CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2025
| Author | Mask, Dylan Thomas |
|---|---|
| Title | South Slavic Refugees and their Impact on Habsburg Policies toward Bosnia and Herzegovina, 1848-75 |
| Summary | For centuries, South Slavic Ottoman Christians, mainly from Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Montenegro, fled as refugees to the Habsburg Monarchy during frequent periods of unrest. This thesis examines how these refugee movements contributed to internal Habsburg colonial imaginations, especially in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and influenced Habsburg refugee policies from the 1848–49 Revolutions until the 1875 Herzegovina Uprising. Habsburg territorial pretensions toward Bosnia and Herzegovina coalesced decades earlier than often formulated; however, the impact of refugees on Habsburg colonial strategies for Ottoman Europe remains unclear in existing historiography. I argue that Habsburg leaders frequently conceived the Monarchy as the preferred protector of Ottoman Christendom and welcomed South Slavic Christian refugees as a Christian moral imperative. However, over decades, critical failures in materially providing for refugees and security concerns along the Habsburg-Ottoman border stoked military and conservative rhetoric that portrayed the Ottoman Empire as an inherently “Oriental,” failing institution and advocated for the Habsburg strategic seizure of Bosnia and Herzegovina, a long-contemplated colonial aspiration accentuated by state duties toward Christian refugees. |
| Supervisor | Radway, Robyn Dora and Miller, Michael Laurence |
| Department | Historical Studies MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2025/mask_dylan.pdf |
Visit the CEU Library.
© 2007-2025, Central European University