4
THE TURKISH MENACE
Rudolf confidently took up a challenge to his lands from the Ottomans in 1593, embarking on what became the Long Turkish War that proved a fiasco for both sides. The thirteen-year struggle contributed to a chain of problems that kept the Ottoman empire out of the Thirty Years War and ensured a period of relative tranquillity for Hungary. With hindsight, this was of undoubted benefit for the Habsburgs, since it enabled them to concentrate on the problems of the Empire and their western and northern European enemies. However, this was not clear at the time and the Turkish menace remained a constant source of anxiety. Worse, the Turkish War left the Habsburgs financially and politically bankrupt, in turn contributing to the outbreak of renewed conflict in 1618.
The Scourge of God
These events and their consequences have not received the attention they deserve, leaving the Ottomans as a shadowy presence in most accounts of the Thirty Years War. Their empire was the superpower of the early modern world, stretching for 2.3 million square kilometres across three continents with at least 22 million inhabitants, well over three times the number in the Habsburg monarchy.1 Much of the original dynamism was lost after the death of Süleyman the Magnificent in 1566, but it would be wrong to categorize the Ottomans as in decline. They remained the terror of Europe, associated by Protestants and Catholics alike with the scourge of God sent to punish a sinful mankind and viewed with a mixture of awe and revulsion.2 Their empire continued to expand, particularly in the east where they seized Georgia and Azerbaijan from the Shiite Persian empire between 1576 and 1590. The Habsburgs were sufficiently alarmed by this that they accepted humiliating terms in November 1590 to obtain an eight-year extension to the truce agreed at the end of the previous Turkish war in 1568. Despite the expense, the emperor maintained a permanent embassy in Constantinople, whereas the sultan disdained to deal with the infidel and rarely sent ambassadors to Christian courts. The Austrian diplomats struggled to secure accurate intelligence at a court that was truly the successor to medieval Byzantium. They were kept waiting for weeks before being received by officials who gave evasive or contradictory answers. The presence of Dutch, English, French, Venetian and other Christian embassies was a further source of concern as these were all powers considered hostile to the emperor.
The difficulty in obtaining a clear picture prevented outsiders from perceiving the Ottomans’ mounting internal difficulties. The absence of accepted rules of succession bred bitter family feuds and forced each new sultan to command his deaf mutes to strangle his immediate brothers and sisters. The internal intrigues weakened the sultanate that lost direction at a time when their most dangerous foes to the east were entering a period of renewed vigour under the Safavid dynasty in Persia. The new conquests failed to bring sufficient rewards to satisfy the groups essential to the running of the Ottoman empire – notably the army, which had once been a pillar of strength and which now entered politics with disastrous results. Accustomed to rich bonuses from new sultans, the regular Janissary infantry began extorting rewards in return for continued loyalty, leading to the assassination of Osman II in 1622, setting a precedent that was repeated in 1648 and again later in the seventeenth century.3
The internal problems of their empire made the Ottomans more unpredictable in their actions, adding to an already unstable situation in south-east Europe at the point where their empire met that of the Habsburgs to the west and the lands of the Poles to the north. The war that broke out in 1593 was essentially a struggle between two of these powers to extend influence over the intervening region while denying access to their rivals. Hungary to the west was already split into Habsburg and Ottoman spheres, with the emperor controlling the north and south-west, along with Croatia, while the sultan commanded the central area and south-east. Neither side had a clear position in the region further east that was split into four principalities, all nominally under Turkish suzerainty, but pursuing varying degrees of autonomy. The area along the northern shores of the Black Sea belonged to the Crimean Tartars, the descendants of Ghengis Khan who had paid tribute to the sultan since the later fifteenth century. They provided useful auxiliaries for his armies, but were largely left alone since they served as a buffer between Ottoman territory and that of the Russian tsar further to the north-east. The three Christian principalities of Moldavia, Wallachia and Transylvania lay to the north and west of the Tartars. They likewise paid tribute, but were more open to influence from Poland and Austria. The Poles sought access to the Black Sea by pushing into Podolia, between Moldavia and the Crimea. Polish influence grew pronounced in Moldavia during the 1590s and they also intrigued in Transylvanian and Wallachian politics.
Translyvania
Of the three, Transylvania is the most significant to our story, and an examination of its internal politics reveals much that was typical for Moldavia and Wallachia as well. Formed from the wreckage of old Hungary in the 1540s, Transylvania was a patchwork of four major and several minor communities. In addition to pockets of Turkish peasants and Eastern Slavs, there were Orthodox Romanians, Calvinist Magyars, Lutheran German immigrants, called Saxons, and finally the self-governing Szekler people, living in the forested east, who remained Catholic.4 The prince maintained power by brokering agreements between these groups, particularly the three ‘nations’ of Magyar nobles, Saxon towns and Szekler villages entitled to sit in the diet. The balance was enshrined in the Torda agreement from 1568 that extended equal rights to Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists and the radical Unitarians (who rejected the doctrine of the Holy Trinity and refused to believe that Christ had been human in any way). Separate princely decrees extended toleration to Jews and the substantial Romanian population.
It was an arrangement that worked surprisingly well at a time when people elsewhere in Europe were murdering each other in God’s name. All parties recognized Transylvania’s vulnerability and wanted to deny predatory outsiders a chance to intervene. Over time, toleration became embedded in society and political culture, enhancing princely power since he could pose as the defender of all faiths and their liberties against Habsburg confessionalization and absolutism. However, it created confusion for external relations, particularly once the prince converted to Calvinism in 1604. While nine-tenths of his nobles now shared his faith, the peasantry were mainly Catholic or Orthodox, while the burghers were Lutheran. Christian powers looking to Transylvania only saw its leadership and mistook the principality as a Protestant champion ready to save them in their hour of need. While it might serve his purpose to present himself as such to outsiders, the prince remained conscious that his rule depended on preserving the balance between the ethnic and confessional groups.
There were also significant material obstacles that inhibited Transylvania from playing a major role in European affairs. Over half its territory was covered by forest and barely a fifth lay under cultivation. The population was concentrated in isolated pockets largely cut off from each other by trees and mountains. It was impossible to maintain a western-style regular army, and in any case, such an army would be ill-suited to operating in such conditions. Like its immediate neighbours, Transylvania relied on lightly armed cavalry able to cover 35km a day, supported by smaller numbers of irregular musketeers to hold outposts on the border. Such forces lacked staying power in a formal battle, which they generally avoided, preferring to break their opponent’s will to resist by rounding up livestock and civilians. These tactics were thwarted if the enemy took refuge in walled towns or fortresses, since the Transylvanians lacked artillery and the disciplined infantry needed for a siege. They were also unable to sustain operations for more than a few months, waiting until the grass grew in the spring for their horses before setting out, and returning home with their booty before the high summer scorched the ground.
Strategy and Logistics
These logistical problems were found elsewhere in the Danube valley and across the Hungarian plains (puszta) where temperatures soared in the summer and plummeted below freezing in winter, and hampered all combatants. The surrounding mountains were blocked by snow from the autumn until the spring thaws that swelled the rivers and flooded a third of the plains for much of the year, providing a rich breeding ground for malarial mosquitoes. Hungary lay at the north-west periphery of the Ottomans’ world empire, 1,100km from their European base at Adrianople (Edirne). A field army of 40,000 infantry and 20,000 cavalry required 300 tonnes of bread and fodder a day.5 Crop yields in eastern Europe were half those of Flanders and other western agricultural regions that could support ten times more non-producers. Even Poland, rapidly becoming the bread basket of western European cities, exported only about 10 per cent of its net crop in the later sixteenth century. It was often impossible to requisition supplies locally in the Danube area, especially as the population tended to be concentrated in isolated pockets, as in Transylvania. The Turks were forced to follow the line of the river during hostilities, reducing their advance to 15km a day. If they set out in April, they could not reach Vienna before July. Not surprisingly, Ottoman armies relied on Belgrade once war broke out, since this was already two-thirds of the way to the front and was the first major city on the Danube west of the Iron Gates (Orsova) pass between the Transylvanian Alps and the northern reaches of the Balkan mountains of modern Bulgaria. These strategic and logistical factors imposed a certain routine on the Turks’ campaigns. Operations began slowly with the collection of troops from across the empire at Adrianople or Belgrade. The main army reached the front in July, leaving only a few months to achieve success before the autumn rains set in during September, while the sultan traditionally suspended campaigns on 30 November with the onset of winter.
Major operations were the exception and most fighting involved cross-border raiding that remained endemic due to political, ideological and social factors. The region lay at the extremity of both the Ottoman empire and the kingdom of Poland, and while physically closer to the heart of Habsburg power, it was still politically distant. All the major powers were forced to rely on local landowners and their private armies who commanded the resources, loyalty and respect of the scattered population. Though wealthy, the magnates in Hungary and Transylvania were adopting expensive new lifestyles, with decorated country houses, foreign university education and grand European tours for sons and heirs. They could not afford large permanent forces to defend the frontier and also needed to satisfy poorer clients who relied on banditry to supplement their incomes from livestock, horse breeding or farming. Those at the centre tolerated the situation as the only way to retain the loyalty of the unruly border lords, and as a convenient means to put pressure on their international opponents. As the secular representatives of opposing world religions, neither the emperor nor the sultan could accept permanent peace without implying recognition of an alternative civilization. The lack of clear frontiers allowed a policy of gradual expansion by encroachment, whereby whichever side was currently stronger exploited weakness in the other to assert the right to collect tribute from border villages. Frontiers shifted back and forth like sand with the tide, while major fortified towns remained immovable rocks that required open war to crack.
