i. Relations with Persia

Diplomatic and Commercial Relations with Persia. Diplomatic and commercial relations between Austria and Persia have a long history, stretching back to the sixteenth century. At that time Shah Esmāʿil I had founded the Safavid dynasty in Persia, while the Hapsburg rulers of Austria were at the same time the German kings and emperors of the Holy Roman Empire (Heiliges Römisches Reich Deutscher Nation). The Hapsburgs maintained this status until 1806, when Franz II surrendered the crown of the Holy Roman Empire after having crowned himself Austrian Emperor in 1804.

The Safavids and the Hapsburgs had a common enemy — the Ottoman Empire, which was trying to expand both westwards and eastwards. Esmāʿil I had already established relations with Venice and the Papal Court, because the Venetians dominated the trade in the Levant and maintained representatives in Tabriz. In 1518, he proposed an alliance against the Turks. However, since the relations he had already established failed to produce a positive result, in October 1523 he sent the monk Petrus de Monte Libano (Maronita) directly to Emperor Karl V of Austria and Ludwig II of Hungary with the same offer (Du Mans, p. I; Palombini, pp. 63-65; Lanz, I, p. 52; Babinger, p. 3; Schuster-Walser, p. 11). Karl V accepted the offer in principle, not knowing that it had become invalidated with the death of Esmāʿil I in 1524 (Lanz, I, pp. 168). In 1526, King Ludwig II of Hungary was killed in a battle against the Turks, and Ferdinand, the brother of Karl V, was elected king of Bohemia and Hungary. From now on the Hapsburgs had to defend the extreme eastern border of the Empire. Therefore they were eagerly looking for allies who could create the desired diversion of the Turks. In 1529, Johann v. Balbi was sent to Shah Tahmāsp I (Palombini, p. 66; Babinger, p. 3; Lanz, I, pp. 292). Karl V informed the Shah that he and his brother Ferdinand would attack the Turks the following year, and asked Tahmāsp to attack from the rear so that together they could overwhelm their common enemy. However, it took Balbi more than a year to reach the Persian Court, during which time the situation had changed completely. The shah had to make peace with the Sultan because the Uzbeks were threatening Persia from the east, so all the endeavors of Balbi failed. The envoys Pietro da Negro and Simon de Lillis, who had been dispatched by King Ferdinand to Persia, could not bring positive news back to Europe either (Neck, pp. 72, 85, 86; Palombini, p. 70; Afshar, p. 21).

In the following years, good relations were maintained with legations being mentioned for the years 1532, 1533 and 1540 (Neck, p. 72), but the domestic problems of the two powers and the long distance between them prevented closer cooperation. For this reason there was no direct trade between Austria and Persia. The relatively poor commercial relations relied on intermediaries. Furthermore, Persia was shaken by turmoil after the death of Tahmāsp I, until Shah ʿAbbās I finally managed to consolidate control of the country. Persia then found peace for the first time in many years.

The next contact between Austria and Persia was initiated by Emperor Rudolf II who resided in Prague. He sent a message to Shah ʿAbbās via the Persian minister in Moscow in 1593 (Kochwasser, p. 28). By coincidence, the British subjects Anthony and Robert Sherley arrived in Persia in 1598 and met Shah ʿAbbās I in Isfahan. Anthony Sherley, a cunning adventurer, successfully curried favor with Shah ʿAbbās I (Le Strange, p. 227), who decided to send a legation to the European Courts, and especially to Rudolf II, in order to build an alliance against the Turks (Babinger, p. 5; Schuster-Walser, p. 73; Hinz, p. 408; Kochwasser, p. 29; Gabriel, p. 67). The basic idea was to begin hostilities simultaneously and to agree that none of the allies should make peace with the enemy separately. In 1599, the Persian ambassador Ḥosayn-ʿAli Beg, 4 nobles, 5 interpreters and the necessary staff left Isfahan. Anthony Sherley, a well experienced traveler with a command of several languages, served not only as the guide but also, more or less, as the head of the legation (Du Mans, pp. VI-VIII; Babinger, p. 6 ff.; Le Strange, p. 234; Kochwasser, p. 29; Slaby, p. 12 ff.). The legation was received by Emperor Rudolf II on 7 November 1600. All the members of the legation were deeply impressed by the sumptuousness of the imperial palace on the Hradschin, the courtly splendor of the reception and the affable condescension of the Emperor (Le Strange, pp. 274-78) during their stay of several months in Prague. The formal response to Shah ʿAbbās, dated 11 December 1600 (MHH, pp. 88-91), was finally handed over, and on 5 February 1601 the legation left Prague to head for Italy, Rome and Spain. It is not known precisely when it arrived back in Persia after having visited several European Courts and the Pope in Rome (Le Strange, p. 9). It can be taken for granted that Ambassador Ḥosayn-ʿAli Beg returned disappointed and embittered, because Anthony Sherley had ruined the purpose of the legation by stealing nearly all the gifts for the European rulers (Le Strange, p. 284; Du Mans, p. IX; Babinger, p. 30; Schuster-Walser, p. 49) and amassing debts wherever he went. Furthermore, several of his companions had become Christians and chose not to return to their homeland (Le Strange, p. 9; Babinger, pp. 3, 30).

