SIGURNOSNA SITUACIJA U HERCEGOVAČKOM SANDŽAKU TOKOM PRVE POLOVINE XVII STOLJEĆA

Author(s): Fuad Ohranović / Language(s): Bosnian Issue: 64/2015

This article provides information and overview of the security situation in the Sancak of the Herzegovina during the first half of 17th century. The paper provides data about the general situation in the Herzegovina during the period. Attention is paid to the Hayduk and Uskok raids which took place in the territory of the Herzegovina and wider as well as to the dangers encountered along the Herzegovinian roads. Also, the diplomatic tensions, criminal deeds and border conflicts between Dubrovnik and the Herzegovina. Last but not least, function of the information collecting services is touched upon as well as the character of information they used to collect.

Un oportunist la curtea domnilor Moldovei – Panaiotache Morona

Author(s): Mihai-Bogdan Atanasiu / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 61/2015

Travelling from south of the Danube with trading affairs in the second half of the 17th century, Panaiotache Morona, like many others like him, sought to make a living in the Principality east of the Carpathians. After two marriages with the daughters of boyars, he entered the vast kinship network of the Moldavian elite, with whom he stayed for better or worse, being involved in all the events of the time. Relations with Constantinople and his Greek and Turkish language skills helped Panaiotache to advance to the office of Great Chamberlain (”mare postelic”), thus taking advantage of every opportunity to achieve his goals. He plotted, wandered, betrayed his Lord and his relatives, he was confidant of some princes, but also felt the thrill of prison, where he perished being strangled at the command of prince Mihai Racoviţă.

Határvédelem, finanszírozás, protestantizmus. A belső-ausztriai és a magyar rendek vitája, 1606–1610

Author(s): Gábor Kármán / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 3/2023

The Peace of Vienna concluded in 1606 between the rebellious Hungarian estates and their king, Rudolph of Habsburg, stipulated that fortifications in the country should be commanded by the country’s inhabitants. This article motivated a series of negotiations between the representatives of the Hungarian estates and the Inner Austrian ones in 1608 and 1609. The peculiarity of the situation was that since 1578 the line of fortifications in Slavonia and Croatia were exclusively financed by the Inner Austrian estates, and the military officers from the region also came from the region. During the debate, which was exacerbated by the recent memory of the Hungarian raids into Styria in 1605, during the Bocskai uprising, the Inner Austrian party threatened to abandon the arrangement altogether and eventually reached the implicit acceptance of the status quo. The paper analyses the argumentation strategies of both parties and calls attention to the fact that this debate may have been the primary reason why, contrary to other Habsburg territories, the Inner Austrians could not enlist Hungarian support in their quest against their ruler’s strict re-Catholisation policies.

Felszabadítás vagy megszállás? Katonai, pénzügyi és polgári igazgatás a visszafoglalt Magyarországon a nagy török háború idején (1683–1699)

Author(s): Géza Pálffy / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 3/2023

Due to European diplomatic and military cooperation, the Great Turkish War, lasting from 1683 to 1699, resulted in the nearly complete recapture of Hungary from Ottoman rule. Only Banat remained in Ottoman hands until 1718. Although the events of the long war are known in detail, little research has been dedicated to what hardships and conflicts the recaptured territories encountered during the organisation of the military and financial, followed by the civil and ecclesiastical administration. The present study aims to focus on these issues by synthesising the research results of the past decades. It presents the challenges of the reconstruction that began during the war, as well as the conflicts among the military, financial, and civil authorities. During the Great Turkish War, the fate of Hungary was determined primarily by the interests of the Habsburg standing army, the Aulic Chamber (Hofkammer), and the Viennese court. This was also reflected by the fact that Leopold I convened the Hungarian diet only once, at the end of 1687. During the war, the Hungarian political elite, therefore, had very little say in the shaping of events and the new administration of the country. For this reason, the revival of civil and ecclesiastical institutions could only commence very slowly and in the face of great difficulties in the liberated areas, which were under close control from military and financial aspects. Consequently, a part of the country’s population often regarded the liberation as occupation by the imperial generals, war commissioners, and chamber officials, and even as a series of devastations caused by the Habsburg forces. The recapture of the historical state of Hungary was, therefore, not without fierce political, social, and religious debates. Paradoxically enough, the Great Turkish War fundamentally contributed to the outbreak of the first independence movement in the history of Hungary, the War of Independence (1703–1711) led by Francis II Rákóczi.

