Login

The Angevins and Central Europe in the Middle Ages

Special editor of the thematic issue Judit Gál

Contents

Articles

Valentina Šoštarić and Krešimir Baljkas
Emotional Responses to the Beginning and End of the Rule of Louis I in Dalmatia 3

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Judit Gál
The Administratve Elite of King Louis I in Croatia-Dalmatia 30

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Tomislav Matić
Croatian-Dalmatian Roles in the Organization of the Wedding of King Vladislaus II and Queen Anne 65

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Renáta Skorka
Marriages of Convenience, Forced Betrothals: Dynastic Agreements in the Angevin-era Hungary 95

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Bálint Ternovácz
The History of the Macsó and Barancs Territories until 1316  127

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Book Review

Servants of Culture: Paternalism, Policing, and Identity Politics in Vienna, 1700–1914. By Ambika Natarajan. Reviewed by Dóra Fedeles-Czeferner 147
Full Text (PDF)

Notes on Contributors
Full Text (HTML)

Business Cooperations and Economic Connections

Special editors of the thematic bloc: Judit Klement and Ágnes Pogány 

Contents

Thematic bloc: Business Cooperations and Economic Connections

Eduard Kubů and Barbora Štolleová
Živnostenská Banka (Trades Bank) and Its Participation in the Banking Consortia/Syndicates of Interwar Czechoslovakia* 533

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Ivan Smiljanić 
The Politics of Business: (Failed) Economic Initiatives of Slovene Liberals in the First Decades of the Twentieth Century 559

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Gyula Horváth
A Unique Path to Monopoly: The Case of the Hungarian Insurance Sector, 1945–1952 575

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Walter M. Iber and Christoph Huber
From Pioneer to Latecomer: Relations between Austria and the Soviet Union (Russia) in the Oil and Gas Sector 596

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Article

Ábel Bede
Fathers of Budapest, Daughters of the Countryside: Recontextualizing Cultural Change in Fin-de-Siècle Hungary 623

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

BOOK REVIEWS

Full Text (PDF)

Közép-Európa a hosszú 13. században: Magyarország, Csehország és Ausztria hatalmi és dinasztikus kapcsolatai 1196 és 1310 között [Central Europe in the long thirteenth century: Power and dynastic relations among Hungary, Bohemia, and Austria between 1196 and 1310]. By Veronika Rudolf. Reviewed by Sándor Hunyadi 655
Full Text (PDF)

Die Karriere des deutschen Renegaten Hasn Caspar in Ofen (1627–1660) im politischen und kulturellen Kontext. By János Szabados. Reviewed by Olivér Gillich 659
Full Text (PDF)

Nations, privilèges et ethnicité: Le Banat habsbourgeois; Un laboratoire politique aux confins de l’Europe éclairée. By Benjamin Landais. Reviewed by Ágoston Berecz 663
Full Text (PDF)

Anti-Axis Resistance in Southeastern Europe, 1940–1944: Forms and Varieties. Edited by John Paul Newman, Ljubinka Škodrić, and Rade Ristanović. Reviewed by Ákos Bartha 667
Full Text (PDF)

Queer Encounters with Communist Power: Non-Heterosexual Lives and the State in Czechoslovakia, 1948–1989. By Věra Sokolová. Reviewed by Sébastien Tremblay 673
Full Text (PDF)

Notes on Contributors
Full Text (HTML)

Agrarian Productivity and Efficiency in East Central Europe

Special editor of the thematic bloc: Gábor Demeter

Contents

ARTICLES

Beatrix F. Romhányi
Spatial Transformations and Regional Differences in the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary (1000–1500) 339

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Gábor Demeter
Differences in Quality of Life and Profitability on Small and Large Farms (1730–1930): A Statistical Approach 361

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Géza Hegyi
The Share of Tithe Paid to Parish Priests in Sixteenth-Century Transylvania 403

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Maciej Kwiatkowski
Agricultural Productivity in the Western Borderlands of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (Second Half of the Sixteenth Century) 431

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

András Schlett
The Export Potential of Hungarian Agriculture and the Issue of Added Value between the two World Wars 446

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Róbert Bagdi
The Incomes and Expenditures of Agrarian Family Enterprises in Interwar Hungary 471

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

BOOK REVIEWS

Full Text (PDF)

Születés és anyaság a régi Magyarországon: 16. század – 20. század [Birth and motherhood in old Hungary: From the sixteenth to the twentieth century]. Written and edited by Lilla Krász.  Reviewed Gábor Koloh 509
Full Text (PDF)