Such fortresses began to be built during the 1530s as both the Ottomans and Habsburgs entrenched their hold over Hungary. The Turks had the advantage of shorter interior lines of defence, with a compact position along the middle Danube and in Bosnia to the south-west. They relied on around 65 relatively large castles held by 18,000 regular soldiers, with 22,000 militia recruited from their predominantly Christian subjects to patrol the gaps. The Habsburgs were forced to defend an 850km-long arc to the west and north, partly detached from Austria and Bohemia by chains of mountains. Lateral movement was restricted, since all the rivers drained eastwards into the Ottoman-held Hungarian plain. Each Austrian and Bohemian province had its own militia, but mobilization depended on the Estates who wanted them mainly for local defence. The Ottoman siege of Vienna in 1529 proved a shock and prompted the construction there of new bastioned fortifications in the Italian manner between 1531 and 1567. Plans to modernize these had to be shelved in 1596 due to the peasant unrest and a lack of funds, leaving the capital weakly defended when the Bohemians and Transylvanians attacked in 1619. The civic militia was converted into a regular garrison in 1582, but they numbered only five hundred men.6
The Military Frontier
To keep the Turks at bay, the Habsburgs revived and expanded existing Hungarian defence measures to create what became known as the ‘military frontier’.7 This militarized zone around 50km deep ran the entire length of the frontier and rested on 12 major and around 130 minor fortified posts held by over 22,000 men by the 1570s. Its development and upkeep was heavily subsidized by the Reichstag, which voted eight grants with a nominal value of around 12 million fl. between 1530 and 1582, plus well over another million towards fortress construction. At least four-fifths of this amount was actually paid, despite the confessional tension in the Empire, since the Ottomans were considered a common menace to all Christians.8 Indeed, the largest two grants had been made in 1576 and 1582 at a time when many historians think confessional tension was growing worse. However, disagreements did ensure there was no immediate renewal when the last grant expired in 1587, increasing the dynasty’s dependency on taxes voted by its Estates to maintain particular sectors. Only about half the border troops could be spared from their garrisons, limiting the scope for offensive operations. A major army of 55,000 men was reckoned to cost at least 7.4 million fl. for a single campaign, a figure way in excess of the monarchy’s entire revenue.
Financial considerations forced the Habsburgs to place large sections of the frontier in local hands. The southern or maritime border, based around Senj on the Adriatic, was held by a people known as the Uskoks, after the Serbian for ‘refugee’. This mountainous region could not support the growing number of refugees who were supposed to be paid by the government to defend the frontier with Ottoman Bosnia. Chronic indebtedness forced the Habsburgs to tolerate Uskok raiding and piracy instead. The next sector to the north was the Croatian border around the castle of Karlstadt that had been built in 1579 with funds granted by the Inner Austrian Estates in return for the Pacification of Bruck, and which protected the upper reaches of the Save river, blocking an invasion of Carniola. The Slovenian border around Warasdin on the upper Drava was also subsidized by Inner Austria since it protected Styria. Around half of all the minor posts were concentrated in these two sectors and were manned by colonists settled on crown land in return for militia duty. They received little help from central coffers and were expected to supplement their meagre existence from farming by raiding villages across the frontier.
The Hungarian border was split into three sections, with that in the south stretching from the Drava to the southern end of Lake Balaton and containing the important fortress of Kanizsa. The middle section ran north from Lake Balaton to the Danube, before curving east around the Ottoman salient at Gran where the river makes a right-angled turn from due east to flow south past Buda and Pest. This was the most heavily contested sector, because the Danube valley gave the best access for both sides. The Ottomans were concerned to protect Buda as the seat of their Hungarian government and as a forward base for an attack against Vienna. To forestall this, the Habsburgs built Komorn at the east end of Schütt Island, a large area that stretched west to Pressburg which was formed by two branches of the river and often flooded. Another fortress was constructed at Raab, approximately 40km south west of Komorn, to guard the only practicable route south of Schütt Island into Lower Austria. The lesser fortress of Neuhäusel covered Komorn’s northern flank by blocking the Neutra river. The final Hungarian section stretched eastwards from there to the Tisza river and Transylvania. Its main fortress was Erlau, which blocked the road north over the Matra mountains into Upper Hungary and so safeguarded communications between Austria and Transylvania. Central funds covered only the principal garrisons, leaving the intervening sections in the hands of Hungarian magnates who maintained private armies of haiduk infantry. The haiduks were originally nomadic oxen drovers who had been forced by the partition of Hungary to accept a semi-settled existence as border guards, living in their own villages under elected headmen and relying on banditry between wars to supplement their irregular pay.
THE WAYS OF WAR
The Military Significance of the Turkish War
The Long Turkish War saw the largest mobilization of troops in the Empire and Habsburg lands since 1568 and was the opportunity for many soldiers to gain experience of major operations prior to 1618. The list of Rudolf’s officers reads like a roll-call of the senior generals of the first half of the Thirty Years War. Wallenstein began his career as an ensign in the imperial infantry in 1604 and was wounded in the left hand during the final stages of the conflict. Both Schlick and Rudolf von Tieffenbach made early reputations against the Turks, while Trauttmannsdorff, the monarchy’s greatest diplomat, performed his only military service in this war. Charles de Nevers, the man at the centre of the Mantuan War of 1628–31, reputedly saved Wallenstein’s life at the siege of Kassa where he was himself serving as one of the many French Catholic volunteers. A significant number of the Italians who later rose to prominence also participated, including Count Collalto who became president of the Imperial War Council, Rodolfo de Colloredo who became a field marshal, and Ernesto Montecuccoli who subsequently commanded in Alsace. Some Italians were drawn to the Austrian forces by established patterns of serving the emperor; others arrived with the men sent to reinforce the Imperialists by Spain and the papacy, including Marradas and Dampierre, as well as Tilly from the Netherlands. Franz von Mercy, the Bavarian commander in the later stages of the Thirty Years War, also began his career against the Turks. The same was true for many of those who were later to oppose the emperor, including all three principal commanders of the Bohemian rebels: counts Thurn, Hohenlohe and Mansfeld.9
The presence of these figures has largely been overlooked by military historians who concentrate on warfare in western Europe and underestimate the impact of the Turkish campaigns on subsequent developments. The western focus is embedded in the concept of a ‘military revolution’ that has become the accepted way of viewing early modern warfare.10 The proponents of this approach variously stress Spain, the Dutch and Sweden as the progenitors of new ways of fighting during the sixteenth century that relied on gunpowder weaponry wielded by large, disciplined units. Innovations in tactics and strategy allegedly made warfare more decisive, as well as increasing its scale and impact on state and society. Developments are fitted into a sequence with one power replacing another as the most efficient war-maker. Initial Spanish predominance is shaken first by the Dutch who are regarded as developing a more flexible military system that Sweden later improved upon and finally France perfected during the later seventeenth century. Scant attention has been paid to the imperial forces during the Thirty Years War, because they are perceived to have clung to an increasingly obsolete Spanish system that is associated with the pedantic positional warfare of the Dutch Revolt. In fact, Spanish ways of fighting often proved successful and were in constant evolution. Methods that were developed from the 1570s to deal with the Dutch were also effective against the Turks who likewise frequently evaded battle and sheltered behind fortifications. However, the Hungarian theatre encouraged its own practices that influenced how armies fought later in Germany, so it is more appropriate to see imperial ways of war as an amalgam of different experiences and ideas.
Military Technology
The Spanish system developed following the ‘real’ military revolution, in the sense of the largely technologically driven changes in warfare between 1470 and 1520 that saw the widespread adoption of hand-held firearms by both horse and foot, and their combination with new shock tactics by large, disciplined bodies of troops.11 These developments in turn sprang from changes in metallurgy and gunpowder milling that made firearms truly effective for the first time in Europe. Relatively rapid improvements followed in both handguns and cannon that forced commanders to rethink their use of these weapons. Guns and artillery were deployed on a larger scale in battle and were combined with existing weapons in new offensive and defensive tactics. The pace of technological change slowed from the mid-sixteenth century, by which time all the basic weapons had appeared while further developments were restricted by manufacturing problems. For example, cannon production lagged considerably behind ballistic theory because gun founders were unable to deliver pieces that matched the potential that mathematicians had calculated. It proved difficult boring straight tubes in solid barrels before the mid-seventeenth century. Instead, cannon were cast using an iron rod coated with clay, horse hair and manure as the bore that was covered with a mixture of molten copper, tin, lead and brass in a mould to form the bronze barrel. The core was then removed and a drill used to finish the bore to the required calibre in a method that was both time-consuming and not entirely reliable.
The bewildering variety of heavy guns essentially fell into two types. Cannon proper (Kartaunen) were short-barrelled, thin-walled pieces firing solid round shot of between 24 and 75 pounds each and were used primarily to batter fortifications. Such guns were very heavy and required ten or more horses to shift them. Culverins (Schlangen) were longer-barrelled, thicker tubes that were safer to use, and had greater range and accuracy. Their stronger barrels required more metal, making them generally twice as heavy as cannons firing shots of equivalent weight. They tended to be used for six- or twelve-pound shot, and were often produced in smaller, two to four pounder versions called falconets (Falkone) that could be pulled in battle by two to eight horses. These guns were supplemented for siege work by mortars, short stubby guns that lobbed round shot or primitive shells over walls and obstacles.
The full range of equipment and projectiles already existed by the 1590s, including poison gas shells (used in the Netherlands and which contained various noxious substances intended to asphyxiate or blind their targets). Firebombs, or heated round shot, could be used to create firestorms in towns by igniting the tightly packed flammable buildings. There were also shells with flint and steel detonators, and those that exploded using a fuse ignited by the propellant charge in the barrel. Attacking troops could be mowed down with canister and other antipersonnel rounds that burst on exiting the barrel, turning it into a large shotgun. In short, there was little left to invent by the later sixteenth century, and future developments were largely refinements of what already existed by improving manufacture to make weapons more reliable and less hazardous to use.
