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Habsburg-Ottoman Diplomacy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 May 2026

Robyn Dora Radway Open the ORCID record for Robyn Dora Radway [Opens in a new window]
Robyn Dora Radway*
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Historical Studies, Central European University , Austria
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Email: radwayr@ceu.edu
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Abstract

The study of early modern diplomatic relations between the Central European Habsburg monarchy and the Ottoman Empire has a robust tradition based on the analysis of a rich body of primary sources preserved mostly in the Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv of the Austrian State Archives. This introduction provides a brief overview of the historiography, the place of the present articles in this tradition, and suggests several directions for future research.

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introductiondiplomatic history

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Austrian History Yearbook , First View , pp. 1 - 6
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© The Author(s), 2026. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Regents of the University of Minnesota

The study of early modern diplomatic relations between the Central European Habsburg monarchy and the Ottoman Empire has a robust tradition based on the analysis of a rich body of primary sources preserved mostly in the Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv of the Austrian State Archives. Given the multi-lingual and paleographically challenging nature of these sources, much of the initial work fell into the realm of philology, linguistics, and diplomatics.Footnote 1 Source editions of selected cross-border correspondence conducted between sultans, emperors, and their representatives offer a treasure trove of raw material from which to work.Footnote 2 A few large-scale projects have also taken on the full-text publication of Habsburg ambassadorial reports.Footnote 3 On a much smaller scale, scholars have also published estate inventories and pay registers of specific Habsburg resident ambassadors to the Ottoman court.Footnote 4 Of all the primary sources available, the hundreds of travel narratives written by members of delegations have received the most attention.Footnote 5

This rich tradition serves as the foundation upon which much interpretive historical work has followed. Close readings of archival sources have proven most fruitful in the detailed analysis of the wording used in ratified copies of peace treaties to show how agreements accommodated multiple interpretations simultaneously.Footnote 6 Most numerous are the studies reconstructing the activities of individual diplomats working for Habsburg rulers.Footnote 7 Though often less well-documented, the activities of certain Ottoman envoys to Vienna over the centuries have also received attention.Footnote 8 Targeted studies and collected volumes have appeared on the negotiations leading to individual peace treaties.Footnote 9 Others have examined debated themes like the lack of diplomatic reciprocity on the part of the Ottomans, the nature of the yearly “honorable present” or “tribute payment” delivered regularly by the Habsburgs to the Porte, and the contested claims of conquest measured according to an Ottoman tax register.Footnote 10

Much of the scholarship published in the last two to three decades can be characterized by the methodological trends that are collectively known as the “new diplomatic history.”Footnote 11 This interdisciplinary approach examines how socio-cultural practices not only conditioned but also constituted political relations. Thus, the focus shifts from the text of a specific treaty or the biography of an ambassador to the actions, mechanisms, rituals, and material culture of a wide range of actors involved in intercultural relations across the political units of analysis. This type of scholarship involves reevaluating the practice of diplomacy by focusing on symbolic communication, thereby examining embassies as a series of multimedia interactions in which clothing, music, gift giving, border crossing, and courtly ceremonies all play central roles.Footnote 12 It also expands the circle of actors being studied to include translators, converts, and other intermediaries who acted as go-betweens and agents in both formal and informal capacities.Footnote 13 Some studies have focused on the individuals, modes, and infrastructures of spying and secrecy.Footnote 14 Others use similar sources to explore diplomatic knowledge production, compilation, and transfer as well as the breakdown of communication in these systems.Footnote 15 Many scholars have moved away from state-centered approaches to reevaluate the role of actors and activities in the borderlands, arguing for their significance in inter-imperial relations.Footnote 16 What emerges is a more nuanced and complicated picture of the entangled diplomatic practices that defined and regulated the relationship between the Habsburgs and the Ottomans. As this field of new diplomatic history matures, a new generation of scholars with training in digital humanities has started a debate about the merits of combining these approaches with tools developed in social network analysis, natural language processing, and prosopography.Footnote 17

