Die europäischen Mächte und der "Lange Türkenkrieg" Kaiser Rudolfs II. (1593-1606) By Jan Paul Niederkorn (review)

448 BOOK REVIEWS others practiced a discreet Calvinism safely ensconced on their landed estates. In this way, royal persecution reinforced the family's provincial character; the unifying aspirations of Versailles paradoxically served to strengthen regional differences in the realm. Like Robert Forster's The Nobility of Toulouse, published a generation ago, Mentzer shows how equal portions of constancy and resilience enabled noble families like the Lacgers to endure through the upheavals of the Ancien Régime and beyond. Michael Wolfe Pennsylvania State University—Altoona Die europäischen Mächte und der "Lange Türkenkrieg" Kaiser Rudolfs II. (1593—1606). By Jan Paul Niederkorn. [Archiv für österreichische Geschichte, Band 135.] (Vienna: Verlag de Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. 1993. Pp. viii, 559. Paperback.) The "Long Turkish War" of Emperor Rudolf II from 1593 to 1606 was one of the many conflicts between the Empire, with the Habsburg states in the forefront and assisted by the Papacy, and the Ottoman Empire which were a feature of early modern European history and a part of die long contest between Christendom and Muslim powers. Niederkorn's purpose is to investigate , first, die efforts of the emperor and the pope to secure, from states not directly involved in the war, support in the form of alliances, troops, and subsidies; secondly, the response of these states; and, thirdly, the reasons behind their response. In doing this, he provides insights into the domestic as well as the foreign policy of the various states. After brief remarks on the contemporary negative image of the Turks in Europe and a rather clumsy, annalistic treatment of the years 1590 to 1606, there follows a long chapter assessing the situation and role of the states that directly participated in the conflict: the Ottoman Empire, still despite its weaknesses perhaps the strongest military power in the world; the Ottoman vassal states, Transylvania, Moldavia, and Wallachia; the Empire and the Habsburg lands; and the Papacy, under Clement VIII (1592-1605) the principal advocate of war against the Turks. The balance of the book then is devoted to the European states: England, France, Spain, Venice, Tuscany, Ferrara/Modena , Mantua, and smaller Italian states, Moscow, Denmark, Poland, and the Knights of Malta. Each state is treated individually, a procedure the author justifies by his desire to make easily available to scholars his discussion of individual states without requiring them to read die whole volume, and the first four are discussed at considerable length. Despite the rhetoric of Christian solidarity and the popularity of military campaigns against the Turks among large sectors of the European population, only the Papacy, according to Niederkorn, was not driven primarily in its BOOK REVIEWS 449 Turkish policy by its own security interests or by the pursuit ofgoals unrelated to the war itself. Clement VIII never conditioned support for Rudolf on the taking of measures against the Protestants in the Empire, and he saw in his advocacy ofwar against the Turks an opportunity to exercise his role aspadre commune of Christendom in the post-Reformation era. The Papacy's financial contribution Niederkorn calculates at roughly 2.85 million florins, which was outdistanced only by the imperial estates with 20 million and Spain with 3.75 million. Spanish support, which increased significantly under Philip IH after the conclusion ofpeace with France ( 1 598) and England ( 1604), was dictated above all, according to the author, not by religious or dynastic considerations but by the desire to keep the Turks occupied in the east and so uninterested in harassing Spanish territory in the Mediterranean. Venice withheld contributions not because of fear for its commercial interests in the Levant but of retaliatory attacks on its own territories; moreover, an increasing paralysis of the Venetian governmental apparatus hindered the taking of any effective decision at a time when secret aid to the emperor was seriously considered. Niederkorn devotes interesting pages to the machinations and rivalry of the English and French ambassadors in Constantinople, neither of whose states effectively supported the emperor. This bulky volume is impressive in its scope and in the range of its sources both primary and secondary; occasionally it is excessive in its detail and seems to lose focus. A weakness is the...