This enjoyable history appealed to my longstanding interest in the lands of the Hapsburgs. Years ago, I read a book praising the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the proverbial 'old man of Europe'. The premise was simply stated: the multicultural, multi-lingual lands of central and eastern Europe were helluva lot better off in the 19th century than they were in the 20th.
This book goes much further into the past than the 19th century. The story starts in the lands lost by the Roman Empire to the invaders from the east in the 5th century. They were later occupied by Germans, Czechs, Moravians, Slovakians, Russians, Ukrainians, Poles, Bulgars, Lithuanians, Serbs, Croats and Maygars. The Hapsburg name first appears in 1273 when Rudolf I was elected Holy Roman Emperor. And from 1440 on, only Hapsburgs would hold that title. Some ruled capably; many did not. Charles V, through a series of deaths, dynastic marriages and outright flukes, wound up in the 16th century as King of Spain, ruler of much of America and the Holy Roman Emperor. He held sway over more of the world than anyone ever had. Charles eventually ceded the eastern lands and the title of emperor to his brother, Ferdinand I. During Ferdinand's reign, the first great clashes between Christianity and the Muslim Ottomans took place in the Balkans and Hungary. "The frontier zone that marked the border between the Hapsburg lands and the Ottoman Empire was a shifting, frightening reality from the fifteenth century to the end of the eighteenth." The last great Ottoman attempt at Vienna was in 1683. It came perilously close to succeeding.
After their defeat at Vienna, the Ottomans slowly gave way, and land they had occupied came under the Hapsburg flag. What had been northern, Alpine, Catholic and German now incorporated Protestant Hungary, Romania and the Slavic north Balkans - a virtual hodge podge of ethnic tensions. As the process unwound, the people of these newly claimed lands had nothing in common with their rulers. Thus, the retreat of the Ottomans brought no relief to Vienna. The latter half of the 18th century saw very capable rule by Maria Theresa and her son, Joseph II. Joseph, in particular, modernized the state and lifted most of the legal, cultural and social restrictions that had been placed on the realm's Jews. Joseph died in 1790 and within a decade-and-a half (1806), the Holy Roman Empire was kaput. "The enterprising young Napoleon made waking up in Vienna and reaching for a newspaper something to be dreaded." Between the battles of Austerlitz and Wagram and his making the Hapsburg princess, Marie Louise, his wife, Napoleon dismantled the Empire and humiliated the Hapsburgs. But, as the author points out, surviving was the core Hapsburg competency. With the Holy Roman Empire gone, they declared Austria an Empire, survived Napoleon and helped rewrite the ground rules for the post-war era at the Congress of,where else - Vienna.
The year 1848 was a watershed one on the continent. Revolution broke out in Paris, Prague, Berlin, Vienna, Budapest and many smaller cities. The forces of suppression prevailed, but the genie had been let out of the bottle. People were returned to their status as 'subjects' but had begun to think of themselves as 'citizens' of possible nations. Natural rights were on everyone's tongue. Soon language was seen as a vehicle to nationhood. If there was anyplace where that would not work it was the Austrian Empire, where the teenaged Franz Joseph ascended the throne he would occupy for sixty-eight years. German, Italian and Romanian unification all followed and nibbled at Austria's territories. The Austro-Hungarian Empire emerged. "The two halves of the Empire carried on in parallel, held together by Franz Joseph's startling longevity. Both halves boomed..." To the south lay the unhappy Balkans, the collapsing Ottomans and the intrusive Russians. What the author calls a "forcefield of nationalism'"created a slow motion disaster for the Empire, which during a century or so first threatened and then destroyed it."
The beginning of the end of course came for the Hapsburgs when Europe spun out of control in August, 1914. Ironically, the 1917 collapse of Russia placed the Empire in a relatively safe and secure strategic position. It was too little too late for the Empire's many, many nationalities. "The Empire ended and its subjects looked out onto a new and - as it would prove - terrible world. Almost everyone in the old Empire seems to have taken turns to be destroyed by one aspect of the twentieth century or another."
These types of unstructured histories can be trying to read. but they do have their many hidden gems. After all, I've just learned that the Baron von Trapp was part of the Empire's four ship navy that went to China to help put down the Boxer Rebellion. As is the case with traditional structured, even academic histories, I enjoy trying to find out how Europe imploded in the 20th century and this book helps in that pursuit.
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