History for ready reference, Volume 1, A-Elba

by J. N. Larned

had the fear of dishonour always present to them, and who,
if ever they failed in an enterprize, would not allow their
virtues to be lost to their country, but freely gave their
lives to her as the fairest offering which they could
present at her feast. The sacrifice which they collectively
made was individually repaid to them; for they received
again each one for himself a praise which grows not old,
and the noblest of all sepulchres--I speak not of that in
which their remains are laid, but of that in which their
glory survives, and is proclaimed always and on every
fitting occasion both in word and deed. For the whole earth
is the sepulchre of famous men; not only are they
commemorated by columns and inscriptions in their own
country, but in foreign lands there dwells also an
unwritten memorial of them, graven not on stone but in the
hearts of men. Make them your examples, and esteeming
courage to be freedom and freedom to be happiness, do not
weigh too nicely the perils of war. The unfortunate who has
no hope of a change for the better has less reason to throw
away his life than the prosperous who, if he survive, is
always liable to a change for the worse, and to whom any
accidental fall makes the most serious difference. To a man
of spirit, cowardice and disaster coming together are far
more bitter than death striking him unperceived at a time
when he is full of courage and animated by the general
hope. Wherefore I do not now commiserate the parents of the
dead who stand here; I would rather comfort them. You know
that your life has been passed amid manifold vicissitudes;
and that they may be deemed fortunate who have gained most
honour, whether an honourable death like theirs, or an
honourable sorrow like yours, and whose days have been so
ordered that the term of their happiness is likewise the
term of their life. I know how hard it is to make you feel
this, when the good fortune of others will too often remind
you of the gladness which once lightened your hearts. And
sorrow is felt at the want of those blessings, not which a
man never knew, but which were a part of his life before
they were taken from him. Some of you are of an age at
which they may hope to have other children, and they ought
to bear their sorrow better; not only will the children who
may hereafter be born make them forget their own lost ones,
but the city will be doubly a gainer. She will not be left
desolate, and she will be safer. For a man's counsel cannot
have equal weight or worth, when he alone has no children
to risk in the general danger. To those of you who have
passed their prime I say: "Congratulate yourselves that you
have been happy during the greater part of those days;
remember that your life of sorrow will not last long, and
be comforted by the glory of those who are gone. For the
love of honour alone is ever young, and not riches, as some
say, but honour is the delight of men when they are old and
useless." To you who are the sons and brothers of the
departed, I see that the struggle to emulate them will be
an arduous one. For all men praise the dead, and, however
pre-eminent your virtue may be, hardly will you be thought,
I do not say to equal, but even to approach them. The
living have their rivals and detractors, but when a man is
out of the way, the honour and good-will which he receives
is unalloyed. And, if I am to speak of womanly virtues to
those of you who will henceforth be widows, let me sum them
up in one short admonition: To a woman not to show more
weakness than is natural to her sex is a great glory, and
not to be talked about for good or for evil among men. I
have paid the required tribute, in obedience to the law,
making use of such fitting words as I had. The tribute of
deeds has been paid in part; for the dead have been
honourably interred, and it remains only that their
children should be maintained at the public charge until
they are grown up: this is the solid prize with which, as
with a garland, Athens crowns her sons living and dead,
after a struggle like theirs. For where the rewards of
virtue are greatest, there the noblest citizens are
enlisted in the service of the state. And now, when you
have duly lamented, everyone his own dead, you may depart.'
Such was the order of the funeral celebrated in this winter,
with the end of which ended the first year of the
Peloponnesian War."
Thucydides, History, translated by B. Jowett,
volume 1, book 2, section 34-47.
{171}
ATHENS: B. C. 130-429.
The Plague in the city.
Death of Pericles.
Capture of Potidæa.
"As soon as the summer returned [B. C. 430] the Peloponnesians
... invaded Attica, where they established themselves and
ravaged the country. They had not been there many days when
the plague broke out at Athens for the first time. ... The
disease is said to have begun south of Egypt in Æthiopia;
thence it descended into Egypt and Libya, and after spreading
over the greater part of the Persian Empire, suddenly fell
upon Athens. It first attacked the inhabitants of the Piæeus,
and it was supposed that the Peloponnesians had poisoned the
cisterns, no conduits having as yet been made there. It
afterwards reached the upper city, and then the mortality
became far greater. As to its probable origin or the causes
which might or could have produced such a disturbance of
nature, every man, whether a physician or not, will give his
own opinion. But I shall describe its actual course, and the
symptoms by which anyone who knows them beforehand may
recognize the disorder should it ever reappear. For I was
myself attacked, and witnessed the sufferings of others. The
season was admitted to have been remarkably free from ordinary
sickness; and if anybody was already ill of any other disease,
it was absorbed in this. Many who were in perfect health, all
in a moment, and without any apparent reason, were seized with
violent heats in the head and with redness and inflammation of
the eyes. Internally the throat and tongue were quickly
suffused with blood and the breath became unnatural and fetid.
There followed sneezing and hoarseness; in a short time the
disorder, accompanied by a violent cough, reached the chest;
then fastening lower down, it would move the stomach and bring
on all the vomits of bile to which physicians have ever given
names; and they were very distressing. ... The body externally
was not so very hot to the touch, nor yet pale; it was a livid
colour inclining to red, and breaking out in pustules and
ulcers. But the internal fever was intense. ... The disorder
which had originally settled in the head passed gradually
through the whole body, and, if a person got over the worst,
would often seize the extremities and leave its mark,
attacking the privy parts and the fingers and toes; and some
escaped with the loss of these, some with the loss of their
eyes. ... The crowding of the people out of the country into
the city aggravated the misery; and the newly-arrived suffered
most. ... The mortality among them was dreadful and they
perished in wild disorder. The dead lay as they had died, one
upon another, while others hardly alive wallowed in the
streets and crawled about every fountain craving for water.
The temples in which they lodged were full of the corpses of
those who died in them; for the violence of the calamity was
such that men, not knowing where to turn, grew reckless of all
law, human and divine. ... The pleasure of the moment and any
sort of thing which conduced to it took the place both of
honour and of expediency. No fear of God or law of man
deterred a criminal." Terrified by the plague, when they
learned of it, the Peloponnesians retreated from Attica, after
ravaging it for forty days; but, in the meantime, their own
coasts had been ravaged, as before, by the Athenian fleet. And
now, being once more relieved from the presence of the enemy,
though still grievously afflicted by the plague, the Athenians
turned upon Pericles with complaints and reproaches, and
imposed a fine upon him. They also sent envoys to Sparta, with
peace proposals which received no encouragement. But Pericles
spoke calmly and wisely to the people, and they acknowledged
their sense of dependence upon him by re-electing him general
and committing again "all their affairs to his charge." But he
was stricken next year with the plague, and, lingering for
some weeks in broken health, he died in the summer of 429 B.
C. By his death the republic was given over to striving
demagogues and factions, at just the time when a capable brain
and hand were needed in its government most. The war went on,
acquiring more ferocity of temper with every campaign. It was
especially embittered in the course of the second summer by
the execution, at Athens, of several Lacedaemonian envoys who
were captured while on their way to solicit help from the
Persian king. One of these unfortunate envoys was Aristeus,
who had organized the defence of Potidaea. That city was still
holding out against the Athenians, who blockaded it obstinately,
although their troops suffered frightfully from the plague.
But in the winter of 430-429 B. C. they succumbed to
starvation and surrendered their town, being permitted to
depart in search of a new home. Potidaea was then peopled
anew, with colonists.
Thucydides, History,
translated by Jowett, book 2, section 8-70.
ALSO IN:
E. Abbott, Pericles and the Golden Age of Athens,
chapter 13-15.
W. W. Lloyd, The Age of Pericles, chapter 64 (volume 2).
L. Whibley, Political Parties in Athens during the
Peloponnesian War.
W. Wachsmuth, History Antiquities of the Greeks,
sections 62-64 (volume 2).
ATHENS: B. C. 429-421.
After Pericles.
The rise of the Demagogues.
"When Pericles rose to power it would have been possible to
frame a Pan-Hellenic union, in which Sparta and Athens would
have been the leading states; and such a dualism would have
been the best guarantee for the rights of the smaller cities.
When he died there was no policy left but war with Sparta, and
conquest in the West. And not only so, but there was no
politician who could adjust the relations of domestic war and
foreign conquest. The Athenians passed from one to the other,
as they were addressed by Cleon or Alcibiades. We cannot
wonder that the men who lived in those days of trouble spoke
bitterly of Pericles, holding him accountable for the miseries
which fell upon Athens. Other statesmen had bequeathed good
laws, as Solon and Clisthenes, or the memory of great
achievements, as Themistocles or Cimon, but the only changes
which Pericles had introduced were thought, not without
reason, to be changes for the worse; and he left his country
involved in a ruinous war.".
E. Abbott, Pericles and the Golden Age of Athens,
pages 362-363.
{172}
"The moral change which had ... befallen the Attic community
had, it is true, even during the lifetime of Pericles,
manifested itself by means of sufficiently clear premonitory
signs; but Pericles had, notwithstanding, up to the days of
his last illness, remained the centre of the state; the people
had again and again returned to him, and by subordinating
themselves to the personal authority of Pericles had succeeded
in recovering the demeanor which befitted them. But now the
voice was hushed, which had been able to sway the unruly
citizens, even against their will. No other authority was in
existence--no aristocracy, no official class, no board of
experienced statesmen--nothing, in fact, to which the citizens
might have looked for guidance and control. The multitude had
recovered absolute independence, and in proportion as, in the
interval, readiness of speech and sophistic versatility had
spread in Athens, the number had increased of those who now
put themselves forward as popular speakers and leaders. But
as, among all these, none was capable of leading the multitude
after the fashion of Pericles, another method of leading the
people, another kind of demagogy, sprung into existence.
Pericles stood above the multitude. ... His successors were
obliged to adopt other means; in order to acquire influence,
they took advantage not so much of the strong as of the weak
points in the character of the citizens, and achieved
popularity by flattering their inclinations, and endeavoring
to satisfy the cravings of their baser nature. ... Now for the
first time, men belonging to the lower class of citizens
thrust themselves forward to play a part in politics,--men of
the trading and artisan class, the culture and wealth of which
had so vigorously increased at Athens. ... The office of
general frequently became a post of martyrdom; and the bravest
men felt that the prospect of being called to account as to
their campaigns by cowardly demagogues, before a capricious
multitude, disturbed the straightforward joyousness of their
activity, and threw obstacles in the way of their successes.
... On the orators' tribune the contrast was more striking.
Here the first prominent successor of Pericles was a certain
Eucrates, a rude and uneducated man, who was ridiculed on the
comic stage as the 'boar' or 'bear of Melite' (the name of the
district to which he belonged), a dealer in tow and
mill-owner, who only for a short space of time took the lead
in the popular assembly. His place was taken by Lysicles, who
had acquired wealth by the cattle-trade. ... It was not until
after Lysicles, that the demagogues attained to power who had
first made themselves a name by their opposition against
Pericles, and, among them, Cleon was the first who was able to
maintain his authority for a longer period of time; so that it
is in his proceedings during the ensuing years of the war that
the whole character of the new demagogy first thoroughly
manifests itself."
E. Curtius, History of Greece, volume 3, chapter 2.
"The characters of the military commander and the political
leader were gradually separated. The first germs of this
division we find in the days of Kimôn and Periklês. Kimôn was
no mean politician; but his real genius clearly called him to
warfare with the Barbarian. Periklês was an able and
successful general; but in him the military character was
quite subordinate to that of the political leader. It was a
wise compromise which entrusted Kimôn with the defence of the
state abroad and Periklês with its management at home. After
Periklês the separation widened. We nowhere hear of
Dêmosthenes and Phormiôn as political leaders; and even in
Nikias the political is subordinate to the military character.
Kleôn, on the other hand, was a politician but not a soldier.
But the old notion of combining military and political
position was not quite lost. It was still deemed that he who
proposed a warlike expedition should himself, if it were
needful, be able to conduct it. Kleôn in an evil hour was
tempted to take on himself military functions; he was forced
into command against Sphaktêria; by the able and loyal help of
Dêmosthenês he acquitted himself with honour. But his head was
turned by success; he aspired to independent command; he
measured himself against the mighty Brasidas; and the fatal
battle of Amphipolis was the result. It now became clear that
the Demagogue and the General must commonly be two distinct
persons. The versatile genius of Alkibiadês again united the
two characters; but he left no successor. ... A Demagogue then
was simply an influential speaker of popular politics.
Dêmosthenês is commonly distinguished as an orator, while
Kleôn is branded as a Demagogue; but the position of the one
was the same as the position of the other. The only question
is as to the wisdom and honesty of the advice given either by
Kleôn or by Dêmosthenês."
E. A. Freeman, Historical Essays, 2d ser.,
pages 138-140.
ATHENS: B. C. 429-427.
Fate of Platæa.
Phormio's Victories.
Revolt of Lesbos.
Siege of Mitylene.
Cleon's bloody decree and its reversal.
See GREECE: B. C. 429-427.
ATHENS: B. C. 425.
Seizure of Pylus by Demosthenes, the general.
Spartans entrapped and captured at Sphacteria.
Peace pleaded for and refused.
See GREECE: B. C. 425.
ATHENS: B. C. 424-406.
Socrates as soldier and citizen.
The trial of the Generals.
"Socrates was born very shortly before the year 469 B. C. His
father, Sophroniscus, was a sculptor, his mother, Phænarete, a
midwife. Nothing definite is known of his moral and
intellectual development. There is no specific record of him
at all until he served at the siege of Potidæa (432 B. C.-429
B. C.) when he was nearly forty years old. All that we can say
is that his youth and manhood were passed in the most splendid
period of Athenian or Greek history. ... As a boy he received the
usual Athenian liberal education, in music and gymnastic, an
education, that is to say, mental and physical. He was fond of
quoting from the existing Greek literature, and he seems to
have been familiar with it, especially with Homer. He is
represented by Xenophon as repeating Prodieus' fable of the
choice of Heracles at length. He says that he was in the habit
of studying with his friends 'the treasures which the wise men
of old have left us in their books:' collections, that is, of
the short and pithy sayings of the seven sages, such as 'know
thyself'; a saying, it may be noticed, which lay at the root
of his whole teaching. And he had some knowledge of
mathematics, and of science, as it existed in those days. He
understood something of astronomy and of advanced geometry;
and he was acquainted with certain, at any rate, of the
theories of his predecessors in philosophy, the Physical or
Cosmical philosophers, such as Heraclitus and Parmenides, and,
especially, with those of Anaxagoras.
{173}
But there is no trustworthy evidence which enables us to go
beyond the bare fact that he had such knowledge. ... All then
that we can say of the first forty years of Socrates' life
consists of general statements like these. During these years
there is no specific record of him. Between 432 B. C. and 429
B. C. he served as a common soldier at the siege of Potidæa,
an Athenian dependency which had revolted, and surpassed
everyone in his powers of enduring hunger, thirst, and cold,
and all the hardships of a severe Thracian winter. At this
siege we hear of him for the first time in connection with
Alcibiades, whose life he saved in a skirmish, and to whom he
eagerly relinquished the prize of valour. In 431 B. C. the
Peloponnesian War broke out, and in 424 B. C. the Athenians
were disastrously defeated and routed by the Thebans at the
battle of Delium. Socrates and Laches were among the few who
did not yield to panic. They retreated together steadily, and
the resolute bearing of Socrates was conspicuous to friend and
foe alike. Had all the Athenians behaved as he did, says
Laches, in the dialogue of that name, the defeat would have
been a victory. Socrates fought bravely a third time at the
battle of Amphipolis [422 B. C.] against the Peloponnesian
forces, in which the commanders on both sides, Cleon and
Brasidas, were killed: but there is no record of his specific
services on that occasion. About the same time that Socrates
was displaying conspicuous courage in the cause of Athens at
Delium and Amphipolis, Aristophanes was holding him up to
hatred, contempt, and ridicule in the comedy of the Clouds
[13. C. 423]. ... The Clouds is his protest against the
immorality of free thought and the Sophists. He chose Socrates
for his central figure, chiefly, no doubt, on account of
Socrates' well-known and strange personal appearance. The
grotesque ugliness, and flat nose, and prominent eyes, and
Silenus-like face, and shabby dress, might be seen every day
in the streets, and were familiar to every Athenian.
Aristophanes cared little--probably he did not take the
trouble to find out--that Socrates' whole life was spent in
fighting against the Sophists. It was enough for him that
Socrates did not accept the traditional beliefs, and was a
good centre-piece for a comedy. ... The Clouds, it is needless
to say, is a gross and absurd libel from beginning to end: but
Aristophanes hit the popular conception. The charges which he
made in 423 B. C. stuck to Socrates to the end of his life.
They are exactly the charges made by popular prejudice,
against which Socrates defends himself in the first ten
chapters of the Apology, and which he says have been so long
'in the air.' He formulates them as follows: 'Socrates is an
evil doer who busies himself with investigating things beneath
the earth and in the sky, and who makes the worse appear the
better reason, and who teaches others these same things.' ...
For sixteen years after the battle of Amphipolis we hear
nothing of Socrates. The next events in his life, of which
there is a specific record, are those narrated by himself in
the twentieth chapter of the Apology. They illustrate, as he
meant them to illustrate, his invincible moral courage. ... In
406 B. C. the Athenian fleet defeated the Lacedæmonians at the
battle of Arginusæ, so called from some small islands off the
south-east point of Lesbos. After the battle the Athenian
commanders omitted to recover the bodies of their dead, and to
save the living from off their disabled enemies. The Athenians
at home, on hearing of this, were furious. The due performance
of funeral rites was a very sacred duty with the Greeks; and
many citizens mourned for friends and relatives who had been
left to drown. The commanders were immediately recalled, and
an assembly was held in which they were accused of neglect of
duty. They defended themselves by saying that they had ordered
certain inferior officers (amongst others, their accuser
Theramenes) to perform the duty, but that a storm had come on
which had rendered the performance impossible. The debate was
adjourned, and it was resolved that the Senate should decide
in what way the commanders should be tried. The Senate
resolved that the Athenian people, having heard the accusation
and the defence, should proceed to vote forthwith for the
acquittal or condemnation of the eight commanders
collectively. The resolution was grossly unjust, and it was
illegal. It substituted a popular vote for a fair and formal
trial. ... Socrates was at that time a member of the Senate,
the only office that he ever filled. The Senate was composed
of five hundred citizens, elected by lot, fifty from each of
the ten tribes, and holding office for one year. The members
of each tribe held the Prytany, that is, were responsible for
the conduct of business, for thirty-five days at a time, and
ten out of the fifty were proedri or presidents every seven
days in succession. Every bill or motion was examined by the
proedri before it was submitted to the Assembly, to see if it
were in accordance with law; if it was not, it was quashed:
one of the proedri presided over the Senate and the Assembly
each day, and for one day only: he was called the Epistates:
it was his duty to put the question to the vote. In short he
was the speaker. ... On the day on which it was proposed to
take a collective vote on the acquittal or condemnation of the
eight commanders, Socrates was Epistates. The proposal was, as
we have seen, illegal: but the people were furious against the
accused, and it was a very popular one. Some of the proedri
opposed it before it was submitted to the Assembly, on the
ground of its illegality; but they were silenced by threats
and subsided. Socrates alone refused to give way. He would not
put a question which he knew to be illegal, to the vote.
Threats of suspension and arrest, the clamour of an angry
people, the fear of imprisonment or death, could not move him.
... But his authority lasted only for a day; the proceedings
were adjourned, a more pliant Epistates succeeded him, and the
generals were condemned and executed."
F. J. Church, Introduction to Trial and Death of Socrates,
pages 9-23.
See, also, GREECE: B. C. 406.
{174}
ATHENS: B. C. 421.
End of the first period of the Peloponnesian War.
The Peace of Nicias.
"The first stage of the Peloponnesian war came to an end just
ten years after the invasion of Attica by Archidamus in 431 B.
C. Its results had been almost purely negative; a vast
quantity of blood and treasure had been wasted on each side,
but to no great purpose. The Athenian naval power was
unimpaired, and the confederacy of Delos, though shaken by the
successful revolt of Amphipolis and the Thraceward towns, was
still left subsisting. On the other hand, the attempts of
Athens to accomplish anything on land had entirely failed, and
the defensive policy of Pericles had been so far justified.
Well would it have been for Athens if her citizens had taken
the lesson to heart, and contented themselves with having
escaped so easily from the greatest war they had ever
known."
C. W. C. Oman, History of Greece, page 341.
"The treaty called since ancient times the Peace of Nicias ...
put an end to the war between the two Greek confederations of
states, after it had lasted for rather more than ten years,
viz., from the attack of the Bœotians upon Platææ, Ol.
lxxxvii. 1 (beginning of April B. C. 431) to Ol. lxxxix. 3
(towards the middle of April B. C. 421). The war was for this
reason known under the name of the Ten Years' War, while the
Peloponnesians called it the Attic War. Its end constituted a
triumph for Athens; for all the plans of the enemies who had
attacked her had come to naught; Sparta had been unable to
fulfil a single one of the promises with which she had entered
upon the war, and was ultimately forced to acknowledge the
dominion of Athens in its whole extent,--notwithstanding all
the mistakes and misgivings, notwithstanding all the
calamities attributable, or not, to the Athenians themselves:
the resources of offence and defence which the city owed to
Pericles had therefore proved their excellence, and all the
fury of her opponents had wasted itself against her in vain.
Sparta herself was satisfied with the advantages which the
peace offered to her own city and citizens; but great was the
discontent among her confederates, particularly among the
secondary states, who had originally occasioned the war and
obliged Sparta to take part in it. Even after the conclusion
of the peace, it was impossible to induce Thebes and Corinth
to accede to it. The result of the war to Sparta was therefore
the dissolution of the confederation at whose head she had
begun the war; she felt herself thereby placed in so
dangerously isolated a position, that she was obliged to fall
back upon Athens in self-defence against her own confederates.
Accordingly the Peace of Nicias was in the course of the same
year converted into a fifty years' alliance, under the terms
of which Sparta and Athens contracted the obligation of mutual
assistance against any hostile attack."
E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 4, chapter 2 (volume 3).
See, also, GREECE: B. C. 424-421.
ATHENS: B. C. 421-418.
New combinations.
Conflicting alliances with Sparta and the Argive Confederacy.
Rising influence of Alcibiades.
War in Argos and Arcadia.
Battle of Mantinea.
See GREECE: B. C. 421-418.
ATHENS: B. C. 416.
Siege and conquest of Melos.
Massacre of the inhabitants.
See GREECE: B. C. 416.
ATHENS: B. C. 415.
The expedition against Syracuse.
Mutilation of the Hermæ (Hermai).
A quarrel having broken out in Sicily, between the cities of
Segesta and Selinous, "the latter obtained aid from Syracuse.
Upon this, Segesta, having vainly sought help from Carthage,
appealed to Athens, where the exiled Sicilians were numerous.
Alkibiades had been one of the most urgent for the attack upon
Melos, and he did not lose the present opportunity to incite
the Athenians to an enterprise of much greater importance, and
where he hoped to be in command. ... All men's minds were
filled with ambitious hopes. Everywhere, says Plutarch, were
to be seen young men in the gymnasia, old men in workshops and
public places of meeting, drawing the map of Sicily, talking
about the sea that surrounds it, the goodness of its harbors,
its position opposite Africa. Established there, it would be
easy to cross over and subjugate Carthage, and extend their
sway as far as the Pillars of Hercules. The rich did not
approve of this rashness, but feared if they opposed it that
the opposite faction would accuse them of wishing to avoid the
service and costs of arming galleys. Nikias had more courage;
even after the Athenians had appointed him general, with
Alkibiades and Lamachos, he spoke publicly against the
enterprise, showed the imprudence of going in search of new
subjects when those they already had were at the moment in a
state of revolt, as in Chalkidike, or only waited for a
disaster to break the chain which bound them to Athens. He
ended by reproaching Alkibiades for plunging the republic, to
gratify his personal ambition, into a foreign war of the
greatest danger. ... One of the demagogues, however, replied
that he would put an end to all this hesitation, and he
proposed and secured the passage of a decree giving the
generals full power to use all the resources of the city in
preparing for the expedition (March 24, 415 B. C.) Nikias was
completely in the right. The expedition to Sicily was
impolitic and foolish. In the Ægæan Sea lay the empire of
Athens, and there only it could lie, within reach, close at
hand. Every acquisition westward of the Peloponnesos was a
source of weakness. Syracuse, even if conquered, would not
long remain subject. Whatever might be the result of the
expedition, it was sure to be disastrous in the end. ... An
event which took place shortly before the departure of the
fleet (8-9 June) threw terror into the city: one morning the
hermai throughout the city were seen to have been mutilated.
... 'These Hermæ, or half-statues of the god Hermês, were
blocks of marble about the height of the human figure. The
upper part was cut into a head, face, neck and bust; the lower
part was left as a quadrangular pillar, broad at the base,
without arms, body, or legs, but with the significant mark of
the male sex in front. They were distributed in great numbers
throughout Athens, and always in the most conspicuous
situations; standing beside the outer doors of private houses
as well as of temples, near the most frequented porticos, at
the intersection of cross ways, in the public agora. ... The
religious feelings of the Greeks considered the god to be
planted or domiciled where his statue stood, so that the
companionship, sympathy, and guardianship of Hermês became
associated with most of the manifestations of conjunct life at
Athens,--political, social, commercial, or gymnastic.' ... To
all pious minds the city seemed menaced with great misfortunes
unless the anger of Heaven should be appeased by a sufficient
expiation.
{175}
While Alkibiades had many partisans, he had also violent
enemies. Not long before this time Hyperbolos, a contemptible
man, had almost succeeded in obtaining his banishment; and he
had escaped this danger only by uniting his party with that of
Nikias, and causing the demagogue himself to suffer ostracism.
The affair of the hermai appeared to his adversaries a
favourable occasion to repeat the attempt made by Hyperbolos,
and we have good reason to believe in a political machination,
seeing this same populace applaud, a few months later, the
impious audacity of Aristophanes in his comedy of The Birds.
An inquiry was set on foot, and certain metoikoi and slaves,
without making any deposition as to the hermai, recalled to
mind that before this time some of these statues had been
broken by young men after a night of carousal and
intoxication, thus indirectly attacking Alkibiades. Others in
set terms accused him of having at a banquet parodied the
Eleusinian Mysteries; and men took advantage of the
superstitious terrors of the people to awake their political
anxieties. It was repeated that the breakers of sacred
statues, the profaners of mysteries, would respect the
government even less than they had respected the gods, and it
was whispered that not one of these crimes had been committed
without the participation of Alkibiades; and in proof of this
men spoke of the truly aristocratic license of his life. Was
he indeed the author of this sacrilegious freak? To believe
him capable of it would not be to calumniate him. Or, on the
other hand, was it a scheme planned to do him injury? Although
proofs are lacking, it is certain that among the rich, upon
whom rested the heavy burden of the naval expenses, a plot had
been formed to destroy the power of Alkibiades, and perhaps to
prevent the sailing of the fleet. The demagogues, who had
intoxicated the people with hope, were for the expedition; but
the popularity of Alkibiades was obnoxious to them: a
compromise was made between the two factions, as is often done
in times when public morality is enfeebled, and Alkibiades
found himself threatened on all sides. ... Urging as a pretext
the dangers of delay in sending off the expedition, they
obtained a decree that Alkibiades should embark at once; and
that the question of his guilt or innocence should be
postponed until after his return. It was now the middle of
summer. The day appointed for departure, the whole city,
citizens and foreigners, went out to Peiraieus at daybreak.
... At that moment the view was clearer as to the doubts and
dangers, and also the distance of the expedition; but all eyes
were drawn to the immense preparations that had been made, and
confidence and pride consoled those who were about to part."
V. Duruy, History of the Greek People,
chapter 25, section 2 (volume 3).
ALSO IN:
Thucydides, History, book 6, section 27-28.
G. W. Cox, The Athenian Empire, chapter 5.
G. Grote, History of Greece, part 2, chapter 58 (volume 7).
ATHENS: B. C. 415-413.
Fatal end of the expedition against Syracuse.
"Alkibiades was called back to Athens, to take his trial on a
charge of impiety. ... He did not go back to Athens for his
trial, but escaped to Peloponnesos, where we shall hear from
him again. Meanwhile the command of the Athenian force in
Sicily was left practically in the hands of Nikias. Now Nikias
could always act well when he did act; but it was very hard to
make him act; above all on an errand which he hated. One might
say that Syracuse was saved through the delays of Nikias. He
now went off to petty expeditions in the west of Sicily, under
cover of settling matters at Segesta. ... The Syracusans by
this time quite despised the invaders. Their horsemen rode up
to the camp of the Athenians at Katanê, and asked them if they
had come into Sicily merely to sit down there as colonists.
... The winter (B. C. 415-414) was chiefly spent on both sides
in sending embassies to and fro to gain allies. Nikias also
sent home to Athens, asking for horsemen and money, and the
people, without a word of rebuke, voted him all that he asked.
... But the most important embassy of all was that which the
Syracusans sent to Corinth and Sparta. Corinth zealously took
up the cause of her colony and pleaded for Syracuse at Sparta.
And at Sparta Corinth and Syracuse found a helper in the
banished Athenian Alkibiadês, who was now doing all that he
could against Athens. ... He told the Spartans to occupy a
fortress in Attica, which they soon afterwards did, and a
great deal came of it. But he also told them to give vigorous
help to Syracuse, and above all things to send a Spartan
commander. The mere name of Sparta went for a great deal in
those days; but no man could have been better chosen than the
Spartan who was sent. He was Gylippos, the deliverer of
Syracuse. He was more like an Athenian than a Spartan, quick
and ready of resource, which few Spartans were. ... And now at
last, when the spring came (414) Nikias was driven to do
something. ... The Athenians ... occupied all that part of the
hill which lay outside the walls of Syracuse. They were joined
by their horsemen, Greek and Sikel, and after nearly a year,
the siege of Syracuse really began. The object of the
Athenians now was to build a wall across the hill and to carry
it down to the sea on both sides. Syracuse would thus be
hemmed in. The object of the Syracusans was to build a
cross-wall of their own, which should hinder the Athenian wall
from reaching the two points it aimed at; This they tried more
than once; but in vain. There were several fights on the hill,
and at last there was a fight of more importance on the lower
ground by the Great Harbour. ... The Syracusans were defeated,
as far as fighting went; but they gained far more than they
lost. For Lamachos was killed, and with him all vigour passed
away from the Athenian camp. At the same moment the Athenian
fleet sailed into the Great Harbour, and a Syracusan attack on
the Athenian works on the hill was defeated. Nikias remained
in command of the invaders; but he was grievously sick, and
for once in his life his head seems to have been turned by
success. He finished the wall on the south side; but he
neglected to finish it on the north side also, so that
Syracuse was not really hemmed in. But the hearts of the
Syracusans sank. ... It was at this darkest moment of all that
deliverance came. ... A Corinthian ship, under its captain
Gongylos, sailed into the Little Harbour. He brought the news
that other ships were on their way from Peloponnesos to the
help of Syracuse, and, yet more, that a Spartan general was
actually in Sicily, getting together a land force for the same
end. As soon as the good news was heard, there was no more talk
of surrender. ... And one day the Athenian camp was startled
by the appearance of a Lacedæmonian herald, offering them a
truce of five days, that they might get them out of Sicily
with bag and baggage.
{176}
Gylippos was now on the hill. He of course did not expect that
the Athenian army would really go away in five days. But it
was a great thing to show both to the besiegers and to the
Syracusans that the deliverer had come, and that deliverance
was beginning. Nikias had kept such bad watch that Gylippos
and his troops had come up the hill and the Syracusans had
come out and met them, without his knowledge. The Spartan, as
a matter of course, took the command of the whole force; he
offered battle to the Athenians, which they refused; he then
entered the city. The very next day he began to carry out his
scheme. This was to build a group of forts near the western
end of the hill, and to join them to the city by a wall
running east and west, which would hinder the Athenians from
ever finishing their wall to the north. Each side went on
building, and some small actions took place. ... Another
winter (B. C. 414-413) now came on, and with it much sending
of envoys. Gylippos went about Sicily collecting fresh troops.
... Meanwhile Nikias wrote a letter to the Athenian people.
... This letter came at a time when the Lacedæmonian alliance
had determined to renew the war with Athens, and when they
were making everything ready for an invasion of Attica. To
send out a new force to Sicily was simple madness. We hear
nothing of the debates in the Athenian assembly, whether
anyone argued against going on with the Sicilian war, and
whether any demagogue laid any blame on Nikias. But the
assembly voted that a new force equal to the first should be
sent out under Dêmosthenês, the best soldier in Athens, and
Eurymedon. ... Meanwhile the Syracusans were strengthened by
help both in Sicily and from Peloponnesos. Their main object
now was to strike a blow at the fleet of Nikias before the new
force came. ... It had been just when the Syracusans were most
downcast that they were cheered by the coming of the
Corinthians and of Gylippos. And just now that their spirits
were highest, they were dashed again by the coming of
Dêmosthenês and Eurymedon. A fleet as great as the first,
seventy-five ships, carrying 5,000 heavy-armed and a crowd of
light troops of every kind, sailed into the Great Harbour with
all warlike pomp. The Peloponnesians were already in Attica;
they had planted a Peloponnesian garrison there, which brought
Athens to great straits; but the fleet was sent out to
Syracuse all the same. Dêmosthenês knew what to do as well as
Lamachos had known. He saw that there was nothing to be done
but to try one great blow, and, if that failed, to take the
fleet home again. ... The attack was at first successful, and
the Athenians took two of the Syracusan forts. But the
Thespian allies of Syracuse stood their ground, and drove the
assailants back. Utter confusion followed. ... The last chance
was now lost, and Dêmosthenês was eager to go home. But Nikias
would stay on. ... When sickness grew in the camp, when fresh
help from Sicily and the great body of the allies from
Peloponnesos came into Syracuse, he at last agreed to go. Just
at that moment the moon was eclipsed. ... Nikias consulted his
soothsayers, and he gave out that they must stay twenty-nine
days, another full revolution of the moon. This resolve was
the destruction of the besieging army. ... It was felt on both
sides that all would turn on one more fight by sea, the
Athenians striving to get out of the harbour, and the
Syracusans striving to keep them in it. The Syracusans now
blocked up the mouth of the harbour by mooring vessels across
it. The Athenians left their position on the hill, a sign that
the siege was over, and brought their whole force down to the
shore. It was no time now for any skillful manoeuvres; the
chief thing was to make the sea-fight as much as might be like
a land-fight, a strange need for Athenians. ... The last fight
now began, 110 Athenian ships against 80 of the Syracusans and
their allies. Never before did so many ships meet in so small
a space. ... The fight was long and confused; at last the
Athenians gave way and fled to the shore. The battle and the
invasion were over. Syracuse was not only saved; she had begun
to take vengeance on her enemies. ... The Athenians waited one
day, and then set out, hoping to make their way to some safe
place among the friendly Sikels in the inland country. The
sick had to be left behind. ... On the sixth day, after
frightful toil, they determined to change their course. ...