The Shadow of the Empress: Fairy-Tale Opera and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy. By Larry Wolff. Reviewed Imre Tarafás 514
Full Text (PDF)

Re/imaginations of Disability in State Socialism: Visions, Promises, Frustrations. Edited by Kateřina Kolářová and Martina Winkler.  Reviewed Boglárka Kőrösi 517
Full Text (PDF)

Survival Under Dictatorships. Life and Death in Nazi and Communist Regimes. By László Borhi. Reviewed Attila Pók 522
Full Text (PDF)

Notes on Contributors
Full Text (HTML)

HHR 2024 1 borito 11

Meaning of Diversity in the Middle Ages

Contents

INTRODUCTION

Julia Burkhardt and Paul Schweitzer-Martin
Concepts of Diversity in the Time of Sigismund of Luxembourg (1368–1437): Introductory Remarks and Conceptual Approaches 153

Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

ARTICLES

Bernd Schneidmüller
Unitas and Diversitas: Sigismund’s Empire as a Model of Late Medieval Rulership 172

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Markus Christopher Müller
Alterity and Self-Understanding: Inclusion and Exclusion Strategies of Southern German  Estates in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries 195

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Éloïse Adde
The League of Lords between Feudalism and the Modern State: Diversity of State Models,  Political Agency, and Opposition in Late-Medieval Bohemia (1394–1405) 213

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Klara Hübner
“The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” – The Impossible Term “Propaganda” and Its Popular and Anti-royal Uses in Luxembourg Bohemia (ca. 1390–1421) 235

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Christine Reinle
Diversity, Differences, and Divergence: Religion as a Criterion of Difference in the Empire in the First Half of the Fifteenth Century 261

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Iryna Klymenko
Religious Diversity: What or How? Towards a Praxeology of Early Modern Religious Ordering 287

Abstract Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Nora Berend
Medieval Diversity: Contexts and Meanings 306

Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

BOOK REVIEWS

Full Text (PDF)

Climate and Society in Europe: The Last Thousand Years. By Christian PfisterClimate and Society in Europe: The Last Thousand Years. By Christian Pfisterand Heinz Wanner. Reviewed András Vadas 320
Full Text (PDF)

Christians or Jews? Early Transylvanian Sabbatarianism (1580–1621).Christians or Jews? Early Transylvanian Sabbatarianism (1580–1621).By Réka Tímea Újlaki-Nagy. Reviewed Graeme Murdock 323
Full Text (PDF)

Párhuzamok és kapcsolódási pontok a spanyol és a magyar politikai emigrációPárhuzamok és kapcsolódási pontok a spanyol és a magyar politikai emigrációtörténetében 1849–1873 [Parallels and connections in the historiesof Spanish and Hungarian political emigration 1849–1873]. By Viktória Semsey.Reviewed Ádám Tibor Balogh 326
Full Text (PDF)

Multicultural Cities of the Habsburg Empire 1880–1914. Imagined CommunitiesMulticultural Cities of the Habsburg Empire 1880–1914. Imagined Communitiesand Conflictual Encounters. By Catherine Horel. Reviewed Gábor Gyáni 330
Full Text (PDF)

Notes on Contributors
Full Text (HTML)

 

 

Volume 7 Issue 4

Medical Authority in East Central Europe

Special editors of the thematic bloc: Janka Kovács and Viola Lászlófi

Contents

ARTICLES

Barbora Rambousková–Darina Martykánová

Social Class in the Czech Physicians’ Quest for Professional Authority and Social Acknowledgement, 1830s–1930s 363

Abstract

Abstract

In the mid-nineteenth century, physicians in the Czech lands could claim neither elite status as a professional group nor unquestioned authority in the medical field. Despite the legal protection granted by the Habsburg Monarchy, they did not have an efficient monopoly on medical authority and practice and had to face fierce competition from lay healers, male and female, and other medical professionals. This article examines how Czech-speaking physicians navigated social dynamics in nineteenth-century society in urban and rural areas and how they strove to strengthen their authority in the medical field both through appeals to their professional credentials and through class and gender discourses. We identify individual strategies of social ascension and collective efforts to boost the standing and authority of the whole professional group. Practices such as socializing in patriotic circles and authoring medical guidebooks for laymen proved as important as publications in the professional press and the work of professional associations in this complex effort, which was eventually crowned with success in interwar Czechoslovakia.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Zsuzsa Bokor
“Separation is Required in Our Special Situation”: Minority Public Health Programs in Interwar Transylvania 395

