Transylvania (Ottoman vassal), Principality of
Substate | Defunct
1566 CE to 1692 CE
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Central Hungary becomes a province of the Ottoman Empire ruled by pashas living in Buda.
The Turks' only interest is to secure their hold on the territory.
The Sublime Porte (a term used to designate the Ottoman rulers) becomes the sole landowner and manages about twenty percent of the land for its own benefit, apportioning the rest among soldiers and civil servants.
The new landlords are interested mainly in squeezing as much wealth from the land as quickly as possible.
Wars, slave-taking, and the emigration of nobles who lose their land depopulates much of the countryside.
However, the Turks practice religious tolerance and allow the Hungarians living within the empire significant autonomy in internal affairs.
Towns maintain some self-government, and a prosperous middle class develops through artisanry and trade.
The partition of Hungary between the Ottoman and Habsburg empires will last more than one hundred and fifty years.
Habsburg Austria controls Royal Hungary, which consists of counties along the Austrian border and some of northwestern Croatia.
The Ottomans annex central and southern Hungary.
Transylvania becomes an Ottoman vassal state, where native princes, who pay the Turks tribute, rule with considerable autonomy.
After the Hungarian defeat at Mohács, the Protestant Reformation takes hold in Hungary.
Initially, German burghers in Transylvania and Royal Hungary adopt Lutheranism; later, John Calvin's works convert many Magyars in Transylvania and central Hungary.
The Reformation spreads quickly, and by the early seventeenth century hardly any noble families remain
Catholic Archbishop Péter Pázmány reorganizes Royal Hungary's Roman Catholic Church and leads a Counter-Reformation that reverses the Protestants' gains in Royal Hungary, using persuasion rather than intimidation.
Transylvania, however, remain a Protestant stronghold.
The Reformation causes rifts between Catholic Magyars, who often side with the Habsburgs, and Protestant Magyars, who develop a strong national identity and become rebels in Austrian eyes.
Chasms also develop between Royal Hungary and Transylvania and between the mostly Catholic magnates and the mainly Protestant lesser nobles.
Royal Hungary becomes a small part of the Habsburg Empire and enjoys little influence in Vienna.
The Habsburg king directly controls Royal Hungary's financial, military, and foreign affairs, and imperial troops guard its borders.
The Habsburgs avoid filling the office of palatine to prevent the holder's amassing too much power.
In addition, the so-called Turkish question divides the Habsburgs and the Hungarians: Vienna wants to maintain peace with the Turks; the Hungarians want the Ottomans ousted.
As the Hungarians recognize the weakness of their position, many become anti-Habsburg.
They complain about foreign rule, the behavior of foreign garrisons, and the Habsburgs' recognition of Turkish sovereignty in Transylvania.
Protestants, who are persecuted in Royal Hungary, consider the Counter-Reformation a greater menace than the Turks, however.
Ferdinand had recognized after the Turkish siege of Vienna in 1529, that defense of the Habsburg lands required that Hungary form a bulwark against the Turks.
Although Turkey's ultimate objective is the conquest of Europe, Western Europe does not see the Turks as a threat and is unwilling to aid Ferdinand in the defense of the continent's eastern borders.
He thus signs a peace agreement with the Turks in 1562 that formalizes the stalemated status quo in Hungary.
The anti-Habsburg rebellions reflect the rising tensions between Catholics and Protestants in the early 1600s.
Proponents of the Counter-Reformation, often operating under Habsburg protection, are reaping the fruits of a generation of work: monastic life is reviving, Catholic intellectual life is regaining confidence, and prominent figures are returning to the Catholic Church.
As a result, Protestants are increasingly on the defensive. The German princes split into two military camps based on religious affiliation: the Evangelical Union and the Catholic League.
Ferdinand I dies in 1564, and Habsburg territories in Central Europe are divided among his three sons, with the eldest, Maximilian III.(r. 1564-76), becoming Holy Roman Emperor.
Although Maximilian's sympathetic policies toward the Protestants contrast with his brothers' efforts to reestablish Catholicism as the sole religion in their lands, military policy, not religious doctrine, is to divide the dynasty in the final years of the sixteenth century and open the door to the religious wars of the seventeenth century.
After the Turks reopen the war in Hungary in 1593, Rudolf is blamed for the rebellion among Protestant nobles in Royal Hungary caused by his brutal conduct of the war.
Backed by junior members of the dynasty, Rudolf's younger brother, Matthias (r. 1612-19), confiscates Rudolf's lands, restores order, and, after Rudolf's death, becomes Holy Roman Emperor, but the religious and political concessions that the two brothers have made to the nobility to win their support in this dynastic feud creates new dangers for the Habsburgs.
To facilitate Ferdinand's eventual election as Holy Roman Emperor, Matthias secures his election as king of Bohemia in 1617.
Before accepting Ferdinand as king, however, the Protestant nobility of Bohemia had required this strong proponent of the Catholic Counter-Reformation to confirm the religious charter granted them by Rudolf II.
A dispute over the charter in 1618 triggers a rebellion by the Protestant nobles.
Hopes for an arbitrated settlement are dashed when Matthias dies in March 1619, and other areas under Habsburg control rebel against Habsburg rule.
A Bohemian diet in August 1619 elects as king the Protestant elector-prince of the Palatinate, Frederick V, and the conclave of elector-princes elect Ferdinand II (r. 1619-37) Holy Roman Emperor.
On November 8, 1620, a force combining troops from the Catholic League and the imperial army decisively defeats Frederick V's largely mercenary force at the Battle of White Mountain.
Throughout the 1620s, the combined imperial and Catholic forces maintain the offensive in Germany, enabling Ferdinand to establish his authority in the Hereditary Lands, Bohemia, and Hungary.
Ferdinand, equating Protestantism with disloyalty, imposes religious restrictions throughout the Hereditary Lands.
In 1627 he implements a long-planned decree to make Bohemia a one-confession state: Protestants are given six months to convert or leave the country.
In the face of a strong Hungarian nationalist movement headed by the Calvinist prince of Transylvania, however, Ferdinand can maintain his hold on Royal Hungary only by confirming guarantees of religious freedom.