They set out in two divisions, that of Nikias going first.
Much better order was kept in the front division and by the
time Nikias reached the river, Dêmosthenês was six miles
behind. ... In the morning a Syracusan force came up with the
frightful news that the whole division of Dêmosthenês were
prisoners. ... The Athenians tried in vain to escape in the
night. The next morning they set out, harassed as before, and
driven wild by intolerable thirst. They at last reached the
river Assinaros, which runs by the present town of Noto. There
was the end. ... The Athenians were so maddened by thirst
that, though men were falling under darts and the water was
getting muddy and bloody, they thought of nothing but
drinking. ... No further terms were made; most of the horsemen
contrived to cut their way out; the rest were made prisoners.
Most of them were embezzled by Syracusans as their private
slaves; but about 7,000 men out of the two divisions were led
prisoners into Syracuse. They were shut up in the
stone-quarries, with no further heed than to give each man
daily half a slave's allowance of food and drink. Many died;
many were sold; some escaped, or were set free; the rest were
after a while taken out of the quarries and set to work. The
generals had made no terms for themselves. Hermokratês wished
to keep them as hostages against future Athenian attempts
against Sicily. Gylippos wished to take them in triumph to
Sparta. The Corinthians were for putting them to death; and so
it was done. ... So ended the Athenian invasion of Sicily, the
greatest attempt ever made by Greeks against Greeks, and that
which came to the most utter failure."
E. A. Freeman, The Story of Sicily, pages 117-137.
ALSO IN:
Thucydides, History;
translated by B. Jowett, books 6-7 (volume 1).
See, also, SYRACUSE: B. C. 415-413.
{177}
ATHENS: B. C. 413-412.
Consequences of the Sicilian Expedition.
Spartan alliance with the Persians.
Plotting of Alcibiades.
The Decelian War.
"At Athens, where, even before this, everyone had been in the
most anxious suspense, the news of the loss of the expedition
produced a consternation, which was certainly greater than
that at Rome after the battle of Cannae, or that in our own
days, after the battle of Jena. ... 'At least 40,000 citizens,
allies and slaves, had perished; and among them there may
easily have been 10,000 Athenian citizens, most of whom
belonged to the wealthier and higher classes. The flower of
the Athenian people was destroyed, as at the time of the
plague. It is impossible to say what amount of public property
may have been lost; the whole fleet was gone.' The
consequences of the disaster soon shewed themselves. It was to
be foreseen that Chios, which had long been wavering, and
whose disposition could not be trusted, would avail itself of
this moment to revolt; and the cities in Asia, from which
Athens derived her large revenues, were expected to do the
same. It was, in fact, to be foreseen, that the four islands
of Lesbos, Chios, Samos, and Rhodes, would instantly revolt.
The Spartans were established at Decelea, in Attica itself,
and thence ravaged the country far and wide: so that it was
impossible to venture to go to the coast without a strong
escort. Although there were many districts in which no Spartan
was seen from one year's end to the other, yet there was no
safety anywhere, except in fortified places, 'and the
Athenians were constantly obliged to guard the walls of their
city; and this state of things had already been going on for
the last twelve months.' In this fearful situation, the
Athenian people showed the same firmness as the Romans after
the battle of Cannae. Had they but had one great man among
them, to whom the state could have been entrusted, even more
might perhaps have been done; but it is astonishing that,
although there was no such man, and although the leading men
were only second or third-rate persons, yet so many useful
arrangements were made to meet the necessities of the case.
... The most unfortunate circumstance for the Athenians was,
that Alcibiades, now an enemy of his country, was living among
the Spartans; for he introduced into the undertakings of the
Spartans the very element which before they had been
altogether deficient in, namely energy and elasticity: he
urged them on to undertakings, and induced them now to send a
fleet to Ionia. ... Erythrae, Teos, and Miletus, one after
another, revolted to the Peloponnesians, who now concluded
treaties with Tissaphernes in the name of the king of
Persia--Darius was then king--and in his own name as satrap;
and in this manner they sacrificed to him the Asiatic Greeks.
... The Athenians were an object of antipathy and implacable
hatred to the Persians; they had never doubted that the
Athenians were their real opponents in Greece, and were afraid
of them; but they did not fear the Spartans. They knew that
the Athenians would take from them not only the islands, but
the towns on the main land, and were in great fear of their
maritime power. Hence they joined the Spartans; and the latter
were not ashamed of negotiating a treaty of subsidies with the
Persians, in which Tissaphernes, in the king's name, promised
the assistance of the Phoenician fleet; and large subsidies,
as pay for the army. ... In return for this, they renounced,
in the name of the Greeks, all claims to independence for the
Greek cities in Asia."
E. C. Niebuhr, Lectures on Ancient History,
volume 2, lectures. 53 and 54.
See, also, GREECE: B. C. 413-412.
ALSO IN:
G. Grote, History of Greece, chapter 61 (volume 7).
ATHENS: B. C. 413-412.
Revolt of Chios, Miletus, Lesbos and Rhodes from Athens.
Revolution of Samos.
See GREECE: B. C. 413.
ATHENS: B. C. 413-411.-
The Probuli.
Intrigues of Alcibiades.
Conspiracy against the Constitution.
The Four Hundred and the Five Thousand.
Immediately after the dreadful calamity at Syracuse became
known, "extraordinary measures were adopted by the people; a
number of citizens of advanced age were formed into a
deliberative and executive body under the name of Probuli, and
empowered to fit out a fleet. Whether this laid the foundation
for oligarchical machinations or not, those aged men were
unable to bring back men's minds to their former course; the
prosecution of the Hermocopidæ had been most mischievous in
its results; various secret associations had sprung up and
conspired to reap advantage to themselves from the distress
and embarrassment of the state; the indignation caused by the
infuriated excesses of the people during that trial, possibly
here, as frequently happened in other Grecian states,
determined the more respectable members of the community to
guard against the recurrence of similar scenes in future, by
the establishment of an aristocracy. Lastly, the watchful
malice of Alcibiades, who was the implacable enemy of that
populace, to whose blind fury he had been sacrificed, baffled
all attempts to restore confidence and tranquillity, and there
is no doubt that, whilst he kept up a correspondence with his
partisans at home, he did everything in his power to increase
the perplexity and distress of his native city from without,
in order that he might be recalled to provide for its safety
and defence. A favourable opportunity for the execution of his
plans presented itself in the fifth year of his exile,
Ol. 92. 1; 411. B. C.; as he had incurred the suspicion of the
Spartans, and stood high in the favour of Tissaphernes, the
Athenians thought that his intercession might enable them to
obtain assistance from the Persian king. The people in Athens
were headed by one of his most inveterate enemies, Androcles;
and he well knew that all attempts to effect his return would
be fruitless, until this man and the other demagogues were
removed. Hence Alcibiades entered into negotiations with the
commanders of the Athenian fleet at Samos, respecting the
establishment of an oligarchical constitution, not from any
attachment to that form of government in itself, but solely
with the view of promoting his own ends. Phrynichus and
Pisander were equally insincere in their co-operation with
Alcibiades. ... Their plan was that the latter should
reconcile the people to the change in the constitution which
he wished to effect, by promising to obtain them the
assistance of the great king; but they alone resolved to reap
the benefit of his exertions. Pisander took upon himself to
manage the Athenian populace. It was in truth no slight
undertaking to attempt to overthrow a democracy of a hundred
and twenty years' standing, and of intense development; but
most of the able bodied citizens were absent with the fleet,
whilst such as were still in the city were confounded by the
imminence of the danger from without; on the other hand, the
prospect of succour from the Persian king doubtless had some
weight with them, and they possibly felt some symptoms of
returning affection for their former favourite Alcibiades.
Nevertheless, Pisander and his accomplices employed craft and
perfidy to accomplish their designs; the people were not
persuaded or convinced, but entrapped into compliance with
their measures. Pisander gained over to his purpose the above
named clubs, and induced the people to send him with ten
plenipotentiaries to the navy at Samos. In the mean time the
rest of the conspirators prosecuted the work of remodelling
the constitution."
W. Wachsmuth, History Antiquities of the Greeks,
volume 2, pages 252-255.
{178}
The people, or an assembly cleverly made up and manipulated to
represent the people, were induced to vote all the powers of
government into the hands of a council of Four Hundred, of
which council the citizens appointed only five members. Those
five chose ninety-five more, to make one hundred, and each of
that hundred then chose three colleagues. The conspirators
thus easily made up the Four Hundred to their liking, from
their own ranks. This council was to convene an assembly of
Five Thousand citizens, whenever it saw fit to do so. But when
news of this constitutional change reached the army at Samos,
where the Athenian headquarters for the Ionian war were fixed,
the citizen soldiers refused to submit to it--repudiated it
altogether--and organized themselves as an independent state.
The ruling spirit among them was Thrasybulus, and his
influence brought about a reconciliation with Alcibiades, then
an exile sheltered at the Persian court. Alcibiades was
recalled by the army and placed at its head. Presently a
reaction at Athens ensued, after the oligarchical party had
given signs of treasonable communication with Sparta, and in
June the people assembled in the Pnyx and reasserted their
sovereignty. "The Council was deposed, and the supreme
sovereignty of the state restored to the people--not, however,
to the entire multitude; for the principle was retained of
reserving full civic rights to a committee of men of a certain
amount of property; and, as the lists of the Five Thousand had
never been drawn up, it was decreed, in order that the desired
end might be speedily reached, to follow the precedent of
similar institutions in other states and to constitute all
Athenians able to furnish themselves with a complete military
equipment from their own resources, full citizens, with the
rights of voting and participating in the government. Thus the
name of the Five Thousand had now become a very inaccurate
designation; but it was retained, because men had in the last
few months become habituated to it. At the same time, the
abolition of pay for civic offices and functions was decreed,
not merely as a temporary measure, but as a fundamental
principle of the new commonwealth, which the citizens were
bound by a solemn oath to maintain. This reform was, upon the
whole, a wise combination of aristocracy and democracy; and,
according to the opinion of Thucydides, the best constitution
which the Athenians had hitherto possessed. On the motion of
Critias, the recall, of Alcibiades was decreed about the same

time; and a deputation was despatched to Samos, to accomplish
the union between army and city."
E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 4, chapter 5.
Most of the leaders of the Four Hundred fled to the Spartan
camp at Decelia. Two were taken, tried and executed.
Thucydides, History, book 8, section 48-97.
See, also, GREECE: B. C. 413-412.
ALSO IN:
V. Duruy, History of Greece, chapter 26 (volume 3).
ATHENS: B. C. 411-407.
Victories at Cynossema and Abydos.
Exploits of Alcibiades.
His triumphal return.
His appointment to command.
His second deposition and exile.
See GREECE: B. C. 411-407.
ATHENS: B. C. 406.
The Peloponnesian War: Battle and victory of Arginusae.
Condemnation and execution of the Generals.
See GREECE: B. C. 406;
and above: B. C. 424-406.
ATHENS: B. C. 405.
The Peloponnesian War:
Decisive defeat at Aigospotamoi.
See GREECE: B. C. 405.
ATHENS: B. C. 404.
The Surrender to Lysander.
After the battle of Ægospotami (August, B. C. 405), which
destroyed their navy, and cut off nearly all supplies to the
city by sea, as the Spartans at Decelea had long cut off
supplies upon the land side, the Athenians had no hope. They
waited in terror and despair for their enemies to close in
upon them. The latter were in no haste, for they were sure of
their prey. Lysander, the victor at Ægospotami, came leisurely
from the Hellespont, receiving on his way the surrender of the
cities subject or allied to Athens, and placing Spartan
harmosts and garrisons in them, with the local oligarchs
established uniformly in power. About November he reached the
Saronic gulf and blockaded the Athenian harbor of Piræus,
while an overwhelming Peloponnesian land force, under the
Lacedæmonian king Pausanias, arrived simultaneously in Attica
and encamped at the gates of the city. The Athenians had no
longer any power except the power to endure, and that they
exercised for more than three months, mainly resisting the
demand that their Long Walls--the walls which protected the
connection of the city with its harbors--should be thrown
down. But when famine had thinned the ranks of the citizens
and broken the spirit of the survivors, they gave up. "There
was still a high-spirited minority who entered their protest
and preferred death by famine to such insupportable disgrace.
The large majority, however, accepted them [the terms] and the
acceptance was made known to Lysander. It was on the 16th day
of the Attic month Munychion,--about the middle or end of
March,--that this victorious commander sailed into the
Peiræus, twenty-seven years, almost exactly, after the
surprise of Platæa by the Thebans, which opened the
Peloponnesian War. Along with him came the Athenian exiles,
several of whom appear to have been serving with his army and
assisting him with their counsel."
G. Grote, History of Greece, part 2, chapter 65 (volume 8).
The Long Walls and the fortifications of Piræus were
demolished, and then followed the organization of an
oligarchical government at Athens, resulting in the reign of
terror under "The Thirty."
E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 4, chapter 5.
ALSO IN:
Xenophon, Hellenics, book 2, chapter 2.
Plutarch, Lysander.
{179}
ATHENS: B. C. 404-403.
The tyranny of the Thirty.
The Year of Anarchy.
In the summer of B. C. 404, following the siege and surrender
of Athens, and the humiliating close of the long Peloponnesian
War, the returned leaders of the oligarchical party, who had
been in exile, succeeded with the help of their Spartan
friends, in overthrowing the democratic constitution of the
city and establishing themselves in power. The revolution was
accomplished at a public assembly of citizens, in the presence
of Lysander, the victorious Lacedæmonian admiral, whose fleet
in the Piraeus lay ready to support his demands. "In this
assembly, Dracontidas, a scoundrel upon whom repeated
sentences had been passed, brought forward a motion, proposing
the transfer of the government into the hands of Thirty
persons; and Theramenes supported this proposal which he
declared to express the wishes of Sparta. Even now, these
speeches produced a storm of indignation; after all the acts
of violence which Athens had undergone, she yet contained men
outspoken enough to venture to defend the constitution, and to
appeal to the fact that the capitulation sanctioned by both
parties contained no provision as to the internal affairs of
Athens. But, hereupon, Lysander himself came forward and spoke
to the citizens without reserve, like one who was their
absolute master. ... By such means the motion of Dracontidas
was passed; but only a small number of unpatriotic and
cowardly citizens raised their hands in token of assent. All
better patriots contrived to avoid participation in this vote.
Next, ten members of the government were chosen by Critias and
his colleagues [the Critias of Plato's Dialogues, pupil of
Socrates, and now the violent and blood-thirsty leader of the
anti-democratic revolution], ten by Theramenes, the
confidential friend of Lysander, and finally ten out of the
assembled multitude, probably by a free vote; and this board
of Thirty was hereupon established as the supreme government
authority by a resolution of the assembly present. Most of the
members of the new government had formerly been among the Four
Hundred, and had therefore long pursued a common course of
action." The Thirty Tyrants so placed in power were masters of
Athens for eight months, and executed their will without
conscience or mercy, having a garrison of Spartan soldiers in
the Acropolis to support them. They were also sustained by a
picked body of citizens, "the Three Thousand," who bore arms
while other citizens were stripped of every weapon. Large
numbers of the more patriotic and high-spirited Athenians had
escaped from their unfortunate city and had taken refuge,
chiefly at Thebes, the old enemy of Athens, but now
sympathetic in her distress. At Thebes these exiles organized
themselves under Thrasybulus and Anytus, and determined to
expel the tyrants and to recover their homes. They first
seized a strong post at Phyle, in Attica, where they gained in
numbers rapidly, and from which point they were able in a few
weeks to advance and occupy the Piræus. When the troops of The
Thirty came out to attack them, they drew back to the adjacent
height of Munychia and there fought a battle which delivered
their city from the Tyrants. Critias, the master-spirit of the
usurpation, was slain; the more violent of his colleagues took
refuge at Eleusis, and Athens, for a time, remained under the
government of a new oligarchical Board of Ten; while
Thrasybulus and the democratic liberators maintained their
headquarters at Munychia. All parties waited the action of
Sparta. Lysander, the Spartan general, marched an army into
Attica to restore the tyranny which was of his own creating;
but one of the two Spartan kings, Pausanias, intervened,
assumed the command in his own person, and applied his efforts
to the arranging of peace between the Athenian parties. The
result was a restoration of the democratic constitution of the
Attic state, with some important reforms. Several of The
Thirty were put to death,--treacherously, it was said,--but an
amnesty was extended to all their partisans. The year in which
they and The Ten controlled affairs was termed in the official
annals of the city the Year of Anarchy, and its magistrates
were not recognized.
E. Curtius, History of Greece,
book 4, chapter 5, and book 5, chapter 1.
ALSO IN:
Xenophon, Hellenics, book 2, chapter 3-4.
C. Sankey, The Spartan and Theban Supremacies.
chapter 2-3.
ATHENS: B. C. 395-387.
Confederacy against Sparta.
Alliance with Persia.
The Corinthian War.
Conon's rebuilding of the Long Walls.
Athenian independence restored.
The Peace of Antalcidas.
See GREECE: B. C. 399-387.
ATHENS: B. C. 378-371.
Brief alliance with Thebes against Sparta.
See GREECE: B. C. 379-371.
ATHENS: B. C. 378-357.
The New Confederacy and the Social War.
Upon the Liberation of Thebes and the signs that began to
appear of the decline of Spartan power--during the year of the
archonship of Nausinicus, B. C. 378-7, which was made
memorable at Athens by various movements of political
regeneration,--the organization of a new Confederacy was
undertaken, analogous to the Confederacy of Delos, formed a
century before. Athens was to be, "not the ruling capital, but
only the directing city in possession of the primacy, the seat
of the federal council. ... Callistratus was in a sense the
Aristides of the new confederation and doubtless did much to
bring about an agreement; it was likewise his work that, in
place of the 'tributes' of odious memory, the payments
necessary to the existence of the confederation were
introduced under the gentler name of 'contributions.' ...
Amicable relations were resumed with the Cyclades, Rhodes and
Perinthus; in other words, the ancient union of navies was at
once renewed upon a large scale and in a wide extent. Even
such states joined it as had hitherto never stood in
confederate relations with Athens, above all Thebes."
E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 6, chapter 1.
This second confederacy renewed much of the prosperity and
influence of Athens for a brief period of about twenty years.
But in 357 B. C., four important members of the Confederacy,
namely, Chios, Cos, Rhodes, and Byzantium leagued themselves
in revolt, with the aid of Mausolus, prince of Caria, and an
inglorious war ensued, known as the Social War, which lasted
three years. Athens was forced at last to assent to the
secession of the four revolted cities and to recognize their
independence, which greatly impaired her prestige and power,
just at the time when she was called upon to resist the
encroachments of Philip of Macedonia.
C. Thirlwall, History of Greece, chapter 42.
ATHENS: B. C. 370-362.
Alliance with Sparta against Thebes.
Battle of Mantinea.
See GREECE: B. C. 371-362.
{180}
ATHENS: B. C. 359-338.
The collision with Philip of Macedon.
The Policy of Demosthenes and Policy of Phocion.
"A new period opens with the growth of the Macedonian power
under Philip (359-336 B. C.) We are here chiefly concerned to
notice the effect on the City-State [of Athens], not only of
the strength and policy of this new power, but also of the
efforts of the Greeks themselves to counteract it. At the time
of Philip's accession the so-called Theban supremacy had just
practically ended with the death of Epaminondias. There was
now a kind of balance of power between the three leading
States, Sparta, Athens, and Thebes, no one of which was
greatly stronger than the others; and such a balance could
easily be worked upon by any great power from without. Thus
when Macedon came into the range of Greek politics, under a
man of great diplomatic as well as military capacity, who,
like a Czar of to-day, wished to secure a firm footing on the
sea-board of the Ægean [see GREECE: B. C. 359-358], she found
her work comparatively easy. The strong imperial policy of
Philip found no real antagonist except at Athens. Weak as she
was, and straitened by the break-up of her new confederacy,
Athens could still produce men of great talent and energy; but
she was hampered by divided counsels. Two Athenians of this
period seem to represent the currents of Greek political
thought, now running in two different directions. Demosthenes
represents the cause of the City-State in this age, of a
union, that is, of perfectly free Hellenic cities against the
common enemy. Phocion represents the feeling, which seems to
have been long growing up among thinking men at Athens, that
the City-State was no longer what it had been, and could no
longer stand by itself; that what was needed was a general
Hellenic peace, and possibly even an arbiter from without, an
arbiter not wholly un-Hellenic like the Persian, yet one who
might succeed in stilling the fatal jealousies of the leading
States. ... The efforts of Demosthenes to check Philip fall
into two periods divided by the peace of Philocrates in 346 B.
C. In the first of these he is acting chiefly with Athens
alone; Philip is to him not so much the common enemy of Greece
as the dangerous rival of Athens in the north. His whole mind
was given to the internal reform of Athens so as to strengthen
her against Philip. In her relation to other Greek States he
perhaps hardly saw beyond a balance of power. ... After 346
his Athenian feeling seems to become more distinctly Hellenic.
But what could even such a man as Demosthenes do with the
Hellas of that day? He could not force on the Greeks a real
and permanent union; he could but urge new alliances. His
strength was spent in embassies with this object, embassies
too often futile. No alliance could save Greece from the
Macedonian power, as subsequent events plainly showed. What
was needed was a real federal union between the leading
States, with a strong central controlling force; and
Demosthenes' policy was hopeless just because Athens could
never be the centre of such a union, nor could any other city.
Demosthenes is thus the last, and in some respects the most
heroic champion of the old Greek instinct for autonomy. He is
the true child of the City-State, but the child of its old age
and decrepitude. He still believes in Athens, and it is on
Athens that all his hopes are based. He looks on Philip as one
who must inevitably be the foe alike of Athens and of Greece.
He seems to think that he can be beaten off as Xerxes was, and
to forget that even Xerxes almost triumphed over the divisions
of the Greek States, and that Philip is a nearer, a more
prominent, and a far less barbarian foe. ... Phocion was the
somewhat odd exponent of the practical side of a school of
thought which had been gaining strength in Greece for some
time past. This school was now brought into prominence by the
rise of Macedon, and came to have a marked influence on the
history of the City-State. It began with the philosophers, and
with the idea that the philosopher may belong to the world as
well as to a particular city. ... Athens was far more open to
criticism now than in the days of Pericles; and a cynical
dislike betrays itself in the Republic for the politicians of
the day and their tricks, and a longing for a strong
government of reason. ... Aristotle took the facts of city
life as they were and showed how they might be made the most
of. ... To him Macedon was assuredly not wholly barbarian; and
war to the death with her kings could not have been to him as
natural or desirable as it seemed to Demosthenes. And though
he has nothing to tell us of Macedon, we can hardly avoid the
conclusion that his desire was for peace and internal reform,
even if it were under the guarantee of the northern power. ...
Of this philosophical view of Greek politics Phocion was in a
manner the political exponent. But his policy was too much a
negative one; it might almost be called one of indifferentism,
like the feeling of Lessing and Goethe in Germany's most
momentous period. So far as we know, Phocion never proposed an
alliance of a durable kind, either Athenian or Hellenic, with
Macedon; he was content to be a purely restraining influence.
Athens had been constantly at war since 432; her own resources
were of the weakest; there was little military skill to be
found in her, no reserve force, much talk, but little solid
courage. Athens was vulnerable at various points, and could
not possibly defend more than one at a time, therefore Phocion
despaired of war, and the event proved him right. The
faithfulness of the Athenians towards him is a proof that they
also instinctively felt that he was right. But he was wanting
on the practical and creative side, and never really dominated
either Athens, Greece, or Philip. ... A policy of resistance
found the City-State too weak to defend itself; a policy of
inaction would land it in a Macedonian empire which would
still further weaken its remaining vitality. The first policy,
that of Demosthenes, did actually result in disaster and the
presence of Macedonian garrisons in Greek cities. The second
policy then took its place, and initiated a new era for
Greece. After the fatal battle of Chæronea (338 B. C.) Philip
assumed the position of leader of the Greek cities."
W. W. Fowler, The City-State of the Greeks and Romans,
chapter 10.
See, also, GREECE: 357-336.
ATHENS: B. C. 340.
Alliance with Byzantium against Philip of Macedon.
See GREECE: B. C. 340.
{181}
ATHENS: B. C. 336-322.
End of the Struggle with the Macedonians.
Fall of Democracy.
Death of Demosthenes.
Athenian decline.
"An unexpected incident changes the whole aspect of things.
Philip falls the victim of assassination; and a youth, who as
yet is but little known, is his successor. Immediately
Demosthenes institutes a second alliance of the Greeks; but
Alexander suddenly appears before Thebes; the terrible
vengeance which he here takes, instantly destroys the league;
Demosthenes, Lycurgus, and several of their supporters,
are required to be delivered up: but Demades is at that
time able to settle the difficulty and to appease the king.
His strength was therefore enfeebled as Alexander departed for
Asia; he begins to raise his head once more when Sparta
attempts to throw off the yoke: but under Antipater he is
overpowered. Yet it was about this very time that by the most
celebrated of his discourses he gained the victory over the
most eloquent of his adversaries; and Æschines was forced to
depart from Athens. But this seems only to have the more
embittered his enemies, the leaders of the Macedonian party;
and they soon found an opportunity of preparing his downfall.
When Harpalus, a fugitive from the army of Alexander, came
with his treasures to Athens, and the question arose, whether
he could be permitted to remain there, Demosthenes was accused
of having been corrupted by his money, at least to be silent.
This was sufficient to procure the imposition of a fine; and
as this was not paid, he was thrown into prison. From thence
he succeeded in escaping; but to the man who lived only for
his country, exile was no less an evil than imprisonment. He
resided for the most part in Ægina and at Trœzen, from whence
he looked with moist eyes toward the neighbouring Attica.
Suddenly and unexpectedly a new ray of light broke through the
clouds. Tidings were brought, that Alexander was dead. The
moment of deliverance seemed at hand; the excitement pervaded
every Grecian state; the ambassadors of the Athenians passed
through the cities; Demosthenes joined himself to the number
and exerted all his eloquence and power to unite them against
Macedonia. In requital for such services, the people decreed
his return; and years of sufferings were at last followed by a
day of exalted compensation. A galley was sent to Ægina to
bring back the advocate of liberty. ... It was a momentary
glimpse of the sun, which still darker clouds were soon to
conceal. Antipater and Craterus were victorious; and with them
the Macedonian party in Athens: Demosthenes and his friends
were numbered among the accused, and at the instigation of
Demades were condemned to die. ... Demosthenes had escaped to
the island Calauria in the vicinity of Trœzen; and took refuge
in the temple of Neptune. It was to no purpose that Archias,
the satellite of Antipater, urged him to surrender himself
under promise of pardon. He pretended he wished to write
something; bit the quill, and swallowed the poison contained
in it."
A. H. L. Heeren, Reflections on the Politics of Ancient
Greece, translated by G. Bancroft, pages 278-280.
See, also, on the "Lamian War," the suppression of
Democracy at Athens, and the expulsion of poor citizens,
GREECE: B. C. 323-322.
"With the decline of political independence, ... the mental
powers of the nation received a fatal blow. No longer knit
together by a powerful esprit de corps, the Greeks lost the
habit of working for the common weal; and, for the most part,
gave themselves up to the petty interests of home life and
their own personal troubles. Even the better disposed were too
much occupied in opposing the low tone and corruption of the
times, to be able to devote themselves, in their moments of
relaxation, to a free and speculative consideration of things.
What could be expected in such an age, but that philosophy
would take a decidedly practical turn, if indeed it were
studied at all? And yet such were the political antecedents of
the Stoic and Epicurean systems of philosophy. ... Stoic
apathy, Epicurean self-satisfaction, and Sceptic
imperturbability, were the doctrines which responded to the
political helplessness of the age. They were the doctrines,
too, which met with the most general acceptance. The same
political helplessness produced the sinking of national
distinctions in the feeling of a common humanity, and the
separation of morals from politics which characterise the
philosophy of the Alexandrian and Roman period. The barriers
between nations, together with national independence, had been
swept away. East and West, Greeks and barbarians, were united
in large empires, being thus thrown together, and brought into
close contact on every possible point. Philosophy might teach
that all men were of one blood, that all were equally citizens
of one empire, that morality rested on the relation of man to
his fellow men, independently of nationalities and of social
ranks; but in so doing she was only explicitly stating truths
which had been already realised in part, and which were in
part corollaries from the existing state of society."
E. Zeller, The Stoics, Epicureans, and Sceptics,
pages 16-18.
"What we have said concerning the evidence of comedy about the
age of the first Diadochi amounts to this: Menander and his
successors--they lasted barely two generations--printed in a
few stereotypes a small and very worthless society at Athens.
There was no doubt a similar set of people at Corinth, at
Thebes, possibly even in the city of Lycurgus. These people,
idle, for the most part rich, and in good society, spent their
earlier years in debauchery, and their later in sentimental
reflections and regrets. They had no serious object in life,
and regarded the complications of a love affair as more
interesting than the rise and fall of kingdoms or the gain and
loss of a nation's liberty. They were like the people of our
day who spend all their time reading novels from the
libraries, and who can tolerate these eternal variations in
twaddle not only without disgust but with interest. They were
surrounded with slaves, on the whole more intelligent and
interesting, for in the first place slaves were bound to
exercise their brains, and in the second they had a great
object--liberty--to give them a keen pursuit in life. The
relations of the sexes in this set or portion of society were
bad, owing to the want of education in the women, and the want
of earnestness in the men. As a natural consequence a class
was found, apart from household slaves, who took advantage of
these defects, and, bringing culture to fascinate unprincipled
men, established those relations which brought estragements,
if not ruin, into the home life of the day."
J. P. Mahaffy, Greek Life and Thought, pages 123-124.
{182}
"The amount of Persian wealth poured into Greece by the
accidents of the conquest, not by its own industries, must
have produced a revolution in prices not since equalled except
by the influx of the gold of the Aztecs and Incas into Spain.
I have already pointed out how this change must have pressed
upon poor people in Greece who did not share in the plunder.
The price of even necessary and simple things must have often
risen beyond their means. For the adventurers brought home
large fortunes, and the traders and purveyors of the armies
made them; and with these Eastern fortunes must have come in
the taste for all the superior comforts and luxuries which
they found among the Persian grandees. Not only the
appointments of the table, in the way of plate and pottery,
but the very tastes and flavours of Greek cookery must have
profited by comparison with the knowledge of the East. So also
the furniture, especially in carpets and hangings, must have
copied Persian fashion, just as we still affect oriental
stuffs and designs. It was not to be expected that the example
of so many regal courts and so much royal ceremony should not
affect those in contact with them. These influences were not
only shown in the vulgar 'braggart captain,' who came to show
off his sudden wealth in impudent extravagance among his old
townspeople, but in the ordinary life of rich young men. So I
imagine the personal appointments of Alcibiades, which were
the talk of Greece in his day, would have appeared poor and
mean beside those of Aratus, or of the generation which
preceded him. Pictures and statues began to adorn private
houses, and not temples and public buildings only--a change
beginning to show itself in Demosthenes's day, but coming in
like a torrent with the opening of Greece to the Eastern
world. It was noticed that Phocion's house at Athens was
modest in size and furniture, but even this was relieved from
shabbiness by the quaint wall decoration of shining plates of
bronze--a fashion dating from prehistoric times, but still
admired for its very antiquity."
J. P. Mahaffy, Greek Life and Thought, pages 105-106.
"The modern historians of Greece are much divided on the
question where a history of Hellas ought to end. Curtius stops
with the battle of Chaeroncia and the prostration of Athens
before the advancing power of Macedon. Grote narrates the
campaigns of Alexander, but stops short at the conclusion of
the Lamian War, when Greece had in vain tried to shake off the
supremacy of his generals. Thirlwall brings his narrative down
to the time of Mummius, the melancholy sack of Corinth and the
constitution of Achaia as a Roman province. Of these divergent
views we regard that of the German historian as the most
correct. ... The historic sense of Grote did not exclude
prejudices, and in this case he was probably led astray by
political bias. At the close of his ninety-sixth chapter,
after mentioning the embassies sent by the degenerate
Athenians to King Ptolemy, King Lysimachus, and Antipater, he
throws down his pen in disgust, 'and with sadness and
humiliation brings his narrative to a close.' Athens was no
longer free and no longer dignified, and so Mr. Grote will
have done with Greece at the very moment when the new Comedy
was at its height, when the Museum was founded at Alexandria,
when the plays of Euripides were acted at Babylon and Cabul,
and every Greek soldier of fortune carried a diadem in his
baggage. Surely the historian of Greece ought either to have
stopped when the iron hand of Philip of Macedon put an end to
the liberties and the political wranglings of Hellas, or else
persevered to the time when Rome and Parthia crushed Greek
power between them, like a ship between two icebergs. No doubt
his reply would be, that he declined to regard the triumph
abroad of Macedonian arms as a continuation of the history of
Hellas. ... The truth is, that the history of Greece consists
of two parts, in every respect contrasted one with the other.
The first recounts the stories of the Persian and
Peloponnesian wars, and ends with the destruction of Thebes
and the subjugation of Athens and Sparta. The Hellas of which
it speaks is a cluster of autonomous cities in the
Peloponnesus, the Islands, and Northern Greece, together with
their colonies scattered over the coasts of Italy, Sicily,
Thrace, the Black Sea, Asia Minor, and Africa. These cities
care only to be independent, or at most to lord it over one
another. Their political institutions, their religious
ceremonies, their customs, are civic and local. Language,
commerce, a common Pantheon, and a common art and poetry are
the ties that bind them together. In its second phase, Greek
history begins with the expedition of Alexander. It reveals to
us the Greek as everywhere lord of the barbarian, as foundling
kingdoms and federal systems, as the instructor of all mankind
in art and science, and the spreader of civil and civilized
life over the known world. In the first period of her history
Greece is forming herself, in her second she is educating the
world. We will venture to borrow from the Germans a convenient
expression, and call the history of independent Greece the
history of Hellas, that of imperial Greece the history of
Hellenism. ... The Athens of Pericles was dictator among the
cities which had joined her alliance. Corinth, Sparta, Thebes,
were each the political head of a group of towns, but none of
the three admitted these latter to an equal share in their
councils, or adopted their political views. Even in the
Olynthian League, the city of Olynthus occupied a position
quite superior to that of the other cities. But the Greek
cities had not tried the experiment of an alliance on equal
terms. This was now attempted by some of the leading cities of
the Peloponnese, and the result was the Achaean League, whose
history sheds a lustre on the last days of independent Greece,
and whose generals will bear comparison with the statesmen of
any Greek Republic [sec GREECE: B. C. 280-146]. ... On the
field of Sellasia the glorious hopes of Cleomenes were
wrecked, and the recently reformed Sparta was handed over to a
succession of bloodthirsty tyrants, never again to emerge from
obscurity. But to the Achaeans themselves the interference of
Macedon was little less fatal. Henceforth a Macedonian
garrison occupied Corinth, which had been one of the chief
cities of the League; and King Antigonus Doson was the
recognized arbiter in all disputes of the Peloponnesian
Greeks. ... In Northern Greece a strange contrast presented
itself. The historic races of the Athenians and Boeotians
languished in peace, obscurity, and luxury. With them every
day saw something added to the enjoyments and elegancies of
life, and every day politics drifted more and more into the
background. On the other hand, the rude semi-Greeks of the
West, Aetolians, Acarnanians, and Epirotes, to whose manhood
the repulse of the Gauls was mainly due, came to the front and
showed the bold spirit of Greeks divorced from the finer
faculties of the race. The Acarnanians formed a league
somewhat on the plan of the Achaean.
