practically inaccessible. This issue made the disadvantages of the system created by the Compromise clear quite early on, disadvantages which included a cumbersome bureaucracy and the continuous transfer of responsibility to other administrative organs, as the Hungarian and the Croatian governments debated the issue of who was responsible for the maintenance of the roads in question for years.62

In the 1880s, three elections were held in Croatia-Slavonia. In all three (they were held in 1883, 1884, and 1887), the city of Senj sent a representative of the Party of Rights to the Sabor. In 1884, the Party of Rights won in four of the nine electoral districts in the county. In the elections held in 1887, which were infamous because of the influence of Khuen-Héderváry (who used forceful tools to ensure that the ruling party would prevail), the victory of the Party of Rights constituted a particularly remarkable feat. After the electoral reforms in 1888, the party was unable to repeat this triumph,63 but the seaside was still home to the aforementioned periodical Novi List, which was unquestionably one of the major organs of the oppositional press.

It is perhaps emblematic, from the perspective of this essay, that Josip Gržanić, who is infamous for having physically attacked the Ban in the Croatian parliament in 1885, was the representative of the Party of Rights from Senj. He is remembered today primarily for this dramatic episode, but perhaps more important from our point of view is the fact that he was socialized in the intellectual milieu (the grammar school in Senj) out which several individuals who were later prominent as Party of Rights activists also came, including for instance Fran Folnegović, who earlier had also represented Senj in the Sabor.64 Before he became active in national politics, Gržanić was the city notary, and as such, he did a great deal to further the foundation of the Senj Savings Bank. The creation of this financial institution was a fundamental precondition for the development of a capitalist economy in the region, which was difficult in part simply because the area was lacking in capital.65

Josip Gržanić was the leader of the Party of Rights in Senj in 1883, when, in the course of anti-Hungarian and anti-modernization disturbances a protest broke out.66 The demonstrators painted over the bilingual Hungarian and Croatian coats of arms on the local customs office and then tore them down and threw them in the sea, cheering both Croatia and the Party of Rights all the while. The people who were identified, in the investigation which was launched in the wake of the protest, as the “principal culprits” and instigators were all familiar names, including Gržanić and Vjenceslav Novak, but also Ladislav Krajacz, who was perhaps the most esteemed wholesale dealer in Senj and also one of the founders of Ungaro-Croata and who served, between 1886 and 1893, as the major of the city.67

The whole coastal region around Senj became one of the core areas of the wave of protests which were growing increasingly strident at the time and spreading to the villages, while the other major area where there were similar shows of discontent was the surroundings of Zagreb. This would suggest that the two large, modernized cities played roles in fomenting tensions and kindling sentiments of exasperation. In the case of the coastal region, the feelings of discontent could perhaps be explained the presence of nearby Fiume, which was seen as a display of Hungarian dominance. However, this would hardly explain the signs of frustration in the area around Zagreb. Thus, if perhaps cautiously, one could hazard the conjecture that, alongside the efforts that were being made to whip up feelings of national pride, the difficulties faced by these areas because of the transition to capitalism had a similarly decisive impact on the popularity and successes of the political opposition. This explanation seems all the more plausible if one simply takes into consideration the processes in question and the circumstances that shaped the fate of Fiume. It seems perfectly likely that Fiume would have come to play a dominant role in the region even if, in the course of the negotiations concerning the Compromise, the proposal made by the Hungarian side, according to which the city would have fallen under shared administration, had been accepted. Indeed, it probably would have risen to a position of prominence and influence in the region even if it had been put under exclusive Croatian control. Economic logic dictated that Fiume would develop very rapidly, regardless of the political constellation. The emergence of a capital intense structure (i.e. the development of factory industry and global commercial ties) radically transformed the network and hierarchy of the cities, raising some central places to new positions of dominance, while other cities, which earlier may also have flourished, would, according to all the indicators of urbanization, lag far behind.

Thus, the antagonisms which found expression in the discourses of nationalism were in fact fueled in no small part by the tensions created by modernization. There is, of course, an explanation for the conflicts which emerged which identifies ethnic attachments and passions as the primary factor, and this explanation was meaningful to the actors at the time as well. And yet both cooperation and conflict among the various (national) communities within the empire were also shaped to no small extent by the degree and pace of the processes of modernization which affected them.

This insight also furthers an understanding of the popularity of the Party of Rights among the denizens of Senj. It explains why the earlier-cited report issued after the events of 1883 identified Josip Gržanić as a figure with socialist sympathies.68 In other words, the successes of the opposition should not be attributed entirely to the appeal of anti-Hungarian political agitation. Rather, it was also a sign of the discontent of a community which was not satisfied with the central government and which felt itself both excluded from the benefits of modernization and directly exposed to its many disadvantages.

Conclusion

My primary goal in this essay was to consider the regional reactions to the growth and development of the city of Fiume, which have only rarely been made the subject of scholarly inquiry or have been presented in the secondary literature as expressions of national antagonisms. The struggle of the city of Senj was significant in the local context, but it also offers an example of how a small city formed its own distinctive vision of modernization. It thus adds a layer of nuance to the image of a peripheral city which was seen, overly simplistically, as doomed to decline. After showing how industrialization and infrastructural development in Fiume shaped the fate of its Adriatic neighbor, I examined three phenomena that can be interpreted as responses to this transformation. First, two new understandings of the city emerged which drew on the experiences of the industrial city: one can be interpreted as a critique of the modern city, while the other was the image of the traditional city which suffered from a lag in modernization or which sought to shield itself from the drawbacks of modernization. The second phenomenon I analyzed, which was tied in part to these identity-forming narratives, was the decision by the community of the city to embrace and support traditional artisanal crafts, a decision which led to concrete lobbying efforts. This task was undertaken by the Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Finally, I offered a brief discussion of the political consequences of the situation that emerged. Support for the political opposition in the region was fueled not only by the national issue but also by the socio-economic transformation. All three phenomena suggest that the social changes ushered in by industrialization and, within this, the emergence of industrial capitalism (which meant a more intense concentration of resources in a smaller number of communities) were for the people at the time part of a clear process against which, in various areas and at various levels, communities fought. Neither were the towns in the region around Fiume isolated from the changes which were taking place in the growing port city, nor were they merely passive victims of the transformations which were taking place in the emerging new world. Rather, these towns developed their own paths towards modernization.

Archival Sources

Hrvatski Državni Arhiv [State Archive of Croatia] (HDA)

Izvještaji upravnog odbora županije ličko-krbavske, 1894–1918.

Magyar Nemzeti Levéltár Országos Levéltára [Hungarian National Archives] (MNL OL)

K 228 Kereskedelemügyi minisztérium; Tengerészeti, hajózási és vízépítési szakosztály iratai, 1889–1911.

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“Izvještaj senjske trgovačke-obrtničke komore” [Report of the Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry]. Novi List, August 1, 1903.

Novak, Vjenceslav. Pavao Šegota. Zagreb: Matica hrvatska, 1888.

Novak, Vjenceslav. Posljednji Štipančići [The last of the Štipančić line]. Zagreb: Matica hrvatska, 1899. Accessed on Sept 10, 2018, https://lektire.skole.hr/lektire.skole.hr/djela/vjenceslav-novak/posljednji-stipancici.

“Pomorstvo nasijeg doba” [The marine of our times]. Novi List, March 2, 1900.

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Beluszky, Pál, and Róbert Győri. The Hungarian Urban Network in the Beginning of the 20th Century. Pécs: Centre for Regional Studies of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, 2005.

Bogović, Mile. “Moji predšasnici biskupi: u Senju, Otočcu, Krbavi, Modrušu, Vinodolu i Rijeci” [My predecessors, the bishops of Senj, Otočac, Krbava, Modruš, Vinodol, and Rijeka]. Senjski zbornik 42–43, no. 1 (2015–16): 5–198.

Boym, Svetlana. The Future of Nostalgia. New York: Basic Books, 2001.

Bourillon, Florence. “La détestation de la ville ou la construction du discours urbaphobe au XIXème et XXème siècle.” 22èmes Journées Scientifiques de l’Environnement – Reconquête des environnement urbains: les défis du 21ème siècle (conference). Créteil, France, 2011. https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00577920/document

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Despot, Miroslava. “Tvornica duhana u Senju: Njen postanak, razvoj i prestanak rada (1894–1945): Prilog privrednoj povijesti Hrvatskog primorja” [The Tobacco factory in Senj: its foundation, development, and shutdown (1894–1945): contribution to the economic history of the Croatian Littoral]. Senjski zbornik 6, no. 1 (1975): 407–20.

Eszik, Veronika. “A magyar–horvát tengermellék mint nemzetiesített táj: Adalék az intézményesülő földrajztudomány és a nemzetépítés kapcsolatához” [The Hungarian-Croatian coast as a landscape of nationalism: Additional thoughts on the relationship between institutionalized geography and nation building]. Korall 16, no. 62 (2015): 75–96.

Fässler, Peter, Thomas Held, and Dirk Sawitzki, eds. Lemberg, Lwów, Lviv: eine Stadt im Schnittpunkt europäischer Kulturen. Cologne–Weimar–Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 1993.

Fried, Ilona. Emlékek városa – Fiume [City of memories – Fiume]. Budapest: Ponte Alapítvány, 2001.

Frisnyák, Zsuzsa. “Budapest Európa közlekedési és kommunikációs térszerkezetében a 19. század végén” [Budapest in the transportation and communication spatial structure of Europe at the end of the nineteenth century]. In A világváros Budapest a két századfordulón [The cosmopolitan city of Budapest at the turn of the two centuries], edited by Barta Györgyi, Keresztély Krisztina, and Sipos András, 169–207. Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 2010.

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Gonda, Béla. A magyar tengerészet és a fiumei kikötő [The Hungarian navy and the port of Fiume]. Budapest: Pátria, 1906.

Gross, Mirjana. Izvorno pravaštvo: Ideologija, agitacija, pokret [The real Party of Rights: ideology, agitation, and movement]. Zagreb: Golden marketing, 2001.

Hein-Kircher, Heidi. Lembergs “polnischen Charakter” sichern: Kommunalpolitik in einer multiethnischen Stadt der Habsburgermonarchie zwischen 1861/62 und 1914. Stuttgart: Steiner, 2020.

Horel, Catherine. Multicultural Cities of the Habsburg Empire, 1880–1914: Imagined Communities and Conflictual Encounters. Budapest: Central European University Press, 2020.

Kirchner Reill, Dominique. The Fiume Crisis: Life in the Wake of the Habsburg Empire. Cambridge–London: Harvard University Press, 2020.

Kolar, Mira. “Senjanin Josip Gržanić, pravaški političar, u obnovi Senja i Hrvatske” [Josip Gržanić, the rightist politician for the reform of Senj and Croatia]. Senjski zbornik 22, no. 1 (1995): 267–92.

Kolar, Mira. “Senjska željeznica” [The Senj railway]. Senjski zbornik 26, no. 1 (1999): 247–83.

Kolar, Mira. “Senjska trgovačko-obrtnička komora 1875. – 1924. I. dio (1875–1890)” [The Senj Chamber of Commerce and Industry 1875. – 1924. I. part (1875–1890)]. Senjski zbornik 28, no. 1 (2001): 153–82.

Ljubović, Enver. “Senjska luka i Jozefinska cesta, arterija tranzitne trgovine” [The port of Senj and the Josephina road, artery of the transit trade]. Modruški zbornik 6, no. 1 (2012): 101–15.

Lorentzen, Anne and Bas van Heur. Cultural political economy of small cities. London–New York: Routledge, 2011.

Mackintosh, Phillip Gordon, Richard Dennis, and Deryck W. Holdsworth, eds. Architectures of Hurry – Mobilities, Cities and Modernity. London–New York: Routledge, 2018.

Mick, Christophe. Lemberg, Lwów, L’viv, 1914–1947: Violence and Ethnicity in a Contested City. West Lafayette: Purdue University Press, 2016.

Mumford, Lewis. The City in History: Its Origins, Its Transformations, and Its Prospects. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1961.

Ordasi, Ágnes. “Egy betiltott kisebbségi lap: A fiumei La Difesa története (1898–1901)” [A banned minority gazette: The history of La Difesa in Rijeka (1898–1901)]. Pro Minoritate 27, no. 2 (2017): 59–85.

Pavličević, Dragutin. Narodni pokret 1883. u Hrvatskoj [The national movement of 1883 in Croatia]. Zagreb: Sveučilišna naklada Liber, 1980.

Pavličević, Dragutin. “Senj u narodnom pokretu godine 1883” [Senj in the national movement of 1883]. Senjski zbornik 8, no. 1 (1981): 31–44.

Pelles, Márton. “Üzleti és nemzeti érdekek harca a dualizmus idején: Az Osztrák Lloyd Társaság tengeri kereskedelme Fiuméban (1871–1913)” [The struggle of business and national interests in the Dualist era: The maritime trade of the Austrian Lloyd’s Society in Fiume (1871–1913)]. Köztes-Európa Társadalomtudományi Folyóirat 3, no. 1–2 (2016): 153–63.

Prokopovych, Markian. Habsburg Lemberg: Architecture, Public Space, and Politics in the Galician Capital, 1772–1914. West Lafayette: Purdue University Press, 2008.

Schorske, Carl E. “The Ringstrasse, Its Critics, and the Birth of Urban Modernism.” In Fin-de-Siècle Vienna: Politics and Culture, edited by Carl E. Schorske, 24–115. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981.

Simmel, Georg. “The Metropolis and Mental Life.” In Georg Simmel: On Individuality and Social Forms. Selected Writings, edited by Donald N. Levine, 324–39. London–Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1971.

Simunić, Nikola, and Ivan Brlić. “Senjsko parobrodarstvo i socioekonomske prilike na prijelazu iz 19. u stoljeće. [Steam-Shipping and Socioeconomic Circumstances at the Turn of the 20th Century]. Geoadria 19, no. 1 (2014): 101–28. doi: 10.15291/geoadria.41.

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Tönnies, Ferdinand, Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft. Leipzig: Fues‘s Verlag, 1887.

Turkalj, Jasna. “Senj i senjani u pravaškom pokretu 1880-ih godina” [Senj and ist dwellers in the rightist movement oft he 1880s]. Senjski zbornik 30, no. 1 (2003): 287–320.

Turkalj, Jasna. “Pravaški pokret u brinjskom kraju 1880ih godina” [The rightist movement in Brinje at the end oft he 1880s]. In Identitet Like: korijeni i razvitak, edited by Željko Holjevac, 405–26. Zagreb–Gospić: Institut društvenih znanosti Ivo Pilar, 2009.

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Volkov, Shulamit. The Rise of Popular Antimodernism in Germany: The Urban Master Artisans, 1873–1896. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978.

Vranješ-Šoljan, Božena. Stanovništvo gradova Banske Hrvatske na prijelazu stoljeća: Socijalno-ekonomski sastav i vodeći slojevi 1890–1914 [Urban population of the Croatian Kingdom in the 19th century: socio-economic composition end the elites 1890–1914]. Zagreb: Školska knjiga–Stvarnost, 1991.

Wakeman, Rosemary. A Modern History of European Cities: 1815 to the Present. London: Bloomsbury, 2020.

Walker, Mack. German Home Towns: Community, State and General Estate 1648–1871. Ithaca–London: Cornell University Press, 1971.

Weck, Nadja. Eisenbahn Und Stadtentwicklung in Zentraleuropa: Am Beispiel Der Stadt Lemberg (Lwów, L’viv). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2020.

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Zsigmond, Gábor. “A fiumei magyar tengeri kereskedelmi gőzhajózás kialakulása” [The development of Hungarian maritime commercial steam shipping in Fiume]. Kút 6, no. 1–2 (2007): 56–74.

Zsigmond, Gábor, and Márton Pelles. The Hungarian Maritime Trade History of Fiume (1868–1918). Pécs: Pro Pannonia, 2018.

1 Ferdinand Tönnies is perhaps the individual most responsible for the popularity of this interpretation, though it then enjoyed the support of the modernization theorists he inspired. The central place theory also favored this interpretation, as did the cultural turn in urban history, which concentrated on multiple or cosmopolitan identities. On the level of world-systems theory and global history, megapolises were put center stage. Connolly, “Decentering Urban History,” 3–4.

2 Trains of thought that seek to avoid the extremes cited above can also perpetuate this dichotomy, for example in Simmel’s classic narrative, the small town is given a dual role (as a site that provides space for the individual but puts limits on his freedom), but it still remains static, as opposed to the dynamically changing character of the big city. Simmel, “The Metropolis and Mental Life.”

3 Connolly, “Decentering Urban History,” 3.

4 The classic version of this vision is Tönnies, Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft.

5 Bourillon, “La détestation de la ville,” 5–8.

6 Much as they do today. See Lorentzen and van Heur, Cultural Political Economy of Small Cities.

7 Regarding the use of place names, I use the standard English names (assuming there is a standard English name for a given settlement) to make them easily identifiable. Fiume is an exception, since its name today, Rijeka, refers to a city changed in its structure, as it incorporates the neighboring town of Sušak. However, when citing a source, I use the name used in the source.

8 Cole, “Visions and Revisions of Empire.”

9 This somewhat cumbersome English translation of the Hungarian term “kis hatótávolságú világváros” is meant simply to refer to cities which were connected to the European transport network and were connected by the railway to at least one capital or a foreign trade center. Frisnyák borrows the term from Pál Beluszky, who originally used it to refer to Budapest only: Frisnyák “Budapest Európa,” 182.