On 27 August 1602, the Austrian legation under Stephan Kakasch von Zalonkemeny left Prague with the order to confirm the agreement of a mutual assistance treaty (Du Mans, pp. XI; Schuster-Walser, p. 73; Kochwasser, p. 29; Gabriel, pp. 56). No member of the mission survived the journey except Georg Tectander von der Jabel, who met Shah ʿAbbās I on 15 November 1603 in Tabriz, which had been captured from the Turks just one week earlier. Tectander handed over the letters of the emperor and stayed for nearly a whole year with the Persian court. In Isfahan, he was graciously dismissed by the shah and, accompanied by the Persian envoy Mahdi Qoli Beg, returned to Prague (Wolkan, pp. 85-92, 117-19; Kochwasser, p. 30; Schuster-Walser, p. 73; Gabriel, p. 57). Prior to his arrival in the autumn of 1605, a second Persian legation under Zaynal Khan Shamlu had reached Prague, and had been received in a similar way as the first one (Kochwasser, p. 30). However, none of these legations and missions produced a decisive result. Due to the distances involved and the duration of the journey, no dates could be fixed for simultaneous action, and then, contrary to all agreements, Emperor Rudolf II made peace with the Turks in 1606 (Schuster-Walser, p. 60). Shah ʿAbbās I was deeply disappointed and lost all confidence in this European ally, so Persian relations with the West cooled off significantly. Several other legations, such as the one under Wratislaw v. Dohna (Gabriel, p. 57; Schuster-Walser, p. 73; Kochwasser, p. 31; Hinz, p. 409) and another Persian mission under ʿAli-Qoli Beg in 1609, did not bring any change. The Hapsburgs now had to deal with grave religious problems within their empire (the rise of Protestantism) and therefore tried to maintain peace with the Turks.

After the end of the “Thirty Years War,” all the European courts ran short of money and tried to increase their income through the means at their disposal: taxes, tolls and tariffs. Therefore every effort was made to improve the administration and to foster trade and export. The time of mercantilism had arrived. In the meantime, the imperial Court had moved from Prague to Vienna. The peace treaty between the Hapsburgs and the Ottoman Empire included favorable terms for trade within and beyond Turkish borders. The merchants had to pay only 3% customs duty (Hassinger, 1942, p. 6). This seemed an opportunity for a wide range of profitable activities, and led, in 1667, to the founding of the first Austrian Oriental Trade Company in Vienna (Hassinger, 1949, pp. 90). The traders used the waterway of the Danube to bring their goods to the Black Sea, whence they sailed to Istanbul and Trabzon. From there the goods could be transported on land to Tabriz, the most important marketplace in Persia at the time. Among the first things imported from Persia in 1668 were cotton veils and silk products (Hassinger, 1942, p. 22). Persian silk and silk threads were especially sought as raw material for silk manufacture. Contacts were made initially by intermediaries, while the first direct contracts were concluded only in 1678 (Hassinger, 1942,, p. 50). Unfortunately the last wave of Turkish expansion to the West, culminating in the siege of Vienna in 1683, brought an end to the first Austrian Oriental Trade Company. However, it should be remembered that this company was the very first to make direct commercial contacts with Persia.