{183}
But they were overshadowed by their neighbors the Aetolians,
whose union was of a different character. It was the first
time that there had been formed in Hellas a state framed in
order to prey upon its neighbours. ... In the course of the
Peloponnesian War Greek religion began to lose its hold on the
Greeks. This was partly the work of the sophists and
philosophers, who sought more lofty and moral views of Deity
than were furnished by the tales of popular mythology. Still
more it resulted from growing materialism among the people,
who saw more and more of their immediate and physical needs,
and less and less of the underlying spiritual elements in
life. But though philosophy and materialism had made the
religion of Hellas paler and feebler, they had not altered its
nature or expanded it. It still remained essentially national,
almost tribal. When, therefore, Greeks and Macedonians
suddenly found themselves masters of the nations of the East,
and in close contact with a hundred forms of religion, an
extraordinary and rapid change took place in their religions
ideas. In religion, as in other matters, Egypt set to the
world the example of prompt fusion of the ideas of Greeks and
natives. ... Into Greece proper, in return for her population
which flowed out, there flowed in a crowd of foreign deities.
Isis was especially welcomed at Athens, where she found many
votaries. In every cult the more mysterious elements were made
more of, and the brighter and more materialistic side passed
by. Old statues which had fallen somewhat into contempt in the
days of Pheidias and Praxiteles were restored to their places
and received extreme veneration, not as beautiful, but as old
and strange. On the coins of the previous period the
representations of deities had been always the best that the
die-cutter could frame, taking as his models the finest
contemporary sculpture; but henceforth we often find them
strange, uncouth figures, remnants of a period of struggling
early art, like the Apollo at Amyclae, or the Hera of Samos.
... In the intellectual life of Athens there was still left
vitality enough to formulate the two most complete expressions
of the ethical ideas of the times, the doctrines of the Stoics
and the Epicureans, towards one or the other of which all
educated minds from that day to this have been drawn. No doubt
our knowledge of these doctrines, being largely drawn from the
Latin writers and their Greek contemporaries, is somewhat
coloured and unjust. With the Romans a system of philosophy
was considered mainly in its bearing upon conduct, whence the
ethical elements in Stoicism and Epicureanism have been by
their Roman adherents so thrust into the foreground, that we
have almost lost sight of the intellectual elements, which can
have had little less importance in the eyes of the Greeks.
Notwithstanding, the rise of the two philosophies must be held
to mark a new era in the history of thought, an era when the
importance of conduct was for the first time recognized by the
Greeks. It is often observed that the ancient Greeks were more
modern than our own ancestors of the Middle Ages. But it is
less generally recognized how far more modern than the Greeks
of Pericles were the Greeks of Aratus. In very many respects
the age of Hellenism and our own age present remarkable
similarity. In both there appears a sudden increase in the
power over material nature, arising alike from the greater
accessibility of all parts of the world and from the rapid
development of the sciences which act upon the physical forces
of the world. In both this spread of science and power acts
upon religion with a dissolving and, if we may so speak,
centrifugal force, driving some men to take refuge in the most
conservative forms of faith, some to fly to new creeds and
superstitions, some to drift into unmeasured scepticism. In
both the facility of moving from place to place, and finding a
distant home, tends to dissolve the closeness of civic and
family life, and to make the individual rather than the family
or the city the unit of social life. And in the family
relations, in the character of individuals, in the state of
morality, in the condition of art, we find at both periods
similar results from the similar causes we have mentioned."
P. Gardner, New Chapters in Greek History, chapter 15.
ATHENS: B. C. 317-316.
Siege by Polysperchon.
Democracy restored.
Execution of Phocion.
Demetrius of Phaleron at the head of the government.
See GREECE: B. C. 321-312.
ATHENS: B.C. 307-197.
Under Demetrius Poliorcetes and the Antigonids.
See GREECE: B. C.307-197.
ATHENS: B. C. 288-263.
Twenty years of Independence.
Siege and subjugation by Antigonus Gonatas.
When Demetrius Poliorcetes lost the Macedonian throne, B. C.
288, his fickle Athenian subjects and late worshippers rose
against his authority, drove his garrisons from the Museum and
the Piræus and abolished the priesthood they had consecrated
to him. Demetrius gathered an army from some quarter and laid
siege to the city, but without success. The Athenians went so
far as to invite Pyrrhus, the warrior king of Epirus, to
assist them against him. Pyrrhus came and Demetrius retired.
The dangerous ally contented himself with a visit to the
Acropolis as a worshipper, and left Athens in possession,
undisturbed, of her freshly gained freedom. It was enjoyed
after a fashion for twenty years, at the end of which period,
B. C. 268, Antigonus Gonatas, the son of Demetrius, having
regained the Macedonian crown, reasserted his claim on Athens,
and the city was once more besieged. The Lacedæmonians and
Ptolemy of Egypt both gave some ineffectual aid to the
Athenians, and the siege, interrupted on several occasions,
was prolonged until B. C. 263, when Antigonus took possession
of the Acropolis, the fortified Museum and the Piræus as a
master (see MACEDONIA, &c.: B. C. 277-244). This was sometimes
called the Chremonidean War, from the name of a patriotic
Athenian who took the most prominent part in the long defence
of his city.
C. Thirlwall, History of Greece, chapter 61.
ATHENS: B. C. 229.
Liberation by the Achaian League.
See GREECE: B. C. 280-146.
ATHENS: B. C. 200.
Vandalism of the second Macedonian Philip.
In the year B. C. 200 the Macedonian king, Philip, made an
attempt to surprise Athens and failed. "He then encamped in
the outskirts, and proceeded to wreak his vengeance on the
Athenians, as he had indulged it at Thermus and Pergamus. He
destroyed or defaced all the monuments of religion and of art,
all the sacred and pleasant places which adorned the suburbs.
The Academy, the Lycenm, and Cynosarges, with their temples,
schools, groves and gardens, were all wasted with fire. Not
even the sepulchres were spared."
C. Thirlwall, History of Greece, chapter 64.
{184}
ATHENS: B. C. 197-A. D. 138.
Under Roman rule.
"Athens ... affords the disheartening picture of a
commonwealth pampered by the supreme power, and financially as
well us morally ruined. By rights it ought to have found
itself in a flourishing condition. ... No city of antiquity
elsewhere possessed a domain of its own, such as was Attica,
of about 700 square miles. ... But even beyond Attica they
retained what they possessed, as well after the Mithridatic
War, by favour of Sulla, as after the Pharsalian battle, in
which they had taken the side of Pompeius, by the favour of
Cæsar;--he asked them only how often they would still ruin
themselves and trust to be saved by the renown of their
ancestors. To the city there still belonged not merely the
territory, formerly possessed by Haliartus, in Boeotia, but
also on their own coast Salamis, the old starting-point of
their dominion of the sea, and in the Thracian Sea the
lucrative islands Scyros, Lemnos, and Imbros, as well as Delos
in the Aegean. ... Of the further grants, which they had the
skill to draw by flattery from Antoninus, Augustus, against
whom they had taken part, took from them certainly Aegina and
Eretria in Euboea, but they were allowed to retain the smaller
islands of the Thracian Sea. ... Hadrian, moreover, gave to
them the best part of the great island of Cephallenia in the
Ionian Sea. It was only by the Emperor Severus, who bore them
no good will, that a portion of these extraneous possessions
was withdrawn from them. Hadrian further granted to the
Athenians the delivery of a certain quantity of grain at the
expense of the empire, and by the extension of this privilege,
hitherto reserved for the capital, acknowledged Athens, as it
were, as another metropolis. Not less was the blissful
institute of alimentary endowments, which Italy had enjoyed
since Trajan's time, extended by Hadrian to Athens, and the
capital requisite for this purpose certainly presented to the
Athenians from his purse. ... Yet the community was in
constant distress."
T. Mommsen, History of Rome, book 8, chapter 7.
ALSO IN:
J. P. Mahaffy, The Greek World under Roman Sway.
See, also, GREECE: B. C. 146-A. D. 180.
ATHENS: B. C. 87-86.
Siege and capture by Sulla.
Massacre of citizens.
Pillage and depopulation.
Lasting injuries.
The early successes of Mithridates of Pontus, in his savage
war with the Romans, included a general rising in his favor
among the Greeks [see MITHRIDATIC WARS], supported by the
fleets of the Pontic king and by a strong invading army.
Athens and the Piræus were the strongholds of the Greek
revolt, and at Athens an adventurer named Aristion, bringing
from Mithridates a body-guard of 2,000 soldiers, made himself
tyrant of the city. A year passed before Rome, distracted by
the beginnings of civil war, could effectively interfere. Then
Sulla came (B. C. 87) and laid siege to the Piræus, where the
principal Pontic force was lodged, while he shut up Athens by
blockade. In the following March, Athens was starved to such
weakness that the Romans entered almost unopposed and killed
and plundered with no mercy; but the buildings of the city
suffered little harm at their hands. The siege of the Piræus
was carried on for some weeks longer, until Sulla had driven
the Pontic forces from every part except Munychia, and that
they evacuated in no long time.
W. Ihne, History of Rome, book 7, chapter 17.
"Athens was ... taken by assault. ... The majority of the
citizens was slain; the carnage was so fearfully great as to
become memorable even in that age of bloodshed; the private
movable property was seized by the soldiery, and Sylla assumed
some merit to himself for not committing the rifled houses to
the flames. ... The fate of the Piræus, which he utterly
destroyed, was more severe than that of Athens. From Sylla's
campaign in Greece the commencement of the ruin and
depopulation of the country is to be dated. The destruction of
property caused by his ravages in Attica was so great that Athens
from that time lost its commercial as well as its political
importance. The race of Athenian citizens was almost
extirpated, and a new population, composed of a heterogeneous
mass of settlers, received the right of
citizenship."
G. Finlay, Greece under the Romans, chapter 1.
ATHENS: A. D. 54 (?).
The Visit of St. Paul.
Planting of Christianity.
"When the Jews of Thessalonica had knowledge that the word of
God was proclaimed of Paul at Berea also, they came thither
likewise, stirring up and troubling the multitude. And then
immediately the brethren sent forth Paul to go as far as to
the sea: and Silas and Timotheus abode there still. But they
that conducted Paul brought him as far as Athens; and
receiving a commandment unto Silas and Timotheus that they
should come to him with all speed, they departed. Now while
Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within
him, as he beheld the city full of idols. So he reasoned in
the synagogue with the Jews, and the devout persons, and in
the market place every day with them that met with him. And
certain also of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers
encountered him. And some said, what would this babbler say?
other some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods:
because he preached Jesus and the resurrection. And they took
hold of him, and brought him unto the Areopagus, saying, May
we know what this new teaching is, which is spoken by thee?
For thou bringest certain strange things to our ears: we would
know therefore what these things mean. (Now all the Athenians
and the strangers sojourning there spent their time in nothing
else, but either to tell or to hear some new thing.) And Paul
stood in the midst of the Areopagus, and said, Ye men of
Athens, in all things I perceive that ye are somewhat
superstitious. For as I passed along and observed the objects
of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription,
'To an Unknown God.' What therefore ye worship in ignorance,
this set I forth unto you. ... Now when they heard of the
resurrection of the dead, some mocked; but others said, We
will hear thee concerning this yet again. Thus Paul went out
from among them. Howbeit certain men clave unto him, and
believed: among whom also was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a
woman named Damaris, and others with them."
Acts of the Apostles, Revised Version, chapter 17.
{185}
"Consider the difficulties which must have beset the planting
of the Church in Athens. If the burning zeal of the great
Apostle ever permitted him to feel diffidence in addressing an
assembly, he may well have felt it when he addressed on Mars'
Hill for the first time an Athenian crowd. No doubt the Athens
of his time was in her decay, inferior in opulence and
grandeur to many younger cities. Yet even to a Jew, provided
he had received some educational impressions beyond the
fanatical shibboleths of Pharisaism, there was much in that
wonderful centre of intelligence to shake his most inveterate
prejudices and inspire him with unwilling respect. Shorn
indeed of her political greatness, deprived even of her
philosophical supremacy, she still shone with a brilliant
afterglow of æsthetic and intellectual prestige. Her monuments
flashed on the visitor memories recent enough to dazzle his
imagination. Her schools claimed and obtained even from
Emperors the homage due to her unique past. Recognising her as
the true nurse of Hellenism and the chief missionary of human
refinement, the best spirits of the age held her worthy of
admiring love not unmixed with awe. As the seat of the most
brilliant and popular university, young men of talent and
position flocked to her from every quarter, studied for a time
within her colonnades, and carried thence the recollection of
a culture which was not always deep, not always erudite, but
was always and genuinely Attic. To subject to the criticism of
this people a doctrine professing to come direct from God, a
religion and not a philosophy, depending not on argument but
on revelation, was a task of which the difficulties might seem
insuperable. When we consider what the Athenian character was,
this language will not seem exaggerated. Keen, subtle,
capricious, satirical, sated with ideas, eager for novelty,
yet with the eagerness of amused frivolity, not of the
truth-seeker: critical by instinct, exquisitely sensitive to
the ridiculous or the absurd, disputatious, ready to listen,
yet impatient of all that was not wit, satisfied with
everything in life except its shortness, and therefore hiding
all references to this unwelcome fact under a veil of
complacent euphemism--where could a more uncongenial soil be
found for the seed of the Gospel? ... To an Athenian the Jew
was not so much an object of hatred (as to the Roman), nor
even of contempt (as to the rest of mankind), as of absolute
indifference. He was simply ignored. To the eclectic
philosophy which now dominated the schools of Athens, Judaism
alone among all human opinions was as if non-existent. That
Athenians should be convinced by the philosophy of a Jew would
be a proposition expressible in words but wholly destitute of
meaning. On the other hand, the Jew was not altogether
uninfluenced by Greek thought. Wide apart as the two minds
were, the Hebraic proved not insensible to the charm of the
Hellenic; witness the Epistle to the Hebrews, witness Philo,
witness the intrusion of Greek methods of interpretation even
into the text-books of Rabbinism. And it was Athens, as the
quintessence of Hellas, Athens as represented by Socrates, and
still more by Plato, which had gained this subtle power. And
just as Judæa alone among all the Jewish communities retained
its exclusiveness wholly unimpaired by Hellenism, so Athens,
more than any Pagan capital, was likely to ignore or repel a
faith coming in the garb of Judaism. And yet within less than
a century we find this faith so well established there as to
yield to the Church the good fruits of martyrdom in the person
of its bishop, and of able defences in the person of three of
its teachers. The early and the later fortunes of the Athenian
Church are buried in oblivion; it comes but for a brief period
before the scene of history. But the undying interest of that
one dramatic moment when Paul proclaimed a bodily resurrection
to the authors of the conception of a spiritual immortality,
will always cause us to linger with a strange sympathy over
every relic of the Christianity of Athens."
C. T. Cruttwell, A Literary History of Early
Christianity, volume 1, book 3, chapter 4.
ALSO IN:
W. J. Conybeare and J. S. Howson, Life and Letters of
St. Paul, volume 1, chapter 10.
F. C. Baur, Paul, part 1, chapter 7 (volume l).
On the inscription,
See E. de Pressensé, The Early Years of Christianity:
The Apostolic Era, book 2, chapter 1.
ATHENS: A. D. 125-134.
The works of Hadrian.
The Emperor Hadrian interested himself greatly in the
venerable decaying capital of the Greeks, which he visited, or
resided in, for considerable periods, several times, between
A. D. 125 and 134. These visits were made important to the
city by the great works of rebuilding which he undertook and
supervised. Large parts of the city are thought to have been
reconstructed by him, "in the open and luxurious style of
Antioch and Ephesus." One quarter came to be called
"Hadrianapolis," as though he had created it. Several new
temples were erected at his command; but the greatest of the
works of Hadrian at Athens was the completing of the vast
national temple, the Olympieum, the beginning of which dated
back to the age of Pisistratus, and which Augustus had put his
hand to without finishing.
C. Merivale, History of the Romans, chapter 66.
ATHENS: A. D. 267.
Capture of, by the Goths.
See GOTHS: A. D. 258-267.
ATHENS: A. D. 395.
Surrender to Alaric and the Goths.
When the Goths under Alaric invaded and ravaged Greece, A. D.
395, Athens was surrendered to them, on terms which saved the
city from being plundered. "The fact that the depredations of
Alaric hardly exceeded the ordinary license of a rebellious
general, is ... perfectly established. The public buildings
and monuments of ancient splendour suffered no wanton
destruction from his visit; but there can be no doubt that
Alaric and his troops levied heavy contributions on the city
and its inhabitants."
G. Finlay, Greece under the Romans, chapter 2, section 8.
ALSO IN:
E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 30
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25717.
See, also, GOTHS: A. D. 395, ALARIC'S INVASION OF GREECE.
ATHENS: A. D. 529.
Suppression of the Schools by Justinian.
"The Attic schools of rhetoric and philosophy maintained their
superior reputation from the Peloponnesian War to the reign of
Justinian. Athens, though situate in a barren soil, possessed
a pure air, a free navigation, and the monuments of ancient
art. That sacred retirement was seldom disturbed by the
business of trade or government; and the last of the Athenians
were distinguished by their lively wit, the purity of their
taste and language, their social manners, and some traces, at
least in discourse, of the magnanimity of their fathers. In
the suburbs of the city, the Academy of the Platonists, the
Lycæum of the Peripatetics, the Portico of the Stoics and the
Garden of the Epicureans were planted with trees and decorated
with statues; and the philosophers, instead of being immured
in a cloister, delivered their instructions in spacious and
pleasant walks, which, at different hours, were consecrated to
the exercises of the mind and body. The genius of the founders
still lived in those venerable seats. ...
{186}
The schools of Athens were protected by the wisest and most
virtuous of the Roman princes. ... Some vestige of royal
bounty may be found under the successors of Constantine. ...
The golden chain, as it was fondly styled, of the Platonic
succession, continued ... to the edict of Justinian [A. D.
529] which imposed a perpetual silence on the schools of
Athens, and excited the grief and indignation of the few
remaining votaries of Greek science and superstition."
E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 40.
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25717
ATHENS: A. D. 1205.
The founding of the Latin Dukedom.
"The portion of Greece lying to the south of the kingdom of
Saloniki was divided by the Crusaders [after their conquest of
Constantinople, A. D. 1204--see BYZANTINE EMPIRE: A. D.
1203-1204] among several great feudatories of the Empire of
Romania. ... The lords of Boudonitza, Salona, Negropont, and
Athens are alone mentioned as existing to the north of the
isthmus of Corinth, and the history of the petty sovereigns of
Athens can alone be traced in any detail. ... Otho de la
Roche, a Burgundian nobleman, who had distinguished himself
during the siege of Constantinople, marched southward with the
army of Boniface the king-marquis, and gained possession of
Athens in 1205. Thebes and Athens had probably fallen to his
share in the partition of the Empire, but it is possible that
the king of Saloniki may have found means to increase his
portion, in order to induce him to do homage to the crown of
Saloniki for this addition. At all events, it appears that
Otho de la Roche did homage to Boniface, either as his
immediate superior, or as viceroy for the Emperor of Romania.
... Though the Byzantine aristocracy and dignified clergy were
severe sufferers by the transference of the government into

the hands of the Franks, the middle classes long enjoyed peace
and security. ... The social civilization of the inhabitants,
and their ample command of the necessaries and many of the
luxuries of life, were in those days as much superior to the
condition of the citizens of Paris and London as they are now
inferior. ... The city was large and wealthy, the country
thickly covered with villages, of which the ruins may still be
traced in spots affording no indications of Hellenic sites.
... The trade of Athens was considerable, and the luxury of
the Athenian ducal court was celebrated in all the regions of
the West where chivalry flourished."
G. Finlay, History of Greece from its Conquest by the
Crusaders, chapter 7.
ALSO IN:
C. C. Felton, Greece, Ancient and Modern: 4th Course.
lecture 5.
ATHENS: A. D. 1311-1456.
Under the Catalans and the Florentines.
See CATALAN GRAND COMPANY.
ATHENS: A. D. 1456.
The Turks in possession.
Athens was not occupied by the Turks until three years after
the conquest of Constantinople (see CONSTANTINOPLE: A. D.
1453). In the meantime the reign of the Florentine dukes of
the house of Acciaioli came to a tragical close. The last of
the dukes, Maurice Acciaioli died, leaving a young son and a
young widow, the latter renowned for her beauty and her
talents. The duchess, whom the will of her husband had made
regent, married a comely Venetian named Palmerio, who was said
to have poisoned his wife in order to be free to accept her
hand. Thereupon a nephew of the late duke, named Franco,
stirred up insurrections at Athens and fled to Constantinople
to complain to the sultan, Mahomet II. "The sultan, glad of
all pretexts that coloured his armed intervention in the
affairs of these principalities, ordered Omar, son of
Tourakhan, chief of the permanent army of the Peloponnesus, to
take possession of Athens, to dethrone the duchess and to
confine her sons in his prisons of the citadel of Megara."
This was done; but Palmerio, the duchess's husband, made his
way to the sultan and interceded in her behalf. "Mahomet, by
the advice of his viziers, feigned to listen equally to the
complaints of Palmerio, and to march to reestablish the
legitimate sovereignty. But already Franco, entering Megara
under the auspices of the Ottomans, had strangled both the
duchess and her son. Mahomet, advancing in turn to punish him
for his vengeance, expelled Franco from Athens on entering it,
and gave him, in compensation, the inferior and dependent
principality of Thebes, in Boeotia. The sultan, as lettered as
he was warlike, evinced no less pride and admiration than
Sylla at the sight of the monuments of Athens. 'What
gratitude,' exclaimed he before the Parthenon and the temple
of Theseus, 'do not religion and the Empire owe to the son of
Tourakhan, who has made them a present of these spoils of the
genius of the Greeks.'"
A. Lamartine, History of Turkey, book 13, section 10-12.
ATHENS: A. D. 1466.
Capture and plundering by the Venetians.
See GREECE: A. D. 1454-1479.
ATHENS: A. D. 1687.
Siege, bombardment and capture by the Venetians.
Destructive explosion in the Parthenon.
See TURKS: A. D. 1684-1696.
ATHENS: A. D. 1821-1829.
The Greek revolution and war of independence.
Capture by the Turks.
See GREECE: A. D. 1821-1829.
----------ATHENS: End--------------
ATHERTON GAG, The.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1836.
ATHLONE, Siege of (A. D. 1691).
See IRELAND: A. D. 1689-1691.
ATHRAVAS.
See MAGIANS.
ATIMIA.
The penalty of Atimia, under ancient Athenian law, was the
loss of civic rights.
G. F. Schömann, Antiquity of Greece: The State,
part 3, chapter 3.
ATIMUCA, The.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: TIMUCUA.
ATLANTA: A. D. 1864 (May-September).
Sherman's advance to the city.
Its siege and capture.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A. D. 1864 (MAY: GEORGIA); and (MAY-SEPTEMBER: GEORGIA).
ATLANTA: A. D. 1864 (September).
Exclusive military occupation of the city.
Removal of inhabitants.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1864
(SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER: GEORGIA).
ATLANTA: A. D. 1864 (November).
Destruction of the city.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1864
(NOVEMBER-DECEMBER: GEORGIA).
----------ATLANTA: End----------
ATLANTIC OCEAN:
The name.
The Atlantic Ocean is mentioned by that name in a single
passage of Herodotus; "but it is clear, from the incidental
way in which it [the name] is here introduced, that it was one
well known in his day."
E. H. Bunbury, History of Ancient Geography,
chapter 7, section 1, note.
For a sketch of the history of the modern use of the name,
See PACIFIC OCEAN.
{187}
ATREBATES, The.
This name was borne by a tribe in ancient Belgic Gaul, which
occupied modern Artois and part of French Flanders, and, also,
by a tribe or group of tribes in Britain, which dwelt in a
region between the Thames and the Severn. The latter was
probably a colony from the former.
See BELGÆ;
also BRITAIN, CELTIC TRIBES.
ATROPATENE.--MEDIA ATROPATENE.
"Atropatene, as a name for the Alpine land in the northwest of
Iran (now Aderbeijan), came into use in the time of the Greek
Empire [Alexander's]; at any rate we cannot trace it earlier.
'Athrapaiti' means 'lord of fire;' 'Athrapata,' 'one protected
by fire;' in the remote mountains of this district the old
fire worship was preserved with peculiar zeal under the
Seleucids."
M. Duncker, History of Antiquity, book 7, chapter 4.
Atropatene "comprises the entire basin of Lake Urumiyeh,
together with the country intervening between that basin and
the high mountain chain which curves round the southwestern
corner of the Caspian."
G. Rawlinson, Five Great Monarchies: Media, chapter 1.
Atropatene was "named in honour of the satrap Atropates, who
had declared himself king after Alexander's death."
J. P. Mahaffy, Story of Alexander's Empire, chapter 13.
ATSINAS.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: BLACKFEET.
ATTABEGS.
See ATABEGS.
ATTACAPAN FAMILY, The.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: ATTACAPAN FAMILY.
ATTAMAN, or HETMAN.
See COSSACKS.
ATTECOTTI, The.
See OTADENI;
also, BRITAIN, CELTIC TRIBES.
ATTIC SALT.
Thyme was a favorite condiment among the ancient Greeks,
"which throve nowhere else so well as in Attica. Even salt was
seasoned with thyme. Attic salt, however, is famed rather in
the figurative than in the literal sense, and did not form an
article of trade."
G. F. Schömann, Antiquity of Greece: The State,
part 3, chapter 3.
ATTIC TALENT.
See TALENT.
ATTIC WAR, The.
See TEN YEARS' WAR.
ATTICA.
"It forms a rocky peninsula, separated from the mainland by
trackless mountains, and jutting so far out into the Eastern
Sea that it lay out of the path of the tribes moving from
north to south. Hence the migratory passages which agitated
the whole of Hellas left Attica untouched, and for this reason
Attic history is not divided into such marked epochs as that of
Peloponnesus; it possesses a superior unity, and presents an
uninterrupted development of coalitions of life native in
their origin to the land. ... On the other hand Attica was
perfectly adapted by nature for receiving immigrants from the
sea. For the whole country, as its name indicates, consists of
coast-land; and the coast abounds in harbours, and on account of
the depth of water in the roads is everywhere accessible;
while the best of its plains open towards the coast and invite
the mariner to land. The first landings by which the
monotonous conditions of the age of the Pelasgians were
interrupted where those of the Phoenicians, who domesticated
the worship of Aphrodite, as well as that of the Tyrian Melcar
on the coasts. Afterwards the tribes of the shores of Asia Minor
came across; in the first place the Carians, who introduced
the worship of the Carian Zeus and Posidon, and were followed
by Cretans, Lycians, Dardanians and Old Ionians. The
population became mixed. ... This first epoch of the national
history the ancients connected with the name of Cecrops. It
forms the transition from the life of rural districts and
villages to that of a state. Attica has become a land with
twelve citadels, in each of which dwells a chieftain or king,
who has his domains, his suite, and his subjects. Every
twelfth is a state by itself, with its separate public hall
and common hearth. If under these circumstances a common
national history was to be attained to, one of the twelve
towns, distinguished by special advantages of situation, would
have to become the capital. And to such a position undeniable
advantages entitled the city whose seat was in the plain of
the Cephisus. ... Into the centre of the entire plain advances
from the direction of Hymettus a group of rocky heights, among
them an entirely separate and mighty block which, with the
exception of a narrow access from the west, offers on all
sides vertically precipitous walls, surmounted by a broad
level sufficiently roomy to afford space for the sanctuaries
of the national gods and the habitations of the national
rulers. It seems as if nature had designedly placed this rock
in this position as the ruling castle and the centre of the
national history. This is the Acropolis of Athens, among the
twelve castles of the land that which was preëminently named
after the national king Cecrops. ... So far from being
sufficiently luxuriant to allow even the idle to find easy
means of sustenance, the Attic soil was stony, devoid of a
sufficient supply of water, and for the most part only adapted
to the cultivation of barley; everywhere ... labour and a
regulated industry were needed. But this labour was not
unremunerative. Whatever orchard and garden fruits prospered
were peculiarly delicate and agreeable to the taste; the
mountain-herbs were nowhere more odourous than on Hymettus;
and the sea abounded with fish. The mountains, not only by the
beauty of their form invest the whole scenery with a certain
nobility, but in their depths lay an abundance of the most
excellent building-stone and silver ore; in the lowlands was
to be found the best kind of clay for purposes of manufacture.
The materials existed for all arts and handicrafts; and
finally Attica rejoiced in what the ancients were wise enough
to recognize as a special favour of Heaven, a dry and
transparent atmosphere, by its peculiar clearness productive
of bodily freshness, health and elasticity, while it sharpened
the senses, disposed the soul to cheerfulness and aroused and
animated the powers of the mind. Such were the institutions of
the land which was developing the germs of its peculiar
history at the time when the [Dorian] migrations were
agitating the whole mainland. Though Attica was not herself
overrun by hostile multitudes, yet about the same time she
admitted manifold accessions of foreign population in smaller
groups. By this means she enjoyed all the advantages of an
invigorating impulse without exposing herself to the evils of
a violent revolution. ... The immigrants who domesticated
themselves in Attica were ... chiefly families of superior
eminence, so that Attica gained not only in numbers of
population, but also in materials of culture of every
description."
E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 2, chapter 2.
ALSO IN:
J. I. Lockhart, Attica and Athens.
See also. ATHENS: THE BEGINNING.
{188}
ATTILA'S CONQUESTS AND EMPIRE.
See HUNS.
ATTIOUANDARONK, The.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: HURONS. &c.
ATTYADÆ, The.
The first dynasty of the kings of Lydia, claimed to be sprung
from Attys, son of the god Manes.
M. Duncker, History of Antiquity, book 4, chapter 17.
AUBAINE, The right of.
"A prerogative by which the Kings of France claimed the
property of foreigners who died in their kingdom without being
naturalized." It was suppressed by Colbert, in the reign of
Louis XIV.
J. A. Blanqui, History of Political Economy in Europe,
page 285.
AUCH:
Origin of the name.
See AQUITAINE: THE ANCIENT TRIBES.
AUCKLAND, Lord, The Indian Administration of.
See INDIA: A. D. 1836-1845.
AUDENARDE.
See OUDINARDE.
AUDIENCIAS.
"For more than two centuries and a half the whole of South
America, except Brazil, settled down under the colonial
government of Spain, and during the greater part of that time
this vast territory was under the rule of the Viceroys of Peru
residing at Lima. The impossibility of conducting an efficient
administration from such a centre ... at once became apparent.
Courts of justice called Audiencias were, therefore,
established in the distant provinces, and their presidents,
sometimes with the title of captains-general, had charge of
the executive under the orders of the Viceroys. The Audiencia
of Charcas (the modern Bolivia) was established in 1559. Chile
was ruled by captains-general, and an Audiencia was
established at Santiago in 1568. In New Grenada the president
of the Audiencia, created in 1564, was also captain-general.
The Audiencia of Quito, also with its president as
captain-general, dated from 1542; and Venezuela was under a
captain-general."
C. R. Markham, Colonial History of South America.
(Narrative and Critical History of America,
volume 8, page 295).
AUERSTADT, Battle of.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1806 (OCTOBER).
AUGEREAU, Marshal, Campaigns of.
See
FRANCE: A. D. 1797 (SEPTEMBER);
GERMANY: A. D. 1806 (OCTOBER);
SPAIN: A. D. 1809 (FEBRUARY-JUNE);
and RUSSIA: A. D. 1812 (JUNE-SEPTEMBER);
1813 (AUGUST), (OCTOBER), (OCTOBER-DECEMBER).
AUGHRIM, OR AGHRIM, Battle of (A. D. 1691).
See IRELAND: A. D. 1689-1691.
AUGSBURG: Origin.
See AUGUSTA VINDELICORUM.
AUGSBURG: A. D. 955.
Great defeat of the Hungarians.
See HUNGARIANS: A. D. 934-955.
AUGSBURG: A. D. 1530.
Sitting of the Diet.
Signing and reading of the Protestant Confession of Faith.
The Imperial Decree condemning the Protestants.
See PAPACY: A. D. 1530-1531.
AUGSBURG: A. D. 1555.
The Religious Peace concluded.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1552-1561.
AUGSBURG: A. D. 1646.
Unsuccessful siege by Swedes and French.
See GERMANY; A. D. 1646-1648.
AUGSBURG: A. D. 1686-1697.
The League and the War of the League.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1686;
and FRANCE: A. D. 1689-1690, and after.
AUGSBURG: A. D. 1703.
Taken by the French.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1703.
AUGSBURG: A. D. 1801-1803.
One of six free cities which survived the Peace of Luneville.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1801-1803.
AUGSBURG: A. D. 1806.
Loss of municipal freedom.
Absorption in the kingdom of Bavaria.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1805-1806.
----------AUGSBURG: End----------
AUGURS.--PONTIFICES.--FETIALES.
"There was ... enough of priesthood and of priests in Rome.