Abstract

Abstract

This paper presents the distinctive manner in which the Hungarian public health system in Transylvania was built up, parallel to the state structures in the interwar period. In several policies and public health projects, the young medical generation of the 1930s formed the basis of the biologically based ethnic community of Hungarians in Transylvania. This process was presented by them as part of ethnic survival and made the presence of the doctor necessary. The paper discusses the foundation of minority health institutes and also the discourses around the formation of these.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Šárka Caitlín Rábová
Between Public Health and Propaganda: Tuberculosis in Czechoslovakia in the First Decades of the Communist Regime 433

Abstract

Abstract

In early postwar Czechoslovakia, medical doctors identified the fight against tuberculosis as one of their fundamental tasks, since mortality and morbidity rates from this dreaded and hardly curable disease were still high. However, the country initially struggled with a lack of special institutions and trained staff. The situation became even more complicated in 1948, when the Communist Party seized power in Czechoslovakia and transformed the organization and practice of healthcare. Focusing on the first two decades of the postwar period, this article presents the strategies used by the socialist country against tuberculosis, stressing especially the importance placed, in the development of these strategies, on having a mass impact. The most significant shifts, which concerned not only tuberculosis but healthcare in general, involved changes to the legislation. The responsibility for the health of the population was transferred to the state, which declared that it would provide free treatment and care for all citizens, regardless of their social background. During this period, the first law to prevent and control the disease was passed, and mandatory vaccination and tuberculosis treatment were introduced. As was often the case, advances in medicine were used for political propaganda, and so, in the period after 1948, tuberculosis was labelled a “capitalist disease.” This label implied that the fault for the continued presence of the disease lay at the feet of the prewar capital system. Yet as I show in the discussion below, many of these basic pillars of the fight against tuberculosis had already been established in the interwar period, and it was first and foremost the growing availability of antibiotics that helped bring this disease under control in the 1960s.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Annina Gagyiova
Every Child According to Its Pace: School Maturity between Expertise, State Policies, and Parental Eigensinn in Socialist Hungary 461

Abstract

Abstract

It is widely known that socialist states such as Hungary attempted to increase social mobility through a compulsory elementary school system. While the research on socialist education is vast, the relevance of school maturity to an egalitarian education system is still understudied. By the end of the 1950s, lack of preparedness for school among children had captured the attention of Hungarian experts in medicine, psychology, and pedagogy, who were hoping to ensure that first-year students would begin their schooling under roughly the same conditions. In response, in 1965, local initiatives started experimenting with corrective (remedial) classes. The aim of these initiatives was to overcome class differences by offering targeted support and helping children who were less prepared for institutional schooling catch up and transfer into the standard school system later. During the first half of the 1970s, the Hungarian Ministry of Education adopted this pedagogical experiment on a national level. In this article, I put two distinct methodological approaches into dialogue, the sociology of expertise on the one hand and Eigensinn on the other. By doing so, I shed light on the complex interplay of state policies, concepts of expertise, and parental agency. As I show, corrective classes reflected persisting social inequalities, thus children from the lower middle classes and the Roma minority were overrepresented in these classes. Ultimately, I explore how bottom-up initiatives had unintended consequences that were often disadvantageous for the children who were in principle the intended beneficiaries. These initiatives thus worked against rather than for the quest for social equality. In the discussion below, I show how pediatricians, psychologists, pedagogues, and parents shaped the school system, working within, taking advantage of, and thus limiting efforts for social transformation despite asymmetrical power relations.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Judit Sándor–Viola Lászlófi
Women Facing the Committee: Decision-Making on Abortion in Postwar Hungary 493