10 Authors who deal with the reassessment of the peripheries in the urban history of the region include Gantner et al., “Backward and Peripheral?” The recent publication of a large number of works on the history of Lemberg can also be regarded as a sign of this increased interest in the subject: Fässler et al., Lemberg, Lwów, Lviv; Czaplicka, Lviv; Prokopovych, Habsburg Lemberg; Mick, Lemberg, Lwów, L’viv; Weck, Eisenbahn und Stadtentwicklung; Hein-Kircher, Lembergs “polnischen Charakter.” Varga discusses the symbolic role of cities on the border areas of a national territory imagined as an ideal: Varga, The Monumental Nation. Catherine Horel chose 12 small and medium-sized towns with different statuses as subjects of study explicitly “to counter the disproportionate attention that the largest cities in the empire receive.” Horel, Multicultural Cities. One of the theoretical foundations of Rosemary Wakeman’s monograph is criticism of metropolis-centered urban history writing: Wakeman, A Modern History.

11 Zsigmond, “A fiumei magyar tengeri,” 58. Following the Settlement concluded by the Austrian and the Hungarian parts of the Habsburg Empire (1867), the Hungarian-Croatian Compromise (1868) redefined the relationship between landlocked Hungary and maritime Croatia, granting the latter limited home rule within the framework of the Hungarian Kingdom. During the negotiations, the parties could not agree on the question regarding the control of the port city Fiume, which lay on Croatian soil but was administered directly from Budapest as a so-called corpus separatum. The legal status of Fiume remained contested until the end of the era, though the city functioned as the only Hungarian seaport. All that said on the legal status of Fiume, the port city was also a microcosm of city dwellers of various ethnicities who spoke different languages and engaged in varying economic and cultural activities. On the multi-layered and tumultuous everyday urban life in Fiume, see Kirchner Reill, The Fiume Crisis.

12 As Boym has observed concerning the nature of nostalgia in general, “Nostalgia is not always about the past; it can be retrospective but also prospective. Fantasies of the past determined by needs of the present have a direct impact on realities of the future. Consideration of the future makes us take responsibility for our nostalgic tales.” Boym, The Future of Nostalgia, 13.

13 For a recently published comprehensive assessment of the city’s economic development at the end of the nineteenth century see Zsigmond and Pelles, A fiumei magyar kereskedelmi tengerészet.

14 Kassa (today Košice, Slovakia) was also on the podium, and Budapest was in fourth place. Fried, Emlékek városa, 68, 73.

15 Beluszky and Győri, The Hungarian Urban Network, 119–20.

16 Vranješ-Šoljan, Stanovništvo gradova Banske Hrvatske, 198.

17 The Josephina was built on a route which was once used by the Romans at the initiative of Joseph II. Measured by standards at the time, it was a good-quality road. It was completed in 1779, and it connected Pannonia with Dalmatia, which meant that it connected the city of Karlovac with Senj. Until the construction of the railway lines, the Josephina was the most efficient trade route to the sea for grain from Pannonia and wood from Slavonia. From the coastal towns, it was then taken to various other cities on the Mediterranean, including, first and foremost, Venice. Szavits Nossan, “Ceste Karlovac – Senj.”

18 Sokcsevits, “A Horvát Jogpárt,” 35.

19 Simunić–Brlić, “Senjsko parobrodarstvo i socioekonomske prilike,” 124.

20 Ljubović, “Senjska luka i Jozefinska cesta.”

21 On the full spectrum of shipping companies and the role of the state see Zsigmond and Pelles, A fiumei magyar kereskedelmi tengerészet.

22 Gonda, A magyar tengerészet, 81–82.

23 Vranješ-Šoljan, Stanovništvo gradova Banske Hrvatske, 201.

24 Ibid., 67, 121. Fried, Emlékek városa, 68–69.

25 The holder of title of ban was the highest dignitary in the Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia. In the Middle Ages, the ban was the equivalent of a viceroy. In the dualist period the bans functioned as quasi prime ministers. They were appointed by the king based on the suggestion and under the condition of the approval of the Hungarian prime minister. A controversial figure of the era was ban Khuen-Héderváry (1883–1903), often considered a great modernizer as well as an oppressor of Croatian nation-building initiatives.

26 Cited in Kolar, “Senjska trgovačko-obrtnička komora,” 163–64, my italics.

27 On the narrative which proclaimed Fiume the display city of Hungarian modernization and dubbed the city “the most beautiful pearl in the crown of Saint Stephen,” see Eszik, “A magyar–horvát tengermellék.”

28 Other authors who deal with the same problems and work with roughly the same mental maps are Milutin Cihlar Nehajev (his novel Bijeg [Escape] is of particular interest), Milan Ogrizović, and Josip Draženović. The famous August Šenoa was also inspired by Senj’s glorious military past and allure of resistance against foreign forces (Čuvaj se senjske ruke [Beware of hands from Zengg]).

29 Čuljat, “Podgorje u pripovjednomu modelu Vjenceslava Novaka,” 438. There is another Croatian word which means the same thing (“županijski”), so this use of this cognate from Hungarian was not a matter of linguistic necessity.

30 Novak, Pavao Šegota, 133.

31 Čuljat, “Podgorje u pripovjednomu modelu Vjenceslava Novaka,” 439.

32 “[…] ‘Hurry’ as much as speed is intrinsic to modernity. We cannot conceive of modern society and modern capitalism without invoking, not just speed, but the desire for speeding-up, the fears and anxieties associated with acceleration […]” Mackintosh et al., Architectures of Hurry, 2. For a contemporary perception of the phenomenon, see Simmel, “The Metropolis and Mental Life.”

33 Novak, Posljednji Štipančići, 25.

34 A monograph has been published on Senj’s rich history in civil organizations: Brlić, Lička i senjska građanska društva.

35 Radetić, “Senj kakav je negda bio,” 20. The Radiša circle partly blamed the agitations provoked by the Party of Rights for the dissent, so it was not considered a radically oppositional organ of the press. Kolar, “Senjanin Josip Gržanić,” 5.

36 Radetić, “Senj kakav je negda bio,” 20.

37 Cited in Kolar, “Senjska trgovačko-obrtnička komora,” 165 (my italics).

38 Ordasi offers a presentation of the problems discussed in the paper, as well as a summary of the source. Ordasi, “Egy betiltott kisebbségi lap,” 76–77.

39 Mumford, The City in History, 446–15.

40 Housing blocks for workers were built in the new industrial port district, but not to such an extent that they formed exclusively workers’ neighborhoods, all the more so because of the fact that, due to the lack of space, industrial and representative functions highly overlapped in the new urban landscape. On this specific urban planning see Zucconi, Una città cosmopolita.

41 Bourillon, “La détestation de la ville.”

42 Gáspár, A Föld körül VI, 9.

43 Vranješ-Šoljan, Stanovništvo gradova Banske Hrvatske, 103.

44 Despot, “Tvornica duhana u Senju,” 412.

45 Vranješ-Šoljan, Stanovništvo gradova Banske Hrvatske, 43. In contrast with the earlier county regulations (1870, 1874), this transformation was the subject of considerable discussion, as ban Károly Khuen-Héderváry followed political considerations and decided in favor of the reform in order to ensure electoral victories for the governing party. The county reports, which are held in the State Archives in Zagreb (Hrvatski Državni Arhiv), begin only with the reports from 1894.

46 The Chamber continuously came up with new solutions to the problems concerning traffic, which can be found in the archives of the Hungarian Ministry of Trade (MNL OL K 228). The requests which were sent to the Maritime Authority include one alleging an unfair competitive advantage for state-subsidized steam shipping companies (MNL OL K 228 70018/1892). One also finds a proposal of a Senj company to take over the transport of mail between Fiume and Senj for state aid (MNL OL K 228 58602/1893). The chamber calls for the restoration of the status of the city as a free port and for support for the use of sailing ships in commerce alongside steamships (MNL OL K 228 39583/1893), etc.

47 Kolar, “Senjska trgovačko-obrtnička komora,” 160.

48 The chamber law was the Sixth Act of 1868 in Hungary and the Eighth Act of 1868 in Croatia.

49 The Military Frontier was a territory which served as a defense zone against incursions of the Ottoman Empire. The zone, which had special privileges and duties, was created in the sixteenth century and was abolished once the Ottoman threat became minor.

50 Kolar, “Senjska trgovačko-obrtnička komora,” 153–55.

51 Szávay, A magyar kamarai intézmény, 441.

52 One finds a request singed by Cihlar for, among other things, the deepening of the Senj port and the conversion of areas around the shore to firm land (MNL OL K 228 84102/1891), but the Maritime Authority also entrusted him with the task of preparing a comprehensive report on sea fishing (MNL OL K 228 38809/1894).

53 Cihlar’s suggestions are included in Kolar, “Senjska trgovačko-obrtnička komora,” 169–74. Cited on p. 169.

54 Cited in Kolar, “Senjska trgovačko-obrtnička komora,” 170.

55 Schorske, “The Ringstrasse,” 29–31.

56 Walker, German Home Towns; Volkov, The Rise of Popular Antimodernism in Germany.

57 For short biographies of Senj’s bishops, see Bogović, “Moji predšasnici biskupi,” 140–49.

58 “Izvještaj senjske trgovačke-obrtničke komore,” Novi List, August 1, 1903, 1.

59 On the importance of this satellite city see Kirchner Reill, The Fiume Crisis, 27–29.

60 The struggle is described in detail, from the first proposal made by engineer Kajetan Knezić in 1829 to 1941, in Kolar, “Senjska željeznica.” Senj also offered alternative proposals after the handover of the Fiume railway, mainly thanks to the efforts of Sebald Cihlar, secretary of the Chamber of Commerce, who called for the construction of a line that would connect Senj and Bihac and thus the coast and Bosnia after the occupation of the latter. As is well known, in the case of Bosnia-Herzegovina, the concept of a Budapest-centered railway network prevailed, and in the end, Budapest was connected to Sarajevo via Brod.

61 The most comprehensive work on the Party of Rights is Gross, Izvorno pravaštvo.

62 Turkalj, “Pravaški pokret u brinjskom kraju,” 408–9.

63 Ibid., 419–24.

64 On this infamously dramatic scene but also, more importantly, on Gržanić’s entire political career, see Kolar, “Senjanin Josip Gržanić.”

65 Kolar, “Senjanin Josip Gržanić,” 8.

66 The disturbances broke out following the violation of the Hungarian-Croatian Settlement of 1868 by Antal Dávid, head of the Zagreb Financial Directorate, who placed bilingual (Croatian and Hungarian) signs on the facade of the Directorate’s building in Zagreb instead of the existing, exclusively Croatian ones. The uprising mirrored general dissatisfaction with Hungarian dominance. See Pavličević, Narodni pokret 1883.

67 Pavličević, “Senj u narodnom pokretu,” 38–39. Krajacz’s career was shaped in no small part by the fact that his financial interests lay in Fiume, not Senj.

68 Ibid., 41.

2021_4_Péterfi

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Multiple Loyalties in Habsburg-Hungarian Relations at the Turn of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Century

Bence Péterfi
Research Centre for the Humanities
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Hungarian Historical Review Volume 10 Issue 4  (2021):621-652 DOI 10.38145/2021.4.621

In this essay, I examine how people with business and political interest on both sides of Austrian–Hungarian border, sometimes even in royal courts, could survive in spite of the rather capricious relationship between Hungarian kings and Habsburg rulers in the second half of the fifteenth century and the early sixteenth century. Most of them sought a solution that would enable them to keep the estates and the positions they had already acquired. This “double loyalty” was practically impossible in the midst of the war between Matthias Corvinus and Frederick III, Holy Roman emperor: very few of the figures in question managed to maintain attachments to both sides. A window of opportunity opened with the Peace of Pressburg in 1491, when the two parties recognized the possibility of service in the neighboring ruler’s service. Although the peace treaty did not alter the significant shrinking of the camp supporting the Habsburg claim to the throne, which had been relatively large in the time of the 1490–91 Austro-Hungarian War, from the 1490s on and in strikingly large numbers from the mid-1510s, more and more people could be found whose activities made plainly clear that they were not exclusive in their loyalties: they were quite able to serve two masters at the same time.

Keywords: multiple loyalties, late Middle Ages, Hungarian Kingdom, Habsburg dynastic politics, cross border contacts

 “A Hungarian will always be a Hungarian, with faith and loyalty rather unstable.” Florian Waldauf made this claim in a letter written to Sigismund, archduke of Austria in October, 1490. Waldauf was informing the archduke about the recent developments of the military expedition launched by Emperor Frederick III (1440–1493) and his son, King Maximilian I (1486/1493–1519) in the autumn of the same year.1 As the imperial army entered the Kingdom of Hungary by force, several Hungarian and Croatian noblemen yielded to it, some of whom undoubtedly did so not simply out of necessity but rather as a strategic move. For those going over to the Habsburg side, the peace treaty signed in Pressburg (Bratislava, today in Slovakia) on November 7, 1491 meant relief from retaliatory actions.2 King Vladislaus II of Bohemia (1471–1516) and Hungary (1490–1516) not only had to guarantee a pardon for these subjects of his, he also acknowledged, for the future, that they had the right to join any prince in any country outside Hungary who was not an enemy of His Majesty and the country and who had not allied with such enemies, especially the Holy Roman emperor, as wished or considered convenient, but by all means remained, like the others, obedient and loyal to Vladislaus II before all else, preserving the freedom of the country and bearing the burdens deriving from their possessions and incomes at all times.3

The Peace of Pressburg in 1491 put an end to a period which had borne witness to repeated outbreaks of conflict from the late 1470s on, the roots of which went back to the 1440s. After the death of Albert, king of the Germany and Hungary (1439), there escalated a civic war of varying intensity between the parties in order to acquire possession of the Holy Crown of Hungary and conquer the Hungarian throne as an ultimate goal: some supported the posthumous-born son of King Albert, Ladislaus (1440/1453–1457), while others supported Vladislaus I, king of Poland (1434–1444). King Vladislaus I was killed in the Battle of Varna (1444), so no rivals were left for Ladislaus the Posthumous, but the civil war was not over. At this point, some estates in Western Hungary ended up in the possession of Duke Albert of Austria for a short time and his brother, King Frederick, from the 1440s onwards, some (the smaller share) by right of pledge and some (the larger share) because they were simply taken by force. Peace with Frederick was finalized in the Treaty of Wiener Neustadt (1463) in the sixth year of the reign of the next king, Matthias Corvinus (1458–1490). The most severe “compromise” in the treaty proved to be the terms regarding the right of inheritance of the Hungarian throne. Supposedly keeping the unsatisfying and frustrating conditions in mind, Matthias Corvinus started an open conflict with the emperor in 1477 which did not come to an end until December 1487 (without any significant success). The aforementioned Peace of Pressburg not only set aside the military conflict between King Wladislaus II and his Habsburg rivals after the death of Matthias Corvinus but also confirmed the main points of the Treaty of Wiener Neustadt. Wladislaus II and Maximilian I then signed a marital agreements involving their dynasties, first in March 1506 and eventually, in its final form, in July 1515.4 Finally, the elevation of Ferdinand, archduke of Austria (1521–1564) to the throne of Hungary was based neither on the treaty of Wiener Neustadt nor on the Treaty of Pressburg, but on two symbolic acts at the time: his election in 1526 and coronation in 1527, as was also true in the case of his rival, János Szapolyai (who was elected and crowned in 1526).5

The following questions arise: 1) did the Peace of Pressburg constitute a new phenomenon that had been unknown or did it merely “legalize” it on the highest level; 2) after 1491 and before the Habsburg provinces and the Jagiellonian Kingdoms of Hungary and Bohemia were united by King Ferdinand (1526–64), how many people, if any, took advantage of the opportunity, created by the Treaty of Pressburg, to show dual loyalties and serve two rulers, a Jagiellon and a Habsburg at the same time? In order to answer these questions, I first examine the issue in general. I then consider, touching on its antecedents and with the help of some graphic examples, what the point included in the Peace of Pressburg, which may seem a bit unusual at first, actually meant in reality.