The same applied to handguns that also existed in great variety but were increasingly called muskets for foot soldiers and pistols for horsemen. The former were between 125 and 144cm long, weighing 4–10kg and firing a lead ball of 40g around 300 metres, with an effective range of less than half that. The heavier versions required a rest to steady the barrel as the musketeer fired. The lighter version was still called an arquebus and was largely restricted to infantry trained to fight in looser formations, and by cavalry relying on firepower rather than cold steel. Improved manufacture enabled the lighter muskets to withstand a larger charge, and led to the disappearance of both the arquebus and the musket rest from around 1630. Most cavalry, including those trained to attack with lances and swords, carried long-barrelled pistols in holsters either side of their saddles. Pistols were rarely effective beyond 25 metres, but their metal-weighted handles could be used as a club in close combat. The technological advances associated with later centuries were already in existence, including rifled barrels, breach loading and a wide variety of mechanisms to ignite the propellant charge. There were mechanical wheel locks for pistols and the snaphance, or flintlock, for muskets, that used a flint to spark the powder. The flintlock became the principal infantry weapon between 1680 and 1840, because it was more reliable in wet weather and less susceptible to accidental discharge than the matchlock. This relied on pulling a lever to depress a metal claw holding a slow-burning match onto loose powder in a pan that sent flame through the vent to ignite the main charge in the barrel. There was a one in five chance that the flame failed to pass through the vent, providing the origins of the expression ‘flash in the pan’. This was double the chance of a misfire with a flintlock, but both these and wheel locks were still expensive, delicate weapons that often broke. Manufacturing problems restricted flintlocks’ use to hunting, while matchlocks remained cheap, sturdy and easy to use.
Infantry
Contemporary drill books convey a false impression that an elaborate sequence of hand, arm and body movements was necessary to load and fire. In fact, the carefully itemized movements reflected the prevailing scientific concern to fix and understand human movement, rather than actual practice. The most complicated manoeuvre was the counter-march, intended to provide continuous fire during an advance or retreat. Each rank fired in turn; those who had just discharged their weapons remained stationary to reload while the next line stepped through the gaps between each man to take its turn. By the time the last line had fired, those who had shot first would have reloaded and could move forward. This was modified around 1595 so that men stood in blocks of five, peeling off as a group right or left once they had fired so as to reduce the number of gaps required in the line. Arquebuses and lighter muskets took around a minute to load, requiring fewer ranks to maintain continuous fire than heavier muskets that needed up to three minutes to reload. The Dutch practised the retiring counter-march, enabling them to fire while avoiding contact with an approaching foe. Well-trained, motivated troops could cover up to forty metres a minute with an advancing counter-march and about half that if retiring. The system could also be used while stationary, with each man peeling off to the rear once he had fired and the soldier behind stepping into his place to fire. The Dutch deployed in only ten ranks, accepting lighter firearms as a consequence, and so kept their evolutions relatively simple. The Spanish preferred deeper formations of 15 to 25 ranks, and appear to have let their men fire in their own time, simply grouping those with lighter, quicker-firing weapons nearer the front.
Musketeers carried short swords for personal protection, either a ‘tuck’ for stabbing, or a heavier ‘hanger’ for cutting. Most were of poor quality that bent or blunted, so mêlées were fought largely by inverting the muskets and using the heavy, angled stock as a club. Such weapons were of limited use against opposing cavalry who could close rapidly before musketeers could reload. Already in the late fifteenth century it had become customary to combine ‘shot’, or firearm troops, with pikemen, each armed with a long pole of around five metres tipped with a steel spike. Pikes could be used offensively by soldiers in a compact block advancing with levelled weapons towards the enemy in the manner of an ancient Greek phalanx. When acting defensively, each man in the front rank would stretch back his right leg, plant the pike butt against his foot and bend his left leg forward to hold his weapon at a low angle. The next few ranks held their pikes level at shoulder height so the formation presented a forest of points in the enemy’s face.
Given their defensive role, pikemen initially wore at least a steel helmet, vaguely resembling that of modern American firefighters, and a breastplate. Some wore a full corselet that also included a backplate and additional sheets protecting the thighs. Armour continued in use because the trend towards lighter-calibre muskets reduced their penetrative power and meant that the steel sheets retained their protective value. It was impossible to thicken them, since a man could not be expected to carry more than around eighteen kilos of equipment in battle without becoming prematurely exhausted. For this reason, as well as expense, no more than half of pikemen wore a full corselet around 1600, relying instead on a leather ‘buff’ coat, and increasingly many lacked even a helmet. Musketeers had a helmet at the most, because they needed greater freedom of movement, both to operate their weapons and to act in looser formations. They frequently wore a cloak to protect their powder horns from getting wet. They needed two horns, one for coarse-grain barrel powder for the main charge, the other for finer, priming powder. Both hung on cords over the right shoulder to be carried on the left hip where they were fastened with iron hooks to a waist belt to stop them swinging. Musketeers also carried single round charges in wooden containers hung on cords from a bandolier over their left shoulder, resting on their right hip where a leather bag for the shot was also attached, along with other items needed to clean and repair their matchlock. The bandolier arrangement was known as the ‘twelve apostles’ after the number of charges. It was gradually replaced around 1630 by prepared paper cartridges, each with a ball and powder that were carried in a hip satchel, or ‘cartouche’. Finally, a musketeer had to carry four to six metres of coiled match around his neck and shoulder, or attached to his bandolier while on the march. Since it burned relatively quickly at the rate of ten to fifteen centimetres an hour, only one in ten men would keep it lit on the march to light those of his comrades if the unit came into action. Musketry was a dangerous business, since the burning match could easily ignite the apostles or loose powder that spilled onto the men’s clothes. For this reason soldiers deployed two to four paces apart, only closing files when attacking.
The question of uniforms has attracted considerable attention from military historians, with many crediting the Swedes as being the first to introduce them. However, it is clear that many German units already wore uniform coloured coats prior to 1618, because they were territorial levies issued with clothing in bulk by their prince. Red and blue appear the preferred colours but needed expensive dyes, and white, or rather undyed cloth, was more common. Bodyguards frequently had more lavish costumes, sometimes with decorated armour. The widespread use of short, leather trousers fastened at the knee, as worn by peasants and artisans, would have also contributed to uniformity. The scale and duration of the conflict after 1618 and its associated cost interrupted this earlier trend towards purpose-made uniforms, and led to a more ragged, dull appearance with a mix of greys, browns, greens and other dark colours. However, the practice of paying troops partly in cloth ensured some continued uniformity, at least in the imperial army where most of the infantry wore light ‘pearl’ grey coats by the 1640s.
The optimum combination of pike and shot, both as a numerical ratio and as a form of deployment, remained hotly debated in military treatises. Setting aside the numerous theoretical models, essentially only two formations were used in the field. Those adopting the Dutch-style counter-march needed thinner lines and more shot than pike, deploying a ratio of two to one in a ten-rank line by the 1590s, with the pikemen in the centre, flanked by equal numbers of musketeers. The Spanish and imperial infantry favoured the larger, deeper formations that had been the norm earlier in the sixteenth century. Their pike were grouped as a central block with always twice the number of men in each line as there were ranks deep, because each man needed twice the amount of space in depth as in width to wield his weapon. The effect was to produce a square block that would be flanked by ‘sleeves’ of musketeers. An additional three to five ranks of light arquebusiers generally lined the entire front to maximize firepower. If caught by a cavalry attack, the musketeers could shelter under the pikes that would stretch over their heads. When attacking enemy foot, the arquebusiers would retire round the flanks once they had fired, leaving the pike free to charge. Spanish and imperial commanders sometimes grouped additional blocks of musketeers on the four corners, which can be seen in many battle engravings from the early seventeenth century. This was simply a formation for deploying and advancing, and the additional shot would fan out towards the enemy to fire, falling back to a less exposed side of the square if the formation came under attack.
The large square formation has become known as the tercio after the term used by the Spanish for their infantry regiments, while the thinner, longer Dutch formation is called a battalion. It has become a historical convention to see the latter as inherently superior to the former, not least because of its association with firearms that have appeared to later generations as obviously more advanced than pikes, weapons first used by the ancient Greeks. This distinction is not accurate, nor does it correspond to sixteenth-century military thinking that drew directly on the ancient world for its inspiration. The deeper block formations offered better all-round fighting ability than the thinner Dutch lines, where each unit relied on its neighbours standing firm or its vulnerable flanks would be exposed if the enemy broke through. Though only the first five ranks of the tercio could fire at any one time, the presence of another ten or more behind stiffened the resolve of those in front, or at least made it harder for them to run away. The unit assumed a more imposing presence on the battlefield; something that was a considerable advantage as it bore down on a wavering foe. In an age of black powder, the battlefield soon filled with smoke, making it extremely difficult for commanders to see what was happening. It was easier to lose control of long thin lines, composed of smaller, but more numerous battalions, than a deployment of fewer, larger tercios. These could be positioned en échelon, or diagonally staggered in chequerboard fashion about 200 metres apart. If one became detached or separated, it was generally large enough to fight on alone until rescued.
There was a trend towards increasing the ratio of shot to pike and to stretch formations into thinner lines that became pronounced in the 1630s, as we shall see later. It was partly related to minor technological advances producing the lighter muskets, and possibly also to pressure from soldiers themselves. Recruits generally preferred becoming musketeers rather than pikemen, who often had to stand under fire without personally being able to retaliate. Pikemen had originally received higher pay and were still seen by officers as more honourable than musketeers. Men who rose from the ranks did so ‘from the pike up’ (von der Pike auf), and not from the musket. Pikemen killed using cold steel, like the traditional knight’s lance, whereas musketeers relied on the devilish invention of gunpowder producing thick clouds of acrid smoke, striking their foes from a distance, rather than looking them in the eye. Pikemen also accused their more lightly equipped colleagues of being more prone to plunder, whereas they could not enter houses with their long weapons – something that clearly had a ring of jealousy to it. Certainly, pikemen were more likely to throw away their weapons if their formation broke, thus becoming defenceless, whereas musketeers could flee still fully armed.
