The Hapsburg family of Europe is one of the oldest and most distinguished of the royal houses.
The Hapsburgs reigned in one form or another from the fifteenth to the twentieth centuries. Guntram the Rich, who lived in the mid-tenth century, is considered by scholars to be the earliest traceable ancestor of the House of Hapsburg. However, it was Werner, who died in 1096, who became the first count of Hapsburg. Otto was the count of Hapsburg to actually use this designation. He died in 1111.
The Hapsburg name comes from the family castle built in 1020. The castle was named Habichtsburg meaning Hawk’s Castle. It was located on the Aare River in the canton of Aargau in Switzerland. In 1173, Otto’s grandson Count Albert III inherited large estates in Alsace, Baden, and Switzerland. In turn, Rudolf II, who died in 1232, and Albert IV inherited these lands. The Hapsburgs acquired more lands when the Houses of Lenzburg, Zähringen, and Kyburg became extinct. The rise of the Hapsburgs to European prominence had begun.
The Hapsburgs became prominent in Europe in 1273 after the election of Count Rudolf IV as the German king and as Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf I. A war with King Ottocar, or Ottokar, II of Bohemia precipitated this election. However, King Ottocar’s defeat and subsequent death at Marchfeld in 1278 allowed the Hapsburgs to take possession of the duchies of Austria, Carniola, Styria, and, in 1335, Carinthia. In 1282, Emperor Rudolf I declared these lands and the title itself hereditary.
Rudolf’s son, Holy Roman Emperor Albert I, was assassinated in 1308. This led to the suppression of the imperial title for more than a century. In the early fifteenth century, Albert V of Austria married a daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund. After Sigismund’s death, Albert succeeded him as king of Bohemia and Hungary. In 1438, Albert became the German king as Albert II. From this time on, except for the short period from 1742 to 1745, the head of the House of Hapsburg was elected both the German king and the Holy Roman emperor.
In 1453, Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III elevated Austria to an archduchy. In 1471, Frederick acquired Fiume. During this time, he was in constant warfare against Matthias Corvinus, king of Bohemia and Hungary. The task of consolidating the empire would fall on the shoulders of his son, Maximilian. After becoming emperor in 1493, Maximilian I, through his shrewd diplomacy, was in a large measure responsible for the establishment of Hapsburg domination of Europe and its politics until the beginning of the twentieth century. Maximilian’s marriage to Mary of Burgundy brought the family the Bourguignon inheritance in the Low Countries. His son Philip’s marriage to Joanna of Castile brought Aragon and Castile in Spain into the empire. His successor, Charles V, inherited Spain and its overseas empire, parts of Italy, the Netherlands, and the Hapsburg German and Austrian possessions. The Hapsburgs were at the zenith of their power, control, and prestige. After his abdication in 1556, Charles V left all his holdings to his son Philip II of Spain. This meant that Philip II ruled Spain, the Netherlands, the Italian provinces, and the overseas empire. At the same time, Charles’s brother, Emperor Ferdinand I, ruled Austria, Bohemia, and Hungary.
During the reign of Charles V, the king of Spain and emperor of Germany, the Hapsburgs ruled over much of Europe in the first half of the sixteenth century, a time when the continent was beginning to establish itself as the dominant trading region of the world. (Library of Congress)
After the death of Charles, the House of Hapsburg was divided in two. The Austrian branch retained the imperial title. However, even with this division the Spanish and Austrian branches fought together during the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648). Additionally, they fought the French in the Third Dutch War (1672–1678) as well as in the War of the Grand Alliance (1688–1697). This much warfare led to a major decline in resources for the Hapsburgs.
The extinction of the Spanish Hapsburg line in 1700 led to the War of the Spanish Succession at the beginning of the eighteenth century. After the Peace of Utrecht in 1713 and the Treaty of Rastatt in 1714, Spain was no longer part of the Hapsburg empire. The family holdings had been reduced significantly. The war shifted economic power to Great Britain, which received the asiento from Spain granting the British the exclusive monopoly on the importation of slaves into the Spanish New World. The French lost their lucra tive fishing rights along the North Atlantic seaboard. The Austrian Hapsburgs received the Italian provinces, except for Sicily, and the southern Netherlands. Shortly, the male line of the Austrian Hapsburgs would cease to exist, thereby creating more hereditary complications.
By the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713, Charles attained the constant indivisibility of the Hapsburg lands as well as the right of succession of his daughter Maria Theresa. When Charles VI died in 1740, the male line of the Austrian Hapsburgs ended. On the death of Charles Albert of Bavaria, Holy Roman emperor as Charles VII, and the only non-Hapsburg to rule since 1438, the imperial title was bestowed on Archduchess Maria Theresa’s husband, Francis. He was the grand duke of Tuscany and the former duke of Lorraine, and became Emperor Francis I. Their marriage in 1736 had created the House of Hapsburg-Lorraine. In 1740, the Prussians invaded Austria, a move that resulted in the War of Austrian Succession. During the conflict, which was also known as King George’s War, territory changed hands, but at the conclusion of the war most of the gains were returned in the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748, except for some Austrian lands that the Prussians retained.
Maria Theresa, unhappy with the outcome of the war, attacked Prussia in 1756, thus precipitating the Seven Years’ War, also known as the French and Indian War. This conflict affected trade worldwide. As a result of the fighting, the European nations verged on bankruptcy. Increased taxation and the imposition of taxes by the British on their American colonies led to the American Revolution. French attempts to force the British out of India resulted in British control over the subcontinent and its pepper and cotton trade in the postwar period. Britain emerged as the dominant world power as a result of its victory in this conflict.
At this point, the Hapsburgs again split into two lines. One carried on the main Hapsburg heritage, and the other was the Hapsburg-Lorraine line. Maria Theresa’s grandson, Francis II, was the last Holy Roman emperor. During his reign, the Hapsburg empire played a leading role in the defense of Europe against Napoléon Bonaparte. In 1804, sensing the end for the Holy Roman empire, Francis II assumed the title of Francis I, emperor of Austria.
At the Congress of Vienna (1815), Francis was one of the most powerful European monarchs, even with Napoléon at the height of his power. Ferdinand I, Francis’s infirm son, proved unable to hold his office. During the Revolution of 1848, Ferdinand was compelled to abdicate in favor of his nephew, Francis Joseph (Franz Josef). Francis Joseph ruled from 1848 until 1916. In 1859, Austria lost its possessions in Italy. The Prussians assumed the role of leaders even as that of the German Hapsburgs declined.
The Hapsburg realm was restructured in 1867 as the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary. The assassination of heir apparent Francis Ferdinand in 1914 brought about World War I. This along with the death of Francis Joseph in 1916 left his grandnephew, Emperor Charles I, to witness the defeat of Austria-Hungary.
The Austro-Hungarian empire was dissolved after Charles’s abdication in 1918. The Hapsburgs were the ruling house of Austria from 1218 until the end of World War I in 1918. The new Austrian republic banished the Hapsburgs in 1919. Charles attempted to regain his Hungarian throne in 1921, but his efforts proved unsuccessful. He died in exile. Charles’s son, Archduke Otto, succeeded him as head of the Hapsburgs. In 1961, Archduke Otto petitioned the government to allow him to return to Austria as a private citizen. Otto’s request was granted in 1963. He became a resident of West Germany.
Peter E. Carr
See also: World War I.
Evans, R.J.W. The Making of the Hapsburg Monarchy, 1550–1700: An Interpretation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979.
Kann, R.A. A History of the Habsburg Empire, 1526–1918. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977.