A Habsburg-ház és a Vasa-dinasztia kapcsolatai a 17. század középső harmadában

Author(s): Tibor Martí / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 3/2022

Conde Pazos, Miguel: La quiebra de un modelo dinástico. Relaciones entre la Casa de Austria y los Vasa de Polonia (1635–1668). Madrid, Polifemo, 2022. 661 p. (La Corte en Europa, 22.)

A pénzügyi válság előszele. Az 1613. évi 28. törvénycikk nyomában

Author(s): János Buza / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2023

The “counterfeit coins” according to Article 28 of Law 1613 were not Polish or Transylvanian coins, but low-quality 3 denier and groat of 1/24th of a taler issued in the German-Roman Empire. Colloquially known as “white groat”, the notes had already caused disturbances in circulation in 1612 and 1613 and were the precursor of the great coinage debacle of the 1620s.

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

Author(s): Tibor Monostori / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

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.

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

Author(s): János Szabados / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

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.

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

Author(s): Claudia Curcuruto / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

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.

Egy kimagasló szervitori karrier. Id. felsőkáldi Káldy Ferenc Batthyány I. Ádám szolgálatában

Author(s): Máté Balogh / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2023

This study aims to examine the details of the relationship between Ferenc Káldy Sr of Felsőkáld, a nobleman from Western Transdanubia, and his overlord, Ádám I. Batthyány. Káldy had significant wealth from a young age, and he was active in the public life of Vas county throughout his whole life. Some of his significant career achievements include becoming the vice captain of Pápa, being the commander of the private army of the Batthyány family from 1634, and serving as the vice captain of the Transdanubian district from 1637. He couldn’t have achieved these positions and influence, however, without the support of the Batthyány family. Ferenc Káldy’s success can largely be attributed to his prominent role in the Batthyány court, as well as his exceptional professional skills. Many of his letters are still accessible today, which gives us the opportunity not just to study this relationship between overlord and confidante, which had an important societal function at the time, but we could also learn new information about the organization and leadership of the private armies of the nobility. Ádám I. Batthyány appreciated his servitor, Káldy’s service yielded significant financial gain and security for him. At the time of his death on 29 May 1648 the most successful member of the Káldy family of Felsőkáld was close to ascending to high nobility, in terms of both wealth and political influence. While his career was somewhat atypical considering the positions he held, it can still be concluded that for nobles with medium holdings, the path to political and financial success usually leads through the court of a magnate.

„…fő nélkül csak egy nap sem jó volna azt a földet hadni”. A felső-magyarországi főkapitányi tisztség hatásköre Homonnai Drugeth János főkapitány példáján keresztül

Author(s): Zoltán Borbély / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2023

The military defence of the northeastern part of the country, known at the time as Upper Hungary, was operated in the 17th century through the system of captaincies under the Hofkriegsrat (Imperial War Council). This region was not only threatened by constant Ottoman raids, but also by the growing ambitions of the princes of Transylvania, which were often supported by the gentry class of the area. At the same time the political significance of counties had grown significantly, as well as the power of the wealthy gentry, who just started finding their political identity. Therefore the position of the captain-general of Upper Hungary was always a role where finding a balance between the goals of the monarch and the interests of the county nobles was a primary political consideration, unlike in the captaincies of the western part of the country. At the same time the military defence system also had to be maintained, and only after addressing all these issues could the captain-general try to realise his own ambitions, or improve the status of his family. This essay analyses János Drugeth de Homonna’s tenure as captai-general to showcase the unique characteristics of the captaincy of Upper Hungary.

