Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
meekly accepted his fate. When the Austrian imperial army conquered Belgrade in 1718
the grand vizier's head was dug up and brought back to Vienna in triumph.
Austria's greatest military hero, Prince Eugene of Savoy, was in fact French. Refused entry to the French
army by Louis XIV, Eugene went on to humiliate him on the battlefield.
Maria Theresia & the Enlightenment
Maria Theresia (1717-80), whose plump figure in stone fills a regal stool on Maria-
Theresian-Platz in Vienna today, was something of the mother of the nation. Thrust into
the limelight when her father died with no male heirs, she ruled for 40 years while also
managing to give birth to 16 children - among them Marie Antoinette, future wife of
Louis XVI. Maria Theresia's fourth child, Joseph II, weighed a daunting 7kg at birth.
Although Maria Theresia is famous for her many enlightened reforms, she was re-
markably prudish for a family that had married and bred its way to power. One of her
less-popular measures was the introduction of the short-lived Commission Against Im-
moral Conduct in 1752, which raided private homes, trying to catch men entertaining
loose women - the commission even tried to snare Casanova during his visit to Vienna,
throwing him out of the city in 1767.
Maria Theresia's low take on fornication (and Casanova's womanising and proclivity
for urinating in public) was no doubt coloured by the conduct of her husband, Francis I,
who was apparently very adept and enthusiastic when it came to fornication. Yet despite
her husband's philandering, Maria Theresia felt she should remain loyal to her spouse,
and when he died suddenly in 1765 she stayed in mourning for the rest of her life. She re-
treated to Schloss Schönbrunn in Vienna, left the running of the state in the hands of
Joseph II (of 7kg fame) as co-regent, and adopted a low profile and chaste existence.
The period of the Enlightenment began under Maria Theresia and continued during the
co-reign of Joseph II in the late 18th century. Vienna was transformed from being a place
in which the Habsburgs lived and ruled into an administrative capital. A functioning bur-
eaucracy was established for the first time and this was directly responsible to the mon-
archy. Joseph was mostly of the same mettle as his mother. He ushered in a period of
greater religious tolerance and in 1781 an edict ensured Protestants would enjoy equal
rights with Catholics. While decrees gave Jews much more freedom, paving the way for
a more active role in trade and education, paradoxically he promoted assimilation of Jews
into the Austrian mainstream, banning whatever customs he thought hindered this.
