This book is the first monographic attempt to follow the environmental changes that took place in the frontier zone of the Ottoman Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. On the one hand, it looks at how the Ottoman–Hungarian wars affected the landscapes of the Carpathian Basin – specifically, the frontier zone. On the other hand, it examines how the environment was used in the military tactics of the opposing realms. By taking into consideration both perspectives, this book intends to pursue the dynamic interplay between war, environment, and local society in the early modern period.
- Cover
- Table of Contents
- Note on Names
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction
- 1.1 Frontier, Border – Do They Mean Anything?
- 1.2 The Development of the Ottoman-Hungarian Frontier – The Scene
- 1.3 Transdanubia and the Great Hungarian Plain – The Setting of the War
- 1.4 The Book’s Concept
- 2 From the Center to the Frontier
- The Environment of Central Transdanubia in the Early Modern Period
- 2.1 Why Hydrography Matters: Military Defense and Waterscape in the Kingdom of Hungary
- 2.2 Summary
- 3 A Century of Water?
- The Rába Valley in the Seventeenth Century
- 3.1 Primary Sources from a Town by the River
- 3.2 The Rába at Körmend
- 3.3 Floods – The Unintended Consequences of Dams and Mills?
- 3.4 Low Water – An Even Less Fortunate Event?
- 3.5 Was Körmend an Exception? Some Conclusions
- 4 From Endless Forests to Meadows and Wastelands?
- What Happened to the Forests Along the Border?
- 4.1 Forest Resources in the Carpathian Basin in Pre-Modern Times – Endless or Scarce?
- 4.2 Reconstructing Forest Cover in the Early Modern Period – Perspectives and Limitations
- 4.3 Forms of Wood Consumption in Early Modern Hungary – Paved Road to Deforestation?
- 4.4 The Biggest “New” Consumer? The Wood Consumption of the Military Defense in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries
- 4.5 Forests in the Hinterlands – What Were They Used For? – A Brief Outlook
- 4.6 Conclusions
- 5 Conclusions
- 5.1 Epilogue – What Came After?
- Appendices
- Bibliography
- Index of Geographic Names
- Index of Personal Names
- List of Figures
- Figure 1.1 Major geographical units of the Carpathian Basin (drawn by Béla Nagy)
- Figure 1.2 The Ottoman Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in the second half of the sixteenth century (drawn by Béla Nagy)
- Figure 2.1 The map of Woldemár Lászlóffy, “Water-Covered Areas and Wetlands in the Carpathian Basin Before the Beginning of Flood Protection and Drainage Works.”
- Figure 2.2 The Rábaköz on the detail of a manuscript map from 167346
- Figure 2.3a-b The settlements, dams, fords, and buildings referred to in the 1543–1544 survey of the Rába River
- Figure 3.1 The estate complex of the Batthyány family in the middle of the seventeenth century
- Figure 3.2 Geographical coverage of the private letters studied
- Figure 3.3. Annual distribution of letters studied from Körmend and Csákány (1600–1659)
- Figure 3.4 Körmend in the 1570s
- Figure 3.5 The beginning and length of the reconstruction of the Traun bridge at Wels in the light of the bridge masters’ accounts (1521–1574)47
- Figure 3.6 The dates of building work on the mill dam and Körmend’s fortifications by calendar years (the period marked in gray is the most frequent period)
- Figure 3.7 The seasonal distribution of letters sent from Körmend (1600–1659)
- Figure 3.8 The number and seasonality of floods on the Rába River (1543–1658)
(Gray background indicates more than 20 letters per year)
- Figure 3.9 Classification of the intensity of historical floods in Western and Central Europe108
- Figure 3.10 The magnitude of the floods on the Rába between [1543] 1600 and 1659112
(Gray background indicates more than 20 letters per year)
- Figure 4.1 Forest cover in the Carpathian Basin in the Late Middle Ages and the frontier zone in the early modern period (after Szabó, Woodland and Forests)
- Figure 4.2 The population fluctuation of the counties of Transdanubia from the late medieval period to the late eighteenth century
- Figure 4.3 The main types of earth and wood fortifications used in the Carpathian Basin108
- Figure 5.1 Malomsok and the branches of the Rába on the First Military Survey
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