Historical Studies on Central Europe

Cooperatives in the Upper Hungarian Region at the Intersection of Embourgeoisement and Nation-Building (1898–1918)

Štefan Gaučík — 2024-12-20

Cooperatives, which abound in theoretical constructions, can be defined as associations of people who unite for a specific purpose and try to satisfy their economic needs through a democratically operated, jointly owned enterprise. However, it is an established fact that, by the end of the nineteenth century, industrial revolution and capitalism had brought many economic and social problems and manifold grave social challenges. This led to the further organizational development of self-help which, in turn, was an effective tool for shaping ethnic communities in the great trend of modernization and embourgeoisement.

Self-help associations had a long tradition in the Habsburg Monarchy, including the territory of the Kingdom of Hungary, already from the first half of the nineteenth century. However, especially in the last third of the nineteenth century, the development and consolidation of cooperative networks in this Central European region went hand in hand with ethnically based cooperative self-organization controlled from above by the agrarian elites. Cooperative centres were established, which performed not only economic and social, but also national policy-related tasks, at the same time gradually monopolizing some producer-supplier areas. Certain interpretations view cooperatives as important tools of small-state economic nationalism, relegating their economic goals to the background.

Focusing on the period between 1898 and 1918, this study deals with the process and stages of development in the Hungarian cooperative system in Upper Hungary, whose solid foundations were laid from the late nineteenth century onwards. Relying on archival sources, it discusses the strategies of the two most significant cooperative centres, the Országos Központi Hitelszövetkezet (National Central Credit Cooperative) and Hangya (’Ant’). In the early twentieth century, these Hungarian attempts at integration coincided with the increasingly pronounced decentralization ideas of the Slovak cooperative elite.

The Cooperative Pattern of Territorial Development in Hungary

Gábor Koloh — 2024-12-20

This paper addresses the following question: What is the spatial pattern of the spread of the most significant consumer cooperatives in Hungary in the first quarter of a century following their establishment in 1898? Spatial pattern is employed as an indicator in order to ascertain the spatial developmental differences. My hypothesis is that organising and operating a cooperative is an indicator of community activity with the objective of attaining a superior quality of life. Although the Hangya Consumption Cooperative in Hungary received considerable support from landlords and later the state, the study indicates that local cultural patterns of organisation and the strength of traditional economic districts are significant. Concurrently, the analysis demonstrates that it is possible to delineate the role of social welfare in the establishment and functioning of local consumer organisations. On the other hand, the Hangya’s operations served to disseminate anti-Semitic ideologies. The macro-regional analysis aims to contribute to the broader investigation of peasant farm development, grassroots modernisation, and the discourse on territorial inequality.

Cottage Industry in the Hungarian Cooperative System before 1948

Fruzsina Cseh — 2024-12-20

The cooperative system that emerged in Eastern Europe in the nineteenth century was very different from the much earlier processes in Western Europe. In Eastern Europe, including Hungary, the establishment and management of cooperatives was under the control of large capitalists and the state, and was closely linked to nation-building efforts. From the second half of the nineteenth century, the cottage industry movement developed with economic, nation-building, and folk-art preservation objectives. The institutional system of cottage industry included associations, alliances, central governing bodies, and cooperatives. In Hungarian academic research, cooperatives and the cottage industry movement are not linked, although both their aims and their organizations were closely related. This study reveals that the movement was integrated into the cooperative institutional system in several ways, and that the centralizing measures, that were increasingly evident in the cottage industry during the first half of the twentieth century, went hand in hand with the cooperative movement. Exploring these links is essential to understanding folk art, applied folk art, and the cottage industry cooperative system that developed from the 1950s onwards.

Noble Migration and Travel Across Central Europe in the Early Modern Period

Ildikó Horn — 2024-12-20

Mobility in the European Aristocracy during the Age of Enlightenment

Michel Figeac — 2024-12-20

Helena Potocka offers a wonderful case study because she was a perfect representative of the high European aristocracy under French influence. Educated in a Parisian religious house, she had the culture of the young girls of the nobility of Versailles. Her matrimonial alliance with the son of the Prince de Ligne poses the problem of matrimonial strategies. Helena was both a free and rebellious spirit who believed in her ability to build her happiness with the side she chose. This is why she left Charles de Ligne; she thought she had discovered her soul mate with Vincent Potocki, but in reality, it must have been a lifelong quest. The Potocki couple are then torn between the financial resources of distant Ukraine, where the immense properties that finance them are located, and Parisian social life.