The authors in the present forum are deeply engaged in digital source publication projects and connect their contributions to trends in the “New Diplomatic History.”Footnote 18 The article by Saeedi, Vogelsberger, and Yılmaz presents the results of a digital critical edition of eighteen letters written in Ottoman Turkish by Grand Vizier Sokollu Mehmed Pasha (in office 1565–79) to the Habsburg court. They argue that such correspondence served as a strategic instrument of governance and self-representation, revealing how Mehmed Pasha carefully crafted his diplomatic persona as both a trustworthy mediator and a coercive intimidator. Zsuzsanna Cziráki’s article examines the relationship between professional bureaucratic approaches to diplomatic activity between 1606 and 1683 and Central European knowledge production about “the East.” She argues that the Aulic War Council (Hofkriegsrat) created a set of cultural practices in which modalities of collecting and understanding information transcended military rivalry. Her analysis of chancellery practices focuses on three dimensions: geopolitical scope, diplomatic actors, and the accumulation of knowledge. In doing so, she also explains the structure, key actors, and operational mechanisms of the diplomatic arm of the Council itself. Yasir Yılmaz’s individual contribution focuses on archival asymmetries between materials preserved in the Austrian and Turkish archives using three case studies: the negotiations prior to the second siege of Vienna in the summer of 1682, the embassy exchange following the Treaty of Carlowitz in 1699, and the embassy exchange following the Treaty of Passarowitz in 1718. He argues that the Habsburg information apparatus described by Cziráki had developed into a sophisticated information-gathering regime that remained unmatched on the Ottoman side. His findings highlight the lack of consistency, continuity, and breadth of Ottoman record-keeping, information-gathering, and archival-preservation capabilities. Finally, Arno Strohmeyer’s contribution explores the role and practice of secrecy in diplomatic correspondence in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Examining the use of terminology related to secrecy (geheim, vertraut, secret, and privat) in a selection of ambassadorial reports that have been processed in the digital QhoD platform, he outlines how secrecy played a defining role in the diplomats’ negotiations, information gathering, and reporting.

While many gaps still exist in the scholarly literature about specific individuals, institutions, and practices, three interrelated overarching themes should be tackled in the coming years: an account of changes in archival practices as they relate to diplomatic documents, a study of representational (il)-legitimacy in both Ottoman and Habsburg foreign relations, and the writing of a new narrative that consolidates recent scholarship while staying close to the diplomatic sources.

The increasing accessibility of published source editions and digital surrogates invites critical engagement with the archival record as a whole. This scholarship would build on recent trends in critical data approaches to digital humanities and the so-called “archival turn,” which examines the historical conditions under which archival institutions emerged and changed over time.Footnote 19 On the one hand, this involves a deeper study of early modern chancellery praxis like the work Cziráki shares here and elsewhere.Footnote 20 On the other, this also involves systematically tackling the interventions of the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries that shaped the collections that are rapidly being digitized and made accessible to scholars around the world.Footnote 21 Thus, in Turkey, the focus would be on archivists in 1845 who established the Turkish Central Archives (Hazine-i Evrak), those active around 1907–11 (Imre Karácson, Ali Emîrî Efendi, Muallim Cevdettel), and the activities of the commission charged with collecting and organizing materials in 1932.Footnote 22 In Austria, this would examine the establishment, organization, and reorganization of the Turcica, Hungarica, and Türkische Urkunden collections by the likes of Antal Gévay, Karl von Buschmann, and Eduard von Adelburg.Footnote 23 Importantly, the history of systematic record keeping and organization did not develop in a linear fashion and curious archival imbalances exist within the materials preserved in the Austrian State Archives as well.Footnote 24 Equally important would be to develop a more comprehensive understanding of the changing relationship between private archives and those preserved by state institutions on both sides of the border. This involves studying the family collections preserved by regional elites whose records long remained outside imperial repositories.Footnote 25