Abstract

Abstract

In this article, we examine the medical, legal, social, and political context of abortion in Hungary after the Second World War, with special attention to the decision-making process of the so-called abortion committees. These committees collected data on the social and medical status of women to support their decision on whether to permit the operation or not. In the first half of the 1950s and after 1973, the committees were given a relatively free hand in making their decision on whether to allow an abortion. Women had to appear in front of these committees in person, and the process was a performance of demonstrating compliance with the law by stating a legally acceptable reason to terminate the pregnancy. In our article we analyze how the hierarchical-paternalistic structures of healthcare were reproduced and operated in the frequently changing abortion regimes within a state socialist legal and political framework. We also explore how these phenomena affected women’s requests and the options available to doctors at the micro level of decision-making on abortion. The study shows how women and doctors were forced to make efforts to comply with the changing normative framework and how different forms of paternalism (e.g., institutional, medical) shaped this process. The main purpose of the various laws was to regulate abortion and population policy by monitoring the measurable circumstances of pregnancy. In the early 1950s, the focus was on the health of the mother, whereas in the 1970s it was more on the living conditions necessary to raise a child. Despite the detailed regulations based on the paternalist structure of the healthcare system, it was left to doctors and other members of abortion committees to implement the norms at the local level. In some cases, doctors utilized this paternalist framework and patriarchal techniques characteristic of the healthcare system to circumvent the intentions of population policy. The article demonstrates these phenomena by analyzing the medical records of Pesterzsébeti Szülő- és Nőbeteg Otthon (Gynecological and Maternity Hospital of Pesterzsébet) and the documents of the abortion committee of Pécs.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

BOOK REVIEWS

Full Text (PDF)

Buda oppugnata: Források Buda és Pest 1540–1542. évi ostromainak történetéhez [Buda oppugnata: Sources on the history of the sieges of Buda and Pest in 1540–1542]. Edited by Péter Kasza. Reviewed Emőke Rita Szilágyi 524
Full Text (PDF)

Maria Theresa: The Habsburg Empress in Her Time. By Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger. Translated by Robert Savage. Reviewed János Nagy 527
Full Text (PDF)

The 1868 Croatian–Hungarian Settlement: Origin and Reality. Edited by Vlasta Švoger, Dénes Sokcsevits, András Cieger, and Branko Ostajmer. Reviewed Veronika Eszik 531
Full Text (PDF)

Family, Taboo and Communism in Poland, 1956–1989. Polish Studies – Transdisciplinary Perspectives 36. By Barbara Klich-Kluczewska. Reviewed Fanni Svégel 534
Full Text (PDF)

Socialist Yugoslavia and the Non-Aligned Movement: Social, Cultural, Political, and Economic Imaginaries. Edited by Paul Stubbs. Reviewed Milorad Lazic 539
Full Text (PDF)

Notes on Contributors
Full Text (HTML)

 

Volume 7 Issue 4

East Central European Émigré Communities in the Low Countries:
Agency, Transfers, Impact

Kim Christaens, Luke Dodds, and Tamás Scheibner Special Editors of the Thematic Issue

Contents

Kim Christiaens, Luke Dodds, Tamás Scheibner
Civil Engagement and Cultural Transfers between Central  and Eastern European Migrants and the Low Countries (from the 1930s to the Present): Introduction 547
Full Text (PDF)

ARTICLES

Vera Hajtó
“The Past Must Be Given a Place”: Migration, Intergenerational Transfer, and Cultural Memory Practices in Belgian Families of Hungarian Descent 555

Abstract

Abstract

This article investigates the intergenerational effects of migration on the memories of Belgian families of Hungarian origin, focusing specifically on how these effects can prompt the second and third generations of migrant families to bring their private memories and identity constructions into the public sphere. Their social participation becomes a crucial element in their quest to uncover their families’ histories. While the memory of the migration experience was initially contained in the “archive” (the private sphere), it eventually transitions into the “canon” (the public sphere), becoming accessible to those outside the family circle. Using published biographies of second-generation members about their immigrant parents, photographic images, texts of a theatre play, group conversations on social media (Facebook), and interviews with members of the second and third generations, this article offers a varied source material to explore these questions. By pushing the boundaries of historical research and memory studies, it demonstrates that the memories of migration can have long-lasting effects that connect people and families with larger communities and the social sphere.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Manuel Herrera Crespo
Challenging Systematization in Romania: Human Rights, Transnationalism, and Dissidents in Campaigns by Opérations Villages Roumains (OVR), 1989–1990 576

Abstract

Abstract

Accounts of popular opposition to the systematization project in Romania have predominantly focused on organizations concerned with cultural heritage preservation and the plight of Hungarian minorities in Transylvania. As a result, the Belgian-born initiative Opérations Villages Roumains (OVR) has been largely overlooked, despite growing into the largest transnational opposition movement against systematization by 1989. Unlike other organizations, OVR primarily denounced Ceauşescu’s totalitarian grip on society, with systematization being its most significant manifestation. This article investigates OVR’s philosophy, methods, and objectives during its formative period from 1988 to 1990. OVR’s challenge to systematization reveals how human rights were strategically implemented at chosen moments, the emergence of several transnational dimensions, and the unique roles played by exiles and dissidents. Through this case study, OVR’s approach uncovers the evolving notions of human rights and transnationalism in the 1980s and highlights how these differed from other well-known Western European challenges to the practices of State Socialist regimes.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Michaela Šmidrkalová, Miroslav Michela 
Czech Anesthesiologists on Their Way to the Netherlands: Motives, Expectations, and (Dis)Engagement (1968–1970) 599