The trend towards more shot around 1590 was also due to the deployment of musketeers in smaller, looser formations to open a battle or to delay an enemy while the rest of the army assembled. Parties of 50 or more musketeers would be pushed out in front of the main line, covered by groups of 250 pikemen as a reserve and rallying point. Such methods anticipated those of 200 years later, but generally disappeared around 1630 with the growing emphasis on massed, disciplined firing by ranks developed by the Dutch and copied by the Swedes. Given the inaccuracy of individual shots, commanders emphasized the volume of fire, and later also its rapidity, culminating in the disciplined firing by platoons adopted around 1700.
Cavalry
Cavalry had evolved into five distinct types by 1590 in an attempt to address the different tactical roles of shock, firepower and reconnaissance. Shock tactics exploited the physical and psychological impact of a charge by heavily armed and armoured horsemen riding large horses. Cavalry mounts were around 16 hands high, weighing 500kg and could gallop at over 40kmh, though the weight of the rider meant that most attacks were delivered at considerably less than this. Horses were conditioned by being exercised in fields full of blazing straw and heaps of carrion to get them used to the sights and smells of the battlefield. They were also trained to kick and to manoeuvre in formation at various gaits.
Two types of ‘heavy’ cavalry evolved to use these tactics. Lancers were favoured by the Spanish and French as ‘gensdarmes’ and wore a full helmet that closed with a visor, as well as armour covering the entire torso, upper arms and upper legs. High leather boots protected the lower legs and feet, while leather or steel gauntlets covered the hands and forearms. They carried steel-tipped wooden lances around three metres long, enabling them to strike crouching foot soldiers as well as unseat opposing horsemen. The spread of firearms reduced the number of lancers in western and Central European armies to a small proportion by 1610, but Hungarian and Polish nobles still fought in this manner as ‘hussars’, wearing mail coats or armour made from layered metal sheets. These eastern lancers fastened pennons to their weapons and often wore ‘wings’ of bird feathers fixed to a wooden frame on their backs that created a rushing sound as they charged, adding to their fearsome appearance.12 Elsewhere, lancers joined the second group of heavy cavalry called cuirassiers, who wore the same armour but relied on long, straight swords for thrusting. These were easier to use in close combat than lances that were largely useless if the initial shock failed to break the opponent.
Both types of cavalrymen also carried a brace of pistols that were used both to shoot at stationary targets and in close combat. Pistols were carried in the saddle holsters with the triggers facing outwards, because their long barrels meant they had to be drawn with the hand turned towards the back. They could be fired only one at a time, as the rider needed a hand free to hold the reins. Ideally, each rider turned his horse to the left and fired with his right arm outstretched at right angles to avoid startling his horse or burning its ears if he fired directly over its head. As most men were right-handed, they had to hold the reins in their left hand and reach over to draw their left-hand side pistol or their sword. The latter was also difficult to extract while mounted, since there was no hand free to hold the scabbard. Firing a carbine was harder still, because this required both hands. Such difficulties persisted till the end of cavalry in the early twentieth century. While later technological developments made firearms easier to use on horseback they did little to resolve the basic problems of fighting while mounted.
Shock tactics were of limited use against disciplined infantry. Experienced commanders became skilled in judging whether opposing foot were likely to run by seeing how steadily they held their pikes. However, a charge could still falter if the infantry remained together, since the horses would not throw themselves on the pikes. Even those horsemen who did break through often found that their mounts simply bolted through the gaps between the enemy ranks, carrying them right through the formation. Swords were often blunt and failed to do much damage, even against the woollen cloaks of the musketeers.
Such problems encouraged the use of firearms instead, based on the caracole, a tactic similar to the counter-march that had been developed earlier by German pistoleers in the 1530s. Successive ranks would trot within range, fire and ride back to reload, sacrificing the psychological impact of shock tactics to the accumulative effect of firepower. The caracole was less tiring on the horses and required less resolve from soldiers than a charge, since the men did not need to close with their opponents. Even men trained to charge home with cold steel would often panic and break off their attack around ten metres from their target, ‘bouncing’ back to their start positions. This explains why contemporary accounts speak of repeated ‘charges’ by the same unit in battle.
The desire to improve mounted firepower led to a third type of ‘medium’ cavalryman called the arquebusier or carabineer, equipped with a light arquebus or carbine with greater range and penetrating power than a pistol. They generally wore less armour, usually no more than a helmet, breastplate, buff coat, boots and gauntlets, and so rode smaller horses and were cheaper to raise. Since they carried two pistols and a sword as well, they could be used for shock tactics and consequently gradually replaced the more expensive cuirassiers and lancers around 1630. Many regiments were composed of a mix of cuirassiers and arquebusiers into the 1620s, with the former deployed in the front ranks if the unit made a charge.
The fourth type of cavalry was a form of mounted infantry, called dragoons, who rode lighter horses or ponies and generally lacked any armour, including the high boots that were difficult to walk in. Dragoons were a mix of pike and shot, using their mounts for rapid movement to stiffen scouting parties, support infantry skirmishers sent forward to secure key positions, or turn an enemy flank. The last type was often employed on similar tasks, but remained mounted to fight. These ‘light’ cavalry were most numerous in Hungarian, Polish and Transylvanian armies and were a major feature of ‘eastern’ warfare that was integrated into the imperial forces. Around a fifth to a quarter of the imperial light cavalry carried lances and were generally called Cossacks or Poles, regardless of their actual origins, while the rest were Croats, distinctive in their red cloaks and fur hats, each armed with a carbine and a pair of pistols. They were grouped in regiments of generally less than five hundred men and attacked rapidly in a zigzag, first firing their right-hand pistol, then their left and finally their carbine again on their right, before racing away to reload.
Organization
The regiment was the primary administrative unit for both horse and foot, subdivided into companies, still called ‘banners’ (Fähnlein) in the Empire. This organization derived from the way soldiers were recruited, whereby a prince contracted a colonel to raise a regiment who then subcontracted the task of recruiting individual companies to captains. Influenced by the classical model of the Roman legion, most colonels strove to have regiments of ten companies, but actual numbers varied from four or five up to twenty companies in some foot units. Captains who received commissions direct from their paymaster raised ‘free companies’ unattached to any larger unit. Such companies were recruited to garrison fortresses or were raised by ambitious individuals hoping to rise through the ranks by proving their value as recruiting officers.
The military hierarchy of ranks still used in the twenty-first century was already in place by 1600.13 A colonel was assisted by a lieutenant-colonel who commanded in his absence. A major supervised training and administration and could command part of the regiment if it became detached from the rest of it. These three ‘staff’ officers were supplemented by secretaries, chaplains, doctors and a provost in charge of punishment. The same pattern was repeated in each company, with the captain assisted by one or two lieutenants, together with an ensign (called a cornet in the cavalry) responsible for the flag. There was generally also a company scribe, a barber surgeon and a number of non-commissioned officers (NCOs). Together, these senior ranks were known as the prima plana, or ‘first page’, on account of their names being listed before all the others in the muster register. The overall size of foot companies fell from three to four hundred, to two to three hundred over the sixteenth century, with cavalry companies averaging around half these sizes. The number of officers remained the same throughout, reflecting the growing emphasis on hierarchical order and enabling more complicated manoeuvres to be carried out. Officers and NCOs had ‘staff’ weapons in addition to swords, with the former carrying a partisan, or half-pike, that resembled a broad-bladed spear, while the latter held a halberd, or spear with an axe-head attached. Both these weapons symbolized rank, and had a practical purpose since they could be used for dressing the ranks by grasping the shaft in both hands and pushing it against several men simultaneously. They could also be used to push pikes or muskets up or down, especially to stop overexcited musketeers from firing prematurely.
The officer-to-men ratio remained relatively static after 1590, because of the technical limitations of the available weapons that required them to be used en masse. Around one officer or NCO could supervise about fifteen soldiers, but captains found it hard to command more than three hundred, as the smoke and noise of battle limited their ability to see what was happening and to shout instructions. This was another reason why infantrymen were packed close together in large formations, since it kept them within the sight of their mounted colonel. The flags and drums would be grouped in the centre and used to signal commands to the rest of the unit. Command problems also placed a premium on experienced men and it was reckoned at least a third of the strength had to be veterans to provide cohesion and sufficient old soldiers to teach new recruits the rudiments of drill and how to survive the rigours of campaign. However, personnel policy remained decentralized and in the hands of individual colonels who were reluctant to part with experienced men to assist the formation of new regiments. Regiment size also dictated prestige, as large formations commanded greater respect and resources than smaller ones that were more likely to be disbanded or amalgamated.
These factors encouraged Spanish and imperial colonels to recruit foot regiments of two to three thousand men, and mounted ones of around a thousand. The latter would be split into two to five squadrons, each of two companies, as tactical units formed into six to ten ranks. These squadrons were interspersed between the battalions in Dutch deployment, or massed on the flanks of the tercios in the Spanish system. Cavalry formed between a fifth and a third of western and Central European field armies, though the total proportion of infantry was higher since additional foot soldiers would garrison fortresses. Large infantry regiments could deploy as a single tercio, but weak ones had to be brigaded together to achieve the right numbers. Dutch-style battalions numbered between four and seven hundred men, so a large regiment might form two.
Artillery lacked formal organization as gunners still regarded themselves a separate guild under St Barbara, the patron saint of miners. Serving the guns was considered a special art with its own tradition and rituals. Catholic gun crew made the sign of the cross before firing and all faiths gave their pieces individual names. German theorists reckoned two to four pieces were required for every thousand soldiers, but usually only the lighter culverins and falconets accompanied the infantry and cavalry in battle. Large guns were expensive to produce and difficult to move, making them both valuable and vulnerable prizes for a victorious enemy.