Potocki’s very particular family situation triggered incessant mobility throughout his life, but this mobility had very varied motivations and was one of the main characteristics of the high European aristocracy, which had the financial means to travel to all parts of Europe. The international circulations of the aristocracy produced, within this social group, a growing cosmopolitanism: in fact, the aristocrats of the various nations of Europe rubbed shoulders and mixed more and more in the various spaces of sociability that were theirs. This worldly cosmopolitanism led to the progressive diffusion within this elite of common modes of consumption, behavior, and thought—in short, an aristocratic European Habitus.

The Voyageur François in Hungary

Caroline Le Mao — 2024-12-20

In the forty-two volumes of Voyageur François, ou la Connaissance de l’Ancien et du Nouveau Monde (1765–1795), Abbé Delaporte devoted a few pages to Hungary. Through fictitious letters, the polygrapher produced a compilation that provides a glimpse of what a French nobleman wishing to discover Hungary might know. This is what we propose to analyse, by considering his historical approach, which reveals his biases, by examining the picture he paints of Hungary’s towns and countryside, and then by focusing on his presentation of Hungarian customs (peoples, languages, religion, etc.).

Horace Saint-Paul

Clément Monseigne — 2024-12-20

This article examines the singular destiny of Horace Saint-Paul, a young British nobleman who served in the Imperial Army during the Seven Years’ War. While the entry of foreign nobles into the service of another nation is not surprising in the modern era, the case of Saint-Paul is particularly interesting to study because of his lightning ascension through the ranks. He managed to rise to a senior position in the general staff without any military experience. His entry into the service of an army that was part of a coalition opposed to his homeland also raises questions about the complex relationship between patriotism and cosmopolitanism in the mid-eighteenth century. His example clearly illustrates the great adaptability of the nobility in the Age of Enlightenment, for whom the context of war provided significant opportunities to move around Europe.

A Hungarian Orphan’s Rare Courtly Career in the Spanish Monarchy

Tibor Monostori — 2024-12-20

Martin Somogyi, a Hungarian orphan and nobleman spent nearly forty years in the service of the Habsburg dynasty, most of that time in Brussels, the capital of the Spanish Netherlands. Via the Dietrichstein and Cardona families, from his childhood he received extraordinary patronage and was a close confidant of several family members, while providing constant courtly services to them and to Albert and Isabella, archdukes and governors of the Spanish Netherlands. Ha became baron and estate owner in both Flanders and Moravia, and from Brussels he repeatedly went on diplomatic missions to Central Europe. Having spent thirty years as vice-captain of the governors’ personal guards, his patrons including Archduke Albert requested a Spanish Order of Cavalry for him, but with no effect. By the 1620s, Somogyi’s career reached its peak and his dissatisfaction was growing. Therefore, he requested from Dietrichstein his return to Central Europe, but again with no success. He died without male offspring, and his descendants still live in Belgium. Somogyi is also known for having sent to Central Europe one of the first issues of the second part of Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quijote de la Mancha.

Migration and Elites

Ildikó Horn — 2024-12-20

This study examines the role and impact of migration on the formation and composition of the elite in the newly established Principality of Transylvania between 1556 and 1586, utilizing a prosopographical database compiled through extensive archival research. The new state was open to nobles fleeing the Ottoman conquest, as well as to those dissatisfied with Habsburg policies, offering peace, political prospects, and opportunities for career advancement in both government and military roles. Consequently, nearly 60 percent of the elite were newcomers, two-thirds of whom were migrant nobles, while one-third rose through social mobility. Characterized by smaller wealth, limited networks, and a tendency toward greater agility and risk-taking, the new elite were highly vulnerable. Their integration was hindered by the old elite’s reluctance to form dynastic ties. Only about 30 percent of the new families that entered the elite managed to maintain their positions long-term, across multiple generations, while a strikingly high number experienced only one or two generations of elite status. The analysis underscores the precarious nature of elite integration in early modern Transylvania and the complex dynamics of social mobility within a newly established state.

Memoirs which Can Hide Others

Ferenc Tóth — 2024-12-20

Jean-Louis de Rabutin’s memoirs are considered a rather particular text which presents an interesting topic from the point of view of the history of noble emigration in the modern era. This author was a French nobleman who entered the imperial service in 1683 and then he participated in almost all military campaigns against the Turks and against Prince Francis II Rákóczi. His memoirs, which recount his military campaigns, were published twice by Prince Charles-Joseph de Ligne. The initial project of Prince de Ligne was the glorification of the imperial generals by publishing their memoirs. During his own emigration, in 1795, the Prince republished the memoirs of Jean-Louis de Rabutin, supplemented by his own remarks and comments referring to his own experiences. Through this mirror game, he constituted a new connection between the Count of Rabutin and himself, which permitted him to reflect his own thoughts through the publication of Rabutin’s memoirs, thus contributing to repairing the errors of the past associated with the imperial army.