Abstract

Abstract

In 1970, the Third European Congress of Anaesthesiology was held in Prague. Paradoxically, many leading Czech and Slovak representatives of the field were absent, having emigrated to the West, predominantly to the Netherlands, following the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968. This emigration, however, did not result in Czechoslovak anaesthesiologists being entirely disconnected from their former colleagues or losing touch with the domestic development of medicine. Despite the Cold War and the Iron Curtain, medical knowledge continued to be exchanged between the West and the East. The congress exemplified how Western anaesthesiologists could meet their Soviet bloc counterparts. Informal contacts, crucial for Czechoslovak (future) migrants, facilitated knowledge dissemination. These contacts with Dutch anaesthesiologists, who became a ‘window to the world,’ enabled them to join European or global medical-scientific networks. The study probes why a significant number of anaesthesiologists emigrated from Czechoslovakia to the Netherlands post-1968, their integration into Dutch society, and their recognition. It questions whether they engaged with the Czechoslovak expatriate community or primarily focused on their profession and relationships with Dutch colleagues. Using anaesthesiology as a lens, the study illustrates how these doctors, having emigrated during 1968–1970, established themselves professionally in Dutch society. They shared a strong professional identity, which assumed a transnational and partly denationalized form. Their medical vocation, along with the experience of living in socialist Czechoslovakia for twenty years, led to a reluctance to partake in exile activities for the ‘homeland cause,’ a sentiment not fully understood by some of the 1948 migrants.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Luke Dodds
The Question of God in Émigré Ghent: Religious Heritage, Émigré Politics, and Dialogical Negotiation among Migrants and Hosts during the Cold War 626

Abstract

Abstract

This article explores the influence of various factors on the formation of identity among the community of World War II Polish veterans which formed in the Flemish city of Ghent after the rise of a socialist regime in their home country. Challenging popular perceptions of the term “émigré,” the article highlights the diverse ways in which the members of this community promoted their heritage within their host society. Particular attention is given to the role of religious and cultural heritage, the émigré community’s engagement with anti-communist politics, and the evolution of this political engagement over time. Interactions with the local Catholic Diocese of Ghent are examined through a framework of Polish Catholicism as a “lived religion” which facilitated the formation of a hybrid identity. In particular, the role of Carlos Bressers, a Belgian priest and chaplain on whose personal archive the research is based, is analyzed. Through his position and contacts, Bressers served as a mediating figure in the negotiation of hybrid identity and helped the community of Polish veterans carve out a place for itself in the city of Ghent.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Wim Coudenys
Migration as Mission: Alojz-Alexis Strýček SJ in Belgium (1938–1945) 650

Abstract

Abstract

This article presents a case study of Alojz-Alexis Strýček SJ, a Slovak Jesuit in Belgium during World War II, to examine the complexities of migration, identity, and religious mission within turbulent historical contexts. Strýček’s experiences challenge conventional categorizations in migration studies, demonstrating how individual narratives can intersect with and transcend national and religious boundaries. The study employs social network analysis and philological-historical methods, offering insights into the dynamic roles migrants play in the circulation of knowledge and in shaping transnational connections. Strýček’s case highlights the importance of considering non-national factors, such as religious affiliations, in understanding migration patterns and migrant identities. This research contributes to the emerging field of “migrant knowledge,” which focuses on the role of migrants in global knowledge exchange and the redefinition of identities in times of crisis, thereby enriching our understanding of the multifaceted nature of migration.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Adam Żaliński
The Evolution of Migrant Mobilization in One Polish Diaspora Community: A Case Study of the Polish Catholic Society Eindhoven 676