A second theme that should be systematically addressed is the question of representational (il)-legitimacy. Already in the sixteenth century, members of the Aulic War Council engaged in debates on the extent to which the ambassadors sent by the Habsburg court were considered representatives of the dynasty, a specific monarchy within their portfolio, or the Holy Roman Empire itself.Footnote 26 While few would argue against calling the early modern Ottoman state an “empire,” diplomatic decision making did not consistently flow from the imperial center and disputes regularly emerged over the legitimacy of negotiations undertaken by regional stakeholders. This is particularly relevant for the agents sent by tributary states and regencies at the edges of Ottoman spheres of control. These issues remain mostly unresolved in both the primary sources and in the secondary literature. This is evident from the terminology used to describe the political units united under the term “Habsburg” throughout the secondary literature. Important work has been done on the contested claims over Transylvania and portions of Royal Hungary.Footnote 27 These debates are particularly interesting for readers of the Austrian History Yearbook because the imperial/royal question offers an opportunity to connect to colleagues across the early modern/modern divide.

Finally, there is now a critical mass of published primary sources and a wealth of secondary literature covering the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries that allows for a nuanced picture of the relationship between the Habsburgs and Ottomans to emerge. Few studies have sought to characterize the nature of Habsburg-Ottoman diplomatic relations across longer stretches of time, pointing instead to moments of reconfiguration, renewal, and rupture. The view that emerges from scholarship published over the past few decades differs, both in its details and in the broader narrative arch, from much of the widely read and cited scholarship available in English, which often focuses on antagonism and open warfare between the two rivals.Footnote 28 Debates about the “hereditary enemy (Erbfeind)” and the “land of warfare (dar-ul-harb),” which defined some public discourse, find little space in the day-to-day diplomatic relationship between these two neighbors. Now would be a great time for scholars to write a new interpretation.

References

1 For early publications of sources in Latin, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Ottoman Turkish, and Hungarian see Anton von Gévay, Urkunden und Actenstücke zur Geschichte der Verhältnisse zwischen Österreich, Ungern und der Pforte im XVI. und XVII. Jahrhunderte, 3 vols. (Schaumburg, 1838–42); Lajos Fekete, Einführung in die osmanisch-türkische Diplomatik der türkischen Botmässigkeit in Ungarn (Budapest, 1926) and Sándor Takáts et al., eds., A Budai basák magyar nyelvű levelezése (1553–1589) [Hungarian-language correspondence of the Buda pashas (1553–1589)] (Budapest, 1915).

2 Anton C. Schaendlinger and Claudia Römer, eds., Die Schreiben Süleymāns des Prächtigen an Karl V., Ferdinand I. und Maximilian II (Vienna, 1983) and Gisela Procházka-Eisl and Claudia Römer, eds., Osmanische Beamtenschreiben und Privatbriefe der Zeit Süleymāns des Prächtigen aus dem Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv zu Wien (Vienna, 2007); Gustav Bayerle, ed., Ottoman Diplomacy in Hungary: Letters from the Pashas of Buda, 1590–1593 (Bloomington, IN, 1972); Gustav Bayerle, ed., The Hungarian Letters of Ali Pasha of Buda: 1604–1616 (Budapest, 1991); Gábor Kármán, ed., The Correspondence of the Beylerbeys of Buda, 1617–1630 (Budapest, 2022).

3 See László Szalay and Gusztáv Wenzel, eds., Verancsics Antal összes munkái [The complete works of Antal Verancsics], 12 vols. (Budapest, 1857–75) and Karl Nehring, ed., Austro-Turcica, 1541–1552: diplomatische Akten des habsburgischen Gesandtschaftsverkehrs mit der Hohen Pforte, im Zeitalter Süleymans des Prächtigen, with Srećko M. Džaja and Günter Weiss (Munich, 1995); István Fazekas et al., eds., Reports of the Habsburg Envoys in Constantinople: 1568–1574, 2 vols. (Budapest, 2025).