At the end of the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth century the Hapsburgs were defeating the Turks, enabling an expansion of their empire into parts of Hungary which had previously been part of the Ottoman Empire, as well as the Banat and Transylvania. The peace-treaty of Passarowitz was signed in 1718 (Meyer, XVI, p. 200), and the subsequent trade agreement included a significant stipulation: all imperial subjects could trade freely in the Mediterranean Sea, in the Black Sea, on the Danube and throughout the Ottoman Empire, and protection of trade from and to Persia was guaranteed. This agreement, which became the basis for the future development of commercial ties, reveals Austria’s special interest in Persia.

Nonetheless, in the eighteenth century diplomatic and commercial relations between Austria and Persia did not improve. A second Oriental Trade Company had been founded in Vienna in 1719, but after only 25 years it was forced into liquidation. Such was the fate of the Ostende Trade Company, which survived only 9 years, because Karl VI had to make concessions to other states in Europe, especially to France and Britain, in order to secure the succession of his daughter Maria Theresia (Slaby, p. 27). Thus Austria never became a sea power of any significance (Hassinger, 1949, pp. 91; Marschalek, pp. 4-8), although cultural relations with Persia flourished nevertheless, and Vienna becoming the center of research on Persia. Many palaces and major buildings in Vienna even today show the influence of Persian architecture. In 1754, the Oriental Academy was founded in Vienna for the purpose of teaching about the Orient and training interpreters in Turkish, Persian and Arabic. It was through this very institution that knowledge of Persian literature and culture spread widely in Europe during the eighteenth century (Slaby, pp. 31).

The nineteenth century witnessed several changes in geopolitics. In Central Europe the dream of the Holy Roman Empire had come to an end, and the Austrian Empire consisted from now on of only the home kingdoms and provinces of the Hapsburgs. Meanwhile, rivalries between the two great imperial powers, the British and the Russians, were threatening Persian independence. The foothold which the British gained on the Indian subcontinent and their supremacy in the Persian Gulf entirely changed the relationship between the two countries. To the north, Russia expanded continuously southwards and in the first decades of the century a considerable amount of Persian territory was permanently appropriated. As a result of this situation, Persia began to develop diplomatic ties with other European countries, which mostly seemed disinterested, and thus Austria became one of the most attractive countries for Persia in this respect.

In 1810, a Persian legation which had already been to London and Paris passed through Vienna. This mission had no special brief, but was more or less a courtesy-visit to reactivate old ties. In 1818, another legation left Tehran, under Mirzā Abu’l-Ḥasan Khan, for Istanbul, Paris and London, while his nephew Mirzā ʿAbd-al-Ḥosayn Khan Širāzi was appointed ambassador to Vienna (Busse, pp. 155, 159). Both ambassadors reached Vienna in February 1819. The audience took place on February 8, and the letters of Fatḥ-ʿAli Shah were then presented to Emperor Franz I. While Mirzā Abu’l-Ḥasan Khan headed for London, Mirzā ʿAbd-al-Ḥosayn Khan Širāzi left Vienna on 14 March 1819. This visit was also no more than a courtesy call and an exchange of letters. A very detailed description of this visit has been given by the famous Orientalist Hammer-Purgstall, who had acted as interpreter (HHStA).

Although diplomatic relations failed to develop significantly, commercial ties did improve. The shifting of trade from land to sea routes proved favorable for the Austrian shipping companies. The most important port for traffic from the north to Persia was Trabzon. Austria had two possible ways to reach there. Ships could either start from Trieste and enter the Black Sea via Istanbul, or sail on the Danube to Galatz, where the goods could be reloaded onto bigger steamers for the journey to Trabzon. Thus in 1830, out of 26 ships arriving in Trabzon, 11 were sailing under the Austrian flag, and, in 1833, 15 ships came directly from Trieste (Slaby, p. 48). In this year 2,600 colliers were unloaded with goods to the value of 1,380,000 florins. Most of the goods, consisting mainly of woolens and glassware, were transported to Tabriz on either of two routes: one led from Trabzon via Erzurum to Tabriz, the other, which was shorter, reached Tabriz via Batumi, Tiflis, Yerevan and Julfa (Blau, p. 238; Polak, II, p. 189). In 1837, the Danube Steamship Company (DDSG) started its first regular service with the steamer called “Fernando,” and soon earned the rewards for its perseverance (Issawi, p. 99; Gödel, p. 3). Later on, the line was taken over by the “Austrian Lloyd” (Issawi, p. 93; Kochwasser, p. 51; Stolze, p. 48; Blau, p. 149). Trade increased such that the value of Austrian exports to Persia reached 5,800,000 florins by 1842, while the imports from Persia amounted to 1,600,000 florins. (Figures on the Austrian export to and import from Persia through the Persian Gulf area are not available, as the British dominated the entire traffic.) There were even deliberations in 1845 to establish an Austrian honorary consulate in Tehran, but the Foreign Ministry refused, claiming that the amount of trade was not enough to justify such a measure (HHStA, FA Präs. 10011 ex 1845).