Battle Tactics
Battle tactics sought the optimum combination of the three main military arms. Battles generally opened with a cannonade at under a thousand paces, while skirmishers went forward to probe and reconnoitre the enemy position. These moves bought time for the rest of the troops to assemble, and could be used simply to delay an enemy while the army made good its escape. The preference for large infantry formations kept deployment relatively varied, since these could be interspersed with artillery and cavalry in different patterns according to the terrain and the commander’s intentions. As Dutch-style firing tactics became more influential, the infantry tended to be massed in the centre in one or more continuous lines with only narrow gaps between each battalion to prevent enemy cavalry striking their vulnerable flanks. Second and subsequent lines were kept between a hundred and three hundred metres behind the first: any closer and they risked shooting their comrades in the back; any further and they would be too far away to assist in a crisis. This linear tactic encouraged commanders to place their cavalry on either side of the infantry lines in the manner that became standard in the later seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Full adoption of linear tactics was inhibited by doubts about the relative merits of firepower over shock, and by the conditions in eastern Europe where the Turks and others employed more flexible enveloping tactics using larger numbers of light troops. Imperial generals operating in Hungary relied on earthworks or wagons and other movable defences to protect their foot.
Generally, each of the three arms fought it out with their counterparts. The artillery sought to silence the enemy guns before its own troops moved forward and obscured the field of fire. The cavalry engaged the opposing horse, trying to drive them from the field and expose the flanks of the enemy foot. Each side hoped it would have sufficient artillery and cavalry left to tip the balance by the time the slower-moving foot soldiers had closed to within musket range, since the combination of two or more arms was generally superior to only one. Infantry could be pinned down by the threat of a cavalry attack, forcing them to remain in defensive formation while the enemy pounded them with artillery and musketry. Firepower could also be used to crack opposing formations, encouraging them to make a premature attack, or lose cohesion and so open them to a charge. Generalship and tactical innovation relied on variations in this standard pattern to achieve the effective combination of the three arms at an earlier stage in the engagement, thereby securing an easier and less costly victory.
THE LONG TURKISH WAR
A New Crusade
There were few opportunities to test these tactics in large battles during the Turkish War of 1593–1606, which mainly consisted of sieges and skirmishes like the Spanish operations in Flanders against the Dutch. Hostilities arose from the systemic problem of endemic banditry and unstable frontiers. The Habsburgs could do little for the Uskoks who were facing overpopulation and were forced to intensify their piratical activities in the Adriatic. Venice, the chief target of their seaborne attacks, encouraged them to redirect their attention to Ottoman Bosnia and Hungary after 1591. The pasha of Bosnia retaliated by besieging a Croatian border fort and was captured and executed by its defenders. Sinan Pasha, the energetic grand vizier, persuaded a reluctant Sultan Murad III to agree general war in 1593. As an opening move, Sinan seized the Habsburg embassy and enslaved its staff: an occupational hazard for those posted to Constantinople.
Rudolf’s advisers believed the war offered a golden opportunity to expand Habsburg influence in the region and extend control over Transylvania. The Croats’ minor victory convinced them the Ottomans were in decline and they thought war against the Turks would rally Christians within the Empire and so reduce problems there. Certainly Rudolf was roused from his depression, and readily embraced what he saw as his traditional role as defender of the true faith. The Reichstag reconvened in 1594 and voted another substantial tax grant, renewing this four years later and again in 1603. At least four-fifths of the 20 million florins promised actually reached the imperial treasury, along with a further 7 to 8 million paid when Rudolf appealed to the Kreis assemblies as well. The Habsburg lands raised around 20 million, and another 7.1 million flowed in from the pope, Spain and Italy. Even the maverick Henri IV of France promised assistance, and many Catholics, recently defeated in that country’s civil war, now flocked to the imperial standard. Others came from further afield, including Captain John Smith, the later founder of Virginia. The princes of the three subject principalities of Transylvania, Wallachia and Moldavia followed suit, and although the Poles refused to help directly, their Ukrainian Cossacks attacked the Crimean Tartars and so prevented these from aiding the sultan. The imperial field army doubled to around 20,000 men, supplemented by about 10,000 Hungarians and about twice that number of Transylvanians and other auxiliaries.14
After all the effort, the result was a crushing disappointment. Some of the assistance proved rather meagre in practice, as in the case of the Russian tsar who sent a huge consignment of furs that flooded the market and brought little return. Worse, imperial planning was unrealistic. Talks were opened with Morocco and Persia to open additional fronts, but an embassy from Shah Abbas did not arrive until 1600, by which time it was unlikely the emperor could win. The sultan managed to keep 60–100,000 men in the field and so generally held the initiative.
The war opened in the south, where the main Ottoman offensive made some gains at Croatian expense in 1593 before the onset of winter forced Sinan to suspend operations. Thereafter, the Croatian, Slovenian and Senj border defenders held their own. Other Ottoman assaults against both ends of Lake Balaton were driven off, and from November 1593 the Habsburgs made periodic counter-attacks from this sector, trying to seize the Turkish fortress of Stuhlweißenburg that guarded the south-western approaches to Buda. The next Ottoman offensive hit the crucial central Hungarian sector, scoring a major success with the capture of Raab in September 1594, thus outflanking Komorn and opening the way to Vienna. Habsburg efforts concentrated on reversing, or at least offsetting, this blow and Archduke Matthias managed to puncture the Ottoman salient by taking Gran and Visegrad the following year. The sultan retaliated by shifting the war north-eastwards, leading his army in person to take Erlau in 1596, and defeating a relief army at Mezökeresztes, the war’s only major field battle, that October. All attention now focused on the three principalities of Transylvania, Wallachia and Moldavia that had defied the sultan and entered the war on the emperor’s side.
Intervention in Transylvania
Habsburg planners saw the new Transylvanian alliance as a means of extending Habsburg suzerainty, and even forcing that country back under royal Hungarian control. The moment seemed opportune, since the current prince, Sigismund Báthory, appeared to welcome a Habsburg takeover. Polish influence had been strong under his predecessor but was now on the wane due to that country’s new preoccupation with Sweden (see Chapter 6, pp.179–81). Imperial troops retook Raab in 1598, stabilizing the main front, while mounting difficulties in the Ottoman empire sparked widespread revolts there from 1599. The apparent success of Catholic reform in Austria contributed to the growing sense of confidence among the emperor’s advisers, and led to the fateful decision to invade Transylvania in conjunction with Prince Michael of Wallachia, who hoped to get Moldavia out of the bargain. A period of confused fighting ended with the Habsburgs’ complete defeat thanks to unofficial Polish intervention that restored Sigismund and installed Polish puppet-rulers in the other two principalities.
Rather than cutting their losses, the Habsburgs stepped up operations in the region, entrusting new, larger forces to Giorgio Basta whose subsequent conduct earned him the reputation of a cruel tyrant among Hungarian and Romanian historians. Basta was one of the many Italians in Habsburg service and had risen from drummer boy to commander of a company of mounted arquebusiers in Spanish service in Flanders. He came to Hungary with a Spanish contingent in 1597 and soon acquired a general’s rank. Schlick, Marradas, Collalto and Ernesto Montecuccoli all served under him, but his influence spread further thanks to his numerous theoretical writings and military commentaries, many of which heavily criticized his employers for failing to pay their soldiers properly. The subsequent campaign presaged much that later followed in the Empire after 1618. As the man on the spot, Basta was forced to act quickly in rapidly changing circumstances. It was often impossible to refer back to the imperial government in Prague where Rudolf’s intentions were, in any case, far from clear. Having successfully conquered Transylvania again with Prince Michael’s help in August 1600, Basta had his ally murdered the following year, because he considered him a liability. As the Poles refused to rescue him a second time, Sigismund abdicated in return for a Habsburg pension in June 1602, leaving the Transylvanian diet no choice but to pay homage to Rudolf in return for confirmation of its privileges.
It was a pyrrhic victory. The diversion of manpower to Transylvania weakened the defence of the other sectors, and the Turks advanced up the Save in the summer of 1600, taking Kanizsa and opening the way to Styria. Though Archduke Matthias captured Stuhlweißenburg in 1601, this was lost the following year to one Turkish army, while another broke into Styria. Worsening financial problems prevented a coordinated defence as parts of the imperial army were paralysed by mutinies, with some of the French and Walloons even defecting to the Turks.15 Matthias retrieved the situation by capturing Pest in October 1602, precipitating a crisis for the Ottomans who now faced revolts in five provinces. Sultan Mehmet died of a heart attack and was succeeded by his thirteen-year-old son Ahmet I. Shah Abbas seized his chance and attacked from Persia, recapturing Azerbaijan and Georgia by 1604. Faced with a war on two fronts, Ahmet opened peace talks with the emperor in February 1604.
By making excessive demands, Rudolf squandered this last chance to end the war before his own position collapsed. Prolonged warfare had devastated Transylvania to the extent that it could no longer support the Habsburg garrisons. With no prospect of help from Prague, Basta resorted to seizing the property of any nobles who opposed his government. Matters spiralled rapidly out of control once the general received secret instructions from the emperor to implement the Austrian policies of Catholic renewal. As in Austria, this began with the towns, with the intention to repopulate the country with Catholic settlers and discharged soldiers after the war. Other measures targeted Upper Hungary where General Jacopo Belgiojoso began evicting Lutheran pastors from the strategic town of Kassa in January 1604, while the garrisons of 90 border posts were rotated to replace the Hungarians with 12,000 German troops. The policy of confiscations was extended to Hungary where Matthias even seized the manors of István Illésházy, a Protestant magnate who was stripped of his post as Hungarian palatine. This proved too much and the disaffected Magyars now made common cause with the oppressed Transylvanians.