Multiple Loyalties

Today, we are perhaps more likely to think (or even judge) about loyalty in categorical terms, but apart from in times of war, loyalty has never been a simple question, as rulers and their counselors themselves quite pragmatically realized in the late Middle Ages. Undoubtedly there were some individuals who showed dual or multiple loyalties for a shorter or longer periods of time, or in other words who served and were loyal to two (or more) masters at the same time.6 Paul-Joachim Heinig stressed that for rather a long time, until the reign of Emperor Charles V (1519–1555), personal commitments predominantly showed a lack of regulation in the Holy Roman Empire. The phenomenon of “serving or being committed to more masters, could, at various levels, lead to one being given the status of familiaritas or being appointed to serve as a counselor. It was not only about titles and formality, but rather went hand in hand with certain functions.”7 Occasionally, however, contemporaries argued8 that “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other” (Mt 6.24).9 Similar arguments can be found in several pieces of medieval European poetry. The strict disapproval of multiple loyalties, however, may suggest that this kind of conduct was more common than poets wanted to admit.10 However, there may have been other “practical” reasons for references to multiple loyalties: conflicts, defections, and betrayals make a more exciting story line. Authors only rarely narrated something that seemed to favor avoiding conflicts and accepting compromise for the sake of realizing multiple interests.11

Multiple loyalty extended beyond borders: first and foremost, permeability was possible due to the identical or very similar social structure (the feudal system).12 Subjects coming from the Low Countries could easily belong to the Holy Roman emperor and to the French king as their liege lord at the same time.13 However, multiple loyalty became more and more conflicted by the growing French expansionism in the early modern period.14 Independently from the social system, actors sometimes performed services for several parties in the world of diplomacy, as recent analysis has shown, drawing on the examples of nuncios, legates, and clerks of the Holy See and the envoys of foreign rulers in Rome in the second half of the fifteenth century.15 Crossing borders between Christian and Muslim countries was not a privilege for traders at all, and sometimes Christian mercenaries paid by Muslim rulers represented the interests of Christian kings (or of the people who had commissioned them).16

The feudal system of Western Europe never set foot in the Hungarian Kingdom, which is why the findings of scholarship on multiple loyalties in Western Europe (a topic which is often intertwined with analysis of the local social system) can only be taken into account in a limited way. A member of the lower nobility, for example, was often “employed” as a so-called familiaris, a position which was distinctive to the world of Hungary and which meant belonging to the familia of a landlord, working in his service. This position had nothing to do with the position of the vassal in the feudal system.17 Based on the criterion of disloyalty, one sees where the limits of loyalty lay.18 However, no systematic analysis has been done on what it meant to be a “good” and “loyal” subject in the Hungarian Kingdom19 or what was done for and thought of loyalty and disloyalty in theory and practice.20 Positions which involved working in the service of the court constituted the highest, most prestigious slice of the “spectrum of loyalty.”21 In most cases, we do not know exactly what service involved or whether any services were actually performed. Receipts and accounts are available only from the turn of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries on from the court of the Holy Roman emperor, certifying that someone made it onto the list of payments, or in other words received regular income for his services, but the nature of this service remains unclear.22 The source material on matters of the medieval court of the Hungarian king is even more scattered and fragmented.23

As seen from the discussion of the differing legal systems, the Hungarian-Austrian border had very sharp contours, but this did not really prevent people from crossing it and having short-term or even long-term (business) issues on the other side of the border. If one interprets the concept of loyalty loosely, multiple loyalties might also mean that, for whatever reason, someone was a landowner in one or more provinces or countries, whether these lands were under a single, autonomous sovereign or belonged to a common composite state under one ruler. In fact, in order to maintain possession of an estate successfully over the long run, a certain degree of loyalty was needed. Otherwise, the estates would have been lost. This kind of double or multiple ownership of estates, or in other words, owning estates which were in more than one country, was not a new phenomenon in the late medieval period; it may certainly be detected, albeit in a fragmented form, in the Austrian-Hungarian borderland from the thirteenth century on. From the second half of the thirteenth century, there is more and more evidence of less significant figures settling in or relocating to and acquiring smaller estates on both sides of the border.24 The will of nobleman Wolfgang Rauschar/Rauscher of Levél or Gáta, written in 1526, offers a clear indication of the places which were decisive in his life. For instance, he designated the hospital in Pressburg as a beneficiary, but also the hospitals in Hainburg and Bruck an der Leitha, right across the border.25 Noblemen were not the only people who obtained estates. Ecclesiastical institutions also did (Heiligenkreuz, Pöllau, Vorau), as did burghers, who indeed obtained them in even higher numbers (Bruck an der Leitha, Wiener Neustadt etc.), usually with vineyards in Hungary, which “enjoyed a special status since the thirteenth century, their owner having the right to sell or bequeath them to whomever he wanted as long as he cultivated them regularly.” The burghers in particular managed to make their voices heard when they repeatedly expressed their resentment for having to pay foreign trade duties, that is, the thirtieth and the ninth (nona), the tax of landlords, for the wine they produced on their own Hungarian estates.26 The predominantly German inhabitants of Pressburg and Sopron, which were both close to the border, must certainly have had interests in the territory of the Empire (owing to their numerous family ties),27 but few details are known about this.

As a consequence of the aforementioned wars in the second half of the fifteenth century, life in the Hungarian-Austrian border region became more complicated and conflicted. The world beset by party strife was vividly captured by German poet Michael Beheim, who wrote in the mid-fifteenth century, a time at which the Hungarian, Bohemian, and Austrian territories were plagued by civil war. In one of his poems, Beheim described how a Hungarian nobleman, having noticed the coat of arms on Beheim’s shield and realized that he was in the service of Ladislaus the Posthumous drove him away, shouting imprecations at him all the while for having discouraged his king from visiting Hungary.28 In another poem, Beheim gave an account of an episode when he was verbally abused at the wedding of a prominent big landowner from the Austrian-Hungarian borderland, Count Sigismund of Szentgyörgy-Bazin, in Óvár. This time, however, the source of conflict was not anti-German sentiment but tensions within the House of Habsburg. When the poet inquired as to why he was being taunted, a jester named Christopher told him that, while Beheim was on the side of Frederick III, those hurling abuse at him supported the monarch’s brother, Albert VI, archduke of Austria.29

Waldauf’s negative view of Hungarians, cited in the first sentence of this essay, may have been indirectly fed by this tumultuous period. Bad experiences were naturally engraved more deeply in the memories of those living in the borderland than they were among the inhabitants of the Tyrol (like Waldauf himself). However, the news affected those living farther from the events as well, as they could hardly avoid hearing the flood of reports. The fear of Hungarians became so intense that it was still palpable in Habsburg territories even in the mid-sixteenth century, by which time the rulers sitting on the Hungarian throne had been from the House of Habsburg for decades.30 On the other hand, it was not only Habsburg supporters who were prejudiced against the people of the Kingdom of Hungary. Similar attitudes were also prevalent among members of the Hungarian nobility.31 Later generations were also swayed by these preconceptions. The once significant royal town of Sopron, for instance, was often accused of being “two-faced” or “false-hearted” because, due to its location near the Austrian-Hungarian border, at times of political crisis, it sometimes had to adopt a prudent policy and make shows of loyalty both to the Hungarian king and the Holy Roman emperor.32

From the Empire to the Kingdom of Hungary

If we wish to have a more subtle grasp of what being in the service of more than one ruler meant after 1491, we would do well first to examine the decades before this period. Members of the Cilli retinue, who took part in the administration of their “empire” (which included lands in Carinthia, Carniola, Styria, the Kingdom of Hungary and Croatia), which fell to pieces after the assassination of Ulrich II, count of Cilli (1456), all found their way somehow. It is a well-known fact that thanks to the influential Cilli family, a great number of imperial subjects arrived in the Kingdom of Hungary as castellans or familiares.33 Nevertheless, few of them were able to achieve anything resembling the career of Bohemian mercenary captain Jan Vitovec who, in the 1450s and 1460s accumulated a considerable size and number of estates by maneuvering between Frederick III and Matthias Corvinus.34 Yet, however prominent Jan Vitovec may have been at the beginning of Matthias Corvinus’s reign, his sons were driven away from their Hungarian estates incredibly easily, by the increasingly autocratic king’s troops in 1488.35 All their significant estates in Hungary were lost, and there was probably little left of the estates amassed and owned by the mercenary captain in the territory of the Empire either. According to the records, the two sons, William and George, were on the side of the Habsburgs in 1491,36 although at this time they also enjoyed support from Matthias Corvinus’ widow, Beatrice of Aragon.37 Presumably because of his knowledge of Slavic languages, Count William was sent as an envoy by Frederick III and Maximilian I to Poland, Mazovia, and Russia in 1493–1494,38 then he became assessor of the supreme court (Kammergericht) in Wiener Neustadt. He was given the estate of Bruck an der Leitha, on the Austrian side of the border, probably as a payment for his services.39 His elder brother, Count George, was able to remain on the Hungarian estates, which were then only a fraction of their previous size, but according to the book of accounts of 1494–1495, he may have been given a place in the court of Vladislaus II.40 Complaints concerning various properties were made in George’s name,41 but the family was unable to get back most of the former estates.

Vitovec was not the only person coming from the far side of the border and settling in Western Hungary who entered the service of the Hungarian King but also kept his interests abroad for a time. In 1472, Frederick III complained to Pope Sixtus IV (1471–84) that the king of Hungary had a habit of supporting Austrian noblemen who dared to rebel against the emperor.42 Andreas Baumkircher from Carniola was one such “rebel.” Baumkircher had spent a long time in the service of the Habsburgs (as a mercenary, first of King Ladislaus the Posthumous, then of Frederick III), and he had thus obtained an estate in Western Hungary (Szalónak or Stadtschlaining, today in Austria). On the day of the treaty of Wiener Neustadt (1463), Baumkircher took an oath of loyalty to King Matthias Corvinus, and he was granted a special privilege: he was allowed to serve anyone as long as, in doing so, he caused no harm to the king of Hungary or the kingdom. Not surprisingly, Baumkircher came up as a counsellor of the emperor a few days later. He eventually turned against Frederick III, however, going over to the side of Matthias Corvinus in 1469. In 1471, the emperor had Baumkircher arrested and executed, and neither the Inner Austrian estates or Matthias Corvinus made any protest.43 Thanks to an agreement between the emperor and Baumkircher’s widow and sons in 1472, the family would receive compensation for Baumkircher’s estates on the territory of the Holy Roman Empire, though there is no clear evidence that the whole amount of money was ever actually transferred to them.44 By the end of the fifteenth century, the major part of the estates of the two sons, Wilhelm and Georg,45 consisted of Császárvár (Cesargrad, today in Croatia) and Szalónak, in the territory of the Kingdom of Hungary, and Rohonc (Rechnitz, today in Austria), bought in July 1490.46 Despite the fact that the Austrian-Hungarian war of 1490–1491 probably also hit his Hungarian estates situated close to the border, Wilhelm Baumkircher did not end up among Maximilian’s troops invading the Kingdom of Hungary but rather joined the supporters of Vladislaus II, crowned king of Hungary in 1490,47 and stayed at his side until his death in 1492. He was rewarded for his loyalty with the position of treasurer for a short time.48 Probably due to considerations of property rights, his brother Georg Baumkircher kept his Austrian estate Kirchschlag49 (which he held by right of pledge) when he entered the service of the Habsburgs in 1493, though he did not choose Frederick III, his father’s executioner, but his son, Maximilian I.50 However, records from 1494 refer to Georg Baumkircher as now (or continually?) a counselor to Vladislaus II.51 Although it is not clear that he played these roles at the same time, one thing is for sure: while the father could not manage to strike a successful balance between his loyalties to the two rulers in wartime, his son managed to do so in a time of peace.

Sigmund Weispriach, a brother-in-law of Jan Vitovec, set foot first as captain of Fraknó (Forchtenstein, today in Austria) in the 1450s in Hungary, serving Frederick III at that time. In 1466, rewarding him for leaving Frederick III’s side and joining the Hungarian king, Matthias Corvinus donated Sigmund the estates of Fraknó and Kabold (Kobersdorf, today in Austria), and privileged Sigmund, among others, to use the arms of the former counts of Fraknó. For the following eight years, he was ispán of Sopron county in Western Hungary and, for a while, he even served as captain of the town of Sopron. Meanwhile, he was possibly able to keep his offices on the other side of the border, namely the captaincy of Pettau (Ptuj, today in Slovenia), which belonged, however, to the authority of the archbishop of Salzburg.52 The path to the Hungarian king’s service was less direct for his sons, Ulrich and Andreas.53 In January 1475, Andreas was said to be a courtier (aulicus) of Corvinus.54 In December 1479, the brothers and their widowed mother refused to open the gates of the Castle of Pettau for the troops of the Hungarian king under an agreement between Corvinus and the archbishop of Salzburg.55 It was probably due to the Hungarian invasions in Styria and Carinthia in the early 1480s as well as a financial conflict of financing mercenaries with Frederick III at the same time that Andreas went over to Matthias Corvinus’s side in 148256 and, following in his father’s footsteps, he became ispán of Sopron.57 Later, as a courtier (“unnser diener, hofgesind”) of Corvinus he was even imprisoned by the emperor for a time, against which the Hungarian king tried to take action.58 Matthias took Ulrich von Weispriach under his protection around December 1485 and made him a member of the royal court (“zu unserm diener und hofgesind”).59 In the case of the Weispriachs, too, a serious break came with the aforementioned 1488 campaign against the Vitovec.60 After that, they came to serve Frederick III and Maximilian I, participated in the aforementioned Habsburg invasion of 1490, and Andreas von Weispriach became captain of the Hungarian town of Veszprém, which was occupied by imperial troops.61 After the Peace of Pressburg, the Weispriach family remained in control of the estate of Kabold and acquired the pawned estate of Kosztel (Kostelgrad, today in Croatia).62 The sources offer no indication that they performed any services for the Hungarian royal court after 1490. They started (or kept) collecting estates in the Habsburg lands, and they were commissioned by King Maximilian to perform some services: Ulrich Weispriach, for example, became governor (Landeshauptmann) of Carinthia (1500–1503).63

The third person arriving from the territory of the empire and dominant from a political perspective was Ulrich von Grafeneck from Swabia, who obtained his first estates in 1447 in Hungary (Sopronkertes or Baumgarten, today in Austria) in the service of Frederick III. In the early 1450s, he served as the castellan of Kőszeg, which at the time was occupied by the emperor’s troops. At the turn of the 1450s and 1460s, Frederick III appointed him to serve as ispán of Sopron county. At the same time, Grafeneck got hold of the estate of Trautmansdorf on the Austrian side of the border (1459) and, gradually, further estates in the Archduchy of Austria. In addition to increasing his wealth, Grafeneck also successfully expanded his network of connections. In the late 1460s, he was often seen around Matthias Corvinus, and he even received an estate from the king (Scharfeneck, 1470). In those days, he clearly tried to achieve a balance by serving both rulers. The cracks in the relationship between Grafeneck and the emperor were probably caused by Andreas Baumkircher’s execution in 1471. Grafeneck took part in a feud (Fehde) led by several Austrian noblemen against the empire, which enjoyed the overt backing of the Hungarian king himself. Eventually, Grafeneck and the emperor reached an agreement in early 1477. In return for 50,000 Rhenish guilders, Grafeneck would give up all his estates in Austria. Not much later (before the spring of 1478), though, the Swabian nobleman went back to supporting Frederick III, then, after further unknown turns, he returned to the service of the Hungarian king. It is possible that in 1487 he was about to change sides again, but this was something the Hungarian king would not tolerate, and it is possible that Grafeneck was killed at his behest. There is no indication in the sources that any of his descendants performed any services for the court. They maintained ownership of (or at least their rights to) both their Hungarian and Austrian estates until they sold them in 1504.64

From the Kingdom of Hungary to the Empire

It was not unusual at all, in the fifteenth century, for Hungarian and Croatian nobles in the service of the Habsburgs to maintain their contacts with the Hungarian king.65 Yet the strategy of Emperor Frederick III and his son, Maximilian I, brought new elements, quite similar to the “methods” used by Matthias Corvinus: they exerted influence on the dynastic policy of their neighboring rival, made some subjects falter in their loyalty by making them various offers, and then built a group of followers who would work to further their dynastic policy, which aimed at destabilization and securing local support for possible military action. This method was particularly used in the period between 1440 and the Peace of Wiener Neustadt in 1463 and the period after 1491. After Matthias Corvinus’s death (1490), and later the Habsburg rulers continuously gave indications of their desire to do so. One of the most emphatic examples of these efforts was the funeral procession of Frederick III (December 6–7, 1493). According to the diplomatic protocol, Maximilian I, delegates of the Holy See and of Charles VIII of France were followed by two emissaries of Vladislav II: Tamás Bakóc, bishop of Eger, and Miklós Bánfi of Alsólendva. They were not the only subjects of the king of Hungary present at the funeral: Hungarian noblemen were also seen in the procession symbolizing the lands of Frederick III. Representing the Holy Roman emperor’s title as king of Hungary, they marched with the coat of arms of the Kingdom of Hungary, right in front of the people symbolizing the Empire, and were last but one (in other words, the second most important figures) in the entire procession. Four of the five delegates can be identified. Two of them were individuals who had recently risen to prominence (Jakab Székely of Kövend and János Kishorvát), and two of them were from prestigious Hungarian noble families (Miklós Szécsi of Felsőlendva and János Ellerbach of Monyorókerék).66 The fact that these noblemen represented the interests of the Holy Roman emperor in the funeral procession was probably a consequence of their serving the Habsburgs during the war of 1490–1491 and continuing to maintain their network of relationships.

