engleski

19th-century Towns in the Croatian and Slavonian Military Border: Architectural Reform and Modernisation on the Borders of the Habsburg Monarchy

The Military Border was an administrative unit within the Habsburg Monarchy formed in the 16th century, in order to consolidate the protection of the monarchy against the Ottoman Empire, and abolished in 1881. The last century of its existence was marked by a series of reforms which included architecture as well. Since it was under the direct rule of the Viennese Court Council of War, that is, under the Ministry of War from 1848, the Border was dominated by the same architectural styles that were characteristic of the monarchy’s capital. In order to modernize the parts on the very borders of the country and thereby firmly secure the opposing position to the Ottoman Empire, Viennese administration launched in this rural and poor area the construction of new public buildings, primarily military barracks and houses for military officers, but also of Catholic and Orthodox churches, schools, and buildings for courts and administration. Designs for these buildings were either made by architects sent to the Border from Vienna or they originated in various Viennese institutions. Due to these architectural endeavours, numerous towns in the Military Border were rebuilt from the end of the 18th to the mid-19th century: Bjelovar, Nova Gradiška, Slavonski Brod, Vinkovci, Petrinja, Glina, Karlovac, Ogulin, Otočac, Senj etc. Partial reason for that could be Vienna’s wish to demonstrate to the Ottoman Empire the military, economic and cultural power of the Habsburg Monarchy. The aim of this paper/presentation is to show that the architecture in the towns of the Military Border, that were located in the close vicinity to the Ottoman Empire, did not contain elements which had originated in Islamic/Ottoman architecture that could be seen on the other side of the border, in the territory of the present-day Bosnia and Herzegovina, or hybrid architectural motifs featuring both European and Ottoman styles. It was, rather, comprised of elements that represented modest interpretations of contemporary Western European architectural styles (Neoclassicism, Romanticism and Historicism/Neo-Renaissance). Neoclassicism emerged as the dominant style during the reign of Joseph II (1780-1790), when in public and religious architecture of the Habsburg Monarchy peculiar aesthetics of austerity begun to be promoted. The austerity policy continued during the reign of his successors Leopold II, Francis I, and Ferdinand I especially after Austria went bankrupt in 1811. Budget savings and uniformity in building projects, characteristic for the whole Habsburg Monarchy, were even more accentuated in the Military Border. The architecture of the time reflected the conservative nature of the regime, which maintained the old feudal order preventing greater industrialization and modernization of the country. The new buildings were treated as Nutzbau – functional buildings needed to accommodate numerous newly established institutions. Accordingly, their facades were very simple, while the layouts relied on the formulas developed in the royal planning offices (mostly in Genie Haupt Amt) and engineering academies in Vienna. After the revolution of 1848/1849 situation changed. New government of the Habsburg Monarchy headed by the new emperor Franz Joseph I, started to promote first Romanticism, that is Rundbogenstil as a new official style, and then, from late 1860s Neo-Renaissance, which spread through the Military Border almost immediately. Buildings in the Military Border towns were again more modest than those in Vienna or bigger cities in the Monarchy, both in size and in terms of facade decoration, due primarily to lack of money. Despite the moneysaving efforts the facades of these buildings show significantly greater inclination towards the picturesque and greater focus on architectural decoration which was practically completely suppressed from this area architecture in the first half of the 19th century.

Habsburg Monarchy; Military Border; Croatia; Neoclassicism; Baroque Classicism; Plattenstil; Biedermeier; Romanticism; Neo-Renaissance; Historicism; Vienna

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