The Bocskai Revolt 1604–6
Opposition coalesced around István Bocskai, a Calvinist landowner from Wardein in Upper Hungary. Bocskai’s journey from loyal servant to rebel leader encapsulates how Habsburg policies were alienating many of their most influential subjects. He had led the Transylvanian auxiliaries during the initial campaigns but was distrusted on account of his religion by Rudolf, who deprived him of his command and had him brought to Prague in 1598. He escaped execution, and retired to his estates that became a centre for malcontents.16 Though hailed by the local Calvinist clergy as a Hungarian Moses, Bocskai avoided inflaming religious passions for fear of alienating potential supporters, drawing instead on widespread popular discontent at the seemingly endless Turkish war. Having intercepted letters from the conspirators, Belgiojoso advanced from Kassa with his 3,500 men to arrest Bocskai, but Bocskai escaped and rallied 5,000 haiduks by granting them noble status and distributing abandoned land. Belgiojoso retired on Kassa, but the disgruntled citizens opened the gates to Bocskai who entered in triumph on 12 December 1604. The fall of Kassa severed the communications between Belgiojoso in Upper Hungary and the 5,000 Habsburg troops holding down Transylvania. As more haiduks rallied to his standard, Bocskai was able to leave a blocking force against Belgiojoso and invade Transylvania with 4,000 light cavalry in January 1605. Though the Habsburgs had the backing of the Szekler people, their troops were scattered in isolated garrisons which had all fallen to Bocskai by September. The Transylvanian diet had already proclaimed Bocskai as their new prince in February, while he was welcomed as the ‘illustrious prince of all Hungary’ when he returned westwards with the rest of his army in April.
By now, the Habsburg position was on the verge of collapse. Basta had been recalled to the main Hungarian sector in July 1604, but despite having 36,000 men, he had been unable to relieve Pest, which fell to the Ottoman besiegers. The imperial army disintegrated as it retreated northwards, allowing the Ottomans to recover both Gran and Visegrad. Bocskai captured Neuhäusel and met the new grand vizier, Lala Mehmed Pasha, outside Pressburg on 11 November 1605 where he was crowned king of Hungary with a special crown made in Constantinople.
Bowing to pressure from his relations, Rudolf reluctantly replaced Basta with Archduke Matthias who was empowered to open negotiations with Bocskai in May. The Bohemian Estates mobilized 17,000 militia, including units commanded by Wallenstein and Count Thurn, to stem the rebels’ advance into Moravia during that summer. Many of Bocskai’s aristocratic supporters were growing concerned that he was simply exchanging Habsburg rule for that of the Turks. They also doubted his ability to control the haiduks, to whom he had promised so much, and felt that the rebellion had achieved its original objectives of halting re-Catholicization and liberating Transylvania. Following a ceasefire in January 1606, the Hungarian and Transylvanian nobility concluded the Treaty of Vienna with Matthias on 23 June at the expense of both Rudolf and their own supporters. Lutheran and Calvinist Hungarian nobles received formal toleration that was extended to the royal towns and Military Frontier, but denied to peasants. Hungarian political autonomy was strengthened by restoring the post of palatine, removing financial control from Vienna, reserving administrative posts for natives, and replacing the German troops with Hungarians in the frontier fortresses. Transylvanian autonomy was also enhanced. Bocskai renounced his new Hungarian crown but kept the courtesy title of king and was recognized as prince of Transylvania by the Habsburgs, who ceded the territory another five Upper Hungarian counties east of Kassa.
While Bocskai did not live long to enjoy his success, his revolt set an important precedent. Militant Catholicism had been reversed, not by the passive resistance that had failed so miserably in Inner Austria, but by armed force. Whereas the Austrian Protestants had used their influence in the provincial Estates to bargain local concessions in the 1570s, the Hungarians and Transylvanians established a viable alliance between their countries. It was an example the Bohemians were to follow in 1618.
Habsburg–Ottoman Relations after 1606
More immediately, the Peace of Vienna cleared the way for Matthias to end the debilitating conflict with the sultan by concluding the Treaty of Zsitva Török on 11 November 1606. This fell short of a permanent peace that neither side was willing to accept. Nonetheless, both the sultan and the emperor were obliged to recognize each other as equals, and the humiliating annual tribute of 30,000 florins paid by the Habsburgs since 1547 was to be replaced by a final ‘free gift’ of 200,000. The sultan retained Kanizsa and Erlau, but had to permit the emperor to construct new fortresses opposite them. The arrangement was to last twenty years, during which cross-border raiding would be tolerated, provided no regular troops were involved.
It was the Habsburgs’ good fortune that the Ottomans were unable to renew the war after 1606. The sultan managed to suppress his own revolts by 1608, but was forced to accept peace with Persia by 1618, confirming the loss of Azerbaijan and Georgia. The Persians exploited ongoing unrest within the Ottoman empire to renew the war in 1623, capturing Baghdad and slaughtering all the Sunni inhabitants who failed to escape. The loss of Iraq triggered convulsions throughout the Ottoman empire, including major revolts in Syria and Yemen which disrupted revenue collection and the routes to the holy sites. The sultan meanwhile lost control over the Crimean Tartars who provoked an undeclared war with Poland that lasted, intermittently, until 1621. Faced with these problems, he was only too happy to confirm Zsitva Török in 1615, accepting minor boundary adjustments that improved Habsburg defences around the Gran salient. The Bohemian Revolt coincided with Persia’s victory, and the sultan went out of his way to conciliate the emperor, even offering him a few thousand Bulgarian or Albanian auxiliaries in the summer of 1618. Though these were politely declined, Osman II sent a special ambassador to congratulate Ferdinand II on his election as emperor the following year. Ottoman benevolence was doubly welcome, because the Reichstag did not renew the last frontier subsidy when this expired in 1615. The Bohemian crisis forced the Austrians to denude the frontier of troops, raising 6,000 cavalry from Croatia and Hungary in 1619. Around 4,000 frontier troops served with the imperial army thereafter until 1624, largely under the command of Giovanni Isolano, a Cypriot with property in Croatia who established his reputation during the Long Turkish War. There was little money left to pay the remaining garrisons on the frontier, prompting mutinies in the Slovenian and Croatian sectors in July 1623. Though the Transylvanians sided with the Bohemians, the sultan refrained from exploiting the opportunity, and without his help their intervention soon collapsed.17
With their respective governments distracted by war elsewhere, cross-border relations devolved to the Hungarian palatine and the Ottoman pasha in Buda. The former position was held by Miklós Esterházy between 1625 and 1645. He fostered the humanist vision of Hungary as Christendom’s bulwark and encouraged the Magyar nobility to place their faith in the Habsburgs as the best guarantors for immediate defence and the eventual recovery of the lands lost to the Turks.18 His negotiations at Szöny with the pasha of Buda in 1627 secured a fifteen-year extension to Zsitva Török, buying more time for the emperor to confront his Christian enemies. The Ottomans did exploit the Mantuan War to plunder fourteen villages in the upper Mur valley in 1631, but they rejected a Venetian suggestion to extend their attacks. Though Sultan Murad IV finally restored order in the Ottoman empire around 1632, suppressing the provincial revolts, he preferred to turn against the Persians, hoping to defeat them while the Habsburgs were preoccupied in Germany. Ottoman armies recovered Azerbaijan, Georgia and Iraq, retaking Baghdad in 1638 and forcing Persia to accept these losses the following year.
The relative quiet allowed the emperor to draw more soldiers from the frontier as the war in Germany intensified from 1625. An initial Croat regiment was raised that year, followed by two more by 1630. Swedish intervention that year prompted a dramatic expansion to fourteen regiments by 1633, as well as 1,500 Kapelletten, or light cavalry recruited in Friuli and Dalmatia. The number of Croat regiments peaked at 25 in 1636, falling to 10 three years later and 6 by the end of the war. Constant recruiting nonetheless depleted the frontier garrisons, leaving only 15,000 effectives by 1641, around 7,000 below official establishment.19 This was still a large force, equivalent to the numbers deployed in a major battle during the latter stages of the war. It represented a major commitment in men, money and materials at a time when the emperor was increasingly hard-pressed, a factor that has been mostly overlooked when assessing the imperial performance during the conflict.
The continued military presence along the frontier indicated how deeply the Habsburgs still feared the Ottoman menace. Their concerns seemed justified when the Turks followed their peace with Persia in 1639 by launching major raids intended to consolidate their hold on Kanisza. Things might have got much worse if the Persian war had not resumed, prompting the sultan to renew Zsitva Török again in 1642, this time for twenty years. The sultan’s problems weakened his hold over Transylvania, which had remained nominally under his suzerainty after 1606. As Transylvania grew more independent, its prince felt emboldened to intervene again in the Thirty Years War in 1644–5 (see Chapter 19). Thus, while Ottoman weakness kept the sultan out of the war, it paradoxically enabled Transylvania to join it. Still, it was always preferable to face the Transylvanians rather than the more powerful Ottomans. Fears that the pasha of Buda would back the prince with infantry and artillery never materialized, which rendered Transylvanian intervention in the war largely ineffective. Just as Transylvania made peace, the sultan became preoccupied with a new conflict against Venice that dragged on until 1669. Demobilization following the Peace of Westphalia obliged the emperor to withdraw his troops from the Empire, and he moved them into Hungary where they deterred further Ottoman raids until 1655. It was not until the late 1650s that the Ottomans were strong enough to pose an active threat and their attempts to reassert influence over Transylvania prompted another war with the emperor after 1662 that ended with a further renewal of Zsitva Török in modified form two years later. The stalemate only broke with the failure of the Ottoman siege of Vienna that opened the Great Turkish War of 1683–99. International assistance enabled the Habsburgs to drive the Turks from Hungary, which was converted to an hereditary kingdom in 1687, followed by the annexation of Transylvania four years later. The victory transformed Austria into a great power in its own right, lessening the significance of the Holy Roman title.20
These glories would have appeared an impossible dream to the Habsburgs surveying the wreckage of Rudolf’s policies by 1606. The frontier had been weakened by the loss of two of its greatest fortresses, the dynasty had lost ground in Hungarian politics, and all influence in Transylvania had been extinguished. However, the repercussions went well beyond the Habsburgs’ eastern kingdom to shake the very foundations of their monarchy. Despite receiving over 55 million fl. in subsidies and taxes during the war, Rudolf’s debts had climbed to 12 million. Key sources of revenue, such as the Hungarian copper mines, had been pawned to raise further loans. The border troops were already owed 1 million fl. in back pay by 1601, while the field army had arrears of twice this by the end of the war. Six thousand soldiers loitered in Vienna demanding at least a million florins to disperse. Habsburg inability to keep order in their own capital underlined their failure. Disappointment and disillusionment spread to the Empire where the princes found it hard to believe that their money had not bought victory. The imperial treasurer, Geizkofler, was formally charged with embezzling half a million florins, and though he was acquitted in 1617, many princes failed to pay their share of the last border subsidy, voted in 1613, which was still 5.28 million fl. in arrears by 1619.