In the period after the Peace of Pressburg in 1491, for Frederick III and Maximilian I, openly supporting those loyal to the Habsburgs would have meant weakening the peace treaty, which had been signed to strengthen the Habsburg claim to the throne in the first place, so their followers could only count on some informal support. At the turn of 1494–1495, the news of the ongoing military campaign ordered by Vladislav II against Duke Lőrinc Újlaki reached Maximilian I, who at the time was in Antwerp, somewhat differently: The Hungarian king and his counselors were settling accounts with Maximilian’s former and present supporters instead of dealing with the Ottoman threat. The king of the Romans did not wish to violate the peace agreement, nor did he want to let down his followers, who were “his only joy and comfort in the Kingdom of Hungary,” and who (and here he was clearly referring to his estates in the south) would “also serve as a shield against the Ottomans.” Therefore, he intended to send a delegation to the Kingdom of Hungary to address the conflicts and more soldiers to fight against the Ottomans.67 This “hesitation” probably paralyzed the supporters of the Habsburg’s claim to the throne, and in time, their numbers dropped. As time passed, the threat of the Ottoman Empire likewise diverted the attention of the inhabitants of the southern regions, including Maximilian I’s former followers. Perhaps it was despair due to the hopeless situation that motivated Ferenc Beriszló in 1511 to revive his earlier relationships with the House of Habsburg, for as former ban of Jajce (1494–1495, 1499–1503), Beriszló knew very well what the Ottoman threat entailed. In his own name and the name of his brother, Bertalan Beriszló, prior of Vrana, he offered his services to Maximilian I,68 and then to the chancellor of Tyrol, Zyprian von Serntein.69

In the former letter,70 Beriszló also mentioned his joint service he had performed earlier with János Kishorvát. He may have been referring to the civil war of 1490–91, but that he had another in mind is also possible, as he and Kishorvát had served the emperor for several years. Yet as an envoy of Matthias Corvinus in 1489 in the Ottoman Empire,71 two years later during the preparatory meetings for the Treaty of Pressburg, Kishorvát represented fellow Hungarian and Croatian noblemen finding themselves on the side of the Habsburgs,72 and in the spring of 1492, he was seen, with many others, in Habsburg service in military campaigns against the Ottomans.73 It was probably on the grounds of his military services that he lay claim to some smaller or greater sums of money, which can be traced in the documents concerning him from late 1496 on.74 At the same time, the amount owed to Kishorvát was so large that, in 1497, the Holy Roman emperor gave him Arnfels, an estate in Styria.75 Kishorvát received half of the 6,000 guilders, Maximilian’s debt, in June 1506 but the rest was considerably delayed: part of the arrears was still unpaid in 1524, years after Kishorvát’s death.76 Like Beriszló, Kishorvát had estates in southern Hungary, so it is quite possible that he was motivated to serve the emperor at least in part because of the dire necessities he faced back home. He also may have been tempted to serve the Habsburgs because he lost his Hungarian estates by the mid-1490s as a consequence of his highly aggressive, sometimes even criminal activity,77 and it became impossible for him to prosper in the political sphere. In 1503, when Kishorvát and his brother-in-law, Lőrinc Bánfi of Gara, got back a part of their estates with the help of Duke John Corvin (under the condition that, in absence of any heir, the estates would become the property of the Corvin line), Kishorvát obliged himself to serve the duke but nobody else.78 He was chosen to be one of the executors of duke’s will after the death of Corvin (1504).79 However, we can assume, given the large debt which had been incurred by the Habsburg court, that Kishorvát’s contacts with the Habsburg court were eagerly kept.80

Alongside Kishorvát, Jakab Székely of Kövend was also in the permanent service of the Habsburgs. In the 1470s, he took on military service in Matthias Corvinus’s court, and he played important roles in the king’s campaigns against the Habsburg lands in the 1480s and even obtained estates in Styria. His decision to change sides was not prompted by the Ottoman threat, but rather by the hope to protect and keep his estates in the Habsburg lands, which he had received in the 1480s. He proved successful in these efforts. The fact that certain sources in the Holy Roman Empire refer to Jakab Székely as a counselor (Rat) of Maximilian I may indicate that he held a position of some distinction but was never a real insider.81 His place of origin and the fact that he owned a considerable number of estates in the Kingdom of Hungary in the 1490s played almost no role in his services to the empire, with the exception of Frederick III’s funeral procession in 1493. The tasks he was given required loyalty and reliability, such as military missions in Italy (e.g. in 1496) and the Habsburg provinces or supporting the emperor in his disputes with the Styrian estates. Occasionally, Székely participated in negotiations and diplomatic missions. It is also possible that sometimes he was consulted in issues concerning Hungary. Perhaps the greatest achievement of his career was his triumph in ensuring that both his brother and his sons would have opportunities to move up in the ranks in the Hungarian royal court, thus considerably expanding their room for maneuver.82

Among the families permanently in the service of the Habsburgs, as opposed to the Hungarian royal court, some of the most prominent members of the Hungarian and Croatian nobility can be found. Among the counts of Szentgyörgy and Bazin, who had close connections to both the Moravian-Bohemian83 and the Austrian-South German84 nobility through kinship and estates, the most important supporters of the Habsburg court were John and Sigismund, who lived in the fifteenth century and whose political role was especially notable in the 1440–60s,85 that is, at the time when the Habsburgs were particularly active in their foreign policies towards the Kingdom of Hungary and Hungary was struggling with serious internal conflicts. And although in the end, the family returned to being loyal supporters of the Hungarian king (mainly because of their important Hungarian estates), their network of connections, the prestige they had won, and their knowledge of German were not wasted, and this sometimes made them seem suspicious in the eyes of several fellow Hungarians, who feared that they might be engaged in malicious negotiations against the Hungarian king.86 It was due to the close-knit network that, in June 1480, a few months after the third Austrian-Hungarian war broke out, Frederick III and counts Sigismund and John made an agreement that would guarantee peace between the two parties with a non-aggression pact, and protect the counts’ estates in Moson County from being taken away by the emperor.87 Count John’s and Sigismund’s orientation to the House of Habsburg was partly followed by Sigismund’s son, Thomas,88 and the half-brother, Christopher, who was in the service of the Habsburgs in 1506.89 Christopher’s ambitions may also have derived from the fact that, thanks to his wife, Elisabeth von Neidberg, he acquired quite a few estates in Styria, which Maximilian I topped up with an estate in pledge (Wachsenegg) in 1501.90

John and Sigismund of Szentgyörgy and Bazin may also have been the people who were able to gain a foothold in the Duchy of Bavaria, though for reasons yet unknown.91 It was, however not them or their lineal descendants, but Count Francis of Szentgyörgy and Bazin, who belonged to another branch of the family, who entered the service of Albert IV, duke of Bavaria (1467–1508).92 It is thus possible that, during the negotiations for the marriage between his son, William IV, duke of Bavaria (1508–1550), and the sister of King Vladislaus II of Hungary and Bavaria (1509–1510), Peter of Szentgyörgy and Bazin, voivode of Transylvania, was purposely commissioned to be the chief negotiator on behalf of the Hungarian party, as he had a good knowledge of both Bavaria and the German language owing to his relatives.93

The Croatian Frankopan family, which had huge estates in the southern regions of the Kingdom of Hungary and Croatia, was also traditionally oriented to the House of Habsburg. Except for a short period, Count Stephen Frankopan was ban of Croatia from 1434 to 1437,94 and between 1436 and 144095 and then again between 1453 and 1454 he served as governor (Landeshauptmann) of Carniola,96 a position that his brother, Duim Frankopan probably also held between 144497 and 1447.98 At the same time, the growing number of members of the Frankopan family in the service of the Habsburgs is also quite notable.99 At the turn of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, Michael Frankopan (from the Slunj line) and his cousins John and Nicholas Angelo (from the Trsat line), as well as John and Nicholas from the Cetin line are noted to have been in the service of the court.100 Bernard from the Modruš line of the Frankopan family may also have had close relations with the House of Habsburg, but the details are unknown.101 In November 1509, Maximilian I reinforced Bernard’s previously granted privileges in the empire (his title as palatine) with reference to the services he had performed.102 The services rendered by Bernard Frankopan’s son Christoph for the Habsburgs in the 1510s and 1520s are among the most documented cases. In 1522–1523, he was Master of the Horse (grand escuier d’escuierie) in Archduke Ferdinand’s court, which, given his role in the War of the League of Cambrai (1508–1516), should be interpreted not as a “classical” position in the court but as a function on the battlefield.103 Presumably maintaining his remarkably good relations with the archduke,104 in 1525 Frankopan appeared as one of the familiares of Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia and then as one of his counselors.105 As in the case of the aforementioned noblemen from the south of Hungary and Croatia, fear of the Ottomans was a decisive factor among fellow Croatian noblemen. Keeping contacts with the Habsburg House and their officials, moreover, receiving financial and military support from them in the 1520s provided a partial solution to the Ottoman threat106 that could, however, give some extraordinary answers to loyalty issues. As Lajos Thallóczy puts it:

the court of Buda was not too delighted to see Christoph, Wolfgang, George and Matthias Frankopan, as well as Stephen Blagajski in the service of Ferdinand, but the same noblemen both frequented the court of Buda and accepted a soldier’s pay from Archduke Ferdinand. This could be accounted for by claiming that, as landowners at the border of Carniola, they were protecting the Austrian territories from the Ottomans too, and the payment they received from the archduke was in fact a contribution to the defense of their own country.107

Although several members of the Kanizsai family, which had estates in the Austrian-Hungarian borderland and enjoyed considerable prestige in the Kingdom of Hungary, likewise served the Habsburgs in times of crisis and civil war, despite their marriages with Austrian families, their service did not prove long-lasting. The only exception was János Kanizsai, whose demonstrable service to the Habsburg court beginning in 1498 can hardly be explained. At the same time, Kanizsai did not give up serving the King of Hungary either (as the ispán of Sopron and ban of Jajce, i.e. a holder of an important military office in the anti-Ottoman defense system), and he kept his estates in Hungary. Initially, he was probably employed as a military man with some horses, then, from the mid-1510s, when he moved to Austria, his service might have involved a permanent presence at the imperial court.108

The fact that János Kanizsai was able to have such a remarkable career may be due in no small part to the intertwining of the Jagiellonian and the Habsburg dynasties. The mutual attitude of distrust, which lasted until 1506 (i.e. until the Treaty of Vienna, which was signed after a short war between Maximilian and Vladislaus II) and, in certain respects, until 1515 (i.e. until the agreements made at the First Congress of Vienna), was obviously not too favorable for the development of such careers. From 1515 on, however, subjects had more room than ever before to find easy transit between the provinces ruled by the dynasties and their courts. The joint courts of young princesses Anna of Jagiello and Marie of Habsburg, who were brought up together in Innsbruck between 1516 and 1521, served as a king of melting pot for the elites, leading to marriages between female and male members of the court.109 It was, however, not the only place where intertwining interests can be seen. One of the master of courts of King Louis II was said to have been a counsellor to Emperor Maximilian I at the same time.110 In 1518, Maximilian I took István Hásságyi, chamberlain of Louis II, into his own service for an annual payment of 200 guilders.111 The assignment of Stefan von Zinzendorf from the Archduchy of Austria was probably partly an undercover maneuver: in February 1516, the Holy Roman emperor gave orders “secretly” to pay him 200 Rhenish guilders for his future services. Zinzendorf’s task was to espouse the issues of Emperor Maximilian I and support them at the Hungarian and Bohemian royal courts. The Austrian nobleman continued performing this task after the death of Vladislaus II in March 1516, following the emperor’s orders, in the court of the new king.112

In the 1510s and 1520s, Péter Erdődi was present in the courts of both Vladislaus II and Louis II,113 but from 1522, in parallel with his service for the latter, he was a familiaris and counselor in the court of Archduke Ferdinand as well.114 It would be difficult to deny that the decisive factor behind this career was his powerful relative, Tamás Bakóc, cardinal and archbishop of Esztergom, who also participated in the First Congress of Vienna in 1515. In 1522, Péter Erdődi obtained the estate belonging to Kőszeg (situated in Western Hungary, under Habsburg rule at the time) by right of pledge, as a result of an agreement to resolve a long financial dispute between Maximilian I and Bakóc, both deceased by then.115

Summary

In a formal or informal way, the persons discussed above all tried to balance between the Hungarian royal court and the court of the Habsburgs in the hopes of ensuring their own prosperity and the prosperity of their families. Such relationships, however, involved great risks, especially in times of war. Some of these individuals were executed (Andreas Baumkircher, for instance), while others “only” lost their estates when suspected of disloyalty to the king (such as the sons of Jan Vitovec).

While at the time of the conflicts between Frederick III and Matthias Corvinus it was primarily those who took the side of the Hungarian king who were able to pursue successful careers, after 1491, the situation reversed, and those who were on the side of the Habsburgs seemed to have more opportunities. However, this was not simply a “180-degree turn,” as the period after 1491 was not the exact opposite of the previous one. Rather, it differed in terms of its dynamics and the logic of power, as well as the ways in which one could adapt this logic. The post-1491 period was less about great changes and, for those supporting the cause of the Habsburgs, definitely more about careful maneuvering. Considerable change was only brought about by turns in the dynasty in 1506 and 1515. Perhaps it is not only the wealth of sources which allows us to identify so many instances of dual loyalties to different rulers and ties to the courts from the mid-1510s, or in other words precisely the time when Anna Jagiellon and Mary of Austria were brought up together on Habsburg soil.

The section of the Peace of Pressburg quoted at the beginning of this essay indeed makes mention of a kind of career which may not have been widespread but which was not completely unknown, neither in the borderlands nor in the royal courts. Including this section in the peace treaty probably served the purpose of reassuring the then numerous Habsburg supporters for many of whom the possibility of serving the House of Habsburg would become unrealistic within a few years: they could not expect any military aid from Maximilian I, as a few of the noblemen in the southern regions, who had fallen into despair because of the ever more impending threat of Ottoman encroachment, had already experienced firsthand. The winds of change could also be felt when, due to the Ottoman threat, Louis II and his brother-in-law Archduke Ferdinand were frequently forced to cooperate in the beginning of the 1520s, which was a new situation for both of them. It meant that, besides the royal courts, in which double loyalties had a place as a consequence of the Habsburg–Jagiellon dynastic agreements in 1515, serving two lords (i.e. the Habsburgs and the Jagiellons) became also possible on the Hungarian-Croatian military border for the sake of a more efficient defense system.

Archival Sources

Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, Munich (BHStA)

Abteilung I (Ältere Bestände)

Herzogtum Bayern (HB)

Ämterrechnungen bis 1506

Kurbayern (KB)

Äußeres Archiv (ÄA)

Magyar Nemzeti Levéltár Országos Levéltára [Hungarian National Archives, State Archive], Budapest (MNL OL)

Fényképgyűjtemény [Photo Collections]

Diplomatikai Fényképgyűjtemény [The Photo Collection of Medieval Documents] (DF)

Magyar kincstári levéltárak [The Treasury Archives of the Hungarian Kingdom]

Magyar Kamara archivuma [The Archive of the Hungarian Chamber]

Vegyes iratok, ügyviteli segédletek, pecsétnyomók [Mixed Files, Finding Aids, Seals]

A bécsi Udvari Kamarai Levéltárban őrzött segédkönyvek és iratok másolatai [Copies of Finding Aids and Files Kept in the Archive of the Treasury in Vienna] (E 239)

Mohács előtti gyűjtemény [Collection of Medieval Documents]

Diplomatikai Levéltár [The Archive of Medieval Documents] (DL)

Österreichisches Staatsarchiv, Vienna (ÖStA)

Allgemeine Verwaltungsarchiv (AVA)

Adelsarchiv

Reichsadelsakten (RAA)

Finanz- und Hofkammerarchiv (FHKA)

Alte Hofkammer, Hoffinanz (AHK)

Gedenkbücher (GB)

Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv (HHStA)

Reichsarchive

Reichskanzlei (RK)

Reichsregisterbücher (RRB)

Maximiliana

Urkundenreihen, Siegelabguß- und Typarsammlung

Urkundenreihen (UR)

Allgemeine Urkundenreihe (AUR)

Sonderbestände

Familienarchiv Erdődy (FA Erdődy)

Urkunden (D)

Országos Széchényi Könyvtár [Széchényi National Library], Budapest

Kézirattár [Manuscript Collection] (OSZKK)

Steiermärkisches Landesarchiv, Graz (StLA)

Allgemeine Urkundenreihe (AUR)

Tiroler Landesarchiv, Innsbruck (TLA)

Landesfürstliche Hofkanzleien

Sigmundiana

Mischbestände

Pestarchiv-Akten

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Péterfi, Bence. “Adalékok a Jagelló-kori magyar–osztrák határ menti kapcsolatok történetéhez: A magyar és birodalmi ‘kétlaki’ nemesség a 15–16. században” [On the relations in the Hungarian-Austrian border region during the Jagiellonian period, 1490–1526: Crossborder nobility in Hungary and the Holy Roman Empire in the fifteenth-sixteenth centuries]” PhD diss., Eötvös Loránd University of Budapest, 2015. Accessed November 8, 2021. https://edit.elte.hu/xmlui/handle/10831/32615.

Péterfi, Bence. “Aus Siebenbürgen in die Steiermark: Der Lebenslauf von Jakob Székely von Kövend (†1504).” In Andreas Baumkircher und das ausgehende Mittelalter: Tagungsband der 32. Schlaininger Gespräche, 16. bis 20. September 2012, edited by Rudolf Kropf, and Gert Polster, 273–96. Eisenstadt: Amt der Burgenländischen Landesregierung, Abteilung 7 – Landesmuseum, 2015.

Péterfi, Bence. “Johann Kanizsai (†1522) und die Grafschaft Neuburg am Inn.” In Die Kanizsai und ihre Zeit: Tagunsband der 38. Schlaininger Gespräche, 17. bis 20. September 2020, edited by Gert Poster, 147–69. Eisenstadt: Amt der Burgenländischen Landesregierung, Abteilung 7 – Amtreferat Sammlungen des Landes, 2019.