Those, however, who had business with a god resorted to the
god, and not to the priest. Every suppliant and inquirer
addressed himself directly to the divinity; ... no
intervention of a priest was allowed to conceal or to obscure
this original and simple relation. But it was no easy matter
to hold converse with a god. The god had his own way of
speaking, which was intelligible only to those acquainted with
it; but one who did rightly understand it knew not only how to
ascertain, but also how to manage, the will of the god, and
even in case of need to overreach or to constrain him. It was
natural, therefore, that the worshipper of the god should
regularly consult such men of skill and listen to their
advice; and thence arose the corporations or colleges of men
specially skilled in religious lore, a thoroughly national
Italian institution, which had a far more important influence
on political development than the individual priests or
priesthoods. These colleges have been often, but erroneously,
confounded with the priesthoods. The priesthoods were charged
with the worship of a specific divinity. ... Under the Roman
constitution and that of the Latin communities in general
there were originally but two such colleges: that of the
augurs and that of the pontifices. The six augurs were skilled
in interpreting the language of the gods from the flight of
birds; an art which was prosecuted with great earnestness and
reduced to a quasi-scientific system. The five 'bridge
builders' (pontifices) derived their name from their function,
as sacred as it was politically important, of conducting the
building and demolition of the bridge over the Tiber. They
were the Roman engineers, who understood the mystery of
measures and numbers; whence there devolved upon them also the
duties of managing the calendar of the state, of proclaiming
to the people the time of new and full moon and the days of
festivals, and of seeing that every religious and every
judicial act took place on the right day. ... Thus they
acquired (although not probably to the full extent till after
the abolition of the monarchy) the general oversight of Roman
worship and of whatever was connected with it. [The president
of their college was called the Pontifex Maximus.] ... They
themselves described the sum of their knowledge as 'the
science of things divine and human.' ... By the side of these
two oldest and most eminent corporations of men versed in
spiritual lore may be to some extent ranked the college of the
twenty state-heralds (fetiales, of uncertain derivation)
destined as a living repository to preserve traditionally the
remembrance of the treaties concluded with neighboring
communities, to pronounce an authoritative opinion on alleged
infractions of treaty rights, and in case of need to demand
satisfaction and declare war."
T. Mommsen, History of Rome, book I, chapter 12.
ALSO IN:
E. Guhl and W. Koner, Life of the Greeks and Romans,
section 103.
See, also, AUSPICES, and FETIALES.
{189}
AUGUSTA TREVIRORUM.
See TUÈVES, ORIGIN OF.
AUGUSTA VEROMANDUORUM.
Modern St. Quentin.
See BELGÆ.
AUGUSTA VINDELICORUM.
"Augusta Vindelicorum is the modern Augsburg, founded, it may
be supposed, about the year 740 [B. C. 14] after the conquest
of Rhætia by Drusus. ... The Itineraries represent it as the
centre of the roads from Verona, Sirmium, and Treviri."
C. Merivale, History of the Romans, chapter 36, note.
AUGUSTODUNUM.
The Emperor Augustus changed the name of Bibracte in Gaul to
Augustodunum, which time has corrupted, since to Autun.
AUGUSTONEMETUM.
See GERGOVIA OF THE ARVERNI.
AUGUSTUS.--AUGUSTA:
The Title.
"Octavius [see ROME: B. C. 31-14] had warily declined any of
the recognized designations of sovereign rule. Antonius had
abolished the dictatorship; his successor respected the
acclamations with which the people had greeted this decree.
The voices which had saluted Cæsar with the title of king were
peremptorily commanded to be dumb. Yet Octavius was fully
aware of the influence which attached to distinctive titles of
honour. While he scrupulously renounced the names upon which
the breath of human jealousy had blown, he conceived the
subtler policy of creating another for himself, which
borrowing its original splendour from his own character,
should reflect upon him an untarnished lustre. ... The epithet
Augustus ... had never been borne by any man before. ... But
the adjunct, though never given to a man, had been applied to
things most noble, most venerable and most divine. The rites
of the gods were called august, the temples were august; the
word itself was derived from the holy auguries by which the
divine will was revealed; it was connected with the favour and
authority of Jove himself. ... The illustrious title was
bestowed upon the heir of the Cæsarian Empire in the middle of
the month of January, 727 [B. C. 27], and thenceforth it is by
the name of Augustus that he is recognized in Roman history."
C. Merivale, History of the Romans, chapter 30.
"When Octavianus had firmly established his power and was now
left without a rival, the Senate, being desirous of
distinguishing him by some peculiar and emphatic title,
decreed, in B. C. 27, that he should be styled Augustus, an
epithet properly applicable to some object demanding respect
and veneration beyond what is bestowed upon human things. ...
This being an honorary appellation ... it would, as a matter
of course, have been transmitted by inheritance to his
immediate descendants. ... Claudius, although he could not be
regarded as a descendant of Octavianus, assumed on his
accession the title of Augustus, and his example was followed
by all succeeding rulers ... who communicated the title of
Augusta to their consorts."
W. Ramsay, Manual of Roman Antiquity., chapter 5.
See, also, ROME: B. C. 31-A. D. 14.
AULA REGIA, The.
See CURIA REGIS OF THE NORMAN KINGS.
AULDEARN, Battle of (A. D. 1645).
See SCOTLAND: A. D. 1644-1645.
AULERCI, The.
The Aulerci were an extensive nation in ancient Gaul which
occupied the country from the lower course of the Seine to the
Mayenne. It was subdivided into three great tribes--the
Aulerci Cenomanni, Aulerci Diablintes and Aulerci Eburovices.
Napoleon III., History of Cæsar, book 3, chapter 2.
AULIC COUNCIL, The.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1493-1519.
AUMALE, Battle of (1592).
See FRANCE: A. D. 1591-1593.
AUNEAU, Battle of (1587).
See FRANCE: A. D. 1584-1589.
AURANGZEB, Moghul Emperor, or Padischah of India, A. D.
1658-1707.
AURAY, Battle of (1365).
See BRITTANY: A. D. 1341-1365.
AURELIAN, Roman Emperor. A. D.270-275.
AURELIAN ROAD, The.
One of the great Roman roads of antiquity, which ran from Rome
to Pisa and Luna.
T. Mommsen, History of Rome, book 4, chapter 11.
AURELIO, King of Leon and the Asturias, or Oviedo, A. D. 768-774.
AURUNCANS, The.
See AUSONIANS;
also OSCANS.
AUSCI, The.
See AQUITAINE, THE ANCIENT TRIBES.
AUSGLEICH, The.
See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1866-1867.
AUSONIANS, OR AURUNCANS, The.
A tribe of the ancient Volscians, who dwelt in the lower
valley of the Liris, and who are said to have been
exterminated by the Romans, B. C. 314.
W. Ihne, History of Rome, book 3, chapter 10.
See, also, OSCANS.
AUSPICES, Taking the.
"The Romans, in the earlier ages of their history, never
entered upon any important business whatsoever, whether public
or private, without endeavouring, by means of divination, to
ascertain the will of the gods in reference to the
undertaking. ... This operation was termed 'sumere auspicia;'
and if the omens proved unfavourable the business was
abandoned or deferred. ... No meeting of the Comitia Curiata
nor of the Comitia Centuriata could be held unless the
auspices had been previously taken. ... As far as public
proceedings were concerned, no private individual, even among
the patricians, had the right of taking auspices. This duty
devolved upon the supreme magistrate alone. ... In an army
this power belonged exclusively to the commander-in-chief; and
hence all achievements were said to be performed under his
auspices, even although he were not present. ... The objects
observed in taking these auspices were birds, the class of
animals from which the word is derived ('Auspicium ab ave
spicienda'). Of these, some were believed to give indications
by their flight ... others by their notes or cries ... while a
third class consisted of chickens ('pulli') kept in cages.
When it was desired to obtain an omen from these last, food
was placed before them, and the manner in which they comported
themselves was closely watched. ... The manner of taking the
auspices previous to the Comitia was as follows:--The
magistrate who was to preside at the assembly arose
immediately after midnight on the day for which it had been
summoned, and called upon an augur to assist him. ... With his
aid a region of the sky and a space of ground, within which
the auspices were observed, were marked out by the divining
staff ('lituus') of the augur. ... This operation was
performed with the greatest care. ... In making the necessary
observations, the president was guided entirely by the augur,
who reported to him the result."
W. Ramsay, Manual of Roman Antiquity., chapter 4.
ALSO IN:
W. Ihne, History of Rome, book 6, chapter 13.
See, also, AUGUR.
{190}
AUSTERLITZ, Battle of.
See FRANCE: A. D. 1805 (MARCH-DECEMBER).
AUSTIN, Stephen F., and the settlement of Texas.
See TEXAS: A. D. 1819-1835.
AUSTIN CANONS, OR CANONS OF ST. AUGUSTINE.
"About the middle of the 11th century an attempt had been made
to redress the balance between the regular and secular clergy,
and restore to the latter the influence and consideration in
spiritual matters which they had, partly by their own fault,
already to a great extent lost. Some earnest and thoughtful
spirits, distressed at once by the abuse of monastic
privileges and by the general decay of ecclesiastical order,
sought to effect a reform by the establishment of a stricter
and better organized discipline in those cathedral and other
churches which were served by colleges of secular priests. ...
Towards the beginning of the twelfth century the attempts at
canonical reform issued in the form of what was virtually a
new religious order, that of the Angustinians, or Canons
Regular of the order of S. Angustine. Like the monks and
unlike the secular canons, from whom they were carefully
distinguished, they had not only their table and dwelling but
all things in common, and were bound by a vow to the
observance of their rule, grounded upon a passage in one of
the letters of that great father of the Latin Church from whom
they took their name. Their scheme was a compromise between
the old fashioned system of canons and that of the monastic
confraternities; but a compromise leaning strongly towards the
monastic side. ... The Austin canons, as they were commonly
called, made their way across the channel in Henry's reign."
K. Norgate, England under the Angevin Kings,
volume 1, chapter 1.
ALSO IN:
E. L. Cutts, Scenes and Characters of the Middle Age.,
chapter 3.
AUSTRALIA: A. D. 1601-1800.
Discovery and early exploration.
The founding of the penal colonies at Sydney and Norfolk Island.
"Australia has had no Columbus. It is even doubtful if the
first navigators who reached her shores set out with any idea
of discovering a great south land. At all events, it would
seem, their achievements were so little esteemed by themselves
and their countrymen that no means were taken to preserve
their names in connexion with their discoveries. Holland long
had the credit of bringing to light the existence of that
island-continent, which until recent years was best known by
her name. In 1861, however, Mr. Major, to whom we are indebted
for more recent research upon the subject, produced evidence
which appeared to demonstrate that the Portuguese had reached
the shores of Australia in 1601, five years before the Dutch
yacht Duyphen, or Dove,--the earliest vessel whose name has
been handed down,--sighted, about March, 1606, what is
believed to have been the coast near Cape York, Mr. Major, in
a learned paper read before the Society of Antiquaries in
1872, indicated the probability that the first discovery was
made 'in or before the year 1531.' The dates of two of the six
maps from which Mr. Major derives his information are 1531 and
1542. The latter clearly indicates Australia, which is called
Jave la Grande. New Zealand is also marked."
F. P. Labilliere, Early History of the Colony of Victoria,
chapter 1.
In 1606, De Quiros, a Spanish navigator, sailing from Peru,
across the Pacific, reached a shore which stretched so far
that he took it to be a continent. "He called the place
'Tierra Australis de Espiritu Santo,' that is 'Southern Land
of the Holy Spirit.' It is now known that this was not really
a continent, but merely one of the New Hebrides Islands, and
more than a thousand miles away from the mainland. ... In
after years, the name he had invented was divided into two
parts; the island he had really discovered being called
Espiritu Santo, while the continent he thought he had
discovered was called Terra Australis. This last name was
shortened by another discoverer--Flinders--to the present term
Australia." After the visit to the Australian coast of the
small Dutch ship, the "Dove," it was touched, during the next
twenty years, by a number of vessels of the same nationality.
"In 1622 a Dutch ship, the 'Leeuwin,' or 'Lioness,' sailed
along the southern coast, and its name was given to the
southwest cape of Australia. ... In 1628 General Carpenter
sailed completely round the large Gulf to the north, which has
taken its name from this circumstance. Thus, by degrees, all
the northern and western, together with part of the southern
shores, came to be roughly explored, and the Dutch even had
some idea of colonizing this continent. ... During the next
fourteen years we hear no more of voyages to Australia; but in
1642 Antony Van Diemen, the Governor of the Dutch possessions
in the East Indies, sent out his friend Abel Jansen Tasman,
with two ships, to make discoveries in the South Seas." Tasman
discovered the island which he called Van Diemen's Land, but
which has since been named in his own honor--Tasmania. "This
he did not know to be an island; he drew it on his maps as if
it were a peninsula belonging to the mainland of Australia."
In 1699, the famous buccaneer, William Dampier, was given the
command of a vessel sent out to the southern seas, and he
explored about 900 miles of the northwestern coast of
Australia; but the description which he gave of the country
did not encourage the adventurous to seek fortune in it. "We
hear of no further explorations in this part of the world
until nearly a century after; and, even then, no one thought
of sending out ships specially for the purpose. But in the
year 1770 a series of important discoveries were indirectly
brought about. The Royal Society of London, calculating that
the planet Venus would cross the disc of the sun in 1769,
persuaded the English Government to send out an expedition to
the Pacific Ocean for the purpose of making observations on
this event which would enable astronomers to calculate the
distance of the earth from the sun. A small vessel, the
'Endeavour,' was chosen; astronomers with their instruments
embarked, and the whole placed under the charge of" the
renowned sailor, Captain James Cook. The astronomical purposes
of the expedition were satisfactorily accomplished at Otaheite,
and Captain Cook then proceeded to an exploration of the
shores of New Zealand and Australia.
{191}
Having entered a fine bay on the south-eastern
coast of Australia, "he examined the country for a few miles
inland, and two of his scientific friends--Sir Joseph Banks
and Dr. Solander--made splendid collections of botanical
specimens. From this circumstance the place was called Botany
Bay, and its two head-lands received the names of Cape Banks
and Cape Solander. It was here that Captain Cook ... took
possession of the country on behalf of His Britannic Majesty,
giving it the name 'New South Wales,' on account of the
resemblance of its coasts to the southern shores of Wales.
Shortly after they had set sail from Botany Bay they observed
a small opening in the land, but Cook did not stay to examine
it, merely marking it on his chart as Port Jackson, in honour
of his friend Sir George Jackson. ... The reports brought home
by Captain Cook completely changed the beliefs current in
those days with regard to Australia. ... It so happened that,
shortly after Cook's return, the English nation had to deal
with a great difficulty in regard to its criminal population.
In 1776 the United States declared their independence, and the
English then found they could no longer send their convicts
over to Virginia, as they had formerly done. In a short time
the gaols of England were crowded with felons. It became
necessary to select a new place of transportation; and, just
as this difficulty arose, Captain Cook's voyages called
attention to a land in every way suited for such a purpose,
both by reason of its fertility and of its great distance.
Viscount Sydney, therefore, determined to send out a party to
Botany Bay, in order to found a convict settlement there; and
in May, 1787, a fleet was ready to sail." After a voyage of
eight months the fleet arrived at Botany Bay, in January,
1788. The waters of the Bay were found to be too shallow for a
proper harbour, and Captain Phillip, the appointed Governor of
the settlement, set out, with three boats, to search for
something better. "As he passed along the coast he turned to
examine the opening which Captain Cook had called Port
Jackson, and soon found himself in a winding channel of water,
with great cliffs frowning overhead. All at once a magnificent
prospect opened on his eyes. A harbour, which is, perhaps, the
most beautiful and perfect in the world, stretched before him
far to the west, till it was lost on the distant horizon. It
seemed a vast maze of winding waters, dotted here and there
with lovely islets. ... Captain Phillip selected, as the place
most suitable to the settlement, a small inlet, which, in
honour of the Minister of State, he called Sydney Cove. It was
so deep as to allow vessels to approach within a yard or two
of the shore." Great difficulties and sufferings attended the
founding of the penal settlement, and many died of actual
starvation as well as of disease; but in twelve years the
population had risen to between 6,000 and 7,000 persons.
Meantime a branch colony had been established on Norfolk
Island. In 1702 Governor Phillip, broken in health, had
resigned, and in 1795 he had been succeeded by Governor
Hunter. "When Governor Hunter arrived, in 1795, he brought
with him, on board his ship, the 'Reliance,' It young surgeon,
George Bass, and a midshipman called Matthew Flinders. They
were young men of the most admirable character. ... Within a
month after their arrival they purchased a small boat about
eight feet in length, which they christened the 'Tom Thumb.'
Its crew consisted of themselves and a boy to assist." In this
small craft they began a survey of the coast, usefully
charting many miles of it. Soon afterwards, George Bass, in an
open whale-boat, pursued his explorations southwards, to the
region now called Victoria, and through the straits which bear
his name, thus discovering the fact that Van Diemen's Land, or
Tasmania, is an island, not a peninsula. In 1798, Bass and
Flinders, again associated and furnished with a small sloop,
sailed round and surveyed the entire coast of Van Diemen's
Land. Bass now went to South America and there disappeared.
Flinders was commissioned by the British Government in 1800 to
make an extensive survey of the Australian coasts, and did so.
Returning to England with his maps, he was taken prisoner on
the way by the French and held in captivity for six years,
while the fruits of his labor were stolen. He died a few years
after being released.
A. and G. Sutherland, History of Australia, chapter 1-3.
ALSO IN:
G. W. Rusden, History of Australia, chapter 1-3 (volume 1).
AUSTRALIA: A. D. 1800-1840.
Beginning of the Prosperity of New South Wales.
Introduction of sheep-farming.
The founding of Victoria and South Australia.
"For twenty years and more no one at home gave a thought to
New South Wales, or 'Botany Bay,' as it was still erroneously
called, unless in vague horror and compassion for the poor
creatures who lived there in exile and starvation. The only
civilizing element in the place was the presence of a devoted
clergyman named Johnson, who had voluntarily accompanied the
first batch of convicts. ... Colonel Lachlan Macquarie entered
on the office of governor in 1810, and ruled the settlement
for twelve years. His administration was the first turning
point in its history. ... Macquarie saw that the best and
cheapest way of ruling the convicts was to make them freemen
as soon as possible. Before his time, the governors had looked
on the convicts as slaves, to be worked for the profit of the
government and of the free settlers. Macquarie did all he
could to elevate the class of emancipists, and to encourage
the convicts to persevere in sober industry in the hope of one
day acquiring a respectable position. He began to discontinue
the government farms, and to employ the convicts in
road-making so as to extend the colony in all directions. When
he came to Sydney, the country more than a day's ride from the
town was quite unknown. The growth of the settlement was
stopped on the west by a range called the Blue Mountains,
which before his time no one had succeeded in crossing. But in
1813, there came a drought upon the colony: the cattle, on
which everything depended, were unable to find food. Macquarie
surmised that there must be plenty of pasture on the plains
above the Blue Mountains: he sent an exploring party, telling
them that a pass must be discovered. In a few months, not only
was this task accomplished, and the vast and fertile pastures
of Bathurst reached, but a road 130 miles long was made,
connecting them with Sydney. The Lachlan and Macquarie rivers
were traced out to the west of the Blue Mountains.
{192}
Besides this, coal was found at the mouth of the Hunter river,
and the settlement at Newcastle formed. ... When it became
known that the penal settlement was gradually becoming a free
colony, and that Sydney and its population were rapidly
changing their character, English and Scotch people soon
bethought them of emigrating to the new country. Macquarie
returned home in 1822, leaving New South Wales four times as
populous, and twenty times as large as when he went out, and
many years in advance of what it might have been under a less
able and energetic governor. The discovery of the fine
pastures beyond the Blue Mountains settled the destiny of the
colony. The settlers came up thither with their flocks long
before Macquarie's road was finished; and it turned out that
the downs of Australia were the best sheep-walks in the world.
The sheep thrives better there, and produces finer and more
abundant wool, than anywhere else. John Macarthur, a
lieutenant in the New South Wales corps, had spent several
years in studying the effect of the Australian climate upon
the sheep; and he rightly surmised that the staple of the
colony would be its fine wool. In 1803, he went to England and
procured some pure Spanish merino sheep from the flock of
George III. ... The Privy Council listened to his wool
projects, and he received a large grant of land. Macarthur had
found out the true way to Australian prosperity. When the
great upland pastures were discovered, the merino breed was
well established in the colony; and the sheep-owners, without
waiting for grants, spread with their flocks over immense
tracts of country. This was the beginning of what is called
squatting. The squatters afterwards paid a quit-rent to the
government and thus got their runs, as they called the great
districts where they pastured their flocks, to a certain
extent secured to them. ... Hundreds upon hundreds of square
miles of the great Australian downs were now explored and
stocked with sheep for the English wool-market. ... It was in
the time of Macquarie's successor, Sir Thomas Brisbane, that
the prospects of New South Wales became generally known in
England. Free emigrants, each bringing more or less capital
with him, now poured in; and the demand for labour became
enormous. At first the penal settlements were renewed as
depots for the supply of labour, and it was even proposed that
the convicts should be sold by auction on their arrival; but
in the end the influx of free labourers entirely altered the
question. In Brisbane's time, and that of his successor, Sir
Ralph Darling, wages fell and work became scarce in England;
and English working men now turned their attention to
Australia. Hitherto the people had been either convicts or
free settlers of more or less wealth, and between these
classes there was great bitterness of feeling, each, naturally
enough, thinking that the colony existed for their own
exclusive benefit. The free labourers who now poured in
greatly contributed in course of time to fusing the population
into one. In Brisbane's time, trial by jury and a free press
were introduced. The finest pastures in Australia, the Darling
Downs near Moreton Bay, were discovered and settled [1825].
The rivers which pour into Moreton Bay were explored: one of
them was named the Brisbane, and a few miles from its mouth
the town of the same name was founded. Brisbane is now the
capital of the colony of Queensland: and other explorations in
his time led to the foundation of a second independent colony.
The Macquarie was traced beyond the marshes, in which it was
supposed to lose itself, and named the Darling: and the Murray
river was discovered [1829]. The tracing out of the Murray
river by the adventurous traveller Sturt, led to a colony on
the site which he named South Australia. In Darling's time,
the Swan River Colony, now called Western Australia, was
commenced. Darling ... was the first to sell the land at a
small fixed price, on the system adopted in America. ...
Darling returned to England in 1831; and the six-years
administration of his successor, Sir Richard Bourke, marks a
fresh turning-point in Australian history. In his time the
colony threw off two great offshoots. Port Phillip, on which
now stands the great city of Melbourne, had been discovered in
1802, and in the next year the government sent hither a
convict colony. This did not prosper, and this fine site was
neglected for thirty years. When the sudden rise of New South
Wales began, the squatters began to settle to the west and
north of Port Phillip; and the government at once sent an
exploring party, who reported most favourably of the country
around. In 1836, Governor Bourke founded a settlement in this
new land, which had been called, from its rich promise,
Australia Felix: and under his directions the site of a
capital was laid out, to be called Melbourne, in honour of the
English Prime Minister. This was in 1837, so that the
beginning of the colony corresponds nearly with that of Queen
Victoria's reign; a circumstance which afterwards led to its
being named Victoria. Further west still, a second new colony
arose about this time on the site discovered by Sturt in 1829.
This was called South Australia, and the first governor
arrived there at the end of the year 1836. The intended
capital was named Adelaide, in honour of the Queen of William
IV. Both the new colonies were commenced on a new system,
called from its inventor the Wakefield system, but the
founders of South Australia were able to carry it out most
effectually, because they were quite independent of the
experience and the prejudices of the Sydney government. Mr.
Wakefield was an ingenious man and a clever writer. ... His
notion was that the new colonies ought to be made 'fairly to
represent English society.' His plan was to arrest the strong
democratic tendencies of the new community, and to reproduce
in Australia the strong distinction of classes which was found
in England. He wanted the land sold as dear as land-owners:
and the produce of the land was to be applied in tempting
labourers to emigrate with the prospect of better wages than
they got at home. A Company was easily formed to carry out
these ideas in South Australia. ... Like the settlement of
Carolina as framed by Locke and Somers, it was really a plan
for getting the advantages of the colony into the hands of the
non-labouring classes: and by the natural laws of political
economy, it failed everywhere. Adelaide became the scene of an
Australian 'bubble.' The land-jobbers and money-lenders made
fortunes: but the people who emigrated, mostly belonging to
the middle and upper classes, found the scheme to be a
delusion. Land rapidly rose in value, and as rapidly sank; and
lots for which the emigrants had paid high prices became
almost worthless. The labourers emigrated elsewhere, and so
did those of the capitalists who had anything left. ... The
depression of South Australia, however, was but temporary. It
contains the best corn land in the whole island: and hence it
of course soon became the chief source of the food supply of
the neighbouring colonies, besides exporting large quantities
of corn to England. It contains rich mines of copper, and
produces large quantities of wool."
E. J. Payne, History of European Colonies, chapter 12.
ALSO IN:
G. W. Rusden, History of Australia, volume 1-2.
{193}
AUSTRALIA: A.D. 1839-1855.
Progress of the Port Phillip District.
Its Separation from New South Wales and erection into the
colony of Victoria.
Discovery of Gold.
Constitutional organization of the colony.
"In 1839 the population of Port Phillip amounted to nearly
6,000, and was being rapidly augmented from without. The sheep
in the district exceeded half a million, and of cattle and
horses the numbers were in proportion equally large. The place
was daily growing in importance. The Home Government therefore
decided to send an officer, with the title of Superintendent,
to take charge of the district, but to act under the Governor
of New South Wales. Charles Joseph La Trobe, Esq., was
appointed to this office. ... He arrived at Melbourne on the
30th September, 1839. Soon after this all classes of the new
community appear to have become affected by a mania for
speculation. ... As is always the case when speculation takes
the place of steady industry, the necessaries of life became
fabulously dear. Of money there was but little, in
consideration of the amount of business done, and large
transactions were effected by means of paper and credit. From
highest to lowest, all lived extravagantly. ... Such a state
of things could not last forever. In 1842, by which time the
population had increased to 24,000, the crash came. ... From
this depression the colony slowly recovered, and a sounder
business system took the place of the speculative one. ... All
this time, however, the colony was a dependency of New South
Wales, and a strong feeling had gained ground that it suffered
in consequence. ... A cry was raised for separation. The
demand was, as a matter of course, resisted by New South
Wales, but as the agitation was carried on with increased
activity, it was at last yielded to by the Home authorities.
The vessel bearing the intelligence arrived on the 11th
November, 1850. The news soon spread, and great was the
satisfaction of the colonists. Rejoicings were kept up in
Melbourne for five consecutive days. ... Before, however, the
separation could be legally accomplished, it was necessary
that an Act should be passed in New South Wales to settle
details. ... The requisite forms were at length given effect
to, and, on the 1st July, 1851, a day which has ever since
been scrupulously observed as a public holiday, it was
proclaimed that the Port Phillip district of New South Wales
had been erected into a separate colony to be called Victoria,
after the name of Her Most Gracious Majesty. At the same time
the Superintendent, Mr. C. J. La Trobe, was raised to the rank
of Lieutenant-Governor. At the commencement of the year of
separation the population of Port Phillip numbered 76,000, the
sheep 6,000,000, the cattle 380,000. ... In a little more than
a month after the establishment of Victoria as an independent
colony, it became generally known that rich deposits of gold
existed within its borders. ... The discovery of gold ... in
New South Wales, by Hargreaves, in February, 1851, caused
numbers to emigrate to that colony. This being considered
detrimental to the interests of Victoria, a public meeting was
held in Melbourne on the 9th of June, at which a
'gold-discovery committee' was appointed, which was authorized
to offer rewards to any that should discover gold in remunerative
quantities within the colony. The colonists were already on
the alert. At the time this meeting was held, several parties
were out searching for, and some had already found gold. The
precious metal was first discovered at Clunes, then in the
Yarra ranges at Anderson's Creek, soon after at Buninyong and
Ballarat, shortly afterwards at Mount Alexander, and
eventually at Bendigo. The deposits were found to be richer
and to extend over a wider area than any which had been
discovered in New South Wales. Their fame soon spread to the
adjacent colonies, and thousands hastened to the spot. ...
When the news reached home, crowds of emigrants from the
United Kingdom hurried to our shores. Inhabitants of other
European countries quickly joined in the rush. Americans from
the Atlantic States were not long in following. Stalwart
Californians left their own gold-yielding rocks and placers to
try their fortunes at the Southern Eldorado. Last of all,
swarms of Chinese arrived, eager to unite in the general
scramble for wealth. ... The important position which the
Australian colonies had obtained in consequence of the
discovery of gold, and the influx of population consequent
thereon, was the occasion of the Imperial Government
determining in the latter end of 1852 that each colony should
be invited to frame such a Constitution for its government as
its representatives might deem best suited to its own peculiar
circumstances. The Constitution framed in Victoria, and
afterwards approved by the British Parliament, was avowedly
based upon that of the United Kingdom. It provided for the
establishment of two Houses of Legislature, with power to make
laws, subject to the assent of the Crown as represented
generally by the Governor of the colony; the Legislative
Council, or Upper House, to consist of 30, and the Legislative
Assembly, or Lower House, to consist of 60 members. Members of

both Houses to be elective and to possess property
qualifications. Electors of both Houses to possess either
property or professional qualifications [the property
qualification of members and electors of the Lower House has
since been abolished]. ... The Upper House not to be
dissolved, but five members to retire every two years, and to
be eligible for re-election. The Lower House to be dissolved
every five years [since reduced to three], or oftener, at the
discretion of the Governor. Certain officers of the
Government, four at least of whom should have seats in
Parliament, to be deemed 'Responsible Ministers.' ... This
Constitution was proclaimed in Victoria on the 23d November,
1855."
H. H. Hayter, Notes on the Colony of Victoria, chapter 1.
ALSO IN:
F. P. Labilliere, Early History of the Colony of
Victoria, volume 2.
W. Westgarth, First Twenty Years of the Colony of
Victoria.
{194}
AUSTRALIA: A. D. 1859.
Separation of the Moreton Bay District from New South Wales.
Its erection into the colony of Queensland.
"Until December, 1859, the north-west portion of the Fifth
Continent was known as the Moreton Bay district, and belonged
to the colony of New South Wales; but at that date it had
grown so large that it was erected into a separate and
independent colony, under the name of Queensland. It lies
between latitude 10° 43' South and 29° South, and longitude
138° and 153° East, bounded on the north by Torres Straits; on
the north-east by the Coral Sea; on the east by the South
Pacific; on the south by New South Wales and South Australia;
on the west by South Australia and the Northern Territory; and
on the north-west by the Gulf of Carpentaria. It covers an
area ... twenty times as large as Ireland, twenty-three times
as large as Scotland, and eleven times the extent of England.
... Numerous good harbours are found, many of which form the
outlets of navigable rivers. The principal of these [is]
Moreton Bay, at the head of which stands Brisbane, the capital
of the colony. ... The mineral wealth of Queensland is very
great, and every year sees it more fully developed. ... Until
the year 1867, when the Gympie field was discovered, gold
mining as an industry was hardly known."
C. H. Eden, The Fifth Continent, chapter 10.
AUSTRALIA: A. D. 1885-1892.
Proposed Federation of the Colonies.
"It has been a common saying in Australia that our fellow
countrymen in that part of the world did not recognise the
term 'Australian;' each recognised only his own colony and the
empire. But the advocates of combination for certain common
purposes achieved a great step forward in the formation of a
'Federal Council' in 1885. It was to be only a 'Council,' its
decisions having no force over any colony unless accepted
afterwards by the colonial Legislature. Victoria, Queensland,
Tasmania, and West Australia joined, New South Wales, South
Australia, and New Zealand standing out, and, so constituted,
it met twice. The results of the deliberations were not
unsatisfactory, and the opinion that the move was in the right
direction rapidly grew. In February of 1890 a Federation
Conference, not private but representative of the different
Governments, was called at Melbourne. It adopted an address to
the Queen declaring the opinion of the conference to be that
the best interests of the Australian colonies require the
early formation of a union under the Crown into one
Government, both legislative and executive. Events proceed
quickly in Colonial History. In the course of 1890 the
hesitation of New South Wales was finally overcome; powerful
factors being the weakening of the Free Trade position at the
election of 1890, the report of General Edwards on the
Defences, and the difficulties about Chinese immigration. A
Convention accordingly assembled at Sydney in March, 1891,
which agreed upon a Constitution to be recommended to the
several Colonies."
A. Caldecott, English Colonization and Empire,
chapter 7, section 2.
"On Monday, March 2nd, 1891, the National Australasian
Convention met at the Parliament House, Sydney, New South
Wales, and was attended by seven representatives from each
Colony, except New Zealand, which only sent three. Sir Henry
Parkes (New South Wales) was elected President of the
Convention, and Sir Samuel Griffith (Queensland),
Vice-President. A series of resolutions, moved by Sir Henry
Parkes, occupied the attention of the Convention for several
days. These resolutions set forth the principles upon which
the Federal Government should be established, which were to
the effect that the powers and privileges of existing Colonies
should be kept intact, except in cases where surrender would
be necessary in order to form a Federal Government; that
intercolonial trade and intercourse should be free; that power
to impose Customs duties should rest with the Federal
Government and Parliament; and that the naval and military
defence of Australia should be entrusted to the Federal Forces
under one command. The resolutions then went on to approve of
a Federal Constitution which should establish a Federal
Parliament to consist of a Senate and a House of
Representatives; that a Judiciary, to consist of a Federal
Supreme Court, to be a High Court of Appeal for Australia,
should be established; and that a Federal Executive,
consisting of a Governor-General, with responsible advisers,
should be constituted. These resolutions were discussed at
great length, and eventually were adopted. The resolutions
were then referred to three Committees chosen from the
delegates, one to consider Constitutional Machinery and the
distribution of powers and functions; one to deal with matters
relating to Finance, Taxation, and Trade Regulations; and the
other to consider the question of the establishment of a
Federal Judiciary. A draft Bill, to constitute the
'Commonwealth of Australia,' was brought up by the first
mentioned of these Committees, and after full consideration
was adopted by the Convention, and it was agreed that the Bill
should be presented to each of the Australian Parliaments for
approval and adoption. On Thursday, April 9th. the Convention
closed its proceedings. The Bill to provide for the Federation
of the Australasian colonies entitled 'A Bill to constitute a
Commonwealth of Australia,' which was drafted by the National
Australasian Convention, has been introduced into the
Parliaments of most of the colonies of the group, and is still
(October, 1892), under consideration. In Victoria it has
passed the Lower House with some amendments."
Statesman's Year-book, 1893, page 308.
AUSTRALIA: A. D. 1890.
New South Wales and Victoria.
"New South Wales bears to Victoria a certain statistical
resemblance. The two colonies have [1890] about the same
population, and, roughly speaking, about the same revenues,
expenditure, debt and trade. In each, a great capital collects
in one neighbourhood more than a third of the total
population. ... But ... considerable differences lie behind
and are likely to develop in the future. New South Wales, in
the opinion of her enemies, is less enterprising than
Victoria, and has less of the go-ahead spirit which
distinguishes the Melbourne people. On the other hand she
possesses a larger territory, abundant supplies of coal, and
will have probably, in consequence, a greater future. Although
New South Wales is three and a half times as large as
Victoria, and has the area of the German Empire and Italy
combined, she is of course much smaller than the three other
but as yet less important colonies of the Australian continent
[namely Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia].