4 Dóra Kerekes, “Johann Christoph von Kindsberg konstantinápolyi császári követ hagyatéki leltára 1678-ból [The estate inventory of imperial ambassador to Constantinople Johann Christoph von Kindsberg from 1678],” Lymbus: Magyarságtudományi Forrásközlemények 1 (2003): 151–79; Tobias P. Graf, Preis der Diplomatie: Die Abrechnungen der kaiserlichen Gesandten an der Hohen Pforte, 1580–1583 (Heidelberg, 2016).

5 The best overviews of travel narratives (both published and unpublished) are Stéphane Yerasimos, Les voyageurs dans l’Empire Ottoman, XIVe–XVIe siècles: bibliografie, itinéraires et inventaire des lieux habités (Ankara, 1991) and Elisabetta Borromeo, Voyageurs occidentaux dans l’empire ottoman, 1600–1644 (Paris, 2007).

6 Sándor Papp, Die Verleihungs-, Bekräftigungs- und Vertragsurkunden der Osmanen für Ungarn und Siebenbürgen: eine quellenkritische Untersuchung (Vienna, 2003); Ernst Dieter Petritsch, “Dissimulieren in den habsburgisch-osmanischen Friedens- und Waffenstillstandsverträgen (16.–17. Jahrhundert): Differenzen und Divergenzen,” in Frieden und Konfliktmanagement in interkulturellen Räumen: das Osmanische Reich und die Habsburgermonarchie in der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Arno Strohmeyer and Norbert Spannenberger (Stuttgart, 2013).

7 Some recent examples include Zsuzsanna Cziráki, “Zur Person und Erwählung des kaiserlichen Residenten in Konstantinopel, Simon Reniger von Renningen (1649–1666),” in Wiener Archivforschungen: Festschrift für den ungarischen Archivdelegierten in Wien, István Fazekas, ed. Zsuzsanna Cziráki et al., (Vienna, 2014); James D. Tracy, “The Ambassador as Third Party: Busbecq’s Summary Account for the Year 1559,” Acta Histriae 22, no. 2 (2014): 195–206; Özgür Kolçak, “Habsburg Elçisi Walter Leslie’nin Osmanlı Ziyareti: Bir Tarihsel Anlatı İnşası (1665–1666) [Imperial Ambassador Walter Leslie in Ottoman Realms: Constructing an Historical Narrative (1665–1666)],” Tarih Dergisi 79 (2023): 1–38.

8 Ernst Dieter Petritsch, “Die osmanische Großbotschaft und der Weltreisende Evliyâ Çelebi in Wien (1665/66),” in Die Schlacht von Mogersdorf/St. Gotthard und der Friede von Eisenburg/Vasvár 1664 Rahmenbedingungen, Akteure, Auswirkungen und Rezeption eines europäischen Ereignisses, ed. Karin Sperl et al. (Eisenstadt, 2016); Özgür Kolçak, “Sınır Diplomasisinden Saltanat Elçiliğine: bir 16. Yüzyıl Diplomasi Hikayesi Yahut Marcus Scherer/ Hidayet’in Esrarlı Sergüzeşti [From Frontier Diplomacy to Imperial Embassy: A 16th-Century Diplomatic Odyssey or the Mysterious Exploits of Marcus Scherer/ Hidayet],” Tarih Araştırmaları Dergisi 39 (2020): 139–214; Mahmut Halef Cevrioğlu, “Avusturya’da Osmanlı Diplomasisi: Büyükelçi Recep Ağa’nın Viyana Sefareti (1628–1629) [Ottoman Diplomacy in Austria: Recep Aga’s Embassy to Vienna (1628–1629)],” Osmanlı Tarihi Araştırma ve Uygulama Merkezi Dergisi 50 (2021): 81–111; Mahmut Halef Cevrioğlu, “Ottoman-Austrian Ceremonial Embassies of the First Half of the Seventeenth Century: The Selection of Ambassador Rıdvan Agha (1633),” Austrian History Yearbook 55 (2024): 19–35. Özgür Kolçak, “Bir Sefaret Hikâyesi (1665–1666): Kara Mehmed Paşa, Viyana Günleri, Elçilik Heyeti ve Sefaretnamesi [An Ottoman Envoy at Work (1665–1666): Kara Mehmed Pasha, His Stay in Vienna, Entourage, and Ambassadorial Report],” Osmanli Arastirmalari—Journal of Ottoman Studies 65 (2025): 95–149; David Do Paço, “Trans-Imperial Familiarity: Ottoman Ambassadors in Eighteenth-Century Vienna,” in Practices of Diplomacy in the Early Modern World, c. 1410–1800, ed. Tracey A. Sowerby and Jan Hennings (London, 2017).