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Peters, Ursula. “‘Gespaltene Treue’: Mehrfachvasallität und feudo-vasallitische Loyalitätsprobleme in der höfischen Erzahälliteratur des 12. und 13. Jahrhunderts.” Frühmittelalterliche Studien 54 (2020): 283–347.

Petrin, Silvia. “Der Verkauf der Herrschaft Nikolsburg im Jahre 1560 und die Stände von Niederösterreich.” Unsere Heimat Neue Folge 44 (1973): 129–37.

Pokluda, Zdeněk. “Magyarországi nemesek földbirtoklása Cseh- és Morvaországban a XV–XX. században” [Land tenure of the Hungarian nobility in the fifteenth-twentieth century in Bohemia and Moravia]. Levéltári Közlemények 46 (1975): 235–77.

Prickler, Harald. “Adalékok a szőlőművelés történetéhez Moson megyében” [On the history of viticulture in Moson County, Hungary]. In Tanulmányok Mosonmagyaróvár és vidéke történetéhez [Studies on the history of Mosonmagyaróvár and its region], edited by Lajos Gecsényi, 21–51. Győr: Győr–Sopron Megyei Levéltár, 1979.

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Prickler, Harald. “Zur Geschichte des burgenländisch-westungarischen Weinhandels in die Oberländer Böhmen, Mähren, Schlesien und Polen.” Zeitschrift für Ostforschung 14 (1965): 294–320, 495–529, 731–54.

Regesta Imperii XIV. Ausgewählte Regesten des Kaiserreiches unter Maximilian I. (1493–1519), 4 vols, edited by Hermann Wiesflecker. Vienna–Cologne: Böhlau, 1990–2004. Accessed November 8, 2021. http://www.regesta-imperii.de/regesten/suche.html.

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Réthelyi, Orsolya. “Mary of Hungary in Court Context (1521–1531).” PhD diss., Central European University, 2010. Accessed November 8, 2021. https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2010/rethelyio.pdf.

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Schönherr, Gyula. Hunyadi Corvin János, 1473–1504 [John Corvinus of Hunyad, 1473–1504]. Budapest: Magyar Történelmi Társulat, 1894.

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Spieß, Karl-Heinz. “Loyalität und Illoyalität an spätmittelalterlichen Fürstenhöfen im Reich.” In Loyalty in the Middle Ages: Ideal and Practice of a Cross-Social Value, edited by Jörg Sonntag, Coralie Zermatten, 183–203. Turnhout: Brepols, 2015.

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Trauttmansdorff, Ferdinand von. Beitrag zur niederösterreichischen Landesgeschichte. Vienna–Leipzig: Braumüller, 1904.

[Thurocz, Johannes de]. Der Hungern chronica: Inhaltend, wie sie anfengklich ins land kommen sind, mit anzeygung aller irer könig, und was sie namhafftigs gethon haben. Angefangen von irem ersten König Athila, un[d] volfüret biß auff König Ludwig, so im 1526. jar bey Mohatz vom Türcken umbkomen ist. Vienna: Metzker, 1534. Accessed November 8, 2021. https://opacplus.bsb-muenchen.de/search?oclcno=645669215&db=100&View=default. Original: Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Res/2 Austr. 125#Beibd.2 [= VD16 T 1212]

Unrest, Jakob. Österreichische Chronik. Edited by Karl Grossmann. Weimar: Böhlau, 1957.

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de Vajay, Szabolcs. “Un ambassadeur bien choisi: Bernardinus de Frangipanus et sa mission à Naples, en 1476.” In “… The Man of Many Devices, Who Wandered Full Many Ways…”: Festschrift in Honor of János M. Bak, edited by Balázs Nagy, Marcell Sebők. 550–57. Budapest: CEU Press, 1999.

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Wertner, Moritz. “Die Grafen von St. Georgen und Bösing.” Jahrbuch der k. k. heraldischen Gesellschaft “Adler,” Neue Folge 1 (1891): 171–264.

Das Wiener Fürstentreffen von 1515: Beiträge zur Geschichte der habsburgisch–jagiellonischen Doppelvermählung, edited by Bogusław Dybaś, István Tringli. Budapest: Hungarian Academy of Sciences – Research Centre for the Humanities, 2019.

Wiesflecker, Hermann. “Das erste Ungarnunternehmen Maximilians I. und der Preßburger Vertrag 1490/91.” Südost-Forschungen 18 (1959): 26–75.

Wiesflecker, Hermann. Kaiser Maximilian I.: Das Reich, Österreich und Europa an der Wende zur Neuzeit, 5 vols. Vienna–Munich: Verlag für Geschichte und Politik, 1971–1986.

Wolf, Susanne. Die Doppelregierung Kaiser Friedrichs III. und König Maximilians (1486–1493). Cologne–Weimar–Vienna: Böhlau, 2005.

1* This study was supported by postdoctoral grant no. PD 124903 and research group no. K 134690 of the National Research, Development and Innovation Office (NKFIH), Hungary, and the János Bolyai Research Scholarship of the Hungarian Academy of Science. I am indebted to Tibor Neumann, Tamás Pálosfalvi, Renáta Skorka and the two anonymous reviewers for their useful comments.
“… aber ein Hunger ist ein Hunger, des glawben vnd trew gantz vnstet ist…” Kraus, Maximilian’s Beziehungen, 35, no. 11.

2 See Wiesflecker, “Das erste Ungarnunternehmen”; Neumann, “Két sorsdöntő esztendő”; E. Kovács, “Miksa magyarországi hadjárata”; Wolf, Die Doppelregierung, 252–72. For the latest assessment of the 1491 Peace of Pressburg see Neumann, “Békekötés Pozsonyban.”

3 Ausgewählte Urkunden, 433.

4 For a new analysis of the period between 1440 and 1464, see Pálosfalvi, “Koronázástól koronázásig.” On the foreign affairs of the reign of King Matthias Corvinus, see Nehring, Matthias Corvinus. On Habsburg-Jagiello dynastic relations, see Das Wiener Fürstentreffen (especially the article by István Tringli). On the Habsburg occupation of Western Hungary, see Bariska, A Szent Koronáért and Csermelyi, “Zwischen Kaiser und König,” 23–30.

5 Pálffy, A Magyar Királyság, 52–59. (The Hungarian version of the monograph is more detailed than the English translation, which is why I cite it instead of the English.)

6 E.g. Heinig, “Römisch-deutscher Herrscherhof,” 232–5; Hesse, Amtsträger, 223–26; Kintzinger, “Servir deux princes”; Metz, “Diener zweier Herren”; Moraw, “Gedanken,” 58–59; Peters, “ ‘Gespaltene Treue’ ” (with the latest literature on the topic of multiple loyalties).

7 “Zugleich mehreren Herren zu dienen oder wenigstens verpflichtet zu sein, ist auf verschiedenen Ebenen bis hin zur Familiarität, zu Ratsernennungen etc. geronnen. Dies waren nicht nur Titulaturen oder Formalia, sondern damit waren auch bestimmte Funktionen verbunden.” – Heinig, “Römisch-deutscher Herrscherhof,” 233.

8 For instance, in the context of Hungarian landlord, Nicolaus Olahus, and his familiaris: Olahus, Epistulae, 477 no. 359, 484 no. 366.

9 See also Lk 16.13.

10 Oschema, “Der loyale Freund,” 28–29; Terada, “Doppelte Lehensbindung,” 137.

11 Peters, “ ‘Gespaltene Treue’.”

12 The earliest traces of double loyalty come up in 1037 in France and in 1074 in the Holy Roman Empire: Deutinger, “Seit wann,” 97–98. For a short overview of the genesis and problematic points of the “feudal” system in the Holy Roman Empire, see Deutinger, “Das hochmittelalterliche Lehnswesen.”

13 E.g. Croenen, “Regions,” 149–53. (Most of the literature concerning the Middle Ages in the Low Countries was inaccessible to me.)

14 Spangler, “Those in Between.”

15 Untergehrer, Die päpstlichen nuntii und legati, 264–73.

16 Jaspert, “Zur Loyalität.”

17 Engel, The Realm, 127–28.

18 “Online Decreta Regni Mediaevalis Hungariae,” 1216–17, 1390–91 (István Werbőczy’s Tripartitum, I. 13). See also Bónis, Hűbériség, 530–32 (in the reprinted version: 374–75).

19 See Oschema, “Der loyale Freund,” 32–33.

20 See Rehberg, “Reziprozität,” 438–42 and Spieß, “Loyalität.”

21 On trust generally, see e.g. Schulte, “The Concept of Trust.” On the same topic and the notion of trustworthiness in the courts of the princes of the Holy Roman Empire (Reichsfürsten), see Hirschbiegel, Nahbeziehungen.

22 On the sources of the court of Habsburgs around 1500, see Noflatscher, “‘Die Heuser Österreich vnd Burgund’.”

23 Recently started, a four-year-long research project was launched which will offer systematic research on this topic: The Hungarian Royal Court in the Reign of King Matthias and the Jagiellonian Kings (1458–1526): A Biographical Encyclopedia, NKFIH no. K 134690, principal investigator: Tibor Neumann.

24 See for example the Stuchs family, which owned estates both in the Principality of Austria and the Kingdom of Hungary: Trauttmansdorff, Beitrag. Brunner offers a more comprehensive picture: Brunner, “Der burgenländische Raum zwischen Österreich und Ungarn, 800 bis 1848,” 270–71, 284–85; Allgemeine Landestopographie des Burgenlandes, vol. 2, part 1, 35–37.

25 MNL OL DL 49819.

26 Prickler, “Adalékok”; Prickler, “Weingartenbesitz”; Prickler, “Zur Geschichte”; Engel, The Realm, 275 (citation).

27 See Majorossy, “Egy város.”

28 Die Gedichte des Michel Beheim, vol. 2, 788–91, no. 356.

29 Die Gedichte des Michel Beheim, vol. 2, 652–54, no. 324; Bleyer, “Beheim,” 530–31.

30 Pálffy, A Magyar Királyság, 111. See also Petrin, “Der Verkauf.”

31 Kubinyi, “Az 1505-ös rákosi országgyűlés.”

32 Szende, “Fidelitas.”

33 Miljan, “Grofovi”; Klaužer, “Plemićka obitelj Frodnacher”; Klaužer, “Plemićka obitelj Lausinger.”

34 Ban and Mirnik, “Die Münzen”; Pálosfalvi, “Vitovec János.”

35 Péterfi, “Korvin János.”

36 Deutsche Reichstagsakten: Mittlere Reihe, vol. 4, 691, 696, 704.

37 MNL OL DF 276742.

38 Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 538, MNL OL DL 82076, fol. 5r.

39 Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 4839, ÖStA HHStA RK Maximiliana Kt. 7, Konv. 4/1, fol. 216r, Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 6273, no. 11856, no. 12395, no. 18817, no. 18892, no. 18896, no. 18904, no. 19069, ÖStA HHStA RK Maximiliana Kt. 42, IV/7a, fol. 175r.

40 Neumann, Registrum, passim.

41 E.g. MNL OL DL 101215, DF 233348, DF 276756.

42 Codex epistolaris saeculi decimi quinti, vol. 3, 266–67 no. 241.

43 See Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 160–70, 190 n. 948. On the execution of Baumkircher, see Schäffer, “Untreue und Verrat.”

44 Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 170.

45 See Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 170–75.

46 Engel, “Andreas Baumkircher,” 252.

47 See Neumann, “Békekötés Pozsonyban,” part 1, 357 and n. 120, 359, 363–64.

48 Neumann, “Békekötés Pozsonyban,” part 2, 333.

49 See Neumann, “Békekötés Pozsonyban,” part 1, 367 and part 2, 303. Regarding the Baumkircher interests in Austria see Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 2934, no. 8041; Neumann, “Békekötés Pozsonyban,” part 1, 368. (literature regarding the “Baumkircherschuld” and the case of Katsch).

50 MNL OL DL 103999. See Neumann, “Békekötés Pozsonyban,” part 2, 338. It is worth mentioning that possibly in the summer or autumn of 1490, Prince Christoph of Bavaria and others were commissioned by Emperor Frederick III or King Maximilian I to “convert” Georg Baumkircher into Habsburg service. TLA, Landesfürstliche Hofkanzleien, Sigmundiana XIII/254, Nr. 29 (fol. 36r–v).

51 Neumann, Registrum, 219 n. 1030–31.

52 See Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 188–92, and C. Tóth et al., Magyarország, vol. 2, 233.

53 See Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 192–97.

54 Ibid., 82.

55 Mátyás király levelei, vol. 1, 448–49, no. 302 (in the reprinted version: 534).

56 Heinicker, “ ‘Sold und schaden’,” 81; Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 193, n. 962 (arguing for 1481).

57 C. Tóth et al., Magyarország, vol. 2, 234.

58 MNL OL DL 37151.

59 MNL OL DF 258172.

60 Péterfi, “Korvin János,” 169, 172–76.

61 StLA AUR 8615, Unrest, Österreichische Chronik, 190 (chapter 185) as well as Thurocz, Der Hungern chronica, fol. 63r. See also Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 194.

62 ÖStA HHStA UR AUR 1493 IV 14 (two charters), MNL OL DF 233236, DF 248689. See also Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 195.

63 Ibid., 194–96.

64 Haller-Reiffenstein, “Ulrich von Grafeneck.” See also Csermelyi, “Idegen származású,” 175–88, 212.

65 In 1312, Master of the Treasury Miklós Kőszegi declared his intention to serve both Charles I, king of Hungary (1301–1342) and Frederick the Fair (or Frederick the Handsome), duke of Austria (1308–1330) (Anjou-kori oklevéltár, vol. 3, 106 no. 223). When in 1374, Count Nicholas “the German” of Fraknó or Nagymarton (Mattersburg, today in Austria) entered the service of Albert III, duke of Austria (1365–1395), he not only offered his services but was also ready to make his entire estate of Fraknó available to support the duke. In case of military conflict, Count Nicholas was not obliged to rush to the duke’s aid against King Louis I of Hungary (1342–1382), although the condition itself became irrelevant after the death of the former: making contact or negotiating with the heir to Louis I was only allowed with the knowledge and approval of the Austrian duke (Lichnowsky, Geschichte, vol. 4, dclxxxviii, no. 1192, Wertner, “Die Grafen von Mattersdorf-Forchtenstein,” 59).

66 Borsa, “Néhány bécsi,” vol. 3, 79–82; Pálffy, “Ungarn,” 37–38.

67 Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 1298.

68 MNL OL DF 258444.

69 MNL OL DF 258445.

70 MNL OL DF 258444.

71 Balogh, A művészet, vol. 1, 60.

72 See Neumann, “Békekötés Pozsonyban,” part 1, 367–68.

73 TLA Pestarchiv-Akten XXV/87, [no. 3].

74 Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 4784, no. 4792, no. 7789, no. 15075.

75 Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 4785–6. See also ÖStA HHStA UR AUR 1506 IV 16 (April 16, 1506).

76 See ÖStA HHStA UR AUR 1506 IV 16 (April 16, 1506 and June 11, 1506), ÖStA HHStA UR AUR 1518 X 18, MNL OL E 239, vol. 14, p. 318–19 (original: ÖStA AVA FHKA AHK Gedenkbücher, Österreichische Reihe 22, fol. 320r).

77 E.g. MNL OL DL 20269. See ÖStA HHStA UR AUR 1518 X 18, fol. 2r.

78 Schönherr, Hunyadi Corvin János, 297.

79 DF 254494. He is not mentioned among the executors: Schönherr, Hunyadi Corvin János, 304.

80 ÖStA HHStA UR AUR 1506 IV 16 (April 16, 1506).

81 Wiesflecker, Kaiser Maximilian, vol. 5, 284–85.

82 Péterfi, “Aus Siebenbürgen.”

83 Pokluda, “Magyarországi nemesek,” 238, 240, 272.

84 Wertner, “Die Grafen von St. Georgen und Bösing,” 257–58.

85 See Heinig, Kaiser Friedrich III., vol. 1, passim.

86 Horváth, “Magyar Regesták,” 71, no. 176.

87 Chmel, Actenstücke, vol. 3, 282–83, no. 118.

88 Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 185 (indirect evidence), no. 8321.

89 He would exclusively serve Maximilian I for an annual payment of 200 Rhenish guilders, with the single exception being Vladislaus II of Hungary. MNL OL DL 21614.

90 E.G. Regesta Imperii XIV, no. 12456.

91 See BHStA KB ÄA 973, fol. 51r-v.

92 E.G. BHStA Herzogtum Bayern, Ämterrechnungen bis 1506, Bd. 1123 (“Jahrgang 1504/1505”), fol. 86v.

93 Marth, Die dynastische Politik, 208–24.

94 Engel, Magyarország, vol. 1, 26.

95 Kozina, Die Landeshauptleute, 15–16. See Dimitz, Geschichte Krains, vol. 1, 328.

96 Lichnowsky, Geschichte, vol. 8, dxix, no. 1742e; Dimitz, Geschichte Krains, vol. 1, 328; A Frangepán család oklevéltára, vol. 1, 385 no. 370, vol. 2, 1. no. 1.