THE BROTHERS’ QUARREL
The Feuding Archdukes
The search for scapegoats extended to the Habsburgs themselves. Having executed Field Marshal Rußwurm – a Calvinist like Bocskai – for the loss of Gran in 1605, the archdukes turned on each other once peace was finally concluded. The ensuing ‘Brothers’ Quarrel’ compounded the damage done by the war, further weakening the dynasty and emboldening radicals within the Estates to believe that violent confrontation could advance their confessional and political goals. Crucially, the family feud distracted the emperor’s attention from the Empire at a critical time, undermining the remaining goodwill and frustrating the efforts of those who sought a peaceful resolution of tensions there. Interpretations of the Brothers’ Quarrel have been influenced by Franz Grillparzer’s play of the same name. One of the great works of nineteenth-century Austrian literature, this casts Matthias in the role of the reckless, power-hungry usurper against Rudolf who appears, despite all his faults, as the peace-loving monarch. Matthias’s position was altogether more complex, while the other archdukes had more than mere bit-parts in the unfolding drama.
Recriminations over the war forced the family to confront the deeper, unresolved problem of the succession. Rudolf agreed with his five brothers in April 1578 not to repeat their grandfather’s partition of 1564 that had fragmented the Austrian lands. As the eldest representative of the main branch, he would retain Austria, Bohemia and Hungary, giving his brothers allowances and roles as provincial governors, pending more suitable accommodation elsewhere. Unfortunately, the spread of Protestantism throughout the Empire reduced the number of opportunities within the imperial church as bishoprics fell under Lutheran administration in the 1580s. Archduke Wenzel’s early death in September 1578 left four brothers to be provided for. Ernst, the next eldest, seemed content with his post as governor of Austria and Hungary after 1578 and his death removed him from the reckoning in 1595. Albert, the youngest surviving brother, remained in Spain after 1571, and was eventually chosen by Philip II as the husband for his daughter Isabella, whom Rudolf had earlier refused to marry. Though his name was invoked by various parties, Albert’s Spanish associations prevented him from becoming a serious contender for the succession in Austria and the Empire.
A childhood illness had kept Maximilian, the middle brother, from the customary trip to Spain. He had been groomed by his mother for a career in the imperial church, but showed more military ambitions. A compromise was found by engineering his appointment as grand master of the crusading Teutonic Order in 1585. Elected minority candidate in the disputed Polish royal election of 1586–7, he failed to assert himself over the favourite, Sigismund of Sweden, who captured him in battle. Though ransomed by Rudolf in 1589, Maximilian blamed his defeat on his brother’s lack of support. The outbreak of the Turkish War gave him a new outlet for his energies and he was considered by observers as the best of the archdukes to try his hand at command. The indiscipline of his troops cost him victory at Mezökeresztes and brief involvement in the Transylvanian quagmire added to his disillusionment. Rudolf’s breakdown in 1600 appears to have galvanized Maximilian back into action. Of all the archdukes, he had the widest contacts among the German princes, thanks especially to his position as Teutonic grand master. The Order remained pan-Christian, rather than narrowly confessional, matching Maximilian’s own pragmatic attitude to faith and concern for peace. Discouraged by his earlier failures from putting himself forward as Rudolf’s successor, Maximilian now emerged as honest broker between the princes and archdukes, and he concentrated on consolidating Habsburg authority in the Tirol where he became governor in 1602.21
This left Matthias, the next eldest brother after Ernst and the main contender for the succession after 1595.22 Matthias escaped the Spanish education and so lacked his two elder brothers’ stiff formality. At first glance, he appears the least sympathetic of all the archdukes, living the life of a playboy prince, self-indulgent and increasingly lazy. Nonetheless, he possessed a certain charm and in a family noted for its dour, gloomy disposition, he had an uncharacteristic sense of fun. He also retained something of the moderate spirit of his father, Emperor Maximilian II, and believed he could resolve confessional strife. One night in 1577 he dashed off without a word to anyone and appeared suddenly in the Netherlands at the height of the crisis there, accepting the rebels’ offer to become their governor. He was completely out of his depth. The rebel leadership simply used him as a face-saving device while they gathered their forces and they expelled him in 1581. It proved a sobering experience, but one that left him kicking his heels, since none of his relations trusted him. Still, he was the only available archduke to replace Ernst as governor of Austria in 1595, while the Turkish War provided opportunities for field command. There were clear signs he was maturing by 1600, thanks partly to the influence of Bishop Klesl with whom he worked closely in Austria to revive Catholicism and pacify the peasant revolt.
Archduke Ferdinand and his brother Leopold of the junior Styrian line had their own claims to the Austrian inheritance. As young men of the Counter-Reformation generation, they represented a more attractive alternative to Spain and Bavaria than the elder archdukes who clung to their father’s hopes of transcending confessional strife. Ferdinand was linked by marriage to Bavaria and had impressed Spain and the papacy with his personal piety and commitment to Catholic renewal. As a younger brother, Leopold had been destined for the church, a calling for which he was entirely unsuited. Despite becoming bishop of Passau (in 1605) and Strasbourg (in 1607), he never took higher clerical vows, and remained the wild card in the Habsburg pack, more interested in war and political ambitions than his benefices.
The Opening Round
Rudolf’s increasingly erratic behaviour convinced the archdukes that they had to act. The Spanish ambassador had already raised the possibility of deposing the emperor in 1603, but the pope was reluctant to condone such a step when it was far from clear whether Rudolf was actually mad. The outbreak of Bocskai’s revolt dispelled such scruples and the archdukes convened in Linz in April 1605, agreeing that they would compel Rudolf to hand over Hungary as a preliminary step. Bishop Klesl carefully steered Matthias, restraining him from doing anything rash – such as accepting the crown of St Stephen from the Hungarian rebels – and working hard to mollify the Spanish who still blamed Matthias for exacerbating the Dutch Revolt. A master of public relations, Klesl appreciated the value of presenting Matthias as a man who understood his subjects’ concerns, whereas Rudolf clung to the older, more reclusive style of monarchy.23 Klesl gathered the archdukes again in Vienna on 25 April 1606, and won their agreement to back Matthias as sole successor. Rudolf was to be declared mentally unfit, clearing the way for his lands to pass to Matthias who could then negotiate from a position of strength with the electors to be named king of the Romans, thus securing the imperial title as well.
Spain backed the plan and allowed Albert to sign it in November, but Ferdinand played a double game, appearing to go along with Matthias, but secretly hoping Rudolf would name him heir instead. When Matthias learned about this, he published the April 1606 pact, ruining his rival’s credit with Rudolf and temporarily removing him from the running. However, Rudolf’s determined opposition unsettled the imperial electors who were reluctant to discuss a successor while he was still alive – and in any case the elector Palatine and the Protestant princes preferred Archduke Maximilian to Matthias as a successor. Matters were brought to a head by the haiduks who rebelled in October 1607, protesting at being abandoned after the Bocskai revolt. The Hungarian magnates suspected Rudolf of deliberately encouraging them in order to sabotage the Peace of Vienna. The crisis ended Klesl’s hopes of settling the succession without recourse to further concessions to the Estates, and he now embarked on the high-risk strategy of enlisting Hungarian support to force Rudolf to agree. Having finally secured his appointment as governor of Hungary in June 1607, Matthias defied Rudolf and summoned the diet to Pressburg the following January. Representatives arrived from Upper and Lower Austria, joining the Hungarians in an alliance with Matthias agreed in February. Ostensibly, this was to uphold the settlement ending Bocskai’s revolt and ensure that Rudolf did not disturb the truce with the Turks. In practice, it transferred the Hungarian crown to Matthias in return for further guarantees for Hungarian Protestants and concessions to the nobility at the expense of the peasants.
Rudolf still had backing from the Hungarian Catholic minority that refused to join the alliance, but his policies were alienating his dwindling supporters. Clumsy intervention in Moravia’s internal affairs prompted the Estates there to close ranks and join Matthias’s alliance in April. Matthias now deliberately escalated the situation, hoping to trigger a crisis that would rally Bohemia to his standard as well and leave Rudolf completely isolated. Backed by the Protestant majority in the Estates, Matthias collected 20,000 Austrian and Moravian troops at Znaim, just across the Moravian frontier from Vienna. A further 15,000 Hungarians assembled on the March river further east. Matthias planned to appear in strength at a general assembly of all Habsburg Estates he had summoned for Cáslav, half-way between his camp and Prague, and he issued a manifesto to the German princes justifying his actions as restoring stability within the monarchy and Empire.