{195}
As the country was in a large degree settled by assisted
emigrants, of whom something like half altogether have been
Irish, while the English section was largely composed of
Chartists, ... the legislation of New South Wales has
naturally shown signs of its origin. Manhood suffrage was
carried in 1858; the abolition of primogeniture in 1862; safe
and easy transfer of land through the machinery of the Torrens
Act in the same year; and also the abolition of state aid to
religion. A public system of education was introduced, with
other measures of democratic legislation. ... Public
education, which in Victoria is free, is still paid for by
fees in New South Wales, though children going to or returning
from school are allowed to travel free by railway. In general
it may be said that New South Wales legislation in recent
times has not been so bold as the legislation of Victoria. ...
The land of New South Wales has to a large extent come into
the hands of wealthy persons who are becoming a territorial
aristocracy. This has been the effect firstly of grants and of
squatting legislation, then of the perversion of the Act of
1861 [for 'Free Selection before Survey'] to the use of those
against whom it had been aimed, and finally of natural
causes--soil, climate and the lack of water. ... The traces of
the convict element in New South Wales have become very slight
in the national character. The prevailing cheerfulness,
running into fickleness and frivolity, with a great deal more
vivacity than exists in England, does not suggest in the least
the intermixture of convict blood. It is a natural creation of
the climate, and of the full and varied life led by colonists
in a young country. ... A population of an excellent type has
swallowed up not only the convict element, but also the
unstable and thriftless element shipped by friends in Britain
to Sydney or to Melbourne. The ne'er-do-weels were either
somewhat above the average in brains, as was often the case
with those who recovered themselves and started life afresh,
or people who drank themselves to death and disappeared and
left no descendants. The convicts were also of various
classes; some of them were men in whom crime was the outcome
of restless energy, as, for instance, in many of those
transported for treason and for manslaughter; while some were
people of average morality ruined through companions, wives,
or sudden temptation, and some persons of an essentially
depraved and criminal life. The better classes of convicts, in
a new country, away from their old companions and old
temptations, turned over a new leaf, and their abilities and
their strong vitality, which in some cases had wrought their
ruin in the old world, found healthful scope in subduing to
man a new one. Crime in their cases was an accident, and would
not be transmitted to the children they left behind them. On
the other hand, the genuine criminals, and also the drunken
ne'er-do-weels, left no children. Drink and vice among the
'assigned servants' class of convicts, and an absence of all
facilities for marriage, worked them off the face of the
earth, and those who had not been killed before the gold
discovery generally drank themselves to death upon the
diggings."
Sir C. W. Dilke, Problems of Greater Britain,
part 2, chapter 2.
AUSTRASIA AND NEUSTRIA, OR NEUSTRASIA.
"It is conjectured by Luden, with great probability, that the
Ripuarians were originally called the 'Eastern' people to
distinguish them from the Salian Franks who lived to the West.
But when the old home of the conquerors on the right bank of
the Rhine was united with their new settlements in Gaul, the
latter, as it would seem, were called Neustria or Neustrasia
(New Lands); while the term Austrasia came to denote the
original seats of the Franks, on what we now call the German
bank of the Rhine. The most important difference between them
(a difference so great as to lead to their permanent
separation into the kingdoms of France and Germany by the
treaty of Verdun) was this: that in Neustria the Frankish
element was quickly absorbed by the mass of Gallo-Romanism by
which it was surrounded; while in Austrasia, which included
the ancient seats of the Frankish conquerors, the German
element was wholly predominant. The import of the word
Austrasia (Austria, Austrifrancia) is very fluctuating. In its
widest sense it was used to denote all the countries
incorporated into the Frankish Empire, or even held in
subjection to it, in which the German language and population
prevailed; in this acceptation it included therefore the
territory of the Alemanni, Bavarians, Thuringians, and even
that of the Saxons and Frises. In its more common and proper
sense it meant that part of the territory of the Franks
themselves which was not included in Neustria. It was
subdivided into Upper Austrasia on the Moselle, and Lower
Austrasia on the Rhine and Meuse. Neustria (or, in the fulness
of the monkish Latinity, Neustrasia) was bounded on the north
by the ocean, on the south by the Loire, and on the southwest
[southeast?] towards Burgundy by a line which, beginning
below Gien on the Loire, ran through the rivers Loing and
Yonne, not far from their sources, and passing north of
Auxerre and south of Troyes, joined the river Aube above
Arcis."
W. C. Perry, The Franks, chapter 3.
"The northeastern part of Gaul, along the Rhine, together with
a slice of ancient Germany, was already distinguished, as we
have seen, by the name of the Eastern Kingdom, or Oster-rike,
Latinized into Austrasia. It embraced the region first
occupied by the Ripumarian Franks, and where they still lived
the most compactly and in the greatest number. ... This was,
in the estimation of the Franks, the kingdom by eminence,
while the rest of the north of Gaul was simply not
it--'ne-oster-rike,' or Neustria. A line drawn from the mouth
of the Scheldt to Cambrai, and thence across the Marne at
Chateau-Thierry to the Aube of Bar-sur-Aube, would have
separated the one from the other, Neustria comprising all the
northwest of Gaul, between the Loire and the ocean, with the
exception of Brittany. This had been the first possession of
the Salian Franks in Gaul. ... To such an extent had they been
absorbed and influenced by the Roman elements of the
population, that the Austrasians scarcely considered them
Franks, while they, in their turn, regarded the Austrasians as
the merest untutored barbarians."
P. Godwin, History of France: Ancient Gaul,
book 3, chapter 13, with note.
ALSO IN:
E. A. Freeman, Historical Geography of Europe,
chapter 5, section 5.
See, also, FRANKS (MEROVINGIAN EMPIRE): A. D. 511-752.

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AUSTRIA: The Name.
"The name of Austria, Oesterreich--Ostrich as our forefathers
wrote it---is, naturally enough, a common name for the eastern
part of any kingdom. The Frankish kingdom of the Merwings had its
Austria; the Italian kingdom of the Lombards had its Austria
also. We are half inclined to wonder that the name was never
given in our own island either to Essex or to East-Anglia.
But, while the other Austrias have passed away, the
Oesterreich, the Austria, the Eastern mark, of the German
kingdom, its defence against the Magyar invader, has lived on
to our own times. It has not only lived on, but it has become
one of the chief European powers. And it has become so by a
process to which it would be hard to find a parallel."--
E. A. Freeman, The Historical Geography of Europe, volume 1,
chapter 8, page 305.
AUSTRIA:
The birthplace.
"On the disputed frontier, in the zone of perpetual conflict,
were formed and developed the two states which, in turn, were
to dominate over Germany, namely, Austria and Prussia. Both
were born in the midst of the enemy. The cradle of Austria was
the Eastern march, established by Charlemagne on the Danube,
beyond Bavaria, at the very gate through which have passed so
many invaders from the Orient. ... The cradle of Prussia was
the march of Brandenburg, between the Elbe and the Oder, in
the region of the exterminated Slavs."
E. Lavisse, General View of the Political
History of Europe, chapter 3, section 13.
AUSTRIA:
The Singularity of Austrian history.
A power which is not a national power.
"It is by no means an easy task to tell the story of the
various lands which have at different times come under the
dominion of Austrian princes, the story of each land by
itself, and the story of them all in relation to the common
power. A continuous narrative is impossible. ... Much mischief
has been done by one small fashion of modern speech. It has
within my memory become usual to personify nations and powers
on the smallest occasions in a way which was formerly done
only in language more or less solemn, rhetorical or poetical.
We now talk every moment of England, France, Germany, Russia,
Italy, as if they were persons. And as long as it is only
England, France, Germany, Russia, or Italy of which we talk in
this way, no practical harm is done; the thing is a mere
question of style. For those are all national powers. ... But
when we go on to talk in this way of 'Austria,' of 'Turkey,'
direct harm is done; thought is confused, and facts are
misrepresented. ... I have seen the words 'Austrian national
honour;' I have come across people who believed that 'Austria'
was one land inhabited by 'Austrians,' and that 'Austrians'
spoke the 'Austrian' language. All such phrases are
misapplied. It is to be presumed that in all of them 'Austria'
means something more than the true Austria, the archduchy; what
is commonly meant by them is the whole dominions of the
sovereign of Austria. People fancy that the inhabitants of
those dominions have a common being, a common interest, like
that of the people of England, France, or Italy. ... There is
no Austrian language, no Austrian nation; therefore there can
be no such thing as 'Austrian national honour.' Nor can there
be an 'Austrian policy' in the same sense in which there is an
English or a French policy, that is, a policy in which the
English or French government carries out the will of the
English or French nation. ... Such phrases as 'Austrian
interests,' 'Austrian policy,' and the like, do not mean the
interests or the policy of any land or nation at all. They
simply mean the interests and policy of a particular ruling
family, which may often be the same as the interests and
wishes of particular parts of their dominions, but which can
never represent any common interest or common wish on the part
of the whole. ... We must ever remember that the dominions of the
House of Austria are simply a collection of kingdoms, duchies,
etc., brought together by various accidental causes, but which
have nothing really in common, no common speech, no common
feeling, no common interest. In one case only, that of the
Magyars in Hungary, does the House of Austria rule over a
whole nation; the other kingdoms, duchies, etc., are only
parts of nations, having no tie to one another, but having the
closest ties to other parts of their several nations which lie
close to them, but which are under other governments. The only
bond among them all is that a series of marriages, wars,
treaties, and so forth, have given them a common sovereign.
The same person is king of Hungary, Archduke of Austria, Count
of Tyrol, Lord of Trieste, and a hundred other things. That is
all. ... The growth and the abiding dominion of the House of
Austria is one of the most remarkable phænomena in European
history. Powers of the same kind have arisen twice before; but
in both cases they were very short-lived, while the power of
the House of Austria has lasted for several centuries. The
power of the House of Anjou in the twelfth century, the power
of the House of Burgundy in the fifteenth century, were powers
of exactly the same kind. They too were collections of scraps,
with no natural connexion, brought together by the accidents of
warfare, marriage, of diplomacy. Now why is it that both these
powers broke in pieces almost at once, after the reigns of two
princes in each case, while the power of the House of Austria
has lasted so long? Two causes suggest themselves. One is the
long connexion between the House of Austria and the Roman
Empire and kingdom of Germany. So many Austrian princes were
elected Emperors as to make the Austrian House seem something
great and imperial in itself. I believe that this cause has
done a good deal towards the result; but I believe that
another cause has done yet more. This is that, though the
Austrian power is not a national power, there is, as has been
already noticed, a nation within it. While it contains only
scraps of other nations, it contains the whole of the Magyar
nation. It thus gets something of the strength of a national
power. ... The kingdom of Hungary is an ancient kingdom, with
known boundaries which have changed singularly little for
several centuries; and its connexion with the archduchy of
Austria and the kingdom of Bohemia is now of long standing.
Anything beyond this is modern and shifting. The so-called
'empire of Austria' dates only from the year 1804. This is one
of the simplest matters in the world, but one which is
constantly forgotten. ... A smaller point on which confusion
also prevails is this.
{197}
All the members of the House of Austria are commonly spoken of
as archdukes and archduchesses. I feel sure that many people,
if asked the meaning of the word archduke, would say that it
was the title of the children of the 'Emperor of Austria,' as
grand-duke is used in Russia, and prince in most countries. In
truth, archduke is the title of the sovereign of Austria. He
has not given it up; for he calls himself Archduke of Austria
still, though he calls himself 'Emperor of Austria' as well.
But by German custom, the children of a duke or count are all
called dukes and counts for ever and ever. In this way the
Prince of Wales is called 'Duke of Saxony,' and in the same
way all the children of an Archduke of Austria are archdukes
and archduchesses. Formally and historically then, the taking
of an hereditary imperial title by the Archduke of Austria in
1804, and the keeping of it after the prince who took it had
ceased in 1806 to be King of Germany and Roman Emperor-elect,
was a sheer and shameless imposture. But it is an imposture
which has thoroughly well served its ends."
E. A. Freeman, Preface to Leger's History of
Austria-Hungary.
"Medieval History is a history of rights and wrongs; modern
History as contrasted with medieval divides itself into two
portions; the first a history of powers, forces, and
dynasties; the second, a history in which ideas take the place
of both rights and forces. ... Austria may be regarded as
representing the more ancient form of right. ... The middle
ages proper, the centuries from the year 1000 to the year
1500, from the Emperor Henry II. to the Emperor Maximilian,
were ages of legal growth, ages in which the idea of right, as
embodied in law, was the leading idea of statesmen, and the idea
of rights justified or justifiable by the letter of law, was a
profound influence with politicians. ... The house of Austria
... lays thus the foundation of that empire which is to be one
of the great forces of the next age; not by fraud, not by
violence, but here by a politic marriage, here by a well
advocated inheritance, here by a claim on an imperial fief
forfeited or escheated: honestly where the letter of the law
is in her favour, by chicanery it may be here and there, but
that a chicanery that wears a specious garb of right. The
imperial idea was but a small influence compared with the
super-structure of right, inheritance, and suzerainty, that
legal instincts and a general acquiescence in legal forms had
raised upon it."
William Stubbs, Seventeen Lectures on the Study of Medieval
and Modern History, pages 209-215.
[Image]
ETHNOGRAPHICAL MAP OF AUSTRIA-HUNGARY
NOTE: The shaded parts denote the distribution of the Germans.
AUSTRIA:
The Races.
"The ethnical elements of the population are as follows (1890
for Austria and 1880 for Hungary) on the basis of language;--
Austria (1890):
German 8,461,580;
Bohemian, Moravian and Slovak 5,472,871;
Polish 3,719,232;
Ruthenian 3,105,221;
Slovene 1,176,672;
Servian and Croatian 644,926;
Italian and Latin 675,305;
Roumanian 209,110;
Magyar 8,139.
Hungary (1880):
German 1,972,115;
Bohemian, Moravian and Slovak 1,892,806;
Ruthenian 360,051;
Slovene 86,401;
Servian and Croatian 2,359,708;
Roumanian 2,423,387;
Magyar 6,478,711;
Gipsies 82,256;
Others 83,940,"
Statesman's Year-Book, 1893; edited by J. S, Keltie.
----------AUSTRIA: End----------
A Logical Outline of Austrian History
In Which The Dominant Conditions And
Influences Are Distinguished By Colors.
[Red] Physical or material.
[Blue] Ethnological.
[Green] Social and political.
[Brown] Intellectual, moral and religious.
[Black] Foreign.
The history of Austria, so far as it has importance, is unique in
being the history of a Family and not the history of a State,--
the history of a Dynastic and not of a National Power.
Territorially, the name was attached, until 1806, to an inconsiderable
arch-duchy, on the Danube, in that corner of Teutonic
Europe where the Germans of the Middle Ages fought back the
Turanian races and the Slaves. Dynastically, it became connected,
in the 13th century, with a House, then insignificant, in
Alsace, and to the future remarkable fortunes of that House the
territory so named contributed little more than a strong central
position and a capital town.
Rodolph, Count of Hapsburg, with whom the importance of Austrian
history begins, was elected Emperor in 1272, for the reason that
his possessions were small and the resoluteness of his character
was unknown. He disappointed the Electors by increasing the
weight and reviving the power of the Imperial office, which they
had not at all desired, and he used its power vigorously for the
benefit of himself and his own. The King of Bohemia resisted him
and was defeated and slain; and a part of the dominions which the
Bohemian king had acquired, including Austria (then a duchy),
Carniola and Styria, was appropriated by Rodolph, for his sons.
The House of Hapsburg thus became the House of Austria, and its
history is what bears the name of Austrian history from that time
until 1806. The Hapsburg family has never produced men of the
higher intellectual powers, or the higher qualities of any kind;
but a remarkable vitality has been proved in it, and a politic
self-seeking capability, which has never, perhaps, persisted
through so many generations in any other line. It owes to these
qualities the acquisition, again and again, of the elective
Imperial crown, until that crown settled, at last, upon the heirs
of the House, in practically hereditary succession, despite the
wish of the princes of Germany to keep it shifting among the
weaker members of their order, and despite the rivalry of greater
houses with ambitions like its own. The prestige of the splendid
Imperial title, and the influence derived from the theoretical
functions of the Emperor--small as the actual powers that he
held might be--were instruments of policy which the Austrian
princes knew how to use with enormous effect. Austrian marriages
and Austrian diplomacy, often alluded to as examples of luck and
craft in political affairs, show, rather, it may be, the
consistent calculation and sagacity with which the House of
Austria has pursued its aims.
By marriages, by diplomacy, and by pressures brought to bear
from the headship of the Empire, the family plucked, one by one,
the coronets of Tyrol and Carinthia (1363), Franche-Comté and
Flanders, with the Low Countries entire (1477), and the crowns of
Spain, Naples, Sicily and Sardinia (1516), Bohemia (including
Moravia), and Hungary (1526). Its many diadems were never
moulded into one, but have been, from first to last, the
carefully distinguished emblems of so many separate sovereignties,
united in no way but by homage to a common prince.
The one most fortunate acquisition of the House, which has given
most stability to the heterogeneous structure of it power, in the
judgement of the ablest among modern historians is the Hungarian
crown. Its Burgundian and Spanish marriages, which brought to it
the rich Netherlands and the vast realm of Ferdinand and
Isabella, brought also a division the Family, and the rooting of
s second stem in Spain; and while its grandeur among the
dynasties of Europe was augmented, the real gain of the House in
its older seat was small. But the Kingdom on Hungary has been a
mass of very concrete political power in its hands, and has
supplied in some degree the weight of nationality that was
otherwise wanting in the dominions of the House.
The mixture of races under the Austrian sovereigns is the most
extraordinary in Europe. Their possessions exactly cover that
part of the continent in which its earlier and later invaders
fought longest and most; where the struggle between them was
final, and where they mingled their settlements together. The
Slavic peoples are predominant in numbers; the Germans are
scarcely more than one-fourth of the whole; and yet, until
recent years, the Austrian power figured chiefly as a German
power in European politics, and took leadership in Germany itself.
This position accrued to it through the persisting, potent
influence of the Imperial title which the Archdukes of Austria
bore, with mediæval fictions from Rome and from Germany woven
together and clinging around it; and through the broken and
divided condition of the German land, where petty courts and
princelings disputed precedence with one another, and none could
lead. When time raised up one strong and purely German kingdom,
to rally and encourage a German sentiment of nationality, then
Austria--expelled by it from the Teutonic circle--first found her
true place in the politics of Europe.
For Germany the relationship was never a fortunate one. Alien
interests came constantly between the Emperors and the Empire--
the proper subject of their care,--and they were drawn to alien
sympathies by their connection with Spain. They imbibed the
hateful temper of the Spanish Church, and fought the large
majority of their German lieges, on the questions of the
Reformation, for a century and a half. Among the combatants of
the frightful "Thirty Years War" they were chiefly
responsible for the death and ruin spread over the face of
Germanic Europe. At no time did Germany find leading or strength
in her nominal Emperors, nor in the states making up the
hereditary possessions of their House. In the dark days when the
sword of Napoleon threatened every neighbor of France, they
deserted their station of command. It was the time which the head
of the House of Austria chose for abdicating the crown of the
Holy Roman Empire--that lingering fiction of history,--and yet
assuming to be an Emperor still--the Emperor of an Empire which
rested on the small duchy of Austria for its name.
The renunciation was timely; for now, when Germany rose to break
the yoke of Napoleon, she found leadership within her own family
of states. Then began the transformation in Germanic Europe which
extinguished, after half a century, the last remains of the false
relations to it of the Austrian House. Prussia opened her eyes to
the new conditions of the age; set the schoolmaster at work among
her children; made herself an example and a stimulus to all her
neighbors. The Family which called itself Austria did otherwise.
It was blind, and it preferred blindness. It read lessons in
nothing but the Holy Alliance and the Treaty of Vienna. It
listened to no teacher but Metternich. It made itself the
resurrectionist of a dead Past in all the graveyards of Feudal
Europe, and was heard for half a century as the supporter and
champion of every hateful thing in government. It had won
Lombardy and Venice by its double traffic with Napoleon and with
those who cast Napoleon down; and it enraged the whole civilized
world by the cold brutality of its oppressions there.
Events in due time brought the two "systems" of domestic polity--
the Prussian and the Austrian--to account, and weighed them
together. As a consequence, it happens to-day that the House of
Austria has neither place nor voice in the political organization
of Germany; has no footing in Italy; has no dungeons of tyranny
in its dominions; has no disciples of Metternich among its
statesmen. Its face and its feet are now turned quite away from
the paths of ambition and of policy which it trod so long. It has
learned, and is learning, so fast that it may yet be a teacher
in the school of liberal politics which it entered so late. It
has set Hungary by the side of Austria, treading the one great
nation of its subjects no longer under foot. It sees its
interests and recognizes its duties in that quarter of Europe to
which History and Geography have been pointing from Vienna and
Buda-Pesth since the days of Charlemagne. Its mission in Europe
is to command the precarious future of the southeastern
states, so far as may be, and to guard them against the dangerous
Muscovite, until they grow in civilization and strength and are
united as one Power. In this mission it is the ally and the
colleague of both Germany and Italy, and the three Powers are
united by stronger bonds than were possible before each stood
free.
[Right Margin]
9th Century.
The March.
A. D. 1272.
Rodolph of Hapsburg.
Emperor.
A. D. 1282.
The House in possession.
A. D. 1438.
The Imperial Crown.
A. D. 1363-1526.
Gathering of crowns and coronets.
The mixture of races.
A. D. 1521-1531.
The Reformation.
A. D. 1618-1648.
Thirty Years War.
A. D. 1806.
End of the Holy Roman Empire.
A. D. 1815-1866.
Policy of Metternich.
vs. policy of Stein.
A. D. 1859.
Loss of Lombardy.
A. D. 1866.
Seven Weeks War.
Loss of Venice.
A. D. 1867.
Austro-Hungarian Empire.
A. D. 1882.
The Triple Alliance.
-----End of "A Logical Outline..."-----
{198}
AUSTRIA: A. D. 805-1246.
The Rise of the Margraviate, and the creation of the Duchy,
under the Babenbergs.
Changing relations to Bavaria.
End of the Babenberg Dynasty.
"Austria, as is well known, is but the Latin form of the
German Oesterreich, the kingdom of the east [see above:
AUSTRASIA]. This celebrated historical name appears for the
first time in 996. in a document signed by the emperor Otto
III. ('in regione vulgari nomine Osterrichi'). The land to
which it is there applied was created a march after the
destruction of the Avar empire [805], and was governed like
all the other German marches. Politically it was divided into
two margraviates; that of Friuli, including Friuli properly so
called, Lower Pannonia to the south of the Drave, Carinthia,
Istria, and the interior of Dalmatia--the sea-coast having
been ceded to the Eastern emperor;--the eastern margraviate
comprising Lower Pannonia to the north of the Drave, Upper
Pannonia, and the Ostmark properly so called. The Ostmark
included the Traungau to the east of the Enns, which was
completely German, and the Grunzvittigau. ... The early
history of these countries lacks the unity of interest which
the fate of a dynasty or a nation gives to those of the Magyar
and the Chekh. They form but a portion of the German kingdom,
and have no strongly marked life of their own. The march, with
its varying frontier, had not even a geographical unity. In
876, it was enlarged by the addition of Bavaria; in 890, it
lost Pannonia, which was given to Bracislav, the Croat prince,
in return for his help against the Magyars, and in 937, it was
destroyed and absorbed by the Magyars, who extended their
frontier to the river Enns. After the battle of Lechfeld or
Augsburg (955), Germany and Italy being no longer exposed to
Hungarian invasions, the march was re-constituted and granted
to the margrave Burkhard, the brother-in-law of Henry of
Bavaria. Leopold of Babenberg succeeded him (973), and with
him begins the dynasty of Babenberg, which ruled the country
during the time of the Premyslides [in Bohemia] and the house
of Arpad [in Hungary]. The Babenbergs derived their name from
the castle of Babenberg, built by Henry, margrave of Nordgau,
in honor of his wife, Baba, sister of Henry the Fowler. It
reappears in the name of the town of Bamberg, which now forms
part of the kingdom of Bavaria. ... Though not of right an
hereditary office, the margraviate soon became so, and
remained in the family of the Babenbergs; the march was so
important a part of the empire that no doubt the emperor was
glad to make the defence of this exposed district the especial
interest of one family. ... The marriages of the Babenbergs
were fortunate; in 1138 the brother of Leopold [Fourth of that
name in the Margraviate] Conrad of Hohenstaufen, Duke of
Franconia, was made emperor. It was now that the struggle
began between the house of Hohenstaufen and the great house of
Welf [or Guelf: See GUELFS AND GHIBELINES] whose
representative was Henry the Proud, Duke of Saxony and
Bavaria. Henry was defeated in the unequal strife, and was
placed under the ban of the Empire, while the duchy of Saxony
was awarded to Albert the Bear of Brandenburg, and the duchy
of Bavaria fell to the share of Leopold IV. (1138). Henry the
Proud died in the following year, leaving behind him a son
under age, who was known later on as Henry the Lion. His uncle
Welf would not submit to the forfeiture by his house of their
old dominions, and marched against Leopold to reconquer
Bavaria, but he was defeated by Conrad at the battle of
Weinsberg (1140). Leopold died shortly after this victory, and
was succeeded both in the duchy of Bavaria and in the
margraviate of Austria by his brother, Henry II." Henry II.
endeavored to strengthen himself in Bavaria by marrying the
widow of Henry the Proud, and by extorting from her son, Henry
the Lion, a renunciation of the latter's rights. But Henry the
Lion afterwards repudiated his renunciation, and in 1156 the
German diet decided that Bavaria should be restored to him.
Henry of Austria was wisely persuaded to yield to the
decision, and Bavaria was given up. "He lost nothing by this
unwilling act of disinterestedness, for he secured from the
emperor considerable compensation. From this time forward,
Austria, which had been largely increased by the addition of
the greater part of the lands lying between the Enns and the
Inn, was removed from its almost nominal subjection to Bavaria
and became a separate duchy [Henry II. being the first
hereditary Duke of Austria]. An imperial edict, dated the 21st
of September, 1156, declares the new duchy hereditary even in
the female line, and authorizes the dukes to absent themselves
from all diets except those which were held in Bavarian
territory. It also permits them, in case of a threatened
extinction of their dynasty, to propose a successor. ... Henry
II. was one of the founders of Vienna. He constructed a
fortress there, and, in order to civilize the surrounding
country, sent for some Scotch monks, of whom there were many
at this time in Germany." In 1177 Henry II. was succeeded by
Leopold V., called the Virtuous. "In his reign the duchy of
Austria gained Styria, an important addition to its territory.
This province was inhabited by Slovenes and Germans, and took
its name from the castle of Steyer, built in 980 by Otokar
III., count of the Trungau. In 1056, it was created a
margraviate, and in 1150 it was enlarged by the addition of
the counties of Maribor (Marburg) and Cilly. In 1180, Otokar
VI. of Styria (1164-1102) obtained the hereditary title of
duke from the Emperor in return for his help against Henry the
Lion." Dying without children, Otokar made Leopold of Austria
his heir. "Styria was annexed to Austria in 1192, and has
remained so ever since. ... Leopold V. is the first of the
Austrian princes whose name is known in Western Europe. He
joined the third crusade," and quarrelled with Richard Coeur
de Lion at the siege of St. Jean d' Acre. Afterwards, when
Richard, returning home by the Adriatic, attempted to pass
through Austrian territory incognito, Leopold revenged himself
by seizing and imprisoning the English king, finally selling
his royal captive to a still meaner Emperor for 20,000 marks.
Leopold VI. who succeeded to the Austrian duchy in 1198, did
much for the commerce of his country. "He made Vienna the
staple town, and lent a sum of 30,000 marks of silver to the
city to enable it to increase its trade. He adorned it with
many new buildings, among them the Neue Burg." His son, called
Frederick the Fighter (1230-1246) was the last of the
Babenberg dynasty. His hand was against all his neighbors,
including the Emperor Frederick II., and their hands were
against him. He perished in June, 1246, on the banks of the
Leitha, while at war with the Hungarians.
L. Leger, History of Austro-Hungary, chapter 9.
ALSO IN:
E. F. Henderson, Select History Documents of the
Middle Ages, book 2, number 7.
{199}
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1246-1282.
Rodolph of Hapsburg and the acquisition of the Duchy for his family.
"The House of Austria owes its origin and power to Rhodolph of
Hapsburgh, son of Albert IV. count of Hapsburgh. The Austrian
genealogists, who have taken indefatigable but ineffectual
pains to trace his illustrious descent from the Romans, carry
it with great probability to Ethico, duke of Alsace, in the
seventh century, and unquestionably to Guntram the Rich, count
of Alsace and Brisgau, who flourished in the tenth." A grandson
of Guntram, Werner by name, "became bishop of Strasburgh, and
on an eminence above Windiisch, built the castle of Hapsburgh
['Habichtsburg' 'the castle of vultures'], which became the
residence of the future counts, and gave a new title to the
descendants of Guntram. ... The successors of Werner increased
their family inheritance by marriages, donations from the
Emperors, and by becoming prefects, advocates, or
administrators of the neighbouring abbeys, towns, or
districts, and his great grandson, Albert III., was possessor
of no inconsiderable territories in Suabia, Alsace, and that
part of Switzerland which is now called the Argau, and held
the landgraviate of Upper Alsace. His son, Rhodolph, received
from the Emperor, in addition to his paternal inheritance, the
town and district of Lauffenburgh, an imperial city on the
Rhine. He acquired also a considerable accession of territory
by obtaining the advocacy of Uri, Schweitz, and Underwalden,
whose natives laid the foundation of the Helvetic Confederacy,
by their union against the oppressions of feudal tyranny."
W. Coxe, History of the House of Austria, chapter 1.
"On the death of Rodolph in 1232 his estates were divided
between his sons Albert IV. and Rodolph II.; the former
receiving the landgraviate of Upper Alsace, and the county of
Hapsburg, together with the patrimonial castle; the latter,
the counties Rheinfelden and Lauffenburg, and some other
territories. Albert espoused Hedwige, daughter of Ulric, count
of Kyburg; and from this union sprang the great Rodolph, who
was born on the 1st of May 1218, and was presented at the
baptismal font by the Emperor Frederic II. On the death of his
father Albert in 1240, Rodolph succeeded to his estates; but
the greater portion of these were in the hands of his paternal
uncle, Rodolph of Lauffenburg; and all he could call his own
lay within sight of the great hall of his castle. ... His
disposition was wayward and restless, and drew him into
repeated contests with his neighbours and relations. ... In a
quarrel with the Bishop of Basel, Rodolph led his troops
against that city, and burnt a convent in the suburbs, for
which he was excommunicated by Pope Innocent IV. He then
entered the service of Ottocar II. King of Bohemia, under whom
he served, in company with the Teutonic Knights, in his wars
against the Prussian pagans; and afterwards against Bela IV.
King of Hungary." The surprising election, in 1272, of this
little known count of Hapsburg, to be King of the Romans, with
the substance if not the title of the imperial dignity which
that election carried with it, was due to a singular
friendship which he had acquired some fourteen years before.
When Archbishop Werner, Elector of Mentz, was on his way to
Rome in 1259, to receive the pallium, he "was escorted across
the Alps by Rodolph of Hapsburg, and under his protection
secured from the robbers who beset the passes. Charmed with
the affability and frankness of his protector, the Archbishop
conceived a strong regard for Rodolph;" and when, in 1272,
after the Great Interregnum [see GERMANY: A. D. 1250-1272],
the Germanic Electors found difficulty in choosing an Emperor,
the Elector of Mentz recommended his friend of Hapsburg as a
candidate. "The Electors are described by a contemporary as
desiring an Emperor but detesting his power. The comparative
lowliness of the Count of Hapsburg recommended him as one from
whom their authority stood in little jeopardy; but the claims
of the King of Bohemia were vigorously urged; and it was at
length agreed to decide the election by the voice of the Duke
of Bavaria. Lewis without hesitation nominated Rodolph. ...
The early days of Rodolph's reign were disturbed by the
contumacy of Ottocar, King of Bohemia. That Prince ...
persisted in refusing to acknowledge the Count of Hapsburg as
his sovereign. Possessed of the dutchies of Austria, Styria,
Carniola and Carinthia, he might rely upon his own resources;
and he was fortified in his resistance by the alliance of
Henry, Duke of Lower Bavaria. But the very possession of these
four great fiefs was sufficient to draw down the envy and
distrust of the other German Princes. To all these
territories, indeed, the title of Ottocar was sufficiently
disputable. On the death of Frederic II. fifth duke of Austria
[and last of the Babenberg dynasty] in 1246, that dutchy,
together with Styria and Carniola, was claimed by his niece
Gertrude and his sister Margaret. By a marriage with the
latter, and a victory over Bela IV. King of Hungary, whose
uncle married Gertrude, Ottocar obtained possession of Austria
and Styria; and in virtue of a purchase from Ulric, Duke of
Carinthia and Carniola, he possessed himself of those dutchies
on Ulric's death in 1269, in defiance of the claims of Philip,
brother of the late Duke. Against so powerful a rival the
Princes assembled at Augsburg readily voted succours to
Rodolph; and Ottocar having refused to surrender the Austrian
dominions, and even hanged the heralds who were sent to
pronounce the consequent sentence of proscription, Rodolph
with his accustomed promptitude took the field [1276], and
confounded his enemy by a rapid march upon Austria. In his way
he surprised and vanquished the rebel Duke of Bavaria, whom he
compelled to join his forces; he besieged and reduced to the
last extremity the city of Vienna; and had already prepared a
bridge of boats to cross the Danube and invade Bohemia, when
Ottocar arrested his progress by a message of submission. The
terms agreed upon were severely humiliating to the proud soul
of Ottocar," and he was soon in revolt again, with the support
of the Duke of Bavaria. Rodolph marched against him, and a
desperate battle was fought at Marschfeld, August 26, 1278, in
which Ottocar, deserted at a critical moment by the Moravian
troops, was defeated and slain. "The total loss of the
Bohemians on that fatal day amounted to more than 14,000 men.
In the first moments of his triumph, Rodolph designed to
appropriate the dominions of his deceased enemy.
{200}
But his avidity was restrained by the Princes of the
Empire, who interposed on behalf of the son of Ottocar; and
Wenceslaus was permitted to retain Bohemia and Moravia. The
projected union of the two families was now renewed: Judith of
Hapsburg was affianced to the young King of Bohemia; whose
sister Agnes was married to Rodolph, youngest son of the King
of the Romans." In 1282, Rodolph, "after satisfying the
several claimants to those territories by various cessions of
lands .... obtained the consent of a Diet held at Augsburg to
the settlement of Austria, Styria, and Carniola, upon his two
surviving sons; who were accordingly jointly invested with
those dutchies with great pomp and solemnity; and they are at
this hour enjoyed by the descendants of Rodolph of Hapsburg."
Sir R. Comyn, History of the Western Empire, chapter 14.
ALSO IN:
J. Planta, History of the Helvetic Confederacy.
book 1. chapter 5 (volume 1).
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1282-1315.
Relations of the House of Hapsburg to the Swiss Forest Cantons.