97 Kozina, Die Landeshauptleute, 16; Heinig, Kaiser Friedrich III., vol. 1, 234.

98 A Frangepán család oklevéltára, vol. 1, 349, no. 342; Lichnowsky, Geschichte, vol. 8, dxvii, no. 1261d.

99 E.g. in 1437, a ten-year agreement was made between Counts Stephen, Bartholomew, Martin, Sigismund, Andrew and Ivan Frankopan, and the two Habsburg dukes, Frederick V (later called as Frederick III, the Holy Roman emperor) and his brother Albert VI. The contracting parties stated that if the dukes’ estates in Inner Austria were to come under attack, the Frankopan family would rush to their aid with a thousand heavy cavalry hired at their own expense. Furthermore, the agreement specified that the cavalry would not go to war against Sigismund, Holy Roman emperor (1433–1437), Frederick IV, duke of Austria and count of Tyrol (1409–1439), or Albert V, archduke of Austria (1404–1439, king of Hungary between 1438 and 1439). A Frangepán család oklevéltára, vol. 1, 291, no. 295, Chmel, Materialien, vol. 1, part 2, 46, no. 27.

100 For a detailed list of the information concerning the people mentioned, see Péterfi, “Adalékok,” 165.

101 A horvát véghelyek, 9, no. 13 as well as MNL OL DF 276656.

102 ÖStA AVA RAA Karton 120, no. 7. See de Vajay, “Un ambassadeur,” 556, n. 26.

103 Dimitz, Geschichte Krains, vol. 2, 9–10, 12, 14; Györkös, “Aventurier sans scrupule”; Györkös, “Magyar hadvezér”; Wiesflecker, Kaiser Maximilian, vol. 4, 140.

104 A Frangepán család oklevéltára, vol. 2, 359–61, no. 324, 369–70, no. 333.

105 See Fógel, II. Lajos, 56; Fraknói, “II. Lajos király”; A Frangepán család oklevéltára, vol. 2, 378, no. 348.

106 A horvát véghelyek, passim; Rothenberg, The Austrian Military Border.

107 A Frangepán család oklevéltára, vol. 2, xlv.

108 Péterfi, “Johann Kanizsai.”

109 See Lamberg, Rosen Garten; Heiß, “Königin Maria,” 419–48; Kerkhoff, Maria van Hongarije, 91–96; Réthelyi, “Mary of Hungary,” 70–130.

110 “magnificus noster [Maximiliani imperatoris – B. P.] et Sacri Imperii fidelis syncere dilectus N. baro de N., consiliarius noster et serenissimi principis domini Ludovici […] regis […] curie magister,” s. d. [between 1516 and 1519], OSZKK Fol. Lat. 1656, fol. 88r–v no. 198. The unknown person must have been Mózes Buzlai or János Pető or Péter Korlátkői serving as masters of the (royal) court at the same time (C. Tóth et al., Magyarország, vol. 1, 109–10). Korlátkői seems to be more likely than the others, since he was awarded the baronial title of Berencs (Podbranč, today in Slovakia) in 1515. Neumann, A Korlátköviek, 57–58. I am grateful to Tibor Neumann for drawing my attention to this detail of the argument.

111 ÖStA HHStA RK RRB Bd. BB, fol. 273v, 280v–81r.

112 ÖStA HHStA RK RRB Bd. Z, fol. 42r.

113 Fógel, II. Ulászló, 66; Fógel, II. Lajos, 53 n. 4.

114 ÖStA HHStA FA Erdődy D 1242a, fol. 1r–2v, D 10285; MNL OL E 239, vol. 14, p. 211–13 (original: ÖStA AVA FHKA AHK Gedenkbücher, Österreichische Reihe 19, fol. 128r–v), p. 216–19 (original: ÖStA AVA FHKA AHK Gedenkbücher, Österreichische Reihe 19, fol. 292v–93r), p. 219–21 (original: ÖStA AVA FHKA AHK Gedenkbücher, Österreichische Reihe 19, fol. 293r–v).

115 Bubryák, “Kaiserkreuz,” 42.

2021_4_Újlaki-Nagy

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Faith, Scripture, and Reason: The Debate between Transylvanian Sabbatarians and Christian Francken

Réka Újlaki-Nagy
Research Centre for the Humanities
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Hungarian Historical Review Volume 10 Issue 4  (2021):653-674 DOI 10.38145/2021.4.653

In this study, I present two Sabbatarian texts which were written in response to texts by Christian Francken. Based on the argumentation in the Sabbatarian texts, I try to clarify which writings by the German philosopher they were responding to. I offer an explanation of the ferocity of the Sabbatarian response, and I clarify the reasons why the Sabbatarians found it so important to respond to Francken’s ideas. My analysis of the Sabbatarian texts shows persuasively that Francken’s attacks were related to the basic and specific teachings of the Sabbatarians. The challenge presented by fashionable philosophical trends at the time compelled the Sabbatarians to face not only the benefits but also the dangers of following the ratio in the interpretation of Scripture. Sabbatarian texts arrived at a solution (by drawing a distinction between the concepts of ratio and philosophy) which, although formulated earlier in the established churches, was still undeveloped in the Transylvanian Antitrinitarian movement out of which Sabbatarianism grew.

Keywords: Sabbatarianism, philosophical skepticism, early modern atheism, ratio

One of the most infamous apostates of the late sixteenth century, the German free thinker Christian Francken, visited Transylvania twice, in the middle and late 1580s, and taught at the Unitarian College in Kolozsvár (today Cluj, Romania).1 He noted several times in his writings that he had intentionally chosen this part of Europe instead of taking one of the other posts which he had been offered with better salaries because in Transylvania he hopes to “find people that Diogenes was looking for with a torch in broad daylight.” Had his goal had been to make money, he writes, he would have chosen another region.2 This self-confident claim must be treated with reservations, as there was practically no other place in Europe where he would have been able to move freely to propagate his teachings, and he would not have found such openness for his bold ideas elsewhere in Europe. Francken tried to spread his criticism of Christian churches among the deniers of the Trinity in the guise of Aristotelianism. This philosophical trend seemed familiar to the Transylvanian Antitrinitarian elite, most of whom had been educated in Padua.3 However, this social stratum was open to a wide variety of new ideas, not just those coming from philosophical skepticism. Fashionable trends competed with one another, and the circle of potentially interested parties overlapped. Since the spiritual elite consisted primarily of aristocrats, who were also supporters and patrons with political power and influence, winning them was a serious challenge. Antal Pirnát considered the Sabbatarian debate with Francken a struggle for support and positions.4 Although with his presence and work in Transylvania Francken not only aroused interest but also provoked hostility in many,5 only Sabbatarians reflected on this in voluminous written texts. These texts try to reach and convince the abovementioned target audience. One of them indicates in its title the reason why it was written: some “great and noble” people had begun to follow a kind of human, Aristotelian reasoning which questioned the authority of Moses and other holy people of ancient times. The main disseminator of these dangerous misconceptions “gives great courage to many great and noble men to their peril.”6 Sabbatarian texts argue with Francken (though without referring to him by name) and not with the aristocrats, whom they address indirectly, presumably in an effort to avoid provoking resentment among them. Thus, it is repeatedly emphasized that the addressees are the deceived people and their “master,” “with the exception of those pious, God-fearing gentlemen and noblemen who do not believe in such lies and seek” to live gracefully.7

Sabbatarianism in the 1580s and early 1590s was still a relatively recent, evolving initiative which looked back on a history of only a few years. Theological debate formulated in polemical-apological writings was seen as a means of perhaps averting the threat to the very existence of Sabbatarianism.

I work in my inquiry here from the hypothesis that Francken attacked the area of the religion that was most sensitive to the Sabbatarian faith. Francken’s attack was not deliberately directed against the Sabbatarians. His works written in Transylvania imply a much broader target audience, and their intellectual horizon included new ideas in terms of philosophy, nonadorantism, and politics. Although Francken could not have regarded the Sabbatarians as remarkable opponents, the anger which one discerns in the Sabbatarian texts and also the length of these texts can be interpreted as indications that the Sabbatarians felt threatened by his ideas. The purpose of the analysis I offer here, therefore, is to identify the areas in which Sabbatarians found Francken’s attacks the most troubling and how they defended themselves against his ideas. I do this by placing reading the Sabbatarian apologies as polemical texts in debate with Francken’s writings. Although Bálint Keserű, Antal Pirnát, and Györgyi Máté have shown that the Sabbatarian texts are reactions to Francken’s provocative writings, they do not offer any in-depth analysis of the disputed issues or their theological background. Though one cannot speak of a nuanced exchange of ideas among the disagreeing parties, since we have only the responses of the Sabbatarians to Francken’s writings but no response from Francken to their polemics, the Sabbatarian texts nonetheless offer a clear indication of the impact of Francken’s ideas.

I begin with a discussion of Francken’s writings, or more narrowly, the texts which seem, on the basis of the Sabbatarian texts, to have been met with such alarm among the Sabbatarians. I then consider the ways in which the ideas found in his writings were recast and rephrased in the Sabbatarian texts, and I consider the Sabbatarian arguments against his tenets.

Francken’s Most Debated Texts

The most important among the text by Francken to which the Sabbatarian polemical writings respond are the Argumenta XXII in Sacram Mosis Historiam and the Disputatio inter Theologum et Philosophum de incertitudine religionis Christianae. In addition, the Sabbatarian texts also seem to have responded to some of the ideas from his Praecipuarum enumeratio8 and Spectrum diurnum Genii Christiani.9

The theses of the Argumenta10 have survived along with their refutation by Franciscus Junius, a French professor from Heidelberg. According to Antal Pirnát, the original document was written before 1587, and it was probably taken by Transylvanian students on their study trip to Heidelberg.11 The 22 theses published in the appendix to Junius’ writing attack the authenticity of the story of creation and the authority of Moses, setting Aristotelian physics as the only reasonable worldview. The original document was written presumably as a reaction to the so-called judaizer practices that Francken encountered in the court of János Gerendi.12 Gerendi was the leader of the abovementioned group formed from the aristocratic elite. He was in contact with the most prominent promulgators of Antitrinitarianism, and he supported them financially and also with his political influence. At the time Francken visited him, he was celebrating Sabbath and also observing certain dietary restrictions, presumably for reasons other than the reasons which guided dietary restrictions among the so-called Sabbatarians.13 Based on the experiences gained during the visit, Francken promised in a letter to him that he would deal in more detail with the beliefs concerning the writings of Moses.14

The other important work by Francken on the subject is the Disputatio, written during his second stay in Kolozsvár around 1590.15 This is perhaps the work in which Francken went the furthest in questioning the foundations of Christianity and belief in God. He himself later declared it a dangerous, atheistic, blasphemous text.16 It was written in the form of a dialogue between a Philosopher and a Theologian. Lech Szczucki aptly called it a “deaf-mute dialogue,”17 as it is only the philosopher who responds to the theologian’s arguments. The theologian does not even seem to understand his opponent’s objection, who does not accept the Holy Scripture as the authoritative basis for the debate, and he (the theologian) founds his arguments over and over again on the infallibility of Scripture. Consequently, the Philosopher begins most of his replies by pronouncing the theologian’s arguments logically defective. The philosopher’s answers in the Disputatio (presumably Francken’s own voice)18 blame his opponent for ignoring rationality and disregarding the rules of logic and argumentation. According to the philosopher, theologians do not derive the less known from the known, but infer it from an uncertain premise and thus commit the classical fallacy of petitio principii. Divine revelation can only be proved from the words of the Scripture, which are precisely what the philosopher requires proof for. Thus, an argument based on divine revelation is only an argument for those who want to believe it.19 This oft repeated accusation is so irritating that it demands the reader’s attention and reflection. This may have been the case for the Sabbatarians as well.

Sabbatarian Texts Written against Francken and the Issues Debated

On the divine wisdom of the prophet Moses

Two polemical texts are included in the Sabbatarian codices that were written against Christian Francken and his followers. One is the On the divine wisdom of the prophet Moses and the worldly wisdom of Aristotle and the various reasonings of men that were now brought forth by the noble orders and presented as true knowledge against the prophet Moses and against the knowledge and understanding of many old saints, presumably written by András Eőssi and surviving in two early Sabbatarian manuscript collections.20 The first part of the text is for the most part a reply to Francken’s criticism of the biblical history of creation, while the second chapter targeted the three other main camps (secta) of those who were seen by the Sabbatarians as having erred: adherents of popery, the followers of Luther, and above all, the Adorantists (Antitrinitarians who accepted the adoration of Christ), called demetriades. The name of the latter group derives from the Unitarian bishop Demeter Hunyadi, who forcibly compelled his followers to accept the worship of Jesus. The literature dates this Sabbatarian text between May 31 and July 8, 1592 and treats it as a reply to Francken’s Argumenta.21

The text mentions two critiques by Francken and offers polemical refutations of them.

The first critique by Francken discussed in this Sabbatarian text concerns the person and credibility of Moses, who according to Francken (as paraphrased in the Sabbatarian text) “talks a lot but proves little.”22 This is not a specific contention found in one of Francken’s works. Rather, it can be seen as a summary of the Argumenta, as this work is in general a questioning of the credibility of Moses and the first chapters of the Bible. One finds a similar line of reasoning in the Disputatio, in which Francken repeatedly states that only those believe the absurd stories of Moses who want to believe them.23

Francken’s criticism of Moses and his laws constituted an attack on the greatest authority for the Sabbatarians. The Sabbatarian apology is trivial. It consists mostly of arguments based on the authority of the Bible: Moses was recognized as a divine messenger by the people living after him, by prophets, saints, apostles, and Christ himself. They referred to him as a supreme authority and did not correct his writings. The same is not true of Aristotle, who never enjoyed such acceptance and authority. Moses’ divine mission was demonstrated by the miracles which had taken place before the eyes and ears of an entire people on Mount Sinai and throughout the wanderings in the wilderness. In contrast, Aristotle authority was not proven by any divine miracle or extraordinary phenomenon. The divine origin of the prophecies of Moses are also confirmed by their fulfilment. Everything that Moses said came true, and this could be continuously verified.24

The second problem discussed by the Sabbatarian author in detail is the question of who Cain feared after he killed Abel, as he was the only living son of the first human couple according to the Bible.25 The answer, according to the author, lies in the characteristics of biblical genealogical tables. The author of Genesis mentioned only the genealogy of the godly, the “holy branch,” i.e. of those who were the ancestors of the Messiah, because he knew that God took no delight in murderers. This way of thinking can be observed in the way in which the text mentions that Cain took a wife but does not specify who his wife was. As a consequence, we do not know of any brothers or sons who were evil, nor do we know of any women. The first God-fearing son of Adam was Seth, who is part of the genealogical table. According to the author, another answer may have been Cain’s state of mind following the murder. God gave him “a terrified heart” because of his deed, and ever since, one who spills innocent blood “dreads even the rustling leaf of the tree,” like Lamech who committed a murder similar to the one committed by Cain.26

The author addresses Aristotle: “This does not mean that man existed on other lands in this earth.” And he continues: “God did not have another creation beyond from Adam, despite what you say, Aristotle.”27 These quotations suggest the existence of a theory of creation assuming parallel creations on different continents with different “Adams.” The “critique of Aristotel” formulated here is thus ambiguous. The surviving documents do not contain any reflection by Francken on the story of Cain, however, such an idea wouldn’t be surprising from him, given his critical attitude to the Mosaic narrative.

It seems, however, that the Sabbatarian author struggles against an allegorical theory of creation very similar to the concepts of Jacobus Palaeologus. Palaeologus, who was born in Chios and completed his literary work in Transylvania, propagated co-Adamism or multiple Adamism, a theory that presumed parallel creations (in opposition to the literal understanding of the story of creation) in his treatise entitled An omnes ab uno Adamo descenderint (1573).28 Nevertheless, he did not go so far to question the veracity of the creation story, nor did he mention this view in his later works.29

The Sabbatarian text calls the opponent Aristotle, which, according to the secondary literature, is a reference to Francken.30 It is also conceivable, however, that the author is confronted with a mixture of fashionable ideas in which, although Francken’s influence is obviously felt, Palaeologus is also implicitly present (despite their otherwise appreciative attitude towards the Greek scholar). If the promotion of this theory of creation was nevertheless connected to Francken, it could only be true in the 1580s, since in Disputatio, which was written later, Francken denied the necessity of divine creation. According to the philosopher of the Disputatio, the creation and functioning of the world can be explained on the basis of the immanent reasons operating it, without the acceptance of a concept of God, a primary reason, or the creatio ex nihilo.31

Towards the end of On the prophet Moses, the author informs us that the disseminator of these false theses denied the existence of God and the Devil, as well as resurrection.32 The latter accusation is also present in the next Sabbatarian text, and it is an unambiguous allusion to Francken. The Devil is not discussed explicitly in the abovementioned works by Francken, but he partially explains his view on resurrection and the afterworld in a short work addressed to Gerendi.33 He claims in this work that literary immortality “is the eternal life all of us must wish for our true friends… We all love the other eternal life [the one in the afterworld] but a secret natural instinct makes us suspect that it is rather uncertain and we would not readily trade one for the other, even if it were possible.”34

The Sabbatarian position follows a traditional Christian argumentation, according to which human nature (conscience and the fear of death) suggests and proves the existence of an afterworld. Francken reverses this line of reasoning, arguing that it is precisely human nature that bears witness to the immortality of the soul and the afterlife. The desire for happiness and immortality can only be a result of the imperfection of nature.35

Francken’s most provocative charge, which the Sabbatarian author does not explicitly mention though he defends his faith against it, concerned the ratio. The philosopher of the Disputatio disputed the actual use of ratio by theologians. This charge obviously disturbed the Sabbatarians, as they were the successors of an Antitrinitarian tradition in which the ratio became increasingly important and the effort to follow it became more and more pronounced. Correspondence with ratio in their view was a condition of true faith.