Content

2024-12-20

Luxembourg Court Cultures in the Long Fourteenth Century. Performing Empire, Celebrating Kingship. Edited by Karl Kügle, Ingrid Ciulisová, and Václav Žůrek.

Máté Vas — 2024-12-20

Pre-Modern Towns at the Times of Catastrophes: East Central Europe in a Comparative Perspective. Edited by Michaela Antonín Malaníková, Beata Możejko, and Martin Nodl.

András Vadas — 2024-12-20

The Outstanding Life of an Outstanding Artist

Réka Horváth — 2024-12-20

Björnståhls Resa. Europa och Konstatinopel 1767–1779 [Björnståhl’s Journey. Europe and Constantinople, 1767–1779]. By Carla Killander Cariboni, Catharina Raudvere, Vassilios Sabatakakis, and Johan Stenström.

Dávid Szabó — 2024-12-20

Kraj Habsburške Monarhije: intelektualna povijest debata i prijepora u britanskoj i američkoj historiografiji [The End of the Habsburg Monarchy: An Intellectual History of Debates and Controversies in British and American Historiography]. By Nikolina Šimetin Šegvić.

Jure Trutanić — 2024-12-20

Összeomlás és útkeresés 1917–1920. A magyar külpolitikai gondolkodás útjai [Collapse and Quests for Direction, 1917–1920: The Paths of Hungarian Foreign Policy Thinking]. By Gergely Romsics.

Virág Rab — 2024-12-20

Urban Heritage in Europe: Economic and Social Revival. Edited by Gábor Sonkoly.

Omar Artal — 2024-12-20

Zgodovina zadružništva v Sloveniji (1856–1992) [History of Cooperatives in Slovenia, 1856–1992]. By Žarko Lazarević, Marta Rendla, Janja Sedlaček.

Andor Mészáros — 2024-12-20

Regional Differences in the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary (c. 1500)

Beatrix F. Romhányi — 2024-12-20

The objective of this project is to examine and delineate regional differences within the Kingdom of Hungary (the Carpathian Basin in geographical terms) at the end of the Middle Ages. Whereas statistical data comparable to the modern period are unavailable for the Middle Ages, regional inequalities (the economic activity or inactivity of a region) can be approximated using indirect indicators. Given the relatively well-documented settlement network of the Carpathian Basin in the Late Middle Ages and the abundance of available data that can be employed as indicators (proxies), the project will utilise this methodology to construct a database for the time around 1500. The database will be processed in order to make regional differences in the late Middle Ages visible by means of various geospatial methods. Furthermore, comparisons will be made with maps of earlier and later periods, using similar methodologies. In addition, new datasets will be incorporated into the database for the eighteenth century, comprising data from Croatia north of the River Save and church censuses. The project will conclude with the production of a series of maps that will facilitate the identification of long-term processes, including changes over time, as well as their variable and stable elements. Moreover, the identification of regions within the Carpathian Basin that are permanently developed (active) or underdeveloped (inactive) may provide new perspectives for the formulation of regional development strategies in the present.

Discovering the Colonial Past of the Habsburg Monarchy

Krisztián Csaplár-Degovics — 2024-12-20

Guilds, Guild Unions, Guild Courts in Transylvanian Saxon Towns in the Sixteenth Century

Julia Derzsi — 2024-12-20

Under the auspices of the Universitas, the common self-governing body of the Transylvanian Saxon towns and seats, the guilds’ statutes were revised between 1539 and 1582: obsolete rules were abolished, and new ones were introduced where they had not existed before. According to the literature, this process marked a turning point in the relationship between the municipal authorities and the guilds, insofar as the town councils intervened in the guilds’ internal affairs, particularly in their powers to judge misconduct and disciplinary offences. But even before the new regulations, the guilds’ powers were limited to settling disputes between members at a lower instance, and even when they formed unions for common defence or drew up common statutes, they enjoyed no greater autonomy. The paper provides an overview of the activities of the guild courts, with case studies. It seeks to show the powers the guilds had in disciplinary matters and how these changed with the growing power of local government and the use of public authority. It argues that the authorities’ intervention in the guilds’ powers was not so much a restriction as a clarification of their entitlements, while ensuring that arising cases were appropriately dealt with, and that normative regulation played an important role in this process, defining the various facts and circumstances and transferring offences such as bodily harm, counterfeiting, and fraud to ordinary courts. At the same time, the guilds retained their power to deal with minor disputes between craftsmen, insults, and moral offences; under the pressure of the Reformation and the spread of Protestant morality, their disciplinary powers were greatly extended.