The Tell Legend.
The Battle of Morgarten.
See SWITZERLAND: THE THREE FOREST CANTONS.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1290.
Beginning of Hapsburg designs upon the crown of Hungary.
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1114-1301.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1291-1349.
Loss and recovery of the imperial crown.
Liberation of Switzerland.
Conflict between Frederick and Lewis of Bavaria.
The imperial crown lost once more.
Rudolf of Hapsburg desired the title of King of the Romans for
his son. "But the electors already found that the new house of
Austria was becoming too powerful, and they refused. On his
death, in fact, in 1291, a prince from another family, poor
and obscure, Adolf of Nassau, was elected after an interregnum
of ten months. His reign of six years is marked by two events;
he sold himself to Edward I. in 1291, against Philip the Fair,
for 100,000 pounds sterling, and used the money in an attempt
to obtain in Thuringia a principality for his family as Rudolf
had done in Austria. The electors were displeased and chose
Albert of Austria to succeed him, who conquered and killed his
adversary at Göllheim, near Worms (1298). The ten years reign
of the new king of the Romans showed that he was very
ambitious for his family, which he wished to establish on the
throne of Bohemia, where the Slavonic dynasty had lately died
out, and also in Thuringia and Meissen, where he lost a
battle. He was also bent upon extending his rights, even
unjustly--in Alsace and Switzerland--and it proved an
unfortunate venture for him. For, on the one hand, he roused
the three Swiss cantons of Uri, Schweitz, and Unterwalden to
revolt; on the other hand, he roused the wrath of his nephew
John of Swabia, whom he defrauded of his inheritance (domains
in Switzerland. Swabia, and Alsace). As he was crossing the
Reuss, John thrust him through with his sword (1308). The
assassin escaped. One of Albert's daughters, Agnes, dowager
queen of Hungary, had more than a thousand innocent people
killed to avenge the death of her father. The greater part of
the present Switzerland had been originally included in the
Kingdom of Burgundy, and was ceded to the empire, together
with that kingdom, in 1033. A feudal nobility, lay and
ecclesiastic, had gained a firm footing there. Nevertheless,
by the 12th century the cities had risen to some importance.
Zurich, Basel, Bern, and Freiburg had an extensive commerce
and obtained municipal privileges. Three little cantons, far
in the heart of the Swiss mountains, preserved more than all
the others their indomitable spirit of independence. When
Albert of Austria became Emperor [King?] he arrogantly tried
to encroach upon their independence. Three heroic
mountaineers, Werner Stauffacher, Arnold of Melchthal, and
Walter Fürst, each with ten chosen friends, conspired together
at Rütli, to throw off the yoke. The tyranny of the Austrian
bailiff Gessler, and William Tell's well-aimed arrow, if
tradition is to be believed, gave the signal for the
insurrection."
See SWITZERLAND: THE THREE FOREST CANTONS.
"Albert's violent death left to Leopold, his successor in the
duchy of Austria, the care of repressing the rebellion. He
failed and was completely defeated at Mortgarten (1315). That
was Switzerland's field of Marathon. ... When Rudolf of
Hapsburg was chosen by the electors, it was because of his
poverty and weakness. At his death accordingly they did not
give their votes for his son Albert. ... Albert, however,
succeeded in overthrowing his rival. But on his death they
were firm in their decision not to give the crown for a third
time to the new and ambitions house of Hapsburg. They likewise
refused, for similar reasons, to accept Charles of Valois,
brother of Philip the Fair, whom the latter tried to place on
the imperial throne, in order that he might indirectly rule
over Germany. They supported the Count of Luxemburg, who
became Henry VII. By choosing emperors [kings?] who were
poor, the electors placed them under the temptation of
enriching themselves at the expense of the empire. Adolf
failed, it is true, in Thuringia, but Rudolf gained Austria by
victory; Henry succeeded in Bohemia by means of marriage, and
Bohemia was worth more than Austria at that time because,
besides Moravia, it was made to cover Silesia and a part of
Lusatia (Oberlausitz). Henry's son, John of Luxemburg, married
the heiress to that royal crown. As for Henry himself he
remained as poor as before. He had a vigorous, restless
spirit, and went to try his fortunes on his own account beyond
the Alps. ... He was seriously threatening Naples, when he
died either from some sickness or from being poisoned by a
Dominican in partaking of the host (1313). A year's
interregnum followed; then two emperors [kings?] at once:
Lewis of Bavaria and Frederick the Fair, son of the Emperor
Albert. After eight years of war, Lewis gained his point by
the victory of Mühldorf (1322), which delivered Frederick into
his hands. He kept him in captivity for three years, and at
the end of that time became reconciled with him, and they were
on such good terms that both bore the title of King and
governed in common. The fear inspired in Lewis by France and
the Holy See dictated this singular agreement. Henry VII. had
revived the policy of interference by the German emperors in
the affairs of Italy, and had kindled again the quarrel with
the Papacy which had long appeared extinguished. Lewis IV. did
the same. ... While Boniface VIII. was making war on Philip
the Fair, Albert allied himself with him; when, on the other
hand, the Papacy was reduced to the state of a servile
auxiliary to France, the Emperor returned to his former
hostility.
{201}
When ex-communicated by Pope John XXII., who
wished to give the empire to the king of France, Charles IV.,
Lewis IV. made use of the same weapons. . . . Tired of a crown
loaded with anxieties, Lewis of Bavaria was finally about to
submit to the Pope and abdicate, when the electors perceived
the necessity of supporting their Emperor and of formally
releasing the supreme power from foreign dependency which
brought the whole nation to shame. That was the object of the
Pragmatic Sanction of Frankfort, pronounced in 1338 by the
Diet, on the report of the electors. . . . The king of France
and Pope Clement VI., whose claims were directly affected by
this declaration, set up against Lewis IV. Charles of
Luxemburg, son of John the Blind, who became king of Bohemia
in 1346, when his father had been killed fighting on the
French side at the battle of Crécy. Lewis died the following
year. He had gained possession of Brandenburg and the Tyrol
for his house, but it was unable to retain possession of them.
The latter county reverted to the house of Austria in 1363.
The electors most hostile to the French party tried to put up,
as a rival candidate to Charles of Luxemburg, Edward III.,
king of England, who refused the empire; then they offered it
to a brave knight, Gunther of Schwarzburg, who died, perhaps
poisoned, after a few months (1349). The king of Bohemia then
became Emperor as Charles IV. by a second election."
V. Duruy, The History of the Middle Ages, book 9, chapter 30.
See, also, Germany: A. D. 1314-1347.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1330-1364.
Forged charters of Duke Rudolf.
The Privilegium Majus.
His assumption of the Archducal title.
Acquisition of Tyrol.
Treaties of inheritance with Bohemia and Hungary.
King John, of Bohemia, had married his second son, John Henry,
at the age of eight, to the afterwards notable Margaret
Maultasche (Pouch mouth), daughter of the duke of Tyrol and
Carinthia, who was then twelve years old. He hoped by this
means to reunite those provinces to Bohemia. To thwart this
scheme, the Emperor, Louis of Bavaria, and the two Austrian
princes, Albert the Wise and Otto the Gay, came to an
understanding. "By the treaty of Hagenau (1330), it was
arranged that on the death of duke Henry, who had no male
heirs, Carinthia should become the property of Austria, Tyrol
that of the Emperor. Henry died in 1335, whereupon the
Emperor, Louis of Bavaria, declared that Margaret Maultasche
had forfeited all rights of inheritance, and proceeded to
assign the two provinces to the Austrian princes, with the
exception of some portion of the Tyrol which devolved on the
house of Wittelsbach. Carinthia alone, however, obeyed the
Emperor; the Tyrolese nobles declared for Margaret, and, with
the help of John of Bohemia, this princess was able to keep
possession of this part of her inheritance. ... Carinthia also
did Dot long remain in the undisputed possession of Austria.
Margaret was soon divorced from her very youthful husband
(1342), and shortly after married the son of the Emperor Louis
of Bavaria, who hoped to be able to invest his son, not only
with Tyrol, but also with Carinthia, and once more we find the
houses of Hapsburg and Luxemburg united by a common interest..
. ... When ... Charles IV. of Bohemia was chosen emperor, he
consented to leave Carinthia in the possession of Austria.
Albert did homage for it. ... According to the wish of their
father, the four sons of Albert reigned after him; but the
eldest, Rudolf IV., exercised executive authority in the name
of the others [1358--1365]. ... He was only 19 when he came to
the throne, but he had already married one of the daughters of
the Emperor Charles IV. Notwithstanding this family alliance,
Charles had not given Austria such a place in the Golden Bull
[see GERMANY: A. D. 1347-1492] as seemed likely to secure
either her territorial importance or a proper position for her
princes. They had not been admitted into the electoral college
of the Empire, and yet their scattered possessions stretched
from the banks of the Leitha to the Rhine. ... These
grievances were enhanced by their feeling of envy towards
Bohemia, which had attained great prosperity under Charles IV.
It was at this time that, in order to increase the importance
of his house, Rudolf, or his officers of state, had recourse
to a measure which was often employed in that age by princes,
religious bodies, and even by the Holy See. It was pretended
that there were in existence a whole series of charters which
had been granted to the house of Austria by various kings and
emperors, and which secured to their princes a position
entirely independent of both empire and Emperor. According to
these documents, and more especially the one called the
'privilegium majus,' the duke of Austria owed no kind of
service to the empire, which was, however, bound to protect
him; ... he was to appear at the diets with the title of
archduke, and was to have the first place among the electors.
... Rudolf pretended that these documents had just come to
light, and demanded their confirmation from Charles IV., who
refused it. Nevertheless on the strength of these lying
charters, he took the title of palatine archduke, without
waiting to ask the leave of Charles, and used the royal
insignia. Charles IV., who could not fail to be irritated by
these pretensions, in his turn revived the claims which he had
inherited from Premysl Otokar II. to the lands of Austria,
Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola. These claims, however, were
simply theoretical, and no attempt was made to enforce them,
and the mediation of Louis the Great, King of Hungary, finally
led to a treaty between the two princes, which satisfied the
ambition of the Habsburgs (1364). By this treaty, the houses
of Habsburg in Austria and of Luxemburg in Bohemia each
guaranteed the inheritance of their lands to the other, in
case of the extinction of either of the two families, and the
estates of Bohemia and Austria ratified this agreement. A
similar compact was concluded between Austria and Hungary, and
thus the boundaries of the future Austrian state were for the
first time marked out. Rudolf himself gained little by these
long and intricate negotiations, Tyrol being all he added to
his territory. Margaret Maultasche had married her son
Meinhard to the daughter of Albert the Wise, at the same time
declaring that, in default of heirs male to her son, Tyrol
should once more become the possession of Austria, and it did
so in 1363. Rudolf immediately set out for Botzen, and there
received the homage of the Tyrolese nobles. ...The acquisition
of Tyrol was most important to Austria. It united Austria
Proper with the old possessions of the Habsburgs in Western
Germany, and opened the way to Italy. Margaret Maultasche died
at Vienna in 1369. The memory of this restless and dissolute
princess still survives among the Tyrolese."
L. Leger, History of Austro-Hungary, pages 143-148.
{202}
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1386-1388.
Defeats by the Swiss at Sempach and Naefels.
SEE SWITZERLAND: A. D. 1386-1388.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1437-1516.
Contests for Hungary and Bohemia.
The right of Succession to the Hungarian Crown secured.
"Europe would have had nothing to fear from the Barbarians, if
Hungary had been permanently united to Bohemia, and had held
them in check. But Hungary interfered both with the
independence and the religion of Bohemia. In this way they
weakened each other, and in the 15th century wavered between
the two Sclavonic and German powers on their borders (Poland
and Austria) [see HUNGARY: A. D. 1301-1442, and 1442-1458].
United under a German prince from 1455 to 1458, separated for
a time under national sovereigns (Bohemia until 1471, Hungary
until 1490), they were once more united under Polish princes
until 1526, at which period they passed definitively into the
hands of Austria. After the reign of Ladislas of Austria, who
won so much glory by the exploits of John Hunniades, George
Podiebrad obtained the crown of Bohemia, and Matthias
Corvinus, the son of Hunniades, was elected King of Hungary
(1458). These two princes opposed successfully the chimerical
pretensions of the Emperor Frederick III. Podiebrad protected
the Hussites and incurred the enmity of the Popes. Matthias
victoriously encountered the Turks and obtained the favour of
Paul II., who offered him the crown of Podiebrad, his
father-in-law. The latter opposed to the hostility of Matthias
the alliance of the King of Poland, whose eldest son,
Ladislas, he designated as his successor. At the same time,
Casimir, the brother of Ladislas, endeavoured to take from
Matthias the crown of Hungary. Matthias, thus pressed on all
sides, was obliged to renounce the conquest of Bohemia, and
content himself with the provinces of Moravia, Silesia, and
Lusatia, which were to return to Ladislas if Matthias died
first (1475-1478). The King of Hungary compensated himself at
the expense of Austria. On the pretext that Frederick III. had
refused to give him his daughter, he twice invaded his states
and retained them in his possession [see HUNGARY: A. D.
1471-1487]. With this great prince Christendom lost its chief
defender, Hungary her conquests and her political
preponderance (1490). The civilization which he had tried to
introduce into his kingdom was deferred for many centuries.
... Ladislas (of Poland), King of Bohemia, having been elected
King of Hungary, was attacked by his brother John Albert, and
by Maximilian of Austria, who both pretended to that crown. He
appeased his brother by the cession of Silesia (1491), and
Maximilian by vesting in the House of Austria the right of
succession to the throne of Hungary, in case he himself should
die without male issue. Under Ladislas, and under his son
Louis II., who succeeded him while still a child, in 1516
Hungary was ravaged with impunity by the Turks."
J. Michelet, A Summary of Modern History, chapter 4.
See, also, BOHEMIA: A. D. 1458-1471.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1438-1493.
The Imperial Crown lastingly regained.
The short reign of Albert II., and the long reign of Frederick III.
"After the death of Sigismund, the princes, in 1438, elected
an emperor [king?] from the house of Austria, which, with
scarcely any intermission, has ever since occupied the ancient
throne of Germany. Albert II. of Austria, who, as son-in-law
of the late Emperor Sigismund, had become at the same time
King of Hungary and Bohemia, was a well-meaning, distinguished
prince, and would, without doubt, have proved of great benefit
to the empire; but he died ... in the second year of his
reign, after his return from an expedition against the Turks.
... In the year 1431, during the reign of Sigismund, a new
council was assembled at Basle, in order to carry on the work
of reforming the church as already commenced at Constance. But
this council soon became engaged in many perplexing
controversies with Pope Eugene IV. ... The Germans, for a
time, took no part in the dispute; at length, however, under
the Emperor [King?] Albert II., they formally adopted the
chief decrees of the council of Basle, at a diet held at Mentz
in the year 1439. ... Amongst the resolutions then adopted
were such as materially circumscribed the existing privileges
of the pope. ... These and other decisions, calculated to give
important privileges and considerable independence to the
German church, were, in a great measure, annulled by Albert's
cousin and successor, Duke Frederick of Austria, who was
elected by the princes after him in the year 1440, as
Frederick III. ... Frederick, the emperor, was a prince who
meant well but, at the same time, was of too quiet and easy a
nature; his long reign presents but little that was calculated
to distinguish Germany or add to its renown. From the east the
empire was endangered by the approach of an enemy--the Turks,
against whom no precautionary measures were adopted. They, on
the 29th of May, 1453, conquered Constantinople. ... They then
made their way towards the Danube, and very nearly succeeded
also in taking Hungary [see HUNGARY: A. D. 1442-1458]. ... The
Hungarians, on the death of the son of the Emperor Albert II.,
Wladislas Posthumus, in the year 1457, without leaving an heir
to the throne, chose Matthias, the son of John Corvinus, as
king, being resolved not to elect one from amongst the
Austrian princes. The Bohemians likewise selected a private
nobleman for their king, George Padriabrad [or Podiebrad], and
thus the Austrian house found itself for a time rejected from
holding possession of either of these countries. ... In
Germany, meantime, there existed numberless contests and
feuds; each party considered only his own personal quarrels.
... The emperor could not give any weight to public measures:
scarcely could he maintain his dignity amongst his own
subjects. The Austrian nobility were even bold enough to send
challenges to their sovereign; whilst the city of Vienna
revolted, and his brother Albert, taking pleasure in this
disorder, was not backward in adding to it. Things even went
to such an extremity, that, in 1462, the Emperor Frederick,
together with his consort and son, Maximilian, then four years
of age, was besieged by his subjects in his own castle of
Vienna. A plebeian burgher, named Holzer, had placed himself
at the head of the insurgents, and was made burgomaster,
whilst Duke Albert came to Vienna personally to superintend
the siege of the castle, which was intrenched and bombarded.
{203}
...The German princes, however, could not witness with indifference
such disgraceful treatment of their emperor, and they
assembled to liberate him. George Padriabrad, King of Bohemia,
was the first who hastened to the spot with assistance, set
the emperor at liberty, and effected a reconciliation between
him and his brother. The emperor, however, was obliged to
resign to him, for eight years, Lower Austria and Vienna.
Albert died in the following year. ... In the Germanic empire,
the voice of the emperor was as little heeded as in his
hereditary lands. ... The feudal system raged under
Frederick's reign to such an extent, that it was pursued even
by the lower classes. Thus, in 1471, the shoeblacks in Leipsic
sent a challenge to the university of that place; and the
bakers of the Count Palatine Lewis, and those of the Margrave
of Baden defied several imperial cities in Swabia. The most
important transaction in the reign of Frederick, was the union
which he formed with the house of Burgundy, and which laid the

foundation for the greatness of Austria. ... In the year 1486,
the whole of the assembled princes, influenced especially by
the representations of the faithful and now venerable Albert,
called the Achilles of Brandenburg, elected Maximilian, the
emperor's son, King of Rome. Indeed, about this period a
changed and improved spirit began to show itself in a
remarkable degree in the minds of many throughout the empire,
so that the profound contemplator of coming events might
easily see the dawn of a new era. ... These last years were
the best in the whole life of the emperor, and yielded to him
in return for his many sufferings that tranquillity which was
so well merited by his faithful generous disposition. He died
on the 19th of August, 1493, after a reign of 54 years. The
emperor lived long enough to obtain, in the year 1490, the
restoration of his hereditary estates by the death of King
Matthias, by means of a compact made with Wladislas, his
successor."
F. Kohlrausch, History of Germany, chapter 14.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1347-1493.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1468.
Invasion by George Podiebrad of Bohemia.
The crusade against him.
See BOHEMIA: A. D. 1458-1471.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1471-1491.
Hungarian invasion and capture of Vienna.
Treaty of Presburg.
Succession to the throne of Hungary secured.
"George, King of Bohemia, expired in 1471; and the claims of
the Emperor and King of Hungary being equally disregarded, the
crown was conferred on Uladislaus, son of Casimir IV. King of
Poland, and grandson of Albert II. To this election Frederic
long persisted in withholding his assent; but at length he
determined to crush the claim of Matthias by formally
investing Uladislaus with the kingdom and electorate of
Bohemia, and the office of imperial cup-bearer. In revenge for
this affront, Matthias marched into Austria: took possession
of the fortresses of the Danube; and compelled the Emperor to
purchase a cessation of hostilities by undertaking to pay an
hundred thousand golden florins, one-half of which was
disbursed by the Austrian states at the appointed time. But as
the King of Hungary still delayed to yield up the captured
fortresses, Frederic refused all further payment; and the war
was again renewed. Matthias invaded and ravaged Austria; and
though he experienced formidable resistance from several
towns, his arms were crowned with success, and he became
master of Vienna and Neustadt. Driven from his capital the
terrified Emperor was reduced to the utmost distress, and
wandered from town to town and from convent to convent,
endeavouring to arouse the German States against the
Hungarians. Yet even in this exigency his good fortune did not
wholly forsake him; and he availed himself of a Diet at
Frankfort to procure the election of his son Maximilian as
King of the Romans. To this Diet, however, the King of Bohemia
received no summons, and therefore protested against the
validity of the election. A full apology and admission of his
right easily satisfied Uladislaus, and he consented to remit
the fine which the Golden Bull had fixed as the penalty of the
omission. The death of Matthias Corvinus in 1490, left the
throne of Hungary vacant, and the Hungarians, influenced by
their widowed queen, conferred the crown upon the King of
Bohemia, without listening to the pretensions of Maximilian.
That valorous prince, however, sword in hand, recovered his
Austrian dominions; and the rival kings concluded a severe
contest by the treaty of Presburg, by which Hungary was for
the present secured to Uladislaus; but on his death without
heirs was to vest in the descendants of the Emperor."
Sir R. Comyn, The History of the Western Empire,
chapter 28 (volume 2).
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1471-1487, and 1487-1526.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1477-1495.
Marriage of Maximilian with Mary of Burgundy.
His splendid dominion.
His joyous character.
His vigorous powers.
His ambitions and aims.
"Maximilian, who was as active and enterprising as his father
was indolent and timid, married at eighteen years of age, the
only daughter of Charles the Bold, duke of Burgundy."
See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1477
"She brought him Flanders, Franche-Comte, and all the Low
Countries. Louis XI., who disputed some of those territories,
and who, on the death of the duke, had seized Burgundy,
Picardy, Ponthieu, and Artois, as fiefs of France, which could
not be possessed by a woman, was defeated by Maximilian at
Guinegaste; and Charles VIII., who renewed the same claims,
was obliged to conclude a disadvantageous peace." Maximilian
succeeded to the imperial throne on the death of his father in
1493.
W. Russell, History of Modern Europe, letter 49 (volume 1).
"Between the Alps and the Bohemian frontier, the mark Austria
was first founded round and about the castles of Krems and
Melk. Since then, beginning first in the valley towards
Bavaria and Hungary, and coming to the House of Hapsburg, it
had extended across the whole of the northern slope of the
Alps until where the Slavish, Italian, and German tongues
part, and over to Alsace; thus becoming an archduchy from a
mark. On all sides the Archdukes had claims; on the German
side to Switzerland, on the Italian to the Venetian
possessions, and on the Slavish to Bohemia and Hungary. To
such a pitch of greatness had Maximilian by his marriage with
Maria of Burgundy brought the heritage received from Charles
the Bold. True to the Netherlanders' greeting, in the
inscription over their gates, 'Thou art our Duke, fight our
battle for us,' war was from the first his handicraft. He
adopted Charles the Bold's hostile attitude towards France; he
saved the greater part of his inheritance from the schemes of
Louis XI. Day and night it was his whole thought, to conquer
it entirely.
{204}
But after Maria of Burgundy's premature death, revolution
followed revolution, and his father Frederick being too old to
protect himself, it came about that in the year 1488 he was
ousted from Austria by the Hungarians, whilst his son was kept
a prisoner in Bruges by the citizens, and they had even to
fear the estrangement of the Tyrol. Yet they did not lose
courage. At this very time the father denoted with the vowels,
A. E. I. O. U. ('Alles Erdreich ist Oesterreich
unterthan'--All the earth is subject to Austria), the extent
of his hopes. In the same year, his son negotiated for a
Spanish alliance. Their real strength lay in the imperial
dignity of Maximilian, which they had from the German Empire.
As soon as it began to bestir itself, Maximilian was set at
liberty; as soon as it supported him in the persons of only a
few princes of the Empire, he became lord in his Netherlands.
... Since then his plans were directed against Hungary and
Burgundy. In Hungary he could gain nothing except securing the
succession to his house. But never, frequently as he concluded
peace, did he give up His intentions upon Burgundy. ... Now
that he had allied himself with a Sforza, and had joined the
Liga, now that his father was dead, and the Empire was pledged
to follow him across the mountains, and now, too, that the
Italian complications were threatening Charles, he took fresh
hope, and in this hope he summoned a Diet at Worms. Maximilian
was a prince of whom, although many portraits have been drawn,
yet there is scarcely one that resembles another, so easily
and entirely did he suit himself to circumstances. ... His
soul is full of motion, of joy in things, and of plans. There
is scarcely anything that he is not capable of doing. In his
mines he is a good screener, in his armoury the best plater,
capable of instructing others in new inventions. With musket
in hand, he defends his best marksman, George Purkhard; with
heavy cannon, which he has shown how to cast, and has placed
on wheels, he comes as a rule nearest the mark. He commands
seven captains in their seven several tongues; he himself
chooses and mixes his food and medicines. In the open country,
he feels himself happiest. ... What really distinguishes his
public life is that presentiment of the future greatness of
his dynasty which he has inherited of his father, and the
restless striving to attain all that devolved upon him from
the House of Burgundy. All his policy and all his schemes were
concentrated, not upon his Empire, for the real needs of which
he evinced little real care, and not immediately upon the
welfare of his hereditary lands, but upon the realization of
that sole idea. Of it all his letters and speeches are full.
... In March, 1495, Maximilian came to the Diet at Worms. ...
At this Reichstag the King gained two momentous prospects. In
Wurtemberg there had sprung of two lines two counts of quite
opposite characters. ... With the elder, Maximilian now
entered into a compact. Wurtemberg was to be raised to a
dukedom--an elevation which excluded the female line from the
succession--and, in the event of the stock failing, was to be
a 'widow's portion' of the realm to the use of the Imperial
Chamber. Now as the sole hopes of this family centred in a
weakling of a boy, this arrangement held out to Maximilian and
his successors the prospect of acquiring a splendid country.
Yet this was the smaller of his two successes. The greater was
the espousal of his children, Philip and Margaret, with the
two children of Ferdinand the Catholic, Juana and Juan, which
was here settled. This opened to his house still greater
expectations,--it brought him at once into the most intimate
alliance with the Kings of Spain. These matters might
possibly, however, have been arranged elsewhere. What
Maximilian really wanted in the Reichstag at Worms was the
assistance of the Empire against the French with its
world-renowned and much-envied soldiery. For at this time in
all the wars of Europe, German auxiliaries were decisive. ...
If Maximilian had united the whole of this power in his hand,
neither Europe nor Asia would have been able to withstand him.
But God disposed that it should rather be employed in the
cause of freedom than oppression. What an Empire was that
which in spite of its vast strength allowed its Emperor to be
expelled from his heritage, and did not for a long time take
steps to bring him back again? If we examine the constitution
of the Empire, not as we should picture it to ourselves in
Henry III. 's time, but as it had at length become--the legal
independence of the several estates, the emptiness of the
imperial dignity, the electiveness of a head, that afterwards
exercised certain rights over the electors,--we are led to
inquire not so much into the causes of its disintegration, for
this concerns us little, as into the way in which it was held
together. What welded it together, and preserved it, would
(leaving tradition and the Pope out of the question) appear,
before all else, to have been the rights of individuals, the
unions of neighbours, and the social regulations which
universally obtained. Such were those rights and privileges
that not only protected the citizen, his guild, and his
quarter of the town against his neighbours and more powerful
men than himself, but which also endowed him with an inner
independence. ... Next, the unions of neighbours. These were
not only leagues of cities and peasantries, expanded from
ancient fraternities--for who can tell the origin of the
Hansa, or the earliest treaty between Uri and Schwyz?--into
large associations, or of knights, who strengthened a really
insignificant power by confederations of neighbours, but also
of the princes, who were bound together by joint inheritances,
mutual expectancies, and the ties of blood, which in some
cases were very close. This ramification, dependent upon a
supreme power and confirmed by it, bound neighbour to
neighbour; and, whilst securing to each his privilege and his
liberty, blended together all countries of Germany in legal
bonds of union. But it is only in the social regulations that
the unity was really perceivable. Only as long as the Empire
was an actual reality, could the supreme power of the
Electors, each with his own special rights, be maintained;
only so long could dukes and princes, bishops and abbots hold
their neighbours in due respect, and through court offices or
hereditary services, through fiefs and the dignity of their
independent position give their vassals a peculiar position to
the whole. Only so long could the cities enjoying
immediateness under the Empire, carefully divided into free
and imperial cities, be not merely protected, but also assured
of a participation in the government of the whole. Under this
sanctified and traditional system of suzerainty and vassalage
all were happy and contented, and bore a love to it such as is
cherished towards a native town or a father's house. For some
time past, the House of Austria had enjoyed the foremost
position. It also had a union, and, moreover, a great faction
on its side. The union was the Suabian League. Old Suabia was
divided into three leagues--the league of the peasantry (the
origin of Switzerland); the league of the knights in the Black
Forest, on the Kocher, the Neckar, and the Danube; and the
league of the cities. The peasantry were from the first
hostile to Austria. The Emperor Frederick brought it to pass
that the cities and knights, that had from time out of mind
lived in feud, bound themselves together with several princes,
and formed, under his protection, the league of the land of
Suabia. But the party was scattered throughout the whole
Empire."
L. von Ranke, History of the Latin and Teutonic Nations,
book 1, chapter 3.
{205}
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1493-1519.
The Imperial reign of Maximilian.
Formation of the Circle of Austria.
The Aulic Council.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1493-1519.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1496-1499.
The Swabian War with the Swiss Confederacy and the Graubunden,
or Grey Leagues (Grisons).
Practical independence of both acquired.
See SWITZERLAND: A. D. 1396-1499.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1496-1526.
Extraordinary aggrandizement of the House of Austria by its marriages.
The Heritage of Charles V.
His cession of the German inheritance to Ferdinand.
The division of the House into Spanish and German branches.
Acquisition of Hungary and Bohemia.
In 1496, Philip the Fair, son of Maximilian, Archduke and
Emperor, by his marriage with Mary of Burgundy, "espoused the
Infanta of Spain, daughter of Ferdinand [of Aragon] and
Isabella of Castile. They had two sons, Charles and Ferdinand,
the former of whom, known in history by the name of Charles
V., inherited the Low Countries in right of his father, Philip
(1506). On the death of Ferdinand, his maternal grandfather
(1516), he became heir to the whole Spanish succession, which
comprehended the kingdoms of Spain, Naples, Sicily, and
Sardinia, together with Spanish America. To these vast
possessions were added his patrimonial dominions in Austria,
which were transmitted to him by his paternal grandfather, the
Emperor Maximilian I. About the same time (1519), the Imperial
dignity was conferred on this prince by the electors [see
GERMANY: A. D. 1519]; so that Europe had not seen, since the
time of Charlemagne, a monarchy so powerful as that of Charles
V. This Emperor concluded a treaty with his brother Ferdinand;
by which he ceded to him all his hereditary possessions in
Germany. The two brothers thus became the founders of the two
principal branches of the House of Austria, viz., that of
Spain, which began with Charles V. (called Charles I. of
Spain), and ended with Charles II. (1700); and that of
Germany, of which Ferdinand I. was the ancestor, and which
became extinct in the male line in the Emperor Charles VI.
(1740). These two branches, closely allied to each other,
acted in concert for the advancement of their reciprocal
interests; moreover they gained each their own separate
advantages by the marriage connexions which they formed.
Ferdinand I. of the German line married Anne (1521), sister of
Louis King of Hungary and Bohemia, who having been slain by
the Turks at the battle of Mohacs (1526), these two kingdoms
devolved to Ferdinand of the House of Austria. Finally, the
marriage which Charles V. contracted with the Infant Isabella,
daughter of Emmanuel, King of Portugal, procured Philip II. of
Spain, the son of that marriage, the whole Portuguese
monarchy, to which he succeeded on the death of Henry, called
the Cardinal (1580). So vast an aggrandisement of power
alarmed the Sovereigns of Europe."
C. W. Koch, The Revolutions of Europe, period 6.
ALSO IN:
W. Coxe, History of the House of Austria,
chapter 25 and 27 (volume 1).
W. Robertson, History of the Reign of Charles V., book 1.
See, also, SPAIN: A. D. 1496-1517.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1519.
Death of Maximilian.
Election of Charles V., "Emperor of the Romans."
See GERMANY: A. D. 1519.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1519-1555.
The imperial reign of Charles V.
The objects of his policy.
His conflict with the Reformation and with France.
"Charles V. did not receive from nature all the gifts nor all
the charms she can bestow, nor did experience give him every
talent; but he was equal to the part he had to play in the
world. He was sufficiently great to keep his many-jewelled
diadem. ... His ambition was cold and wise. The scope of his
ideas, which are not quite easy to divine, was vast enough to
control a state composed of divers and distant portions, so as
to make it always very difficult to amalgamate his armies, and
to supply them with food, or to procure money. Indeed its very
existence would have been exposed to permanent danger from
powerful coalitions, had Francis I. known how to place its
most vulnerable points under a united pressure from the armies
of France, of England, of Venice, and of the Ottoman Empire.
Charles V. attained his first object when he prevented the
French monarch from taking possession of the inheritance of
the house of Anjou, at Naples, and of that of the Viscontis at
Milan. He was more successful in stopping the march of Solyman
into Austria than in checking the spread of the Reformation in
Germany. ... Charles V. had four objects very much at heart:
he wished to be the master in Italy, to check the progress of
the Ottoman power in the west of Europe, to conquer the King
of France, and to govern the Germanic body by dividing it, and
by making the Reformation a religious pretext for oppressing
the political defenders of that belief. In three out of four
of these objects he succeeded. Germany alone was not
conquered: if she was beaten in battle, neither any political
triumph nor any religious results ensued. In Germany, Charles
V. began his work too late, and acted too slowly; he undertook
to subdue it at a time when the abettors of the Reformation
had grown strong, when he himself was growing weaker. ... Like
many other brilliant careers, the career of Charles V. was
more successful and more striking at the commencement and the
middle than at the end, of its course. At Madrid, at Cambrai,
at Nice, he made his rival bow down his head. At Crespy he
again forced him to obey his will, but as he had completely
made up his mind to have peace, Charles dictated it, in some
manner, to his own detriment.
{206}
At Passau he had to yield to the terms of his enemy--of an
enemy whom Charles V. encountered in his old age, and when his
powers had decayed. Although it may be said that the extent
and the power of the sovereignty which Charles V. left to his
successor at his death were not diminished, still his armies
were weakened, his finances were exhausted, and the country
was weary of the tyranny of the imperial lieutenants. The
supremacy of the empire in Germany, for which he had struggled
so much, was as little established at the end as at the
beginning of his reign; religious unity was solemnly destroyed
by the 'Recess' of Augsburg. But that which marks the position
of Charles V. as the representative man of his epoch, and as
the founder of the policy of modern times, is that, wherever
he was victorious, the effect of his success was to crush the
last efforts of the spirit of the middle ages, and of the
independence of nations. In Italy, in Spain, in Germany, and
in the Low Countries, his triumphs were so much gain to the
cause of absolute monarchy and so much loss to the liberty
derived from the old state of society. Whatever was the
character of liberty in the middle ages--whether it were
contested or incomplete, or a mockery--it played a greater
part than in the four succeeding centuries. Charles V. was
assuredly one of those who contributed the most to found and
consolidate the political system of modern governments. His
history has an aspect of grandeur. Had Francis I. been as
sagacious in the closet as he was bold in the field, by a
vigorous alliance with England, with Protestant Germany, and
with some of the republics of Italy, he might perhaps have
balanced and controlled the power of Charles V. But the French
monarch did not possess the foresight and the solid
understanding necessary to pursue such a policy with success.