The Sabbatarian text responds to the charge of neglecting reason with a kind of differentiation in the concept of the ratio. This distinction between divine and human ratio appears in the title and runs throughout the text. Understanding Scripture depends on approaching it with human or divine wisdom. This is, in fact, a rejection of Francken’s claim, which is only willing to accept rational and natural philosophical arguments as the basis of the debate on religion and theology. Thus, the Sabbatarian author does not directly refer to Scripture as the absolute authority, but rather claims that the mere notion of following reason does not mean the same thing to him as it does to his opponent. Decisive authority for him is divine wisdom, which obviously includes the perceptive capacity of the mind, but also conceals the written and oral revelation that does not contradict it. Thus, contrary to Francken’s method inclining to rationality, the Sabbatarian author when dealing with religious issues may allow himself, under the pretext of divine wisdom, to use other (even scriptural) arguments that fit into his concept of divine wisdom.

As can be seen from the responses in the Sabbatarian text, the polemic treatise On the prophet Moses… is not a direct reply to Francken’s Argumenta. This finding is confirmed not only by the mention in the Sabbatarian text of ideas that are not found in the Argumenta (e. g. Cain’s fear), but also by the fact that there are no issues in it that are not present in Francken’s other works.

The Complaint of the Holy Scripture

The second, undated Sabbatarian apology against Francken is entitled Complaint of the Holy Scripture against those who started to hate it out of obstinacy, the love of the world or other reasons due to human wickedness (hereinafter Complaint).36 The first 18 arguments (out of 37 arguments for the existence of God) of the theologian of Disputatio are thematized and cited in this text. However, like the other Sabbatarian polemic writing mentioned above, this text cannot be considered merely an answer to the Disputatio, since the Sabbatarian author also fights against thoughts of unspecified origin and ideas known from Francken’s other works. The author does not even refer to a particular work, but his most commonly used formula of address is the plural “your Sophists also say,” which may also apply to ideas spread orally.

It could be claimed that the preface of the Complaint is a response to the preface of the Disputatio, but one should be careful with this claim, since Francken’s main argument against Christian theologians discussed here (that religion cannot be supported by an absolutely certain and doubtless argument) can be found also in his Spectrum.37 He asserts that the arguments supporting religion are only of a probable nature, and since probable arguments can be refuted and human cognitive abilities vary, this explains the existence of the many religions.38 He sees the reason for the existence of religion itself in fear of punishment, which suppresses the mind and allows it to be dominated by distorted beliefs.39 Although he is highly critical of religions, he does not reject them completely. In his view, religions are useful tools for society, as they hold people in check and make them easy to control.40

The Sabbatarian author formulates this utilitarian thought of Francken, according to which religion is merely a tool, with these words: “religion was only invented for the foolish people.”41 According to him, bad interpretations lead to the creation of errant religions, but this does not change the substance of God’s word. A true fact may be interpreted in many ways, depending on influencing factors and interests. He takes an example from Transylvanian social practice: if a case is taken to the Diet, Saxons and Hungarians interpret it in different ways according to various factors. However, the truth of the case is independent of the Hungarian and Saxon interpretation, as the truth stands in and of itself. One must make efforts to find the truth, the true religion, and one must look for it at the right place (that is, in Judaism).42

As a counterattack, the Sabbatarian author accuses Francken of covert atheism. He attributes to him a reduced image of God that could not have originated from the Disputatio, which rejects even the idea of a God based on the smallest dogmatic minimum, but which must have been closer to the concept of God of the Spectrum and was probably spread orally by Francken’s followers. The Spectrum still keeps a reduced, so-called Anselmian concept of God (“quo nihil sit melius aut maius” – “argumentum Anselmianum” of Anselm of Canterbury) and protests against the charge of atheism.43

The Sabbatarian charge is as follows: “You say that the kind of God you promote with your disciples and Sophists, just to refute the accusation that you are a denier of God, does not feel anything, does not talk to those on Earth, does not take care of or hurt anyone, just sits calmly and is not angry with anyone.”44 Although the Sabbatarian author sensed the difference between atheism and Francken’s concept of God, he thought that Francken’s defense against atheism was artificial, apparent objection. According to him, the existence of a God that Francken’s worldview allows cannot be demonstrated with any argument.45 The author does not tolerate any other image of God or concept of revelation than the one announced in the Old Testament. This means that, as opposed to the theologian of the Disputatio, among others, the Sabbatarian author is against the natural religion. He believes that without oral revelation, nothing is sufficient to prove the existence of a true God.46

The criticism in Francken’s works that seems to have irritated the Sabbatarian author the most was probably the one concerning Moses and the revelation of the law. It is no coincidence that both Sabbatarian texts deal with this issue at the greatest length. The first text indicates this in its title, and although the title of the second one suggests that its author defends all of Scripture, he also reduces his defense to the person and writings of Moses. The previously mentioned Argumenta is entirely a questioning of the history of creation written by Moses and of his intentions and capacities. Francken formulated his arguments in a very provocative way, presenting Moses as someone who “can hardly avoid the stamp of ignorance,”47 who “does not understand what he is saying,”48 who “demonstrates his total lack of astronomical knowledge” or “any kind of meteorological knowledge,” and who “presents God as an ignorant God who does not foresee anything,” “either because he did not know that there is also air in nature or because he did not want his Jews to know this, and he claims—not only falsely but entirely improbably—that birds were created from water”49 and “man is similar to God in body, so Moses believes that God is also a body.”50 These statements constituted an attack on the books of the Scripture that were considered most authentic and important by the Sabbatarians and even went so far as to mock the greatest biblical authority, Moses, and present him as ignorant and of dubious intentions.

In his first eight arguments of the Argumenta, Francken sets out in his objections to the history of creation with references to details of astronomy, which the Sabbatarian author formulates in the following words: “As the son cannot be born before the father, the day cannot exist before the Sun. But the Sun was created on the fourth day, so it cannot have existed on the previous three days, because the Sun and the Moon make and divide the day and the night.”51 The Argumenta states that the cause of the days is the sun, and light is the quality and attribute of the sun, not a substance but an accident. However, the effect cannot precede the cause, just as the son cannot precede his father, and the accident cannot exist without the subject to which it belongs.52 Darkness does not precede but simply follows the existence of light.53 He repeatedly refers to the relationship of the part to the whole and claims that the whole cannot be created without its parts.54

The Sabbatarian reply to this is not particularly detailed. It is limited to the distinction between “dies” and “Sol.” According to the Sabbatarian author, at the beginning of creation, on the first day, the duration of a day was determined. The day had some light, but not as strong as later from the sun. Thus, on the first three days, day was separated from night in a way that a furrow separates two pieces of land: it is not as evident as if a great stone had been put between the two to signal the demarcation.55

Not only the Argumenta, but also the first point of the Disputatio discusses the revelation, claiming that there is no evidence for it. Accordingly, the Sabbatarian response is also detailed. The Sabbatarian author seeks to list a number of arguments in defense of divine revelation, the most significant of which he considers to be human remembrance. The existence of generations and empires is built on collective memory, preserved through letters, oral testimonies, and historical chronicles. Nor can the existence of Aristotle be proven in any other way unless we give credit to the writings that perpetuate his memory.56 In addition to written memory, however, there is also an oral memory, survived purely only among Jews. The yearly festivals and rites with historical narratives served as aids to keep memories alive and pure.57 In order to prove the authenticity of the revelation and the writings of Moses, the author also tries to use psychological arguments. Contrary to the “sophist” charge, according to which Moses wrote and acted arbitrarily, he tries to prove that, like the other prophets, Moses did nothing to seek his own glory. According to the Sabbatarian author, it would be understandable if Moses had attributed the law to himself, issued in his own name to seek his own glory, but he never did.58 If the law had been merely a fiction of Moses, it would not have been able to persuade an entire people to follow it. After his death, there would have been little compulsion or reason to obey such a law,59 just as it would have been pointless to suffer in the desert for 40 years without any result if Moses had been the originator of all this. It is a well-known argument that it would have been foolish for the prophets to endure persecution and torture for something they themselves knew was not true.60 Scripture cannot belong solely to Moses, because the covenant had begun with Abraham. Moses only continued an existing tradition. If the writings of Moses had been created arbitrarily, the prophets of later ages would have pointed out the unauthentic parts.61 The author defends only the prophecies of Moses against the accusation by Francken that they were not fulfilled. According to the philosopher of the Disputatio, if the facts prove that the prophets were not mistaken, it is due to chance or the existence of magical powers.62 The Sabbatarian author, on the other hand, believes that the prophecies had been fulfilled “point by point,” and this can be verified empirically. The miserable fate of the Jews, foretold by Moses as a consequence of their disobedience, is still clearly perceptible.63

The essence of the revelation for the Sabbatarian author is the law, so it is particularly offensive to him that Francken considers biblical law and other religious laws equal.64 The philosopher of the Disputatio claims that the laws of different nations are equally useful tools of social order, of controlling people.65 Although they are not of divine origin, they teach us honesty when interpreted properly.66 Francken finds a parallel between Moses and other lawmakers who lied and claimed that they had received their laws from gods, e. g. Zoroaster from the Good Spirit, Lycurgus from Apollo, Mohammed from Gabriel, etc.67

In contrast, the Sabbatarian author believes that although divine laws (such as the laws of Adam and Noah) existed outside the mosaic law, they survived only among the Jews and the Caldeans.68 Every other law is just human fabrication. He proves this with yet another psychological argument: the omission of human writings does not have an effect on the human soul, as opposed to Scripture, which influences our soul. If you keep its teachings, you will feel good. If not, you will be filled with fear:69 “It is not possible that the dead Moses does this in the human heart, that he creates a movement and sensitivity… He bears his blessed and damned effects in his conscience, whether he wants to or not… he cannot remove it.”70 The hour of death or dying is a great sign of this functioning, as even the “atheist” feels “the sting of eternal death” and is horrified.71

The Sabbatarian text mentions several so called “sophist” criticisms related to the authenticity of the Holy Scripture which are not found in Francken’s writings. One of these criticisms was that believers in Scripture cannot even say when these books were given the names Scripture and Bible.72 The Sabbatarian author tries to give a historical answer, but he is a bit misinformed (according to him, the texts were given these names when the Septuagint translation was completed), and he concludes his line of reasoning with a logical argument: the late appearance of a name is not an argument against the authenticity of the object of the name, just as the New World discovered by the Spanish had existed for a long time, regardless of the fact that it only received its name recently. However, the answer points out that the author considers the Hebrew Scripture to be the Bible and not the Christian one.73

Similarly, the origin of the “sophist” argument that the historical events portrayed in the Bible are not mentioned by other nations is unknown. According to the Sabbatarian author, it is only natural that the revelation was given to only one nation, the nation that was willing to pass it on. Each nation tried to record and pass on the glory of its own nation and not that of others, if it knew writing at all (except the Chaldeans).74 Nevertheless, the lack of such texts in other nations does not demonstrate the inauthenticity of Scripture. Just because Mohammed does not write about Attila’s acts and Vlach (Romanian) chronicles do not mention King Matthias, these people and their deeds existed.75

Another criticism by Francken which constituted a keen attack on essential aspects of the faith for the Sabbatarians concerns the Jewish people as the chosen one (Disputatio, arguments 3–5). The philosopher argues “on the basis of rationality” that God cannot be closer to one people than to another. If he created all people, he nurtures them all. Everyone is his property, and he takes care of everyone. He must teach everyone if he wants everyone to convert. It is also clear that every nation refers to its own divine miracles and exceptional treatment, and every nation considers itself God’s people and its law divine law.76

The Sabbatarian text clearly and firmly defends the Jews as the chosen people. It mentions the usual Sabbatarian argument according to which the revelation and its interpretation were given to the Jews and it asserts the Jews the guides of the blind in this matter, but it also describes the Jews with stereotypical characteristics as an exceptional, blessed nation. They handle work and money wisely and have learned longsuffering and patience at the cost of much misery.77

To reinforce his proofs, Francken ends his Disputatio with a catalogue enumerating ten theses from ancient atheist philosophers. The Sabbatarian author saw in this catalogue the machination of contrasting philosophy and religious faith.78 He rejects this attempt by stating that philosophy is not necessarily blasphemous. Because of the oblivion of true memory among their fathers, the philosophers in question could no longer learn of God. The Sabbatarian author also devaluates his opponent’s skills and character with pejorative words, contrasting him with the ancient “sophists,” who pursued philosophical reasoning on a higher level:

But wise men with a true mind could differentiate between the grunt of a drove of pigs and the song of the nightingale. Read the writings of Coriphees attacking atheists: the philosophy of Lactantius, Philippus Morneus, Joannes Bodinus, Philo. See what Josephus answers to Appion the Grammaticus when Appion had the same opinion of Moses as you do. Read old histories that I cannot even enumerate. Were all philosophers atheists? Plato, Socrates and the others.79

Although Sabbatarian texts do not have a positive view of philosophy in general, it cannot be stated that they were expressly anti-philosophical. Towards the end of the apology under discussion, the following statement can be found: “Philosophy is thus double: true and false. One is for my followers, one is for yours.”80 The abovementioned “grunt of a drove of pigs” and the “song of the nightingale” thus signify the two kinds of philosophy or wisdom, true and false.

One long Sabbatarian treatise begins with the theoretical distinction between human and divine wisdom and brings philosophy into the discourse:

[Those erring] do not make a difference between the two kinds of wisdom, as the wisdom of this world is worldly, the wisdom of the spiritual person is heavenly… That is what Lactantius thinks when he writes: The sages of the world are rightly called philosophers, as they seek wisdom throughout their lives, but they never find it, because they do not search it where it can be found, for out of the nations under the sun God had given it unto one nation.81

This latter text gives us the Sabbatarian key to true philosophy and wisdom: the Jewish oral tradition, or in other words, the Jewish interpretation of Scripture.

Conclusion

Christian Francken’s works written in Transylvania are of historical and philosophical significance on the European level, especially his Disputatio inter Theologum et Philosophum de incertitudine religionis Christianae, the first theoretical atheist work in the history of European philosophy.82 The most significant reflection on the works of the German philosopher, at least from the perspective of the length of the texts, came from the Transylvanian Sabbatarians. Therefore, it would be reasonable for the secondary literature to place more emphasis on these polemic texts. Although the impact of the texts discussed above remained local due to their inaccessibility in terms of language and the fact that they remained in handwritten manuscripts, the ideas in these texts were nonetheless significant for the formation of a religious community balancing between Christianity and Judaism.

As is clear from the discussion above, the ideas in Francken’s writings which were made the object of criticism by the Sabbatarian author(s) concerned four main theological topics: the existence of God, the authenticity of Scripture and the law, the authority of Moses, and the privileges of the chosen people. Most of these issues, especially the last three, are particularly emphatic teachings for the Sabbatarians. In the defense of these teachings, they could not have relied on other denominations. These were theological issues which for the Sabbatarians were the foundations of true religion and faith on which they built their entire system of teachings. It is thus understandable that they came to the defense of these ideas.

In addition to opposing certain attacks on Scripture and the belief in God, the most important part of the Sabbatarian defense was that the provocative ideas claiming to follow the ratio were considered human reasonings by them. Although they may have experienced the presence of the philosophy of Francken as a serious threat and may have detected its influence, this threat did not entail a devaluation of rationality or a total rejection of philosophy by them. In the search for effective answers, they had to make their own way without the help of their spiritual predecessors. They did not choose a solution that subordinated ratio entirely to the text of Scripture, but avoided the accusation of anti-rationality by drawing a distinction between philosophy and the concept of ratio.

The interaction and influence between the Sabbatarians and Francken could not have been deep or long-term. It was reciprocal in the sense that it stimulated discussion and debate on both sides. Thanks to the law-oriented spiritual trends of the time in Transylvania, Francken was thoroughly immersed in dissecting the authenticity of the Holy Scripture, especially the books of Moses and the law. The result, in turn, forced Sabbatarians of the 1590s into a defensive stance and prompted them to face the challenges of following the ratio.

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Simon, József. “Filozófiai ateizmus és vallási tolerancia Christian Francken Erdélyben írt műveiben” [Philosophical atheism and religious tolerance in Christian Francken’s Transylvanian works]. In Régiók, határok, identitások: Kelet-Közép-Európa (magyar) filozófiatörténetben, edited by Béla Mester, 103–15. Budapest: Gondolat, 2016.

Simon, József. “Philosophical Atheism and Inccommensurability of Religions in Christian Francken’s Thought.” Magyar Filozófiai Szemle 61, no. 2 (2017): 57–67.

Szabó, Miklós. “Az erdélyi unitáriusok külföldi egyetemjárása 1848-ig” [Academic peregrination of Transylvanian Unitarian students until 1848]. Keresztény Magvető 97(1991), 85–104.

Szabó, Miklós, and Sándor Tonk. Erdélyiek egyetemjárása a korai újkorban 1521–1700 [Early modern academic peregrination of the Transylvanians 1521–1700]. Fontes Rerum Scholasticarum 4. Szeged: JATE, 1992.