Kanizsától Olmützig. Magyar végvári alakulatok a harmincéves háború birodalmi hadszínterein (1642)

Author(s): Ferenc Végh / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2023

The incursion of the Swedish army into Moravia in 1642 caught the Habsburg leadership by surprise, and they did everything they could to bolster the numbers of their fighting forces, including the deployment of irregulars recruited from Hungary and Croatia. Until now it hasn’t been common knowledge that by the advice of palatine Miklós Esterházy a thousand soldiers were transferred from the frontier regions of Lower Hungary, Győr and Kanizsa to the imperial theatre. From the region of Kanizsa 219 soldiers accepted foreign deployment for a three month period. It is exceptionally lucky that the whole list of the group’s members remained, and the broader context and circumstances of the foundation of this unit could also be reconstructed fairly well. One company of this contingent participated in the blockade of Olmütz (Olomouc, CZ), a city seized by Swedish forces in the early summer. Interestingly István Svatics, the captain of the Zala castle, who led the group recruited from the forts near Kanizsa, wrote two field reports about the deployment in Hungarian that can still be read today, giving us information about the unit’s involvement in the war. From these reports we can learn so far unknown details about the blockade fights in Olmütz, specifically about the involvement of the Hungarian units, as well as the characteristics and tasks of these groups.

Egy fiatal főúr helykeresése a magyar arisztokrácia köreiben. Zrínyi Ádám küzdelme a muraközi és légrádi kapitányi cím elnyeréséért két 1687 nyarán Batthyány II. Kristófhoz írt levele tükrében

Author(s): Iván Márk Erdei / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2023

Radonay Mátyás zalavári apát és kapitány, Pécs öntörvényű püspöke

Author(s): Gábor Szebenyi / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2023

Sárkányok a Kanizsával szembeni végvidéken. Katonai karriertörténetek vázlata a 17. századból

Author(s): Bence Gonda / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2023

On the Legal and Governmental History of the Principality of Transylvania

Author(s): Teréz Oborni / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2024

The Union of the Estates in the Principality of Transylvania: The Basis of the Constitution

Author(s): Teréz Oborni / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2024

The paper briefly describes the basis of the constitution of the Principality of Transylvania, the union of Estates. Among the antecedents, it reviews the late medieval alliances of the Estates that were made by the nations (nationes) living in Transylvania, highlighting that the three ‘political nations’ were not nations or ethnicities in the modern sense, but rather were separated by their privileges and legal status. Based on Latin and Hungarian sources, the author reveals the covenants as renewed in the Articles of Law and emphasized that the concept of Union was broadened in the seventeenth century so that it no longer served only to support the unity of the state but also guaranteed the maintenance of the privileges of the Estates. The most precise interpretation of the Union was set out in the Approbatae Constitutiones, a collection of laws compiled in 1653.

Report on the Government of Transylvania, 1604: Notes on the Operation of the Provisional Habsburg Government Bodies

Author(s): Petra Mátyás-Rausch / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2024

In the summer of 1604, the Transylvanian Council of Government, which had been formed shortly before, submitted a longer report to King Rudolf I of Hungary. They reported on the administration and financial situation of the newly pacified province of Transylvania. The most pressing issue, however, was the pay and maintenance of the mercenary corps stationed in Transylvania. Accordingly, the bulk of the report is devoted to discussing problems relating to the army. The report gives us an idea of how a Council of Government (Regiment) that had already been ‘tried and tested’ in the Austrian hereditary provinces functioned in Transylvania, and introduces the challenges members of the Council had to face.

Jezsuiták Nyugat-Magyarországon a 17. században. A pozsonyi, győri és soproni kollégiumok [Jesuits in Western Hungary in the Seventeenth Century. The Colleges of Pressburg (Bratislava), Győr and Sopron]. By Zsófia Kádár.

Author(s): László Pilikta / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2023

Jezsuiták Nyugat-Magyarországon a 17. században. A pozsonyi, győri és soproni kollégiumok [Jesuits in Western Hungary in the Seventeenth Century. The Colleges of Pressburg (Bratislava), Győr and Sopron]. By Zsófia Kádár. Budapest: Bölcsészettudományi Kutatóközpont Történettudományi Intézet, 2020. 475 pp.

Moszkóvia rövid története

Author(s): Erzsébet Stróbl / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 2/2024

Milton, John: Moszkóvia rövid története. Ford. Péti Miklós. Bp., L’Harmattan Kiadó, 2024. 160 p.