9 Ernst Dieter Petritsch, “Der habsburgisch-osmanische Friedensvertrag des Jahres 1547,” Mitteilungen des Österreichischen Staatsarchivs 38 (1985): 49–80; Hajnalka Tóth, “The Circumstances and Documents of the Peace of Vasvár,” Archivum Ottomanicum 34 (2017): 243–56; Mahmut Halef Cevrioğlu, “Garmat (1625) ve Sön (1627) Muahedeleri [The Peace Treaties of Gyarmat (1625) and Szőny],” Ege ve Balkan Araştırmaları Dergisi 3, no. 2 (2016): 67–86; Charles W. Ingrao et al., eds., The Peace of Passarowitz, 1718, (West Lafayette, 2011); Colin Heywood and Ivan Parvev, eds., The Treaties of Carlowitz (1699): Antecedents, Course and Consequences (Leiden, 2020); Konstantinos Poulios, The Congress of Carlowitz (1698/99): Supra-Cultural Diplomatic Norms and Practices of Peacemaking at the End of the Seventeenth Century (Leiden, 2026).

10 A. Nuri Yurdusev, ed., Ottoman Diplomacy: Conventional or Unconventional? (Basingstoke, 2004); Ernst Dieter Petritsch, “Tribut oder Ehrengeschenk? Ein Beitrag zu den habsburgisch-osmanischen Beziehungen in der zweiten Halfte des 16. Jahrhunderts,” in Archiv und Forschung: Das Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv in seiner Bedeutung für die Geschichte Österreichs und Europas, ed. Elisabeth Springer and Leopold Kammerhofer (Vienna, 1993); James D. Tracy, “The Logic of Kleinkrieg: The ‘Book of Halil Beg’ in Habsburg-Ottoman Diplomacy, 1550–76,” Austrian History Yearbook 52 (2021): 85–101.

11 John Watkins, “Toward a New Diplomatic History of Medieval and Early Modern Europe,” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 38, no. 1 (2008): 1–14; Jan Hennings and Tracey A. Sowerby, “Introduction: Practices of Diplomacy,” in Practices of Diplomacy in the Early Modern World, c. 1410–1800, ed. Tracey A. Sowerby and Jan Hennings (London, 2017).