Szczucki, Lech. W kręgu myślicieli heretyckich [Among heretical thinkers]. Wrocław–Warszawa–Gdańsk: Ossolineum, 1972.

Szczucki, Lech. “Philosophie und Autorität: Der Fall Christian Francken.” In Reformation und Frühaufklärung in Polen: Studien über den Sozinianismus und seinen Einfluß auf das westeuropäische Denken im 17. Jahrhundert, edited by Paul Wrzecionko, 157–243. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1977.

Szczucki, Lech. “Filozófia és tekintély (Christian Francken esete)” [Philosophy and authority: The case of Christian Francken]. In Két XVI. századi eretnek gondolkodó (Jacobus Palaeologus és Christian Francken), translated by István Varsányi, and Tibor Schulek, 83–124. Budapest: Akadémiai, 1980.

Újlaki-Nagy, Réka. Korai szombatos írások [Early Sabbatarian writings]. Fiatal Filológusok Füzetei 7. Szeged: SZTE, 2010.

Újlaki-Nagy, Réka. “Sabbath-Keeping in Transylvania from the End of the 16th Century to the Early 17th Century.” In Sabbat und Sabbatobservanz in der Frühen Neuzeit, edited by Anselm Schuber, Schriften des Vereins für Reformationsgeschichte 217, 167–200. Göttingen: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 2016.

Újlaki-Nagy, Réka. “Judaizing and Identity in the Earliest Transylvanian Sabbatarian Writings (1588?–1621).” Wrocław Theological Review 26, no. 1 (2018): 41–60.

Veress, Endre. A paduai egyetem magyarországi tanulóinak anyakönyve és iratai (1264–1864) [Registers and documents of Hungarian students at the University of Padua]. Budapest–Kolozsvár: Stephaneum, 1915.

Veress, Endre, ed. Annuae Litterae Societatis Jesu de rebus Transylvanicis temporibus principum Báthory (1579–1613). Fontes Rerum Transylvanicarum 16. Budapest–Veszprém: Egyházm. Nyomda, 1921.

1 The most important literature on Francken from the perspective of this inquiry: Pietrzyk et al., Antitrinitaires polonais; Pirnát, “Christian Francken egy ismeretlen munkája”; Keserű, “Christian Franckens Tätigkeit”; Szczucki, “Filozófia és tekintély”; Simon, Die Religionsphilosophie Christian Franckens (1552–1610?); Simon, “Filozófiai ateizmus”; Simon, “A kleitomakhoszi ateista-katalógus recepciója”; Biagioni, The Radical Reformation; Francken, Opere a stampa.

2 “His, inquam, et multis aliis vitae commoditatibus reiectis, in Transylvaniam rediit, non aliam certe ob causam, quam quod experientia didicerat, citius hic, quam alibi inveniri homines, quales Diogenes clarissimo die quaerere lucernacula sua solitus fuit.” Spectrum diurnum Genii Christiani Francken, apparens malo Simonis Simonii Genio, Kolozsvár, ca. 1590. Published in Simon, Die Religionsphilosophie, 183–203. Original numbering: 47–49. See also the 33.

3 See the list of Hungarians who studied at the University of Padua in Veress, A paduai egyetem. Concerning the peregrinatio academica of Transylvanian students, see Szabó and Tonk, Erdélyiek egyetemjárása; Szabó. “Az erdélyi unitáriusok”; Lovas, “Unitáriusok egyetemjárása.”

4 Pirnát, “Arisztoteliánusok és antitrinitáriusok.” The Sabbatarian references to the spread of Francken’s ideas among the elite are consistent with the accusations made by the Calvinist theologian Franciscus Junius, who claimed that Francken, as the servant of Satan, spread his ungodly views among the students of Kolozsvár and like a bat “flies around the houses of the mighty people in darkness.” Pirnát, “Christian Francken egy ismeretlen munkája,” 109.

5 For example, the Bishop Demeter Hunyadi ironically refers to Francken’s followers as “deep minded” in one of his sermons. According to him, the rich and mighty, in particular, are more likely to be tempted by this aberration. The deceived people question the authority of the Scripture, mock those who suffer for their faith, do not believe in miracles, in the existence of Devil, in the religion itself, claim that the function of the religion is to tie or bind the poor, and contend that the world is eternal and belief in the soul is nonsense. Possár. “Újabb adatok,” especially 187–88. There are other references to individuals who came under Francken’s influence. See Pázmány Péter összes munkái, vol. 3, 13; Cf. Balázs, “Trauzner Lukács ‘megtérése’,” 12; Pirnát, “Arisztoteliánusok,” 371. The secondary literature identifies the person referred to here as Lukács Trauzner, the son-in-law of Ferenc Dávid. Related to this, see Giovanni Argenti, leader of the Transylvanian Jesuit Order: “tandem, inquam, ex Arianismo in atheismum praeceps actus, tantum profecerat, ut in mundi fabrica et gubernatione Aristoteli potius, quam Moysi credendum esse existimaret. Hinc cum aliquando philosophi Ethicam percurrisset, ea de re ad amicum scribens: ‘Etiamsi, inquit, libri omnes sacri amitterentur, nihilominus tamen homo suae saluti consulere posset, si vel Ethicas ab Aristotele traditas praeceptiones observaret.’ Licet autem privatim de Deo, uti atheus sentiret, religionemque nihil aliud esse, quam populare frenum a sapientoribus excogitatum arbitraretur; publice tamen Arianismum, in quo consenuerat, profitebatur.” Veress, Annuae Litterae Societatis Jesu, 97. I would like to express my gratitude to József Simon for the data mentioned in this paragraph.

6 RMKT XVII/5, 513, 515.

7 Ibid., 515.

8 Praecipuarum enumeratio causarum, cur Christiani, cum in multis modis religionis doctrinis mobiles sint et varii, in Trinitatis tamen retinendo dogmate sint constantissimi, Kraków, 1584. Modern edition: Szczucki, W kręgu myślicieli heretyckich, 256–67.

9 Spectrum diurnum Genii Christiani Francken, apparens malo Simonis Simonii Genio, Kolozsvár, ca. 1590. The manuscript is preserved in Archives of Székesfehérvár City with County Rights, the deposit of Ferenc Vathay, fol. 17–49. Published in Simon, Die Religionsphilosophie, 183–203.

10 The manuscript was considered missing for a long time, until Antal Pirnát found Francken’s theses and their refutation in a collection of theological treatises of Franciscus Junius in Debrecen (“Confutatio argumentorum XXII, quae olim a Simplicio in Sacram Mosis historiam de creatione fuerunt proposita, et nostro saeculo ab hominibus prophanis atheisque recocta imperitis obtruduntur.” In Francisci Junii Biturgis Opera Theologica I. Genevae, 1613, 99–120). The Latin theses and their Hungarian translation were published by Pirnát, “Christian Francken egy ismeretlen munkája,” 107–19.

11 Ibid., 109.

12 See Dán, “Judaizare”; Újlaki-Nagy, “Judaizing and Identity.”

13 See Pirnát’s study cited above and from the same author “Gerendi János és Eőssi András.” See also Újlaki-Nagy, “Sabbath-Keeping.”

14 Pokoly, Magyar Protestáns Egyháztörténeti Adattár, vol 8, 158–60; Pirnát, “Arisztoteliánusok és antitrinitáriusok,” 369–70.

15 The final form of Disputatio is thought to have developed in 1593. See Biagioni, The Radical Reformation and the Making of Modern Europe, 116–18. The manuscript is kept in Biblioteka Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, signature Mss. Akc. 1955/220. Modern edition: Simon, Die Religionsphilosophie Christian Franckens, 151–82. The work was found by Bálint Keserű in 1972 in Wrocław.

16 Keserű, “Christian Franckens Tätigkeit,” 79. The arguments are typical erudite libertarian ideas and bear a resemblance to the mysterious and undated text of De Tribus Impostoribus. See the debate on whether Francken can be linked to this work: Biagioni, “Christian Francken e le origini” and Simon, “Metaphysical Certitude.”

17 Szczucki, “Filozófia és tekintély,” 114.

18 Biagioni, The Radical Reformation and the Making of Modern Europe, 118.

19 Disputatio, the first argument of the philosopher.

20 Mózes prófétának Istentől származó bölcsességéről és Arisztotelésznek ez világi bölcsességéről és az embereknek külemb-külemb okoskodásokról való írás melyet most ez világi fő rendek némelyek elővettek és igaz tudománnak mondanak Mózes próféta ellen és az régi sok szentek tudományok és értelmek ellen. One of the collections is the codex Mátéfi Kissolymosi, kept in the Kalocsa Cathedral Library under the signature Ms 303 (21 509). The other collection is in the Library of the Romanian Academy Cluj-Napoca with the title Szombatosok régi könyve or Árkosi kódex, signature MsU. 1290. There is no significant difference between the two variants. The critical edition of the text was published in the Volume 5 of the seventeenth-century series Régi Magyar Költők Tára, on pages 513–18.

21 Pirnát, “Christian Francken egy ismeretlen munkája,” 107.

22 RMKT XVII/5, 513.

23 Pirnát, “Arisztoteliánusok és antitrinitáriusok.” The first argument of the Disputatio.

24 RMKT XVII/5, 513.

25 See Gen 4:14.

26 RMKT XVII/5, 514–15.

27 Ibid, 514.

28 Codex Máté Thoroczkai, Biblioteca Academiei Romane, Cluj-Napoca, MsU 1669-XIXb, 720–21. Modern edition: Szczucki, W kręgu myślicieli heretyckich, 243–44. Hungarian edition: Balázs, Földi és égi hitviták, 135–36. On the history of non-adamic creation theories, see Livingstone, Adam’s Ancestors; Livingstone, “The Preadamite Theory.”

29 Cf. Pirnát, “Arisztoteliánusok és antitrinitáriusok,” 370; Pirnát, Die Ideologie der Siebenbürger Antitrinitarier, 75–76. Szczucki warns that the co-Adamism of Palaeologus formulated in this work should be treated with reservation, as he makes no mention of it anywhere in his later woks. Szczucki, Filozófia és tekintély, 60.

30 According to Pirnát, the literary education of the Sabbatarian author was too superficial for him to have realized that these arguments did not come from Aristotle. He assumes a fictive dialogue in the background of the text that the Sabbatarian author may have read. Pirnát, “Arisztoteliánusok és antitrinitáriusok,” 370; Pirnát, “Christian Francken egy ismeretlen munkája,” 107.

31 Disputatio, arguments 27–35. Szczucki, Filozófia és tekintély, 114–15. According to Simone Simoni, Francken wrote a text on this subject with the title Theses de materia prima. Simon Simonius, Appendix, last page.

32 “What could be a more dangerous knowledge than one who dares to say that there is neither God nor Devil, nor resurrection, but as Aristotle says, so it was and will be.” RMKT XVII/5, 515.

33 The title of the work is Oratiuncula. Published in Elek, “Gerendi János és Franken Keresztély,” 37.

34 Pirnát, “Arisztoteliánusok és antitrinitáriusok,” 386–87.

35 Disputatio, 15th argument.

36 This text has survived in the codex Árkosi, forming a separate unit of text and copied with strikingly clear, easy-to-read letters. Published in Máté, “A szentírás apológiája.” Máté presumes that the text was written in the mid-1590s. Ibid., 192.

37 Disputatio, first page. Spectrum in Simon, Die Religionsphilosophie Christian Franckens, 192–94.

38 Szczucki, Filozófia és tekintély, 114, 118; Simon, “Politikai vallás,” 124.

39 Praecipuarum, introduction; Disputatio, 8. argument and Kapaneus Statius’ statement in the atheist catalogue. See also Simon, “Politikai vallás,” 123.

40 Disputatio, 8. argument.

41 Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 200. The Sabbatarian author is outraged when he describes the libertine, drunking, and carefree life advocated and practiced by the so called sophists and their master. He calls Francken a giddy, childish man, deficient since his childhood, who does not care about good reputation, honor, or humanity, and he contends that the spirit of the Devil dwells in him and that his teachings and the teachings of his adherents are “some giggles over wine” and “lies clanging like a dulcimer.” He also insists that Francken’s followers are hypocrites, flirtatious rogues, ship sails, reeds etc. Ibid., 204–6. According to the secondary literature, many of these expressions refer to Francken’s dense changes of religion as signs of some sort of opportunism. The philosopher of the Disputatio does not explicitly claim that he supports seeking joy and pleasure, but he defends all such positions attacked by the theologian (arguments 12–18) with such vehemence that the Sabbatarian author might easily have read the text as an implicit endorsement of libertine ways. Although the philosopher tries to occupy a neutral position in connection with the issues, he declares that seeking pleasure is not contrary to the law of nature or rationality. The law of nature dictates: “Do what is useful for you and brings you pleasure!” (the thirteenth and sixteenth arguments of the philosopher), “as wise nature instilled us with a desire for pleasure for good reason,” and it is only human laws that forbid it. Thus, Francken implicitly defends practices like homosexuality, the abandonment of unwanted children, the cult of the phallus, and the creation of bordellos (the sixteenth and seventeenth arguments), and this obviously met with outrage.

42 Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 201.

43 See the twenty-second answer of the philosopher. Simon, “Politikai vallás,” 121–22, 124. According to Simon, Francken distinguishes between the political and metaphysical use of the term “atheist.” The Latinized form of the Greek term became fashionable in sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Europe. A dispute arose between Simon and Mario Biagioni about the contemporary meaning of the terms atheist and skepticism. See Simon, “Metaphysical Certitude” and Biagioni, “Christian Francken Sceptical.” See also Simon, “Philosophical Atheism”; Simon, “Se a hit, se a nevelés.”

44 Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 195.

45 According to the author, if Scripture is not true, then there is no god, because there is no other who has professed to be the creator of the world. “Thus, you are atheists, as you do not believe me to be true [the personified Scripture is speaking].” Ibid., 195.

46 Ibid., 195.

47 Pirnát, “Christian Francken egy ismeretlen munkája,” 114.

48 Ibid., 115.

49 Ibid., 116.

50 Ibid., 117.

51 Ibid., 203–4.

52 Ibid., 114, 115.

53 Ibid., 114.

54 Ibid., 115.

55 Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 204.

56 An example offered by the author of how remembrance works and for its imprints in later times is the story of the wrestling between Jacob and the angel. In remembrance of this event, even thousands of years later, the Jews do not eat the sciatic nerve of some animals. The other example is the Shavuot, the feast of the giving of the law. This feast also proves that Jews celebrate the revelation of the Torah not only on the basis of Scripture, but also because of the experiences of their fathers. Ibid., 198.

57 Ibid., 195–98, 202.

58 Ibid., 197.

59 Ibid., 198.

60 Ibid., 196–97.

61 Ibid., 199.

62 According to Simon, while the philosopher attacks the rationality of his opponent’s faith and argumentation, he himself uses irrational means in his reasoning (e.g. magic).

63 Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 196.

64 Ibid., 199.

65 Similarly, he treats religions and ritual customs equally, the so-called heretics in the same way as the ecclesiastical authority, since in his view they unjustly place themselves above the other, since after all, the faith of none of them can be proved. Disputatio, arguments 19–21.

66 Ibid., sixth argument.

67 Ibid., first argument.

68 Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 200.

69 In the omitted section, the author refers to suicide as a consequence of breaking the law. This is, according to the secondary literature, an intimation to Francken, who repeatedly blackmailed his Catholic superiors by threatening to commit suicide when they doubted the sincerity of his re-Catholicization. Szczucki, “Philosophie und Autorität,” 242. Cf. Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 190.

70 Ibid., 199.

71 Ibid., 200, 205.

72 Ibid., 202–3.

73 Ibid., 192.

74 Ibid., 200.

75 Ibid., 203.

76 Disputatio, arguments 4–5.

77 “You claim that Jews are fools. Cheat him, if he is fool! If he is fool, why do you borrow money from him? Why does he have more money than other nations, when it has no heritage at all? […] For he does not want to press clay for noble people, that is why he does not ask for his inheritance. He does not even want to rebel foolishly, seeing that not one, not two nations, but all the nations under the Sun hate him for the religio, and he does not want your lies turned into truth, because than they would go fool […] From experience, they have learned the profit of peaceful sufferance.” Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 205–6.

78 See the responses in the Sabbatarian text to the atheist catalogue in Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 200–1. On the role of the atheist catalogue in the Disputatio, see Simon, “A kleitomakhoszi,” 80–82. See also Keserű, “Christian Franckens Tätigkeit, 76–77.

79 Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 201. A similar dispraise can be found on the page 206: “The ratio that you feel too strong against Moses is just child’s play, as you are only the children of old sophists, your Fathers were the bucks….” Unlike Sabbatarians, Francken believed to have philosophical tools that the philosophers of Antiquity did not yet possess, and with these tools, he thought himself able to refute belief in God on a metaphysical level. See Simon, “A kleitomakhoszi” 88.

80 Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 204.

81 Újlaki-Nagy, Korai szombatos írások, 32. Cf. Divinarum institutio, second book, fifth chapter. Lactantius here declares that pagans and philosophers seek wisdom in the wrong places. However, he does not claim that only the Jews possess correct knowledge of God. Cf. Máté, “A szentírás apológiája,” 202.

82 Concerning this claim, see the monograph by József Simon, Die Religionsphilosophie Christian Franckens.

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