Abstract

Abstract

This research concerns the transformation of one migrant community. It is based on an analysis of selected documents presenting Polish migrant associations in the Netherlands from the beginning of 1950s until the 1990s. The study offers an analysis of the minority mobilization process, with a focus on migrant organizational agency. It is a case study devoted to the Polish community in Eindhoven and its association, which was a local branch of migrant organization operating at a national level. The main sources used in the study are archival records, including organizational statute, circulars, information leaflets, press releases, official and private correspondence, bulletins, protocols, organizational reports, official declarations, and minutes from meetings. In addition, interviews and biographical data are taken into account. Most of the written sources were obtained from the archive of Franciszek Łyskawa, a Polish migrant soldier who settled in Eindhoven shortly after World War II. Over the course of the following decades, he remained an active member of the diaspora while also integrating into the host society, and he became a Dutch citizen. The study shows the evolution of this Polish migrant community from the precarious situation of the early postwar years through the development of immigrants’ associations and institutions which emerged in parallel to efforts to integrate into the multicultural society in the 1960s and 1970s and eventually the gradual decline of activity among the members of this community as immigrants..
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Elżbieta Kuźma, Dorota Praszałowicz
Polish Immigrant Community Building in Brussels: The Role of the Polish Catholic Mission 700

Abstract

Abstract

This paper provides the first outline of the history of the Polish Catholic Mission (PCM) in Belgium, focusing on its role in the Polish immigrant community from 1926 to 2023. It examines the transformation of the PCM and its impact on the Polish diaspora, considering the broader context of secularization and social changes. The study utilizes primary sources, interviews, and participant observations to explore the PCM’s influence on community building, cultural preservation, and social capital formation within the Polish immigrant population in Belgium.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

 

BOOK REVIEWS

Full Text (PDF)

Klasszikus és modern republikanizmusok: Eszmetörténeti tanulmányok [Classical and modern republicanisms: Studies in intellectual history]. By Ágoston Nagy and Milán Pap. Reviewed Henrik Hőnich 735
Full Text (PDF)

Die Protokolle des Cisleithanischen Ministerrates 1867–1918. Vols. 1–3. Reviewed Ágnes Deák 740
Full Text (PDF)

Nationalism and Populism: Expressions of Fear or Political Strategies. Edited by Carsten Schapkow and Frank Jacob. Reviewed Oto Luthar 745
Full Text (PDF)

Experimental Cinemas in State Socialist Eastern Europe. Edited by Ksenya Gurshtein and Sonja Simonyi. Reviewed Dina Iordanova 751
Full Text (PDF)

Notes on Contributors
Full Text (HTML)

 

 

Volume 7 Issue 4

Forms of Early Modern Diplomacy

Contents

ARTICLES

Special editors of the thematic bloc: Veronika Novák and András Vadas

Tibor Monostori
The Integration of Bohemian and Hungarian Aristocrats into the Spanish Habsburg System via Diplomatic Encounters, Cultural Exchange, and News Management (1608–1655) 171

Abstract

Abstract

The composite state of the Spanish Habsburgs had a fading military, financial and diplomatic predominance in Central Europe in the first half of the seventeenth century. The Bohemian and Hungarian aristocracy was, to varying extents, integrated into the Spanish Habsburg system. This article presents three forms of integration and diplomatic relationship. First, it examines diplomatic and political encounters in the main governmental bodies and diets advising the emperor in decision-making, or more specifically, in the Imperial Privy Council in Vienna and during the diets of the kingdom of Hungary. Spanish Habsburg politicians and diplomats acted in many powerful ways to establish connections with Bohemian and Hungarian aristocrats so that they follow and adjust to their political agenda. Bohemian families (Slavata, Martiniz) had close relations and alliances with Spanish councilors in Vienna (who acted as ambassadors of the Spanish king), and several Hungarian aristocrats had interactions with them during the diets in order to secure the long-term interests of the dynasty in the Kingdom of Hungary. Second, the exchange, purchase, and influence of cultural goods and objects (e.g., books and gifts) and the ways in which these cultural goods were put to use, as well as the migration of people, show that the relationship went well beyond power politics and formal diplomatic relations. Personal and cultural influence and even early signs of acculturation can be clearly detected in several Bohemian and Hungarian families (e.g., the Forgách, Pázmány, and Zrínyi families), who ordered and read hundreds of books from Spanish Habsburg authors (including several books from Spanish Habsburg diplomats) and cities and exchanged diplomatic gifts with their Spanish counterparts. People, including influential figures (soldiers and nobles), also moved among Habsburg political centers, prompted by diplomatic or family relations between Spanish Habsburg politicians and Bohemian or Hungarian families. Third, information gathered in Vienna radiated to all Spanish Habsburg states in different layers of granularity, density, and confidentiality. Top Spanish diplomats could access and transmit classified documents and the texts of international contracts obtained from Central European aristocrats and events. They also sent thousands of reports to their superiors about general news in Bohemia and Hungary. At the same time, lower-ranking nobles often struggled to keep up with and understand international events and trends and failed to get information about the key results of wars and imperial diets, since they lacked access to the network and the seniority to exert adequate influence.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