12 Ernst Dieter Petritsch, “Zeremoniell bei Empfängen habsburgischer Gesandtschaften in Konstantinopel,” in Diplomatisches Zeremoniell in Europa und im Mittleren Osten in der frühen Neuzeit, ed. Ralph Kauz et al. (Vienna, 2009); Hedda Reindl-Kiel, “Symbolik, Selbstbild und Beschwichtigungsstrategien: Diplomatische Geschenke der Osmanen für den Wiener Hof,” in Frieden und Konfliktmanagement in interkulturellen Räumen: das Osmanische Reich und die Habsburgermonarchie in der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Arno Strohmeyer and Norbert Spannenberger (Stuttgart, 2013); Harriet Rudolph, “The Material Culture of Diplomacy: The Impact of Objects on the Dynamics of Habsburg-Ottoman Negotiations at the Sublime Porte (1530–1650),” in Politische Kommunikation zwischen Imperien Der diplomatische Aktionsraum Südost- und Osteuropa, ed. Gunda Barth-Scalmani et al. (Innsbruck, 2013); Zsuzsanna Cziráki, “Ruha teszi a követet? A Habsburgok 17. századi konstantinápolyi diplomatáinak magyar viseletéről [Do clothes make the ambassador?: The Hungarian dress of Habsburg ambassadors to Constantinople in the Seventeenth Century],” Művészettörténeti Értesítő 69, no. 1 (2020): 15–36; Christoph Würflinger, “Symbolic Communication in Habsburg-Ottoman Diplomatic Relations: The Grand Embassy of Johann Rudolf Schmid Zum Schwarzenhorn (1650–51),” Legatio 4 (2020): 95–122; Gamze İlaslan Koç, “An Untold Battle of Music and Banners: Ambassadorial Entrance Ceremonies between the Ottoman and Habsburg Empires,” in Sounds of Power: Sonic Court Rituals In- and Outside Europe in the 15th–18th Centuries, ed. Margret Scharrer and Tül Demirbaş (Cologne, 2024).

13 Tobias P. Graf, The Sultan’s Renegades: Christian-European Converts to Islam and the Making of the Ottoman Elite, 1575–1610 (Oxford, 2017); Aneliya Stoyanova, “The Dragomans of the Habsburg Embassy in Constantinople in the Second Half of the 16th Century: The Story of Matthias Del Faro,” History Studies 18 (2017): 95–108; Gábor Kármán, “Grand Dragoman Zülfikar Aga,” Archivum Ottomanicum 35 (2018): 5–29; Hajnalka Tóth, “Thirty Years in the Service of the Habsburgs: Insight into the Devoted Work of the Turkish Dragoman (Interpreter) Johann Adam Lachowitz (1678–1709),” Prace Historyczne 148, no. 4 (2021): 745–67; János Szabados, Die Karriere des deutschen Renegaten Hans Caspar in Ofen (1627–1660) im politischen und kulturellen Kontext (Vienna, 2023); Zsuzsanna Cziráki, A Habsburg Monarchia keleti nyelvi tolmácsai a 17. században [The Translators of Eastern Languages in the Seventeenth-Century Habsburg Monarchy] (Budapest, 2024).

14 Tobias P. Graf, “Stopping an Ottoman Spy in Late Sixteenth-Century Istanbul: David Ungnad, Markus Penckner, and Austrian-Habsburg Intelligence in the Ottoman Capital,” in Rethinking Europe: War and Peace in the Early Modern German Lands, ed. Gerhild Scholz Williams et al. (Leiden, 2019); Sándor Papp, “Osmanische Funktionäre im Informationsnetz des kaiserlichen Residenten in Konstantinopel Simon Reniger (1649–1666),” Chronica 19 (2019): 24–41; Christoph Würflinger, “Die Verschlüsselung der Korrespondenz des kaiserlichen Residenten in Konstantinopel, Alexander von Greiffenklau zu Vollrads (1643–48),” Chronica 20 (2020): 6–23; Tobias P. Graf, “Knowing the ‘Hereditary Enemy’: Austrian-Habsburg Intelligence on the Ottoman Empire in the Late Sixteenth Century,” Journal of Intelligence History 21 (2022): 268–88; János Szabados, “‘Secret Correspondence’ in Habsburg-Ottoman Communication in the First Half of the Seventeenth Century,” Hungarian Historical Review 12, no. 2 (2023): 194–223.