His rival, therefore, occupies the first place in the
historical picture of the epoch. Charles V. had the sentiment
of his position and of the part he had to play."
J. Van Praet, Essays on the Political History of the 15th,
16th, and 17th Centuries, pages 190-194.
See, also, GERMANY: A. D. 1519 to 1152-1561,
and FRANCE: A. D. 1520-1523, to 1547-1559.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1525-1527.
Successful Contest for the Hungarian and Bohemian Crowns.
In Hungary, "under King Matthias the house of Zapolya, so
called from a Slavonic village near Poschega, whence it
originated, rose to peculiar eminence. To this house, in
particular, King Wladislas had owed his accession to the
throne; whence, however, it thought itself entitled to claim a
share in the sovereign power, and even a sort of prospective
right to the throne. Its members were the wealthiest of all
the magnates; they possessed seventy-two castles. ... It is
said that a prophecy early promised the crown to the young
John Zapolya. Possessed of all the power conferred by his rich
inheritance, Count of Zips, and Woiwode of Transylvania, he
soon collected a strong party around him. It was he who mainly
persuaded the Hungarians, in the year 1505, to exclude all
foreigners from the throne by a formal decree; which, though
they were not always able to maintain in force, they could
never be induced absolutely to revoke. In the year 1514 the
Woiwode succeeded in putting down an exceedingly formidable
insurrection of the peasants with his own forces; a service
which the lesser nobility prized the more highly, because it
enabled them to reduce the peasantry to a still harder state
of servitude. His wish was, on the death of Wladislas, to
become Gubernator of the kingdom, to marry the deceased king's
daughter Anne, and then to await the course of events. But he
was here encountered by the policy of Maximilian. Anne was
married to the Archduke Ferdinand; Zapolya was excluded from
the administration of the kingdom; even the vacant Palatinate
was refused him and given to his old rival Stephen Bathory. He
was highly incensed. ... But it was not till the year 1525
that Zapolya got the upper hand at the Rakosch. ... No one
entertained a doubt that he aimed at the throne. ... But
before anything was accomplished--on the contrary, just as
these party conflicts had thrown the country into the utmost
confusion, the mighty enemy, Soliman, appeared on the
frontiers of Hungary, determined to put an end to the anarchy.
... In his prison at Madrid, Francis I. had found means to
entreat the assistance of Soliman; urging that it well
beseemed a great emperor to succour the oppressed. Plans were
laid at Constantinople, according to which the two sovereigns
were to attack Spain with a combined fleet, and to send armies
to invade Hungary and the north of Italy. Soliman, without any
formal treaty, was by his position an ally of the Ligue, as
the king of Hungary was, of the emperor. On the 23d of April,
1526, Soliman, after visiting the groves of his forefathers
and of the old Moslem martyrs, marched out of Constantinople
with a mighty host, consisting of about a hundred thousand
men, and incessantly strengthened by fresh recruits on its
road. ... What power had Hungary, in the condition we have
just described, of resisting such an attack? ... The young
king took the field with a following of not more than three
thousand men. ... He proceeded to the fatal plain of Mohaez,
fully resolved with his small band to await in the open field
the overwhelming force of the enemy. ... Personal valour could
avail nothing. The Hungarians were immediately thrown into
disorder, their best men fell, the others took to flight. The
young king was compelled to flee. It was not even granted him
to die in the field of battle; a far more miserable end a
waited him. Mounted behind a Silesian soldier, who served him
as a guide, he had already been carried across the dark waters
that divide the plain; his horse was already climbing the
bank, when he slipped, fell back, and buried himself and his
rider in the morass. This rendered the defeat decisive. ...
Soliman had gained one of those victories which decide the
fate of nations during long epochs. ... That two thrones, the
succession to which was not entirely free from doubt, had thus
been left vacant, was an event that necessarily caused a great
agitation throughout Christendom. It was still a question
whether such a European power as Austria would continue to
exist;--a question which it is only necessary to state, in
order to be aware of its vast importance to the fate of
mankind at large, and of Germany in particular. ... The claims
of Ferdinand to both crowns, unquestionable as they might be
in reference to the treaties with the reigning houses, were
opposed in the nations themselves, by the right of ejection
and the authority of considerable rivals.
{207}
In Hungary, as soon as the Turks had retired, John Zapolya
appeared with the fine army which he had kept back from the
conflict; the fall of the king was at the same time the fall
of his adversaries. ... Even in Tokay, however, John Zapolya
was saluted as king. Meanwhile, the dukes of Bavaria conceived
the design of getting possession of the throne of Bohemia. ...
Nor was it in the two kingdoms alone that these pretenders had
a considerable party. The state of politics in Europe was such
as to insure them powerful supporters abroad. In the first
place, Francis I. was intimately connected with Zapolya: in a
short time a delegate from the pope was at his side, and the
Germans in Rome maintained that Clement assisted the faction
of the Woiwode with money. Zapolya sent an agent to Venice
with a direct request to be admitted a member of the Ligue of
Cognac. In Bohemia, too, the French had long had devoted
partisans. ... The consequences that must have resulted, had
this scheme succeeded, are so incalculable, that it is not too
much to say they would have completely changed the political
history of Europe. The power of Bavaria would have outweighed
that of Austria in both German and Slavonian countries, and
Zapolya, thus supported, would have been able to maintain his
station; the Ligue, and with it high ultra-montane opinions
would have held the ascendency in eastern Europe. Never was
there a project more pregnant with danger to the growing power
of the house of Austria. Ferdinand behaved with all the
prudence and energy which that house has so often displayed in
difficult emergencies. For the present, the all-important
object was the crown of Bohemia. ... All his measures were
taken with such skill and prudence, that on the day of
election, though the Bavarian agent had, up to the last
moment, not the slightest doubt of the success of his
negotiations, an overwhelming majority in the three estates
elected Ferdinand to the throne of Bohemia. This took place on
the 23d October, 1526. ... On his brother's birth-day, the
24th of February, 1527, Ferdinand was crowned at Prague. ....
The affairs of Hungary were not so easily or so peacefully
settled. ... At first, when Zapolya came forward, full armed
and powerful out of the general desolation, he had the
uncontested superiority. The capital of the kingdom sought his
protection, after which he marched to Stuhlweissenburg, where
his partisans bore down all attempts at opposition: he was
elected and crowned (11th of November, 1526); in Croatia, too,
he was acknowledged king at a diet; he filled all the numerous
places, temporal and spiritual, left vacant by the disaster of
Mohaez, with his friends. ... [But] the Germans advanced
without interruption; and as soon as it appeared possible that
Ferdinand might be successful, Zapolya's followers began to
desert him. ... Never did the German troops display more
bravery and constancy. They had often neither meat nor bread,
and were obliged to live on such fruits as they found in the
gardens: the inhabitants were wavering and uncertain--they
submitted, and then revolted again to the enemy; Zapolya's
troops, aided by their knowledge of the ground, made several
very formidable attacks by night; but the Germans evinced, in
the moment of danger, the skill and determination of a Roman
legion: they showed, too, a noble constancy under difficulties
and privations. At Tokay they defeated Zapolya and compelled
him to quit Hungary. ... On the 3rd November, 1527, Ferdinand
was crowned in Stuhlweissenburg: only five of the magnates of
the kingdom adhered to Zapolya. The victory appeared complete.
Ferdinand, however, distinctly felt that this appearance was
delusive. ... In Bohemia, too, his power was far from secure.
His Bavarian neighbours had not relinquished the hope of
driving him from the throne at the first general turn of
affairs. The Ottomans, meanwhile, acting upon the persuasion
that every land in which the head of their chief had rested
belonged of right to them, were preparing to return to
Hungary; either to take possession of it themselves, or at
first, as was their custom, to bestow it on a native
ruler--Zapolya, who now eagerly sought an alliance with
them--as their vassal."
L. Von Ranke, History of the Reformation in Germany,
book 4, chapter 4 (volume 2).
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1564-1618.
The tolerance of Maximilian II.
The bigotry and tyranny of Rodolph and Ferdinand II.
Prelude to the Thirty Years War.
"There is no period connected with these religious wars that
deserves more to be studied than these reigns of Ferdinand I.,
Maximilian [the Second], and those of his successors who preceded
the thirty years' war. We have no sovereign who exhibited that
exercise of moderation and good sense which a philosopher
would require, but Maximilian; and he was immediately followed
by princes of a different complexion. ... Nothing could be
more complete than the difficulty of toleration at the time
when Maximilian reigned; and if a mild policy could be
attended with favourable effects in his age and nation, there
can be little fear of the experiment at any other period. No
party or person in the state was then disposed to tolerate his
neighbour from any sense of the justice of such forbearance,
but from motives of temporal policy alone. The Lutherans, it
will be seen, could not bear that the Calvinists should have
the same religious privileges with themselves. The Calvinists
were equally opinionated and unjust; and Maximilian himself
was probably tolerant and wise, chiefly because he was in his
real opinions a Lutheran, and in outward profession, as the
head of the empire, a Roman Catholic. For twelve years, the
whole of his reign, he preserved the religious peace of the
community, without destroying the religious freedom of the
human mind. He supported the Roman Catholics, as the
predominant party, in all their rights, possessions, and
privileges; but he protected the Protestants in every exercise
of their religion which was then practicable. In other words,
he was as tolerant and just as the temper of society then
admitted, and more so than the state of things would have
suggested. ... The merit of Maximilian was but too apparent
the moment that his son Rodolph was called upon to supply his
place. ... He had always left the education of his son and
successor too much to the discretion of his bigoted consort.
Rodolph, his son, was therefore as ignorant and furious on his
part as were the Protestants on theirs; he had immediate
recourse to the usual expedients--force, and the execution of
the laws to the very letter. ... After Rodolph comes Matthias,
and, unhappily for all Europe, Bohemia and the empire fell
afterwards under the management of Ferdinand II. Of the
different Austrian princes, it is the reign of Ferdinand II.
that is more particularly to be considered. Such was the
arbitrary nature of his government over his subjects in
Bohemia, that they revolted. They elected for their king the
young Elector Palatine, hoping thus to extricate themselves
from the bigotry and tyranny of Ferdinand. This crown so
offered was accepted; and, in the event, the cause of the
Bohemians became the cause of the Reformation in Germany, and
the Elector Palatine the hero of that cause. It is this which
gives the great interest to this reign of Ferdinand II., to
these concerns of his subjects in Bohemia, and to the
character of this Elector Palatine. For all these events and
circumstances led to the thirty years' war."
W. Smyth, Lectures on Modern History, volume I, lecture 13.
See BOHEMIA: A. D. 1611-1618,
and GERMANY: A. D. 1618-1620.
{208}
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1567-1660.
Struggles of the Hapsburg House in Hungary and Transylvania to
establish rights of sovereignty.
Wars with the Turks.
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1567-1604, and 1606-1660.
----------AUSTRIA: End----------
Seventeenth Century: Second Half.
Contemporaneous Events.
A.D.
1651.
Invasion of England by Charles II. and the Scots;
Cromwell's victory at Worcester; complete conquest of
Scotland.
1652.
Victorious naval war of the English with the Dutch.
End of the Fronde.
Institution of the Liberum Veto in Poland.
1653.
Expulsion of "the Rump" by Cromwell, and establishment of
the Protectorate in England.
Adoption of the Instrument of Government.
Return of Mazarin to power in France.
The Cromwellian settlement of Ireland.
1654.
Incorporation of Scotland with the English Commonwealth,
under Cromwell.
Peace between the English and Dutch.
Conquest of Nova Scotia, by the New England colonists.
1655.
Alliance of England and France against Spain.
English conquest of Jamaica.
1656.
Beginning of the persecution of the Quakers in Massachusetts.
1658.
Capture of Dunkirk from the Spaniards and possession given
by the French to the English.
Death of Cromwell and succession of his son Richard as
Protector.
1659.
Meeting of a new Parliament in England;
its dissolution;
resuscitation and re-expulsion of the Rump, and formation
of a provisional government by the Army.
1660.
March of the English army under Monk from Scotland to
London.
Call of a new Parliament by Monk, and restoration of the
monarchy, in the person of Charles II.
1661.
Restoration of the Church of England and ejection of 2,000
nonconformist ministers.
Personal assumption of government by Louis XIV. in France.
Beginning of the ministry of Colbert.
1662.
Sale of Dunkirk to France by Charles II.
Restoration of episcopacy in Scotland and persecution of
the Covenanters.
1664.
Seizure of New Netherland (henceforth New York) by the
English from the Dutch and grant of the province to the
duke of York.
Grant of New Jersey to Berkeley and Carteret.
1665.
Outbreak of the great Plague in London.
Formal declarations of war between the English and the
Dutch.
1666.
The great fire in London.
Tremendous naval battles between Dutch and English and
defeat of the former.
1667.
Ravages by a Dutch fleet in the Thames.
Peace treaties of Breda, between England, Holland, France
and Denmark.
War of Louis XIV., called the War of the Queen's Rights, in
the Spanish Netherlands.
1668.
Triple alliance of England, Holland and Sweden against
France.
1669.
First exploring journey of La Salle from the St. Lawrence
to the West.
1670.
Treaty of the king of England with Louis XIV. of France,
betraying his allies, the Dutch, and engaging to profess
himself a Catholic,
1672.
Alliance of England and France against the Dutch.
Restoration of the Stadtholdership in Holland to the Prince
of Orange, and murder of the De Witts.
1673.
Recovery of New Netherland by the Dutch from the English.
1674.
Treaty of Westminster, restoring peace between the Dutch
and English and ceding New Netherland to the latter.
1675. War with the Indians in New England, known
as King Philip's War.
1678.
Pretended Popish Plot in England.
Treaties of Nimeguen.
1679.
Passage of the Habeas Corpus Act in England.
Oppression of Scotland and persecution of the Covenanters.
Defeat of Claverhouse at Drumclog.
Defeat of Covenanters at Bothwell Bridge.
1680.
First naming of the Whig and Tory parties in England.
1681.
Merciless despotism of the duke of York in Scotland.
Beginning of "dragonnade" persecution of Protestants in
France.
Grant of Pennsylvania by Charles II. to William Penn.
1682.
Exploration of the Mississippi to its mouth by La Salle.
1683.
The Rye-house Plot, and execution of Lord Russell and
Algernon Sidney, in England.
Great invasion of Hungary and Austria by the Turks;
their siege of Vienna, and the deliverance of the city by
John Sobieski, king of Poland.
Establishment of a penny post in London.
1685.
Death of Charles II., king of England, and accession of his
brother James II., an avowed Catholic.
Rebellion of the duke of Monmouth.
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes by Louis XIV. of France.
1686.
Consolidation of New England under a royal
governor-general.
League of Augsburg against Louis XIV. of France.
1688.
Declaration of Indulgence by James II. of England, and
imprisonment and trial of the seven bishops for refusing to
publish it.
Invitation to William and Mary of Orange to accept the
English crown.
Arrival in England of the Prince of Orange and flight of
James.
1689.
Completion of the English Revolution.
Settlement of the crown on William and Mary.
Passage of the Toleration Act and the Bill of Rights.
Landing of James II. in Ireland and war in that island;
siege and successful defense of Londonderry.
1690.
The first congress of the American colonies.
Battle of the Boyne in Ireland.
1692.
The Salem Witchcraft madness in Massachusetts.
Massacre of Glencoe in Scotland.
1695.
Passage of the first of the Penal Laws, oppressing
Catholics in Ireland.
1697.
Peace of Ryswick.
Cession of Strasburg and restoration of Acadia to France.
1699.
Peace of Carlowitz, between Turkey, Russia, Poland, Venice,
and the Emperor.
1700.
Prussia raised in rank to a kingdom.
First campaigns of Charles XII. of Sweden.
Seventeenth Century: First Half.
Contemporaneous Events.
A.D.
1602.
Chartering of Dutch East India Company.
First acting of Shakespeare's "Hamlet."
1603.
Death of Queen Elizabeth of England and accession of James I.
1600.
Gunpowder plot of English Catholics.
Publication of Bacon's "Advancement of Learning," and part
1 of Cervantes' "Don Quixote."
1606.
Charter granted to the London and Plymouth companies, for
American colonization.
Organization of the Independent church of Brownists at
Scrooby, England.
1607.
Settlement of Jamestown, Virginia.
Migration of Scrooby Independents to Holland.
1609.
Settlement of the exiled Pilgrims of Scrooby at Leyden.
Construction of the telescope by Galileo and discovery of
Jupiter's moons.
1610.
Assassination of Henry IV. of France and accession of Louis XIII.
1611.
Publication in England of the King James or Authorized
version of the Bible.
1614.
Last meeting of the States General of France before the
Revolution.
1610.
Appearance at Frankfort-on-the-Main of the first known
weekly newspaper.
1616.
Opening of war between Sweden and Poland.
Death of Shakespeare and Cervantes.
1618.
Rising of Protestants in Bohemia, beginning the Thirty
Years War.
1619.
Trial and execution of John of Barneveldt.
Introduction of slavery in Virginia.
1620.
Decisive defeat of the Protestants of Bohemia in the battle
of the White Mountain.
Rising of the French Huguenots at Rochelle.
Migration of the Pilgrims from Leyden to America.
1621.
Formation of the Dutch West India Company.
The first Thanksgiving Day in New England.
1622.
Appearance of the first known printed newspaper in England
"The Weekly Newes."
1624.
Beginning of Richelieu's ministry, in France.
1625.
Death of James I., of England, and accession of Charles I.;
beginning of the English struggle between King and
Parliament.
Engagement of Wallenstein and his army in the service of
the Emperor against the Protestants.
1627.
Alliance of England with the French Huguenots.
Siege of Rochelle by Richelieu.
1628.
Passage by the English Parliament of the act called the
Petition of Right.
Assassination of the duke of Buckingham.
Surrender of Rochelle to Richelieu.
Publication of Harvey's discovery of the circulation of the
blood.
1629.
Tumult in the English Parliament, dissolution by the king
and arrest of Eliot and others.
1630.
Appearance in Germany of Gustavus Adolphus, king of Sweden,
as the champion of Protestantism.
Settlement of the colony of Massachusetts Bay, in New
England, and founding of Boston.
The Day of the Dupes in France.
1631.
Siege, capture and sack of Magdeburg by the imperial
general, Tilly.
Defeat of Tilly on the Breitenfeld, at Leipzig, by Gustavus
Adolphus.
1632.
Defeat and death of Tilly.
Victory and death of Gustavus Adolphus at Lützen.
Patent to Lord Baltimore by James I., of England, granting
him the territory in America called Maryland.
First Jesuit mission to Canada.
1634.
Assassination of Wallenstein.
Levy of Ship-money in England.
1635.
First settlements in the Connecticut valley.
1636.
Banishment of Roger Williams from Massachusetts, and his
founding of Providence.
1637.
The Pequot War in New England.
Introduction of Laud's Service-book in Scotland; tumult in
St. Giles' church.
1638.
Banishment of Anne Hutchinson from Massachusetts.
Rising in Scotland against the Service-book;
organization of the Tables;
signing of the National Covenant.
1639.
The First Bishops' War of the Scotch with King Charles I.
1640.
Meeting of the Long Parliament in England.
Recovery of independence by Portugal.
1641.
Impeachment and execution of Strafford and adoption of the
Grand Remonstrance by the English Parliament.
Catholic rising in Ireland and alleged massacres of
Protestants.
1642.
King Charles' attempt, in England, to arrest the Five
Members, and opening of the Civil War at Edgehill.
Conspiracy of Cinq Mars in France.
Death of Cardinal Richelieu.
1643.
Meeting of the Westminster Assembly of Divines.
Subscription of the Solemn League and Covenant between the
Scotch and English nations.
Siege of Gloucester and first battle of Newbury.
Death of Louis XIII. of France and accession of Louis XIV.
1644.
Battles of Marston Moor and the second Newbury, in the
English civil war.
1645.
Oliver Cromwell placed second in command of the English
Parliamentary army.
His victory at Naseby.
Exploits of Montrose in Scotland.
1646.
Adoption of Presbyterianism by the English Parliament.
Surrender of King Charles to the Scottish army.
1647.
Surrender of King Charles by the Scots to the English, and
his seizure by the Army.
1648.
The second Civil War in England.
Cromwell's victory at Preston.
Treaty of Newport with the king.
Grand Army Remonstrance, and Pride's Purge of Parliament.
Last campaigns of the Thirty Years War.
Peace of Westphalia; cession of Alsace to France.
1649.
Trial and execution of King Charles I., of England, and
establishment of the Common-wealth.
Campaign of Cromwell in Ireland.
First civil war of the Fronde in France.
1650.
Charles II. in Scotland.
War between the English and the Scotch.
Victory of Cromwell at Dunbar.
The new Fronde in France, in alliance with Spain.
-----End "Contemporaneous Events"-----
AUSTRIA: A. D, 1618-1648.
The Thirty Years War.
The Peace of Westphalia.
"The thirty years' war made Germany the centre-point of
European politics. ... No one at its commencement could have
foreseen the duration and extent. But the train of war was
everywhere laid, and required only the match to set it going;
more than one war was joined to it, and swallowed up in it;
and the melancholy truth, that war feeds itself, was never
more clearly displayed. ... Though the war, which first broke
out in Bohemia, concerned only the house of Austria, yet by
its originating in religious disputes, by its peculiar
character as a religious war, and by the measures adopted both
by the insurgents and the emperor, it acquired such an extent,
that even the quelling of the insurrection was insufficient to
put a stop to it. ... Though the Bohemian war was apparently
terminated, yet the flame had communicated to Germany and
Hungary, and new fuel was added by the act of proscription
promulgated against the elector Frederic and his adherents.
From this the war derived that revolutionary character, which
was henceforward peculiar to it; it was a step that could not
but lead to further results, for the question of the relations
between the emperor and his states, was in a fair way of being
practically considered. New and bolder projects were also
formed in Vienna and Madrid, where it was resolved to renew
the war with the Netherlands. Under the present circumstances,
the suppression of the Protestant religion and the overthrow
of German and Dutch liberty appeared inseparable; while the
success of the imperial arms, supported as they were by the
league and the co-operation of the Spaniards, gave just
grounds for hope. ... By the carrying of the war into Lower
Saxony, the principal scat of the Protestant religion in
Germany (the states of which had appointed Christian IV. of
Denmark, as duke of Holstein, head of their confederacy), the
northern states had already, though without any beneficial
result, been involved in the strife, and the Danish war had
broken out. But the elevation of Albert of Wallenstein to the
dignity of duke of Friedland and imperial general over the
army raised by himself, was of considerably more importance,
as it affected the whole course and character of the war. From
this time the war was completely and truly revolutionary. The
peculiar situation of the general, the manner of the formation
as well as the maintenance of his army, could not fail to make
it such. ... The distinguished success of the imperial arms in
the north of Germany unveiled the daring schemes of
Wallenstein. He did not come forward as conqueror alone, but,
by the investiture of Mecklenburg as a state of the empire, as
a ruling prince. ... But the elevation and conduct of this
novus homo, exasperated and annoyed the Catholic no less than
the Protestant states, especially the league and its chief;
all implored peace, and Wallenstein's discharge. Thus, at the
diet of the electors at Augsburg, the emperor was reduced to
the alternative of resigning him or his allies: He chose the
former. Wallenstein was dismissed, the majority of his army
disbanded, and Tilly nominated commander-in-chief of the
forces of the emperor and the league. ... On the side of the
emperor sufficient care was taken to prolong the war. The
refusal to restore the unfortunate Frederic, and even the sale
of his upper Palatine to Bavaria, must with justice have
excited the apprehensions of the other princes. But when the
Jesuits finally succeeded, not only in extorting the edict of
restitution, but also in causing it to be enforced in the most
odious manner, the Catholic states themselves saw with regret
that peace could no longer exist. ... The greater the success
that attended the house of Austria, the more actively foreign
policy laboured to counteract it. England had taken an
interest in the fate of Frederic V. from the first, though
this interest was evinced by little beyond fruitless
negotiations. Denmark became engaged in the quarrel mostly
through the influence of this power and Holland. Richelieu,
from the time he became prime minister of France, had exerted
himself in opposing Austria and Spain. He found employment for
Spain in the contests respecting Veltelin, and for Austria
soon after, by the war of Mantua. Willingly would he have
detached the German league from the interest of the emperor;
and though he failed in this, he procured the fall of
Wallenstein. ... Much more important, however, was Richelieu's
influence on the war, by the essential share he had in gaining
Gustavus Adolphus' active participation in it. ... The
nineteen years of his [Gustavus Adolphus'] reign which had
already elapsed, together with the Polish war, which lasted
nearly that time, had taught the world but little of the real

worth of this great and talented hero. The decisive
superiority of Protestantism in Germany, under his guidance,
soon created a more just knowledge, and at the same time
showed the advantages which must result to a victorious
supporter of that cause. ... The battle at Leipzig was
decisive for Gustavus Adolphus and his party, almost beyond
expectation. The league fell asunder; and in a short time he
was master of the countries from the Baltic to Bavaria, and
from the Rhine to Bohemia. ... But the misfortunes and death
of Tilly brought Wallenstein again on the stage as absolute
commander-in-chief, bent on plans not a whit less extensive
than those he had before formed. No period of the war gave
promise of such great and rapid successes or reverses as the
present, for both leaders were determined to effect them; but
the victory of Lutzen, while it cost Gustavus his life,
prepared the fall of Wallenstein.
{209}
... Though the fall of Gustavus Adolphus frustrated his own
private views, it did not those of his party. ... The school
of Gustavus produced a number of men, great in the cabinet and
in the field; yet it was hard, even for an Oxensteirn, to
preserve the importance of Sweden unimpaired; and it was but
partially done by the alliance of· Heilbronn. ... If the
forces of Sweden overrun almost every part of Germany in the
following months, under the guidance of the pupils of the
king, Bernard of Weimar and Gustavus Horn, we must apparently
attribute it to Wallenstein's intentional inactivity in
Bohemia. The distrust of him increased in Vienna the more, as
he took but little trouble to diminish it; and though his fall
was not sufficient to atone for treachery, if proved, it was
for his equivocal character and imprudence. His death probably
saved Germany from a catastrophe. ... A great change took
place upon the death of Wallenstein; as a prince of the blood,
Ferdinand, king of Hungary and Bohemia, obtained the command.
Thus an end was put to plans of revolutions from this quarter.
But in the same year the battle of Nordlingen gave to the
imperial arms a sudden preponderance, such as it had never
before acquired. The separate peace of Saxony with the emperor
at Prague, and soon after an alliance, were its consequences;
Sweden driven back to Pomerania, seemed unable of herself,
during the two following years, to maintain her ground in
Germany: the victory of Wittstock turned the scale in her
favour. ... The war was prolonged and greatly extended by the
active share taken in it by France: first against Spain, and
soon against Austria. ... The German war, after the treaty
with Bernhard of Weimar, was mainly carried on by France, by
the arming of Germans against Germans. But the pupil of
Gustavus Adolphus preferred to fight for himself rather than
others, and his early death was almost as much coveted by
France as by Austria. The success of the Swedish arms revived
under Baner. ... At the general diet, which was at last
convened, the emperor yielded to a general amnesty, or at
least what was so designated. But when at the meeting of the
ambassadors of the leading powers at Hamburg, the
preliminaries were signed, and the time and place of the
congress of peace fixed, it was deferred after Richelieu's
death, (who was succeeded by Mazarin), by the war, which both
parties continued, in the hope of securing better conditions
by victory. A new war broke out in the north between Sweden
and Denmark, and when at last the congress of peace was opened
at Munster and Osnabruck, the negotiations dragged on for
three years. ... The German peace was negotiated at Munster
between the emperor and France, and at Osnabruck between the
emperor and Sweden; but both treaties, according to express
agreement, Oct. 24, 1648, were to be considered as one, under
the title of the Westphalian."
A. H. L. Heeren, A Manual of the History of the
Political System of Europe and its Colonies, pages 91-99.
"The Peace of Westphalia has met manifold hostile comments,
not only in earlier, but also in later, times. German patriots
complained that by it the unity of the Empire was rent; and
indeed the connection of the States, which even before was
loose, was relaxed to the extreme. This was, however, an evil
which could not be avoided, and it had to be accepted in order
to prevent the French and Swedes from using their opportunity
for the further enslavement of the land. ... The religious
parties also made objections to the peace. The strict
Catholics condemned it as a work of inexcusable and arbitrary
injustice. ... The dissatisfaction of the Protestants was
chiefly with the recognition of the Ecclesiastical
Reservation. They complained also that their brethren in the
faith were not allowed the free exercise of their religion in
Austria. Their hostility was limited to theoretical
discussions, which soon ceased when Louis XIV. took advantage
of the preponderance which he had won to make outrageous
assaults upon Germany, and even the Protestants were compelled
to acknowledge the Emperor as the real defender of German
independence."
A. Gindely, History of the Thirty Years' War,
volume 2, chapter 10, section 4.
See, also,
GERMANY: A. D. 1618-1620, to 1648;
FRANCE: A. D. 1624-1626; and
ITALY: A. D. 1627-1631.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1621.
Formal establishment of the right of primogeniture in the
Archducal Family.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1636-1637.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1624-1626.
Hostile combinations of Richelieu.
The Valtelline war in Northern Italy.
See FRANCE: A. D. 1624-1626.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1627-1631.
War with France over the succession to the Duchy of Mantua.
See ITALY: A. D. 1627-1631.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1660-1664.
Renewed war with the Turks.
Help from France.
Battle and victory of St. Gothard.
Twenty years truce.
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1660-1664.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1668-1683.
Increased oppression and religious persecution in Hungary.
Revolt of Tekeli.
The Turks again called in.
Mustapha's great invasion and siege of Vienna.
Deliverance of the city by John Sobieski.
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1668-1683.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1672-1714.
The wars with Louis XIV. of France: War of the Grand Alliance.
Peace of Ryswick.
"The leading principle of the reign [in France] of Louis XIV.
... is the principle of war with the dynasty of Charles
V.--the elder branch of which reigned in Spain, while the
descendants of the younger branch occupied the imperial throne
of Germany. ... At the death of Mazarin, or to speak more
correctly, immediately after the death of Philip IV., ... the
early ambition of Louis XIV. sought to prevent the junior
branch of the Austrian dynasty from succeeding to the
inheritance of the elder branch. He had no desire to see
reconstituted under the imperial sceptre of Germany the
monarchy which Charles V. had at one time wished to transmit
entire to his son, but which, worn out and weakened, he
subsequently allowed without regret to be divided between his
son and his brother. Before making war upon Austria, Louis
XIV. cast his eyes upon a portion of the territory belonging
to Spain, and the expedition against Holland, begun in 1672
[see NETHERLANDS (HOLLAND): A. D. 1672-1674, and 1674-1678],
for the purpose of absorbing the Spanish provinces by
overwhelming them, opened the series of his vast enterprises.
His first great war was, historically speaking, his first
great fault. He failed in his object: for at the end of six
campaigns, during which the French armies obtained great and
deserved success, Holland remained unconquered.
{210}
Thus was Europe warned that the lust of conquest of a young
monarch, who did not himself possess military genius, but who
found in his generals the resources and ability in which he
was himself deficient, would soon threaten her independence.
Condé and Turenne, after having been rebellious subjects under
the Regency, were about to become the first and the most
illustrious lieutenants of Louis XIV. Europe, however, though
warned, was not immediately ready to defend herself. It was
from Austria, more directly exposed to the dangers of the
great war now commencing, that the first systematic resistance
ought to have come. But Austria was not prepared to play such
a part; and the Emperor Leopold possessed neither the genius
nor the wish for it. He was, in fact, nothing more than the
nominal head of Germany. ... Such was the state of affairs in
Europe when William of Orange first made his appearance on the
stage. ... The old question of supremacy, which Louis XIV.
wished to fight out as a duel with the House of Austria, was
now about to change its aspect, and, owing to the presence of
an unexpected genius, to bring into the quarrel other powers
besides the two original competitors. The foe of Louis XIV.
ought by rights to have been born on the banks of the Danube,
and not on the shores of the North Sea. In fact, it was
Austria that at that moment most needed a man of genius,
either on the throne or at the head of affairs. The events of
the century would, in this case, doubtless have followed a
different course: the war would have been less general, and
the maritime nations would not have been involved in it to the
same degree. ... The treaties of peace would have been signed
in some small place in France or Germany, and not in two towns
and a village in Holland, such as Nimeguen, Ryswick, and
Utrecht. . . . William of Orange found himself in a position
soon to form the Triple Alliance which the very policy of
Louis XIV. suggested. For France to attack Holland, when her
object was eventually to reach Austria, and keep her out of
the Spanish succession, was to make enemies at one and the
same time of Spain, of Austria, and of Holland. But if it
afterwards required considerable efforts on the part of
William of Orange to maintain this alliance, it demanded still
more energy to extend it. It formed part of the Stadtholder's
ulterior plans to combine the union between himself and the
two branches of the Austrian family, with the old
Anglo-Swedish Triple Alliance, which had just been dissolved
under the strong pressure brought to bear on it by Louis XIV.
... Louis XIV., whose finances were exhausted, was very soon
anxious to make peace, even on the morrow of his most
brilliant victories; whilst William of Orange, beaten and
retreating, ardently desired the continuance of the war. ...
The Peace of Nimeguen was at last signed, and by it were
secured to Louis XIV. Franche-Comté, and some important places
in the Spanish Low Countries on his northern frontier [see
NIMEGUEN, PEACE OF]. This was the culminating point of the
reign of Louis XIV. Although the coalition had prevented him
from attaining the full object of his designs against the
House of Austria, which had been to absorb by conquest so much
of the territory belonging to Spain as would secure him
against the effect of a will preserving the whole inheritance
intact in the family, yet his armies had been constantly
successful, and many of his opponents were evidently tired of
the struggle. ... Some years passed thus, with the appearance
of calm. Europe was conquered; and when peace was broken,
because, as was said, the Treaty of Nimeguen was not duly
executed, the events of the war were for some time neither
brilliant or important, for several campaigns began and ended
without any considerable result. ... At length Louis XIV.
entered on the second half of his reign, which differed widely
from the first. ... During this second period of more than
thirty years, which begins after the Treaty of Nimeguen and
lasts till the Peace of Utrecht, events succeed each other in
complete logical sequence, so that the reign presents itself
as one continuous whole, with a regular movement of ascension
and decline. ... The leading principle of the reign remained
the same; it was always the desire to weaken the House of
Austria, or to secure an advantageous partition of the Spanish
succession. But the Emperor of Germany was protected by the
coalition, and the King of Spain, whose death was considered
imminent, would not make up his mind to die. ... During the
first League, when the Prince of Orange was contending against
Louis XIV. with the co-operation of the Emperor of Germany, of
the King of Spain, and of the Electors on the Rhine, the
religious element played only a secondary part in the war. But
we shall see this element make its presence more manifest. ...