János Szabados
“Secret Correspondence” in Habsburg–Ottoman Communication in the First Half of the Seventeenth Century 194

Abstract

Abstract

For the Habsburg Monarchy in the seventeenth century, it was very important to collect, send to Vienna, and evaluate up-to-date information on the Ottoman Empire. Following the Long Turkish War (1591/1593–1606), it was necessary in the 1620s to organize, alongside couriers and other channels of correspondence (e. g. the Venetian post), a cost-effective and sustainable system with which to transmit news and, in part, intelligence. In this essay, I present the historiography of the “institution” known as the “Secret Correspondence” and the history of the organization and reorganizations of the system. I also establish a typology of the people involved in the correspondence, namely 1) letter forwarders, 2) letter forwarders who also wrote secret reports, and
3) spies who wrote secret reports regardless of their location (in this case, the person was more important than the information). In the first half of the seventeenth century (1624 to 1658), the system of “Secret Correspondence” had to be reorganized several times (mostly due to lack of funds). In each case, the main challenge was to find and continuously employ the right people, so the role of the recruiter was also important. The political situation in the abovementioned period had an obvious impact on the functioning of the system, too. My research is based on documents from the Viennese archives (Österreichisches Staatsarchiv, Haus-, Hof-, und Staatsarchiv; Kriegsarchiv, Finanz- und Hofkammerarchiv), which have helped me to offer a more detailed and nuanced understanding of the “Secret Correspondence” than found in the existing secondary literature.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Zsuzsanna Hámori Nagy
A Special Form of Diplomatic Encounter: Negotiations in Constantinople (1625–1626) 224

Abstract

Abstract

In this article, I present a case study of a special form of diplomatic encounter that took place as secret negotiations between the resident ambassadors of France, England, Holland, and Venice and the Transylvanian envoys in Constantinople in 1625–1626 about a prospective alliance between Prince Gábor Bethlen and the anti-Habsburg powers during the Danish phase of the Thirty Years’ War. My analysis of this special form of negotiation offers a comprehensive overview of the practices deriving from the most characteristic circumstances and setbacks of diplomatic activity in Constantinople, i.e., what solutions (if any) were found to resolve problems of precedence, information brokerage, poor economic conditions, and bribery and corruption. I address, furthermore, the private interests of the participating Transylvanian diplomats and consider the extent to which these interests corresponded to the interests of their sending polity and especially of Gábor Bethlen. My discussion sheds light on the ways in which, in general, everyday challenges and networks of relations in Constantinople influenced the diplomacy of small states in the Ottoman orbit, specifically Transylvania in this case, when entering into an alliance with major powers outside the bonds of their Ottoman tributary status.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Gábor Kármán
A Professor as Diplomat: Johann Heinrich Bisterfeld and the Foreign Policy of the Principality of Transylvania, 1638–1643 248

Abstract

Abstract

The paper addresses a unique phenomenon, the prominent role played by Johann Heinrich Bistefeld, a German professor at the academy of Gyulafehérvár Alba Iulia/Weissenburg in the foreign policy of György Rákóczi I, prince of Transylvania during the 1630s and 1640s. Having accepted a mission to Western European courts in 1638–1639, where Bisterfeld’s academic activities served as an excellent camouflage for the professor’s secret diplomatic negotiations, the professor maintained a leading role in keeping contact with the representatives of the Swedish and French Crowns also in the period after his return to the principality. As an “alternative correspondent” to the prince, he proved very useful in creating the treaties of Gyulafehérvár (1643) and Munkács (1645), and he played an outstanding role also in keeping the spirits of the prince high not to give up his plans to join the anti-Habsburg side of the Thirty Years’ War. Building upon the ideas Bisterfeld inherited from his tutor and father-in-law, Johann Heinrich Alsted, the German professor treated his pansophistic ideas and faith in the continuing Reformation as well as his political activities as different parts of the same endeavor as long as Calvinist believers were facing political repression in the Holy Roman Empire.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Claudia Curcuruto
The Instrumentalization of Courtly Privacy in the Context of the Wedding Celebrations of Emperor Leopold I in 1676 279