15 Robyn Dora Radway, “The Captive Self: The Art of Intrigue and the Holy Roman Emperor’s Resident Ambassador at the Ottoman Court in the Sixteenth Century,” Journal of Early Modern History 22 (2018): 475–99; János Szabados, “Habsburg-Ottoman Communication in the Mid-17th Century—The Death of Imperial Courier Johann Dietz. A Case Study,” The Journal of Ottoman Studies 54 (2019): 119–40; Zsuzsanna Cziráki, “‘Mein gueter, väterlicher Maister’ —Wissenstransfer unter kaiserlichen Gesandten an der Hohen Pforte in der ersten Hälfte des 17. Jahrhunderts,” Chronica 19 (2019): 42–83; Aneliya Stoyanova, “Early Modern Diplomatic Realities: Michael Starzer and Caspar Gratiani in the First Years of Their Acquaintance (1610–1614),” Istoriya-History 32, no. 4 (2024): 257–74.

16 Claudia Römer and Gisela Procházka-Eisl, “Raub, Mord und Übergriffe an der habsburgisch-osmanischen Grenze: Der diplomatische Alltag der Beglerbege von Buda abseits von Zeremonien,” in Diplomatisches Zeremoniell in Europa und im Mittleren Osten in der frühen Neuzeit, ed. Ralph Kauz et al. (Vienna, 2009); Robyn Dora Radway, “Vernacular Diplomacy in Central Europe: Statesmen and Soldiers Between the Habsburg and Ottoman Empires, 1543–1593” (Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, 2017); Mahmut Halef Cevrioğlu, “Murteza Pasha’s Conduct of Diplomacy on the Buda Frontier (1626–1630),” Osmanli Mirasi Arastirmalari Dergisi 9, no. 24 (2022): 351–64; Gábor Kármán, “Habib Ağa, Hungarian Interpreter in Buda,” in Hürmetler: Studies in Honour of Pál Fodor on His Seventieth Birthday, ed. Géza Dávid et al. (Budapest, 2025); Gábor Kármán, “A Third Party: Gábor Bethlen, Prince of Transylvania and the Habsburg-Ottoman Peace Negotiations 1624–27,” in Beyond Sovereign Courts: Agents and Practices in Early Modern Spanish and Habsburg Diplomacy, ed. Rubén González Cuerva and Francesco Caprioli (Turnhout, 2026).

17 Tessa de Boer et al., “Provincializing ‘New’ Diplomatic History: An Interdisciplinary Manifesto,” Diplomatica 7, no. 2 (2025): 227–49.

18 On the QhoD-project, see Yasir Yılmaz and Stephan Kurz, “QhoD: Digitale Edition von Quellen zur habsburgisch-osmanischen Diplomatie 1500–1918,” Journal of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association 9, no. 2 (2022): 57–65.

19 Elizabeth Yale, “The History of Archives: The State of the Discipline,” Book History 18, no. 1 (2015): 332–59.

20 Megan Williams, “Unfolding Diplomatic Paper and Paper Practices in Early Modern Chancellery Archives,” in Parktiken der frühen Neuzeit: Akteure, Handlungen, Artefakte, ed. Arndt Brendecke (Cologne, 2015); Fabio Antonini, “A Diplomatic Narrative in the Archive: The War of Cyprus, Record Keeping Practices, and Historical Research in the Early Modern Venetian Chancery,” in Cultures of Diplomacy and Literary Writing in the Early Modern World, ed. Tracey A. Sowerby and Joanna Craigwood (Oxford, 2019).

21 The reorganization and digitization of the Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv’s Türkische Urkunden collection (TUK) is ongoing since 2023. This involved dissolving the existing archival boxes and integrating their digitized contents into the archive’s online database. There are available at https://www.archivinformationssystem.at/archivplansuche.aspx?ID=4361201 (accessed 23 February 2026). The digitization of the Turcica (Türkei I) collection is ongoing on the same platform https://www.archivinformationssystem.at/archivplansuche.aspx?ID=463 (accessed 23 February 2026). This digitization process was preceded by extensive indexing and microfilming, with a full copy available in the Hungarian National Archives. Some of these collections were re-folated in the intervening years. For the digitization of the Başbakanlık Osmanlı Arşivi’s holdings, see https://katalog.devletarsivleri.gov.tr/ (accessed 23 February 2026).