The Bohemians now held the trump card. If they defected, the Silesians and Lusatians would follow, leaving Rudolf alone. Encouraged by religious militants in Germany, the Bohemian Protestant leadership seized the opportunity to extort formal recognition for their faith denied them by the Habsburgs’ refusal to acknowledge the Bohemian Confession of 1575 (see Chapter 3, p.60 above). Rudolf had only 5,000 unpaid men under Colonel Tilly who were in full retreat on his capital. He had lost the confidence of the Spanish ambassador, who advised him to cut a deal before it was too late. Rudolf tacitly allowed the Bohemian Estates to assemble in Prague and begin their own military preparations in May. Seeing that Matthias had also run out of money, the Bohemians showed their hand by refusing his summons to attend at Cáslav and declaring for Rudolf instead. Both men were outmanoeuvred by their respective backers, who secured their own objectives under the cloak of Habsburg reconciliation in the Treaty of Lieben, signed on 25 June 1608. Rudolf was compelled to abandon plans to renew the war against the Ottomans, surrender the crown of St Stephen to his brother and recognize him as ruler of Moravia and Upper and Lower Austria. The Moravians received greater autonomy from Bohemia and established a new government under Karel Zierotin, an intelligent adherent of the Bohemian Brethren who sincerely desired peace.
The Austrians, Moravians and Hungarians used the opportunity of their meeting at Matthias’s camp to forge their own alliance on 29 June, agreeing to cooperate to extract further concessions from the dynasty. Matthias and Klesl had expected this and tried to negotiate with each province in turn, hoping to limit the damage. Matthias received the Moravians’ homage in August 1608 in return for promising that no one would be persecuted on the grounds of faith. This fell far short of the full legal rights desired by the Protestant radicals, but Zierotin held them in check, happy simply that his country had secured greater political autonomy. The situation was very different in Austria where the Estates’ leadership was passing into the hands of men like Baron Tschernembl, who had entered the Upper Austrian house of lords in 1598. A former student of the radical Altdorf University, he had toured Protestant Europe in the 1580s meeting the leading intellectuals and discussing their opposition to tyranny. Though he opposed the peasants’ revolt of 1595–7, he was more prepared than his fellow lords to concede the right of resistance to ordinary folk. Because of this, he has attracted considerable attention from later historians, often distorting his actual significance.24 As a Calvinist, he was in a minority among the Austrian Protestants, but the Habsburgs’ feuding gave him a chance to push himself forward and seize the Estates’ leadership. However, he never succeeded in rallying all the Lutherans, while his extremism eroded the scant remaining common ground with the moderate Catholics.
Tschernembl argued that Rudolf’s renunciation of Austria created an interregnum, leaving power in the Estates’ hands until they agreed to accept Matthias as successor. This technicality convinced 166 Upper and Lower Austrian Protestant lords and knights to gather in the radicals’ stronghold of Horn in Tschernembl’s home province. Here they swore a solemn confederation on 3 October 1608, effectively declaring their secession from the moderates and Catholics and establishing an alternative government in both provinces. They voted money (to be paid by their tenants!) for troops and sent emissaries to Hungary and to the Calvinist leadership in the Palatinate. Matthias went to Pressburg to head them off by meeting the Hungarians himself. He agreed to implement the treaty of Vienna, and had to watch while the diet restored the Protestant Illésházy as palatine. Having confirmed Hungarian and Transylvanian autonomy, the diet finally recognized Matthias as the new king of Hungary on 19 November.
With the Austrians still defiant and his brother plotting in Prague, Matthias’s position was far from secure. Unable to sleep at night, he is reported to have cried out, ‘My God, what should I do! If I don’t give them what they want, I’ll lose my lands and subjects. If I agree, I’ll be damned!’25On 19 March 1609, he conceded most of Tschernembl’s demands, halting Catholic reform, restoring the Religious Assurance of 1571, and extending this by a verbal promise of free worship for the crown towns. The painstaking efforts to combine Habsburg authority and Catholic conformity over the previous thirty years were swept away. Though the Austrians now accepted him as archduke, Matthias alienated the Catholic minority who felt abandoned. The wily Klesl remained discreetly in the background, remaining in Vienna when his master embarked on his rebellious invasion of Bohemia in 1608. He publicly refused Matthias the sacraments during Easter 1609, while secretly advising the concessions as a tactical expedient. Under pressure from Tschernembl to banish Klesl as an arch-schemer, Matthias considered persuading the pope to make him a cardinal in a face-saving device to send him to Rome. But as relations became strained with his adviser, Matthias was unable to recover any ground against the Estates.
The Letter of Majesty 1609
The Bohemians, meanwhile, lost no time in holding the emperor to his Faustian bargain. The struggle with his brother had exhausted Rudolf’s remaining credit and he had no one else to turn to to prop up his crumbling imperial dignity. Having been dismissed in 1608, the Protestant members of the Estates unilaterally reassembled in April 1609 and forced their way into the emperor’s inner sanctum in the Hradschin, in defiance of an express order to leave him in peace. As in Austria, the heady atmosphere allowed the radicals to elbow their way to the front. Some shouted ‘This king is no good, we need another!’, while Count Thurn was applauded when he called for military preparations, this time against the emperor.26 The count’s family had originally hailed from north Italy as the della Torre, but like many of their compatriots, they had acquired land in Austria and Bohemia. He has received an almost universal bad press and certainly proved a singularly inept political leader and poor strategist. Though a Lutheran, his actions suggest he was driven more by personal ambition than religious conviction, with his radicalism of 1609 motivated by his dissatisfaction with Rudolf’s failure to reward his services during the Turkish War.
Thurn orchestrated a relentless barrage of demands until the fragile Rudolf capitulated on the evening of 9 July, signing the infamous Letter of Majesty that granted the Bohemian Protestants religious and political freedoms exceeding those won by their Austrian and Hungarian counterparts. Henceforth, the lords, knights and royal towns were free to choose which Christian confession to follow, and each group could elect ten ‘Defensors’ to safeguard their rights. This effectively created a parallel government under the presidency of Vaclav Budovec von Budov, alongside the formal Habsburg administration under Chancellor Lobkowitz. Thurn and Colonna von Fels, another military nonentity of Italian descent, were named as commanders of the Protestant militia. Other Protestants took over Prague University and the Utraquist consistory, thus acquiring the institutional framework to construct their own provincial church.27 The Silesians extracted a similar Letter of Majesty on 20 August, giving Lutheranism equal status to Catholicism.
The Bohemian Catholics, who had been in the ascendant since 1599, were cast adrift by the dynasty on which their fortunes depended. Slavata lost his post of Castellan of Karlstein, associated with guardianship of the crown jewels, which Rudolf transferred to Count Thurn. Lobkowitz led the Catholics in refusing to sign the Letter of Majesty, leaving the emperor still more isolated. Habsburg prestige plummeted to new depths, convincing Tschernembl and his radical allies in Germany that the dynasty was on the verge of total collapse. Their hopes seemed justified when Rudolf offered the Austrians their own Letter of Majesty provided they defected to him.
The crisis coincided with the formation of hostile Protestant and Catholic princely alliances in the Empire and with international tension surrounding the Jülich-Cleves inheritance dispute (for which, see Chapter 7). Yet, no major war followed and the immediate threat to the Habsburgs receded. This requires some explanation, before we turn to events elsewhere in Europe.
The radicals were victims of their own success. The concessions of 1608–9 represented the achievement of long-cherished dreams that left most Protestants satisfied and dampened desires to forge closer links with co-religionists in the Empire and further afield. Since the gains had been won at sword point, few Germans wanted anything to do with the Habsburg malcontents who were widely regarded as disloyal subjects of the imperial dynasty. Blinded by their apparent success, the radical minority failed to see their support slipping away. An envoy to the Protestant princes to solicit a loan returned empty-handed late in 1608 and by February 1610 the Bohemians decided to disband their expensive militia.28 While Zierotin still held the Protestants and Catholics together in Moravia, the two parties no longer met together in the other provinces. The radical Protestants’ boycott of the formal diets opened the way for the Catholic minority to seize control of the Estates while their opponents met in separate sectarian assemblies that lacked a firm constitutional basis.
The outbreak of the Turkish War in 1593 had brought dangers and opportunities. Rudolf rediscovered a personal sense of purpose, while militants of all hues were marginalized as the German princes and Habsburg Estates closed ranks behind him and voted substantial support for the glorious crusade. The inability to make any headway in Hungary bred mounting frustration among Rudolf’s relations and subjects. The situation became increasingly precarious as first Ferdinand of Styria and then Matthias and Rudolf intensified Catholic renewal in their parts of the monarchy. The Catholic revival was explicitly linked to the dynasty’s attempt to reassert political authority, representing a shift from the era before 1576 when Ferdinand I and Maximilian II pinned their influence on reconciling the competing faiths. Habsburg policy became increasingly inflexible as its dynastic and confessional interests became closely intertwined making it impossible to grant concessions in one area without undermining the family’s position in another. The difficulties became clear when Rudolf extended this policy to Upper Hungary and Transylvania after 1600. With the Turkish War still raging, this was sheer folly and provoked Bocskai’s revolt, forcing Matthias to intervene and conclude an unsatisfactory peace with the Ottomans. The Habsburgs were rescued from a worse disaster by the sultan’s own problems after 1606, but their monarchy now lurched from international conflict to civil war as the Brothers’ Quarrel spiralled out of control. The rival archdukes gambled away much of their family’s remaining credit in a game they both lost. While Matthias emerged with tangible gains in Austria, Moravia and Hungary by 1609, these were only at the cost of strengthening the Protestant faction in the Estates. Rudolf granted still more damaging concessions to the Bohemians and Silesians in his Letters of Majesty. The Tirol escaped, thanks to its lack of an hereditary archduke after 1595, while Ferdinand’s temporary exit from the family feud kept Inner Austria out of this stage of the dispute. Nonetheless, the overall impact of sixteen years of unbroken international and civil war left the Austrian monarchy severely weakened, and overshadowed by its richer Spanish cousins.