Abstract

Abstract

According to the wishes of Pope Innocent XI Odescalchi and his representative at the imperial court, Francesco Buonvisi (1675–1689), Leopold I married the candidate they favored: Eleonora Magdalena of Palatinate-Neuburg. The emperor’s third wedding and the subsequent wedding festivities were held in Passau on December 14, 1676 in an absolutely private manner and without the intervention of the secular diplomats or the apostolic nuncio. The private staging of the sposalizio contrasts not only with the norms of the traditions of the imperial court with regards to ceremony, but also with the public staging of the emperor’s two previous weddings. Against this background, this article considers the possible functions that can be attributed to the private in this context and how the preferential treatment of the house of “Pfalz-Neuburg” can be interpreted in relation to the ceremonial norms of the imperial court. In this regard, the nunciature’s correspondence and their manifold interconnections thus represent essential sources which shed light on the mechanisms of “privacy” in diplomacy, as well as the shifting importance and meanings of the ceremonial norms of the imperial court.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

Katalin Schrek
Changes in the Diplomatic Measures of the Russian Empire in the Balkans after the Treaty of Kuchuk Kainardji (1774) 310

Abstract

Abstract

In the last third of the eighteenth century, the foreign policy of the Russian Empire was oriented towards the Ottoman Empire and, as part of it, towards the Balkans and the Black Sea region. The aspirations of Russian foreign policy under Catherine II were shaped not only by the weakening of the government in Constantinople and the acquisition of new territories, but also by the creation of Russian economic, cultural, and political presence in southeastern Europe. The creation of official diplomatic representations was one of the main tools used by Russia to establish its presence in the Balkans.
The establishment of permanent embassies and the creation of the necessary political and infrastructural background became a decisive segment in the development of European diplomacy from the Peace of Westphalia to the Napoleonic Wars. The steps taken by the government in St. Petersburg with the creation of permanent embassies in the leading European courts were in line with the abovementioned trend, but while this kind of “catching up” process gradually moved towards Central and Western Europe, Russia applied a completely different set of conditions to maintain diplomatic relations in the case of the Ottoman Empire. Ottoman diplomacy operated as a “one-sided diplomatic relation”: there were permanent Russian envoys at the Constantinople court, but no representatives were delegated by the Porte to St. Petersburg. Russia had to adapt to this special situation in the eighteenth century. This closed system was broken by the Treaty of Kuchuk Kainardji, which closed the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774 and included a clause according to which Russia had the right to establish consulates in the Ottoman Empire and thus in the Balkans, a key area.
The other key element of the Treaty of Kuchuk Kainardji was the right of the reigning Russian tsar to be the protector of Christians in the Ottoman Empire, which was also fixed in this agreement. The “authority” acquired at this time was not unprecedented, as the Porte had acceded to such requests in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries through capitulations with other states (such as France, Austria, or the Venetian Republic), thus establishing the “protégé” system. At the same time, the Russian government took the protection of Christians under the jurisdiction of the Porte to a new level and made it an integral part of its foreign policy. In my study, I examine how the Russian Empire applied the results of the Peace of Kuchuk Kainardji to diplomatic advocacy in the Balkans.
Full Text (HTML) and Full Text (PDF)

BOOK REVIEWS

Ringen um den einen Gott. Eine politische Geschichte des Antitrinitarismus in Siebenbürgen im 16. Jahrhundert. By Edit Szegedi. Reviewed Réka Újlaki-Nagy 339
Full Text (PDF)

Rendi ellenzék és kormánypárt az 1751. évi országgyűlésen [The opposition and the governing party at the 1751 Diet]. By János Nagy. Reviewed Henrik Hőnich 344
Full Text (PDF)

Remarriage and Stepfamilies in East Central Europe, 1600–1900. Edited by Gabriella Erdélyi and András Péter Szabó. Reviewed Gábor Koloh 348
Full Text (PDF)

Making Sense of Dictatorship: Domination and Everyday Life in East Central Europe after 1945. Edited by Celia Donert, Ana Kladnik, and Martin Sabrow. Reviewed Heléna Huhák 352
Full Text (PDF)

A történeti tudás [Historical knowledge]. By Gábor Gyáni. Reviewed Tamás Kisantal 356
Full Text (PDF)

Notes on Contributors
Full Text (HTML)

 

 

More Articles ...

  1. Volume 12 Issue 1 2023
  2. Volume 11 Issue 4 2022
  3. Volume 11 Issue 3 2022
  4. Volume 11 Issue 2 2022
  5. Volume 11 Issue 1 2022
  6. Volume 10 Issue 4 2021