22 Lajos Fekete, “Über Archivalien und Archivwesen in der Türkei,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 3, no. 3 (1953): 179–205; İsmet Binark and Bilge Kaya, Macar asıllı Türk tarihçisi ve arşivist Lajos Fekete’nin arşivciliğimizdeki yeri [The place of Lajos Fekete, a Hungarian-born Turkish historian and archivist, in our archival history] (Ankara, 1994); Gábor Fodor, Osmanlı’da Macar Tarih Bilimi ve Arkeolojisi. İstanbul Macar Bilim Enstitüsü Tarihi (1916–1918) (Istanbul, 2025).

23 Volume 6 of The Austrian History Yearbook included several important articles on the history of different branches of the Austrian State Archives: Rudolf Neck, “The Haus-, Hof- Und Staatsarchiv: Its History, Holdings, and Use,” Austrian History Yearbook 6 (1970): 3–16 and Rainer Egger, “The Kriegsarchiv,” Austrian History Yearbook 6 (1970): 39–66. See also James P. Niessen, “Records of Empire, Monarchy, or Nation? The Archival Heritage of the Habsburgs in East Central Europe,” Ab Imperio 3 (2007): 265–90 and István Fazekas, A Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv magyar vonatkozású iratai [The documents of the Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv related to Hungary] (Budapest, 2015), which has an important details about the involvement of various scholars and interests in the establishment and reorganization of the Turcica (Türkei I), Hungarica (Ungarische Akten), and other collections.

24 For example, sixty archival boxes cover the quarter century between 1567 to 1593 as opposed to only eleven boxes covering the quarter century between 1619 and 1644.

25 More than half of the 441 letters published in a recent edition of the correspondence of regional governors of Buda between 1617 and 1630 are held by archives outside Vienna and Istanbul. Kármán, ed., The Correspondence. In some cases, the existence of these private collections help partly explain archival imbalances. This remains understudied on the Ottoman side, where for example, three chests full of archival documents were found in an armory in Belgrade that once formed the private archive of Grand Vizier Sarı Süleyman Pasha (d. 1687). Excerpts from these roughly 2,000 documents were translated by the interpreter Heinrich Christoph Schwegler in a bound volume from 1689 now preserved in the Wienbibliothek, Jc 82888.

26 For more on these debates, see Robyn Dora Radway, Portraits of Empires: Habsburg Albums from the German House in Ottoman Constantinople (Bloomington, IN, 2023), 6–10, 28–32, 123–28.

27 Gábor Kármán, ed., Tributaries and Peripheries of the Ottoman Empire (Leiden, 2020); George B. Michels, The Habsburg Empire under Siege: Ottoman Expansion and Hungarian Revolt in the Age of Grand Vizier Ahmed Köprülü (Montreal, 2021); Sándor Papp, “Peacemaking between the Ottoman Empire, the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary and the Habsburg Monarchy,” in “Buyurdum Ki….”: The Whole World of Ottomanica and Beyond: Studies in Honour of Claudia Römer, ed. Hülya Çelik et al. (Leiden, 2023).

28 Paula S. Fichtner, Terror and Toleration: The Habsburg Empire Confronts Islam, 1526–1850 (London, 2008); Andrew Wheatcroft, The Enemy at the Gate: Habsburgs, Ottomans and the Battle for Europe (New York, 2009); For two different approaches to a new narrative, see James D. Tracy, “The Habsburg Monarchy in Conflict with the Ottoman Empire, 1527–1593: A Clash of Civilizations,” Austrian History Yearbook 46 (2015): 1–26 and Gábor Ágoston, The Last Muslim Conquest (Princeton, 2021), particularly chapter 9, “Lawfare and Diplomacy.”