At the Imperial Periphery: Religion - Warfare - Szlachta

This follow-up FWF-project to "Multicultural Border Towns in Western Ukraine, 1772-1914" aims to explore three new thematic clusters in the same general geographic area. It extends thereby a comparative micro-history study of towns and shtetls situated at the border of Austria and Russia during the long 19th-century to an analysis of how this imperial periphery reacted to specific events: to the imposition of the Orthodox-Greek Catholic confessional barrier, to the Napoleonic and First World Wars, and to the decline of the ancien regime. Part one examines the confessional barrier between the Russian Orthodox and Greek Catholic (Uniate) Churches, which began to develop with the partitions of Poland (1772/1793/1795) and remains present in Western Ukraine until today. Due to mutual, if diametric, imperial decrees on confessions in the newly annexed territories, whereby the Habsburgs quickly recognized and encouraged the Galician Greek Catholic minority and the Romanovs eventually repressed and forcibly converted the Greek Catholics in Volhynia, Podolia and Kyiv to Orthodoxy, our goal is a long-overdue investigation of religion and religious life at the periphery (i.e., regulation vs. praxis, religiosity, the role of pilgrimages, often "across" the border). Part two compares the effects of the Napoleonic Wars, where the area under discussion was not a battlefield but rather a "trophy" (the "Ternopil` region" was annexed by Russia from Austria following Austria`s defeat by Napoleon at Wagram), with those of World War I, where Russian troops twice marched into eastern Galicia. As yet hardly dealt with in the historiography, our aim is to investigate why the Ternopil` region was selected in 1809 and how the local populations reacted to this short-term "changing of sides." Likewise, our emphasis in the framework of World War I is to explore everyday war conditions in towns on both sides of the border (at the warfronts), in particular by comparing the actions and reactions of the various ethnic (and national) groups. Part three studies aspects of enduring feudalism in the long 19th century and the question of the Polish noble landowning class (szlachta). In particular it examines the situation in six border towns (three in Galicia, three in Russia) and explores how policy changes instigated in Vienna or St. Petersburg influenced the landlord (and at times landlady) of a peripheral town.

This project focuses on Austrian-Russian border areas that were established as a result of the thrice-partitioned Poland (1772/1793/1795). Concentrating on two paired Galician-Volhynian and one Galician-Podolian border towns, we investigated continuities and changes during the long nineteenth century, paying particular attention to issues of religion, warfare, and the landed gentry (szlachta). Today this area all lies in Western Ukraine. Religion: The demarcation line drawn up first in 1772 by the Habsburg Monarchy, creating Galicia, and then in 1793/95 by the Romanov Empire, encompassing Volhynia and Podolia, led to the creation of a parallel confessional border. That is, the Habsburgs recognized and supported the Uniate (`Greek Catholic`) Church in Galicia, whereas the Romanovs forced the Uniate populations of Volhynia and Podolia to `reintegrate` into the Russian Orthodox Church. A competitive relationship between East and West Churches evolved along the border. We examined this politicized development by example of the cloisters - and pilgrimage sites of - Podkamień (in Galicia) and nearby Pochaev (in Volhynia). The Jewish communities on both sides of the border also found themselves in varying political and juridical positions. We looked at two Russian cases: the effects of the 1843 forced Jewish resettlement plans (Radzivilov, Volochisk) and the 1881 pogrom (Volochisk). For Galicia we contrasted Brody, exemplifying a center of Haskala, with Husiatyn, a center of Hasidism. Warfare. The Napoleonic wars brought a short-term profit boom for Brody`s traders and little armed conflict. By contrast, the sudden outbreak of World War I ended a century-long peaceful coexistence. Brody was soon occupied by Russian forces, who retreated a year later; the town became an Austrian military zone and few inhabitants returned. By contrast, the Russian occupation of the towns Husiatyn and Podwoloczyska lasted until 1917. The physical devastation in all six border towns under investigation was severe, and no matter which side of the front the large ethnic Ruthenian, Jewish, and Polish minority populations lived on, most were distrusted by Austrian and Russian armies and occupying forces alike. A significant portion of the Jewish populations on both sides of the border never returned. Szlachta. Our interest in the (mostly Polish) landed gentry was spurred by the fact that these elites often had property on both sides of the imperial border. We examined the changing political and social role of such landlords and landladies who, following legal changes (1848 in Austria, 1866 in Russia) evolved from being feudal owners of a town to one of several property owners in a town. A monograph that lays out the results of this project and its predecessor, `Multicultural Border Towns in Western Ukraine, 1772-1914`, will be published by Böhlau Verlag (late 2009): Grenz-Orte. Städte zwischen Österreich und Russland 1772-1918 (working-title). A project report (in Polish) will appear in a forthcoming issue of the Kwartalnik Historyczny.