Thus the influence of Protestant England made itself more and
more felt in the affairs of Europe, in proportion as the
government of the Stuarts, from its violence, its
unpopularity, and from the opposition offered to it, was
approaching its end. ... The second coalition was neither more
united nor more firm than the first had been: but, after the
expulsion of the Stuarts, the germs of dissolution no longer
threatened the same dangers. ... The British nation now made
itself felt in the balance of Europe, and William of Orange
was for the first time in his life successful in war at the
head of his English troops. ... This was the most brilliant
epoch of the life of William III. ... He was now at the height
of his glory, after a period of twenty years from his start in
life, and his destiny was accomplished; so that until the
Treaty of Ryswick, which in 1698 put an end to his hostilities
with France, and brought about his recognition as King of
England by Louis XIV., not much more was left for him to gain;
and he had the skill to lose nothing. ... The negotiations for
the Treaty of Ryswick were conducted with less ability and
boldness, and concluded on less advantageous terms, than the
Truce of Ratisbon or the Peace of Nimeguen. Nevertheless, this
treaty, which secured to Louis the possession of Strasbourg,
might, particularly as age was now creeping on him, have
closed his military career without disgrace, if the eternal
question, for the solution of which he had made so many
sacrifices, and which had always held the foremost place in
his thoughts, had not remained as unsettled and as full of
difficulty as on the day when he had mounted the throne.
{211}
Charles II. of Spain was not dead, and the question of the
Spanish succession, which had so actively employed the armies
of Louis XIV., and taxed his diplomacy, was as undecided as at
the beginning of his reign. Louis XIV. saw two alternatives
before him: a partition of the succession between the Emperor
and himself (a solution proposed thirty years before as a
means to avoid war), or else a will in favour of France,
followed of course by a recommencement of general hostilities.
... Louis XIV. proposed in succession two schemes, not, as
thirty years before, to the Emperor, but to the King of
England, whose power and whose genius rendered him the arbiter
of all the great affairs of Europe. ... In the first of the
treaties of partition, Spain and the Low Countries were to be
given to the Prince of Bavaria; in the second, to the Archduke
Charles. In both, France obtained Naples and Sicily for the
Dauphin. ... Both these arrangements ... suited both France
and England as a pacific solution of the question. ... But
events, as we know, deranged all these calculations, and
Charles II., who, by continuing to live, had disappointed so
much impatient expectation, by his last will provoked a
general war, to be carried on against France by the union of
England with the Empire and with Holland--a union which was
much strengthened under the new dynasty, and which afterwards
embraced the northern states of Germany. ... William III. died
at the age of fifty-two, on the 9th of March, 1702, at the
beginning of the War of Succession. After him, the part he was
to have played was divided. Prince Eugene, Marlborough, and
Heinsius (the Grand Pensionary) had the conduct of political
and especially of military affairs, and acted in concert. The
disastrous consequences to France of that war, in which
William had no part, are notorious. The battles of Blenheim,
of Ramilies, and of Oudenarde brought the allied armies on the
soil of France, and placed Louis XIV. on the verge of ruin."
J. Van Praet, Essays on the Political History of the
15th, 16th, and 17th Centuries, pages 390-414 and 441-455.
ALSO IN:
H. Martin, History of France: Age of Louis XIV:,
volume 2, chapter 2 and 4-6.
T. H. Dyer, History of Modern Europe,
book 5, chapter 5-6 (volume 3).
See, also,
GERMANY: A. D. 1686; and
FRANCE: A. D. 1689-1690 to 1697.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1683-1687.
Merciless suppression of the Hungarian revolt.
The crown of Hungary made hereditary in the House of Hapsburg.
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1683-1687.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1683-1699.
Expulsion of the Turks from Hungary.
The Peace of Carlowitz.
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1683-1699.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1699--1711.
Suppression of the Revolt under Rakoczy in Hungary.
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1699-1718.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1700.
Interest of the Imperial House in the question of the Spanish
Succession.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1698-1700.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1701-1713.
The War of the Spanish Succession.
See
GERMANY: A. D. 1702, to 1704;
ITALY: A. D. 1701-1713;
SPAIN: A. D. 1702, to 1707-1710, and
NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1702-1704, to 1710-1712.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1711.
The War of the Spanish Succession.
Its Circumstances changed.
"The death of the Emperor Joseph I., who expired April 17,
1711, at the age of thirty-two, changed the whole character of
the War of the Spanish Succession. As Joseph left no male
heirs, the hereditary dominions of the House of Austria
devolved to his brother, the Archduke Charles; and though that
prince had not been elected King of the Romans, and had
therefore to become a candidate for the imperial crown, yet
there could be little doubt that he would attain that dignity.
Hence, if Charles should also become sovereign of Spain and
the Indies, the vast empire of Charles V. would be again
united in one person; and that very evil of an almost
universal monarchy would be established, the prevention of
which had been the chief cause for taking up arms against
Philip V. ... After an interregnum of half a year, during
which the affairs of the Empire had been conducted by the
Elector Palatine and the Elector of Saxony, as imperial vicars
for South and North Germany, the Archduke Charles was
unanimously named Emperor by the Electoral College (Oct.
12th). ... Charles ... received the imperial crown at
Frankfort, Dec. 22d, with the title of Charles VI."
T. H. Dyer, History of Modern Europe,
book 5, chapter 6 (volume 3).
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1713-1714.
Ending of the War of the Spanish Succession.
The Peace of Utrecht and the Treaty of Rastadt.
Acquisition of the Spanish Netherlands, Naples and Milan.
See UTRECHT: A. D. 1712-1714.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1713-1719.
Continued differences with Spain.
The Triple Alliance.
The Quadruple Alliance.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1713-1725.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1714.
The Desertion of the Catalans.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1713-1714.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1714-1718.
Recovery of Belgrade and final expulsion of the Turks from
Hungary.
See HUNGARY: A. D. 1699-1718.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1718-1738.
The question of the Succession.
The Pragmatic Sanction of Charles VI., and its guarantee by
the Powers.
"On the death [A. D. 1711] of Joseph, the hopes of the house
of Austria and the future destiny of Germany rested on Charles
[then, as titular king of Spain, Charles III., ineffectually
contesting the Spanish throne with the Bourbon heir, Philip V.
afterwards, as Emperor, Charles VI.] who was the only
surviving male of his illustrious family. By that event the
houses of Austria, Germany and Europe were placed in a new and
critical situation. From a principle of mistaken policy the
succession to the hereditary dominions had never been
established according to an invariable rule; for it was not
clearly ascertained whether males of the collateral branches
should be preferred to females in lineal descent, an
uncertainty which had frequently occasioned many vehement
disputes. To obviate this evil, as well as to prevent future
disputes, Leopold [father of Joseph and Charles] had arranged
the order of succession: to Joseph he assigned Hungary and
Bohemia, and the other hereditary dominions; and to Charles
the crown of Spain, and all the territories which belonged to
the Spanish inheritance. Should Joseph die without issue male,
the whole succession was to descend to Charles, and in case of
his death, under similar circumstances, the Austrian dominions
were to devolve on the daughters of Joseph in preference to
those of Charles. This family compact was signed by the two
brothers in the presence of Leopold. Joseph died without male
issue; but left two daughters." He was succeeded by Charles in
accordance with the compact.
{212}
"On the 2nd of August, 1718, soon after the signature of the
Quadruple Alliance, Charles promulgated a new law of
succession for the inheritance of the house of Austria, under
the name of the Pragmatic Sanction. According to the family
compact formed by Leopold, and confirmed by Joseph and
Charles, the succession was entailed on the daughters of
Joseph in preference to the daughters of Charles, should they
both die without issue male. Charles, however, had scarcely
ascended the throne, though at that time without children,
than he reversed this compact, and settled the right of
succession, in default of his male issue, first on his
daughters, then on the daughters of Joseph, and afterwards on
the queen of Portugal and the other daughters of Leopold.
Since the promulgation of that decree, the Empress had borne a
son who died in his infancy, and three daughters, Maria
Theresa, Maria Anne and Maria Amelia. With a view to insure
the succession of these daughters, and to obviate the dangers
which might arise from the claims of the Josephine
archduchesses, he published the Pragmatic Sanction, and
compelled his nieces to renounce their pretensions on their
marriages with the electors of Saxony and Bavaria. Aware,
however, that the strongest renunciations are disregarded, he
obtained from the different states of his extensive dominions
the acknowledgement of the Pragmatic Sanction, and made it the
great object of his reign, to which he sacrificed every other
consideration, to procure the guaranty of the European
powers." This guaranty was obtained in treaties with the
several powers, as follows: Spain in 1725; Russia, 1726,
renewed in 1733; Prussia, 1728; England and Holland, 1731;
France, 1738; the Empire, 1732. The inheritance which Charles
thus endeavored to secure to his daughter was vast and
imposing. "He was by election Emperor of Germany, by
hereditary right sovereign of Hungary, Transylvania, Bohemia,
Austria, Styria, Carinthia and Carniola, the Tyrol, and the
Brisgau, and he had recently obtained Naples and Sicily, the
Milanese and the Netherlands."
W. Coxe, History of the House of Austria,
chapter 80, 84-85 (volume 3).
"The Pragmatic Sanction, though framed to legalize the
accession of Maria Theresa, excludes the present Emperor's
daughters and his grandchild by postponing the succession of
females to that of males in the family of Charles VI."
J. D. Bourchier, The Heritage of the Hapsburgs
(Fortnightly Review, March, 1889).
ALSO IN:
H. Tuttle, History of Prussia, 1740-1745, chapter 2.
S. A. Dunham, History of the Germanic Empire,
book 3, chapter 3 (volume 3).
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1719.
Sardinia ceded to the Duke of Savoy in exchange for Sicily.
See
SPAIN: A. D. 1713-1725; and
ITALY: A. D. 1715-1735.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1731.
The second Treaty of Vienna with England and Holland.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1726-1731.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1732-1733.
Interference in the election of the King of Poland.
See POLAND: A. D. 1732-1733.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1733-1735.
The war of the Polish Succession.
Cession of Naples and Sicily to Spain, and Lorraine and Bar to
France.
See
FRANCE: A. D. 1733-1735, and
ITALY: A. D. 1715-1735.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1737-1739.
Unfortunate war with the Turks, in alliance with Russia.
Humiliating peace of Belgrade.
Surrender of Belgrade, with Servia, and part of Bosnia.
See RUSSIA: A. D. 1725-1739.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1740 (October).
Treachery among the Guarantors of the Pragmatic Sanction.
The inheritance of Marie Theresa disputed.
"The Emperor Charles VI. ... died on the 20th of October,
1740. His daughter Maria Theresa, the heiress of his dominions
with the title of Queen of Hungary, was but twenty-three years
of age, without experience or knowledge of business; and her
husband Francis, the titular Duke of Lorraine and reigning
Grand Duke of Tuscany, deserved the praise of amiable
qualities rather than of commanding talents. Her Ministers
were timorous, irresolute, and useless: 'I saw them in
despair,' writes Mr. Robinson, the British envoy, 'but that
very despair was not capable of rendering them bravely
desperate.' The treasury was exhausted, the army dispersed,
and no General risen to replace Eugene. The succession of
Maria Theresa was, indeed, cheerfully acknowledged by her
subjects, and seemed to be secured amongst foreign powers by
their guarantee of the Pragmatic Sanction; but it soon
appeared that such guarantees are mere worthless parchments
where there is strong temptation to break and only a feeble
army to support them. The principal claimant to the succession
was the Elector of Bavaria, who maintained that the will of
the Emperor Ferdinand the First devised the Austrian states to
his daughter, from whom the Elector descended, on failure of
male lineage. It appeared that the original will in the
archives at Vienna referred to the failure not of the male but
of the legitimate issue of his sons; but this document, though
ostentatiously displayed to all the Ministers of state and
foreign ambassadors, was very far from inducing the Elector to
desist from his pretensions. As to the Great Powers--the Court
of France, the old ally of the Bavarian family, and mindful of
its injuries from the House of Austria, was eager to exalt the
first by the depression of the latter. The Bourbons in Spain
followed the direction of the Bourbons in France. The King of
Poland and the Empress of Russia were more friendly in their
expressions than in their designs. An opposite spirit pervaded
England and Holland, where motives of honour and of policy
combined to support the rights of Maria Theresa. In Germany
itself the Elector of Cologne, the Bavarian's brother, warmly
espoused his cause: and 'the remaining Electors,' says
Chesterfield, 'like electors with us, thought it a proper
opportunity of making the most of their votes,--and all at
the expense of the helpless and abandoned House of Austria!'
The first blow, however, came from Prussia, where the King
Frederick William had died a few months before, and been
succeeded by his son Frederick the Second; a Prince surnamed
the Great by poets."
Lord Mahon (Earl Stanhope), History of England,
1713-1783, chapter 23 (volume 3).
"The elector of Bavaria acted in a prompt, honest, and
consistent manner. He at once lodged a protest against any
disposition of the hereditary estates to the prejudice of his
own rights; insisted on the will of Ferdinand I.; and demanded
the production of the original text. It was promptly produced.
But it was found to convey the succession to the heirs of his
daughter, the ancestress of the elector, not, as he contended,
on the failure of male heirs, but in the absence of more
direct heirs born in wedlock. Maria Theresa could, however,
trace her descent through nearer male heirs, and had,
therefore, a superior title. Charles Albert was in any event
only one of several claimants. The King of Spain, a Bourbon,
presented himself as the heir of the Hapsburg emperor Charles
V. The King of Sardinia alleged an ancient marriage contract,
from which he derived a right to the duchy of Milan. Even
August of Saxony claimed territory by virtue of an antiquated
title, which, it was pretended, the renunciation of his wife
could not affect. All these were, however, mere vultures
compared to the eagle [Frederick of Prussia] which was soon to
descend upon its prey."
H. Tuttle, History of Prussia, 1740-1745, chapter 2.
{213}
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1740 (October-November).
The War of the Succession.
Conduct of Frederick the Great as explained by himself.
"This Pragmatic Sanction had been guarantied by France,
England, Holland, Sardinia, Saxony, and the Roman empire; nay
by the late King Frederic William [of Prussia] also, on
condition that the court of Vienna would secure to him the
succession of Juliers and Berg. The emperor promised him the
eventual succession, and did not fulfil his engagements; by
which the King of Prussia, his successor, was freed from this
guarantee, to which his father, the late king, had pledged
himself, conditionally. ... Frederic I., when he erected
Prussia into a kingdom, had, by that vain grandeur, planted
the scion of ambition in the bosom of his posterity; which,
soon or late, must fructify. The monarchy he had left to his
descendants was, if I may be permitted the expression, a kind
of hermaphrodite, which was rather more an electorate than a
kingdom. Fame was to be acquired by determining the nature of
this being: and this sensation certainly was one of those
which strengthened so many motives, conspiring to engage the
king in grand enterprises. If the acquisition of the dutchy of
Berg had not even met with almost insurmountable impediments,
it was in itself so small that the possession would add little
grandeur to the house of Brandenbourg. These reflections
occasioned the king to turn his views toward the house of
Austria, the succession of which would become matter of
litigation, at the death of the emperor, when the throne of
the Cæsars should be vacant. That event must be favourable to
the distinguished part which the king had to act in Germany,
by the various claims of the houses of Saxony and Bavaria to
these states; by the number of candidates which might canvass
for the Imperial crown; and by the projects of the court of
Versailles, which, on such an occasion, must naturally profit
by the troubles that the death of Charles VI. could not fail
to excite. This accident did not long keep the world in
expectation. The emperor ended his days at the palace La
Favorite, on the 26th [20th] day of October, 1740. The news
arrived at Rheinsberg when the king was ill of a fever. ... He
immediately resolved to reclaim the principalities of Silesia;
the rights of his house to which [long dormant, the claim
dating back to a certain covenant of heritage-brotherhood with
the duke of Liegnitz, in 1537, which the emperor of that day
caused to be annulled by the States of Bohemia] were
incontestable: and he prepared, at the same time, to support
these pretensions, if necessary, by arms. This project
accomplished all his political views; it afforded the means of
acquiring reputation, of augmenting the power of the state,
and of terminating what related to the litigious succession of
the dutchy of Berg. ...The state of the court of Vienna, after
the death of the emperor, was deplorable. The finances were in
disorder; the army was ruined and discouraged by ill success
in its wars with the Turks; the ministry disunited, and a
youthful unexperienced princess at the head of the government,
who was to defend the succession from all claimants. The
result was that the government could not appear formidable. It
was besides impossible that the king should be destitute of
allies. ... The war which he might undertake in Silesia was
the only offensive war that could be favoured by the situation
of his states, for it would be carried on upon his frontiers,
and the Oder would always furnish him with a sure
communication. ... Add to these reasons, an army fit to march,
a treasury ready prepared, and, perhaps, the ambition of
acquiring renown. Such were the causes of the war which the
king declared against Maria Theresa of Austria, queen of
Hungary and Bohemia."
Frederick II. (Frederick the Great), History of My Own
Times: Posthumous Works (translated by Holcroft),
volume 1, chapter 1-2.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1740-1741.
The War of the Succession: Faithlessness of the King of Prussia.
The Macaulay verdict.
"From no quarter did the young queen of Hungary receive
stronger assurances of friendship and support than from the
King of Prussia. Yet the King of Prussia, the
'Anti-Machiavel,' had already fully determined to commit the
great crime of violating his plighted faith, of robbing the
ally whom he was bound to defend, and of plunging all Europe
into a long, bloody, and desolating war, and all this for no
end whatever except that he might extend his dominions and see
his name in the gazettes. He determined to assemble a great
army with speed and secrecy, to invade Silesia before Maria
Theresa should be apprized of his design, and to add that rich
province to his kingdom. ... Without any declaration of war,
without any demand for reparation, in the very act of pouring
forth compliments and assurances of good will, Frederic
commenced hostilities. Many thousands of his troops were
actually in Silesia before the Queen of Hungary knew that he
had set up any claim to any part of her territories. At length
he sent her a message which could be regarded only as an
insult. If she would but let him have Silesia, he would, he
said, stand by her against any power which should try to
deprive her of her other dominions: as if he was not already
bound to stand by her, or as if his new promise could be of
more value than the old one. It was the depth of winter. The
cold was severe, and the roads deep in mire. But the Prussians
pressed on. Resistance was impossible. The Austrian army was
then neither numerous nor efficient. The small portion of that
army which lay in Silesia was unprepared for hostilities.
Glogau was blockaded; Breslau opened its gates; Ohlau was
evacuated. A few scattered garrisons still held out; but the
whole open country was subjugated: no enemy ventured to
encounter the king in the field; and, before the end of
January, 1741, he returned to receive the congratulations of
his subjects at Berlin.
{214}
Had the Silesian question been merely a question between
Frederic and Maria Theresa it would be impossible to acquit
the Prussian king of gross perfidy. But when we consider the
effects which his policy produced, and could not fail to
produce, on the whole community of civilized nations, we are
compelled to pronounce a condemnation still more severe. ...
The selfish rapacity of the king of Prussia gave the signal to
his neighbours. ... The evils produced by this wickedness were
felt in lands where the name of Prussia was unknown; and, in
order that he might rob a neighbour whom he had promised to
defend, black men fought on the coast of Coromandel, and red
men scalped each other by the great lakes of North America.
Silesia had been occupied without a battle; but the Austrian
troops were advancing to the relief of the fortresses which
still held out. In the spring Frederic rejoined his army. He
had seen little of war, and had never commanded any great body
of men in the field. ... Frederic's first battle was fought at
Molwitz [April 10, 1741], and never did the career of a great
commander open in a more inauspicious manner. His army was
victorious. Not only, however, did he not establish his title
to the character of an able general, but he was so unfortunate
as to make it doubtful whether he possessed the vulgar courage
of a soldier. The cavalry, which he commanded in person, was
put to flight. Unaccustomed to the tumult and carnage of a
field of battle, he lost his self-possession, and listened too
readily to those who urged him to save himself. His English
gray carried him many miles from the field, while Schwerin,
though wounded in two places, manfully upheld the day. The
skill of the old Field-Marshal and the steadiness of the
Prussian battalions prevailed, and the Austrian army was
driven from the field with the loss of 8,000 men. The news was
carried late at night to a mill in which the king had taken
shelter. It gave him a bitter pang. He was successful; but he
owed his success to dispositions which others had made, and to
the valour of men who had fought while he was flying. So
unpromising was the first appearance of the greatest warrior
of that age."
Lord Macaulay, Frederic the Great (Essays, volume 4).
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1741 (April-May).
The War of the Succession: French responsibility.
The Carlyle verdict.
"The battle of Mollwitz went off like a signal shot among the
Nations; intimating that they were, one and all, to go
battling. Which they did, with a witness; making a terrible
thing of it, over all the world, for above seven years to
come. ... Not that Mollwitz kindled Europe; Europe was already
kindled for some two years past;--especially since the late
Kaiser died, and his Pragmatic Sanction was superadded to the
other troubles afoot. But ever since that image of Jenkins's
Ear had at last blazed up in the slow English brain, like a
fiery constellation or Sign in the Heavens, symbolic of such
injustices and unendurabilities, and had lighted the
Spanish-English War [see ENGLAND: A. D. 1739-1741], Europe was
slowly but pretty surely taking fire. France 'could not see
Spain humbled,' she said: England (in its own dim feeling, and
also in the fact of things), could not do at all without
considerably humbling Spain. France, endlessly interested in
that Spanish-English matter, was already sending out fleets,
firing shots,--almost, or altogether, putting her hand in it.
'In which case, will not, must not, Austria help us?' thought
England,--and was asking, daily, at Vienna ... when the late
Kaiser died. ... But if not as cause, then as signal, or as
signal and cause together (which it properly was), the Battle
of Mollwitz gave the finishing stroke and set all in motion.
... For directly on the back of Mollwitz, there ensued, first,
an explosion of Diplomatic activity, such as was never seen
before; Excellencies from the four winds taking wing towards
Friedrich; and talking and insinuating, and fencing and
fugling, after their sort, in that Silesian camp of his, the
centre being there. A universal rookery of Diplomatists, whose
loud cackle is now as if gone mad to us; their work wholly
fallen putrescent and avoidable, dead to all creatures. And
secondly, in the train of that, there ensued a universal
European War, the French and the English being chief parties
in it; which abounds in battles and feats of arms, spirited
but delirious, and cannot be got stilled for seven or eight
years to come; and in which Friedrich and his War swim only as
an intermittent Episode henceforth. ... The first point to be
noted is, Where did it originate? To which the answer mainly
is ... with Monseigneur, the Maréchal de Belleisle
principally; with the ambitious cupidities and baseless
vanities of the French Court and Nation, as represented by
Belleisle. ... The English-Spanish War had a basis to stand on
in this Universe. The like had the Prussian-Austrian one; so
all men now admit. If Friedrich had not business there, what
man ever had in an enterprise he ventured on? Friedrich, after
such trial and proof as has seldom been, got his claims on
Schlesien allowed by the Destinies. ... Friedrich had business
in this War; and Maria Theresa versus Friedrich had likewise
cause to appear in Court, and do her utmost pleading against
him. But if we ask, What Belleisle or France and Louis XV. had
to do there? the answer is rigorously Nothing. Their own windy
vanities, ambitions, sanctioned not by fact and the Almighty
Powers, but by Phantasm and the babble of Versailles;
transcendent self-conceit, intrinsically insane; pretensions
over their fellow-creatures which were without basis anywhere
in Nature, except in the French brain; it was this that
brought Belleisle and France into a German War. And Belleisle
and France having gone into an Anti-Pragmatic War, the unlucky
George and his England were dragged into a Pragmatic
one,--quitting their own business, on the Spanish Main, and
hurrying to Germany,--in terror as at Doomsday, and zeal to
save the Keystone of Nature there. That is the notable point
in regard to this War: That France is to be called the author
of it, who, alone of all the parties, had no business there
whatever."
T. Carlyle, History of Friedrich II.,
book 12, chapter 11 (volume 4).
See, also, FRANCE: A. D. 1733.
{215}
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1741 (May-June).
Mission of Belleisle.
The thickening of the Plot.
"The defeat of Maria Theresa's only army [at Mollwitz] swept
away all the doubts and scruples of France. The fiery
Belleisle had already set out upon his mission to the various
German courts, armed with powers which were reluctantly
granted by the cardinal [Fleury, the French minister], and
were promptly enlarged by the ambassador to suit his own more
ambitious views of the situation. He travelled in oriental
state. ... The almost royal pomp with which he strode into the
presence of princes of the blood, the copious eloquence with
which he pleaded his cause, ... were only the outward
decorations of one of the most iniquitous schemes ever devised
by an unscrupulous diplomacy. The scheme, when stripped of all
its details, did not indeed at first appear absolutely
revolting. It proposed simply to secure the election of
Charles Albert of Bavaria as emperor, an honor to which he had
a perfect right to aspire. But it was difficult to obtain the
votes of certain electors without offering them the prospect
of territorial gains, and impossible for Charles Albert to
support the imperial dignity without greater revenues than
those of Bavaria. It was proposed, therefore, that provinces
should be taken from Maria Theresa herself, first to purchase
votes against her own husband, and then to swell the income of
the successful rival candidate. The three episcopal electors
were first visited, and subjected to various forms of
persuasion, bribes, flattery, threats,--until the effects of
the treatment began to appear; the count palatine was devoted
to France; and these four with Bavaria made a majority of one.
But that was too small a margin for Belleisle's aspirations,
or even for the safety of his project. The four remaining
votes belonged to the most powerful of the German states,
Prussia, Hanover, Saxony and Bohemia. ... Bohemia, if it voted
at all, would of course vote for the grand-duke Francis
[husband of Maria Theresa]. Saxony and Hanover were already
negotiating with Maria Theresa; and it was well understood
that Austria could have Frederick's support by paying his
price." Austria refused to pay the price, and Frederick signed
a treaty with the king of France at Breslau on the 4th of
June, 1741. "The essence of it was contained in four secret
articles. In these the king of Prussia renounced his claim to
Jülich-Berg in behalf of the house of Sulzbach, and agreed to
give his vote to the elector of Bavaria for emperor. The king
of France engaged to guarantee Prussia in the possession of
Lower Silesia, to send within two months an army to the
support of Bavaria, and to provoke an immediate rupture
between Sweden and Russia."
H. Tuttle, History of Prussia, 1740-1745, chapter 4.
ALSO IN: W. Coxe, History of the House of Austria, chapter 99
(volume 3).
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1741 (June-September).
Maria Theresa and the Hungarians.
"During these anxious summer months Maria Theresa and the
Austrian court had resided mainly at Presburg, in Hungary.
Here she had been occupied in the solution of domestic as well
as international problems. The Magyars, as a manly and
chivalrous race, had been touched by the perilous situation of
the young queen; but, while ardently protesting their loyalty,
insisted not the less on the recognition of their own
inalienable rights. These had been inadequately observed in
recent years, and in consequence no little disaffection
prevailed in Hungary. The magnates resolved, therefore, as
they had resolved at the beginning of previous reigns, to
demand the restoration of all their rights and privileges. But
it does not appear that they wished to take any ungenerous
advantage of the sex or the necessities of Maria Theresa. They
were argumentative and stubborn, yet not in a bargaining,
mercenary spirit. They accepted in June a qualified compliance
with their demands; and when on the 25th of that month the
queen appeared before the diet to receive the crown of St.
Stephen, and, according to custom, waved the great sword of
the kingdom toward the four points of the compass, toward the
north and the south, the east and the west, challenging all
enemies to dispute her right, the assembly was carried away by
enthusiasm, and it seemed as if an end had forever been put to
constitutional technicalities. Such was, however, not the
case. After the excitement caused by the dramatic coronation
had in a measure subsided, the old contentions revived, as
bitter and vexatious as before. These concerned especially the
manner in which the administration of Hungary should be
adjusted to meet the new state of things. Should the chief
political offices be filled by native Hungarians, as the diet
demanded? Could the co-regency of the grand-duke, which was
ardently desired by the queen, be accepted by the Magyars? For
two months the dispute over these problems raged at Presburg,
until finally Maria Theresa herself found a bold, ingenious,
and patriotic solution. The news of the Franco-Bavarian
alliance and the fall of Passau determined her to throw
herself completely upon the gallantry and devotion of the
Magyars. It had long been the policy of the court of Vienna
not to entrust the Hungarians with arms. ... But Maria Theresa
had not been robbed, in spite of her experience with France
and Prussia, of all her faith in human nature. She took the
responsibility of her decision, and the result proved that her
insight was correct. On the 11th of September she summoned the
members of the diet before her, and, seated on the throne,
explained to them the perilous situation of her dominions. The
danger, she said, threatened herself, and all that was dear to
her. Abandoned by all her allies, she took refuge in the
fidelity and the ancient valor of the Hungarians, to whom she
entrusted herself, her children, and her empire. Here she
broke into tears, and covered, her face with her handkerchief.
The diet responded to this appeal by proclaiming the
'insurrection' or the equipment of a large popular force for
the defence of the queen. So great was the enthusiasm that it
nearly swept away even the original aversion of the Hungarians
to the grand-duke Francis, who, to the queen's delight, was
finally, though not without some murmurs, accepted as
co-regent. ... This uprising was organized not an hour too
early, for dangers were pressing upon the queen from every
side."
H. Tuttle, History of Prussia, 1740-1745, chapter 4.
ALSO IN: Duc de Broglie, Frederick the Great and Maria
Theresa, chapter 4 (volume 2).
{216}
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1741 (August-November).
The French-Bavarian onset.
"France now began to act with energy. In the month of August
[1741] two French armies crossed the Rhine, each about 40, 000
strong. The first marched into Westphalia, and frightened
George II. into concluding a treaty of neutrality for Hanover,
and promising his vote to the Elector of Bavaria. The second
advanced through South Germany on Passau, the frontier city of
Bavaria and Austria. As soon as it arrived on German soil, the
French officers assumed the blue and white cockade of
Bavaria, for it was the cue of France to appear only as an
auxiliary, and the nominal command of her army was vested in
the Elector. From Passau the French and Bavarians passed into
Upper Austria, and on Sept. 11 entered its capital, Linz,
where the Elector assumed the title of Archduke. Five days
later Saxony joined the allies. Sweden had already declared
war on Russia. Spain trumped up an old claim and attacked the
Austrian dominions in Italy. It seemed as if Belleisle's
schemes were about to be crowned with complete success. Had
the allies pushed forward, Vienna must have fallen into their
hands. But the French did not wish to be too victorious, lest
they should make the Elector too powerful, and so independent
of them. Therefore, after six weeks' delay, they turned aside
to the conquest of Bohemia."
F. W. Longman, Frederick the Great and the Seven Years
War, chapter 4, section 4.
"While . . . a portion of the French troops, under the command
of the Count de Segur, was left in Upper Austria, the
remainder of the allied army turned towards Bohemia; where
they were joined by a body of Saxons, under the command of
Count Rutowsky. They took Prague by assault, on the night of
the 25th of November, while the Grand Duke of Tuscany, the
husband of Maria Theresa, was marching to his relief. In
Prague, 3,000 prisoners were taken. The elector of Bavaria
hastened there, upon hearing of the success of his arms, was
crowned King of Bohemia, during the month of December, and
received the oath of fidelity from the constituted
authorities. But while he was thus employed, the Austrian
general, Khevenhuller, had driven the Count de Segur out of
Austria, and had himself entered Bavaria; which obliged the
Bavarian army to abandon Bohemia and hasten to the defence of
their own country."
Lord Dover, Life of Frederick II.,
book 2, chapter 2 (volume 1).
ALSO IN: Frederick II., History of My Own Times
(Posthumous Works, volume 1, chapter 5).
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1741 (October).
Secret Treaty with Frederick.
Lower Silesia conceded to him.
Austrian success.
"By October, 1741, the fortunes of Maria Theresa had sunk to
the lowest ebb, but a great revulsion speedily set in. The
martial enthusiasm of the Hungarians, the subsidy from
England, and the brilliant military talents of General
Khevenhuller, restored her armies. Vienna was put in a state
of defence, and at the same time jealousies and suspicion made
their way among the confederates. The Electors of Bavaria and
Saxony were already in some degree divided; and the Germans,
and especially Frederick, were alarmed by the growing
ascendency, and irritated by the haughty demeanour of the
French. In the moment of her extreme depression, the Queen
consented to a concession which England had vainly urged upon
her before, and which laid the foundation of her future
success. In October 1741 she entered into a secret convention
with Frederick [called the convention of Ober-Schnellendorf],
by which that astute sovereign agreed to desert his allies,
and desist from hostilities, on condition of ultimately
obtaining Lower Silesia, with Breslau and Neisse. Every
precaution was taken to ensure secrecy. It was arranged that
Frederick should continue to besiege Neisse, that the town
should ultimately be surrendered to him, and that his troops
should then retire into winter quarters, and take no further
part in the war. As the sacrifice of a few more lives was
perfectly indifferent to the contracting parties, and in order
that no one should suspect the treachery that was
contemplated, Neisse, after the arrangement had been made for
its surrender, was subjected for four days and four nights to
the horrors of bombardment. Frederick, at the same time
talked, with his usual cynical frankness, to the English
ambassador about the best way of attacking his allies the
French; and observed, that if the Queen of Hungary prospered,
he would perhaps support her, if not--everyone must look for
himself. He only assented verbally to this convention, and, no
doubt, resolved to await the course of events, in order to
decide which Power it was his interest finally to betray; but
in the meantime the Austrians obtained a respite, which
enabled them to throw their whole forces upon their other
enemies. Two brilliant campaigns followed. The greater part of
Bohemia was recovered by an army under the Duke of Lorraine,
and the French were hemmed in at Prague; while another army,
under General Khevenhuller, invaded Upper Austria, drove
10,000 French soldiers within the walls of Linz, blockaded
them, defeated a body of Bohemians who were sent to the
rescue, compelled the whole French army to surrender, and
then, crossing the frontier, poured in a resistless torrent
over Bavaria. The fairest plains of that beautiful land were
desolated by hosts of irregular troops from Hungary, Croatia,
and the Tyrol; and on the 12th of February the Austrians
marched in triumph into Munich. On that very day the Elector
of Bavaria was crowned Emperor of Germany, at Frankfort, under
the title of Charles VII., and the imperial crown was thus, for
the first time, for many generations, separated from the House
of Austria."
W. E. H. Lecky, History of England, 18th Century,
chapter 3 (volume 1).
ALSO IN:
F. Von Raumer, Contributions to Modern History:
Frederick II. and his Times, chapter 13-14.
AUSTRIA: A. D. 1741-1743.
Successes in Italy.