In 1848, by strange coincidence, a young ruler came to the throne in both Austria and Persia: in Persia Nāṣer-al-Din became shah, while in Austria Franz Joseph I became emperor, both at just 18 years old. Each was confronted with disturbances within his own country. In Europe it was the year of revolution, while in Persia religious disturbances broke out due to the Bābi movement. These problems were not so difficult to overcome, but the pressure on Persia due to British and Russian rivalries made matters even worse. Therefore the Grand Vizier Mirzā Taqi Khan Amir Kabir tried to extract his country from this pincer-like embrace by enhancing modernization with the aid of foreigners. In 1850, the Dār al-fonun was founded as a polytechnic school in Tehran. Amir Kabir sent Jān Dāwud Khan to Vienna to hire teachers and military instructors specifically for this new institution (Issawi, p. 293; Polak, I, pp. 298, 301; Brugsch, I, p. 307), and six Austrians each signed a contract to work there for several years. This first Austrian military mission to Persia was not an official one, because the Austrian authorities wished to avoid any suspicion that they might have political intentions in this area. However, among the members of the mission there were two men who proved to be of major importance for the future relations between the two countries, namely the artillery-officer August Krziz, who drew the first map of Tehran, and the physician Jacob Eduard Polak, who worked to improve relations and spread knowledge about Persia in Europe.

As the commercial relations between the two countries continued to improve, it seemed necessary also to come to an official political understanding. The first steps towards this were taken in 1851/52, but they didn’t achieve a positive result (Slaby, pp. 86). In 1855, Dāwud Khan was again sent to Vienna to hand over the Persian draft of a bilateral treaty. Vienna was unable to agree, since the draft did not contain the reciprocal “most favored” nation clause (HHStA, St-K, Admin. Reg. F 34, Karton 3). The counter-draft was sent to Tehran in 1856. The reply from Persia was handed over in Istanbul by Mirzā Malcolm Khan to the Austrian internuntius Count Prokesch-Osten (the title internuntius was a special one for the Austrian Ambassador to the Ottoman Court). The negotiations became difficult. Austria, although an independent country, was at the same time member of the German Confederation and Customs Union, and so they demanded the possible inclusion of German states into the treaty. The Persians did not understand this desire (Gobineau, p. 107), but Farroḵ Khan Ḡaffāri Kāšāni, Amin-al-Dawla, was ordered to bring the negotiations with Austria to an end while he was staying in Paris to make the peace-agreement with the British in 1857 (Fragner, pp. 30-36). Thus the first Austro-Persian “Friendship-, Trade- and Shipping-Treaty” was agreed in Paris on 17 May 1857. The Austrians had the right to establish consulates in Tehran and Tabriz, as well as at one place in the Gulf, while the Persians could establish consulates in Vienna, Venice and Trieste (Hübner, II, pp. 4,7,12,19,41; Kochwasser, p. 52).

A curious misunderstanding occurred in 1857 in connection with this treaty. Farroḵ Khan Amin-al-Dawla, still in Istanbul, informed Tehran that an Austrian legation under Colonel Eugen Schindlöcker would soon arrive there. In view of the ongoing negotiations about the Austro-Persian treaty, officials in Tehran thought that Schindlöcker had been dispatched to sign the treaty. In fact his mission had been sent by the Austrian War Ministry to buy fine Arab horses for the imperial stables. The Austrians were surprised by the honors they received, while the Persians were disappointed when they discovered the actual goals of this mission. Schindlöcker and his companions returned to Vienna after having bought several fine horses (KA, Reg. Präs. 1857, 612, 775, 851, 1110; Hedāyat, X, p. 743; Blau, p. 67; Slaby, p. 92 ff.).

In 1860, the engineer Albert Joseph Gasteiger arrived in Tehran and, with help of Dāwud Khan, he found employment in the Dār al-fonun. Later he was appointed as a general and became famous for his road constructions. He also became the first European to be honored with the title “Khan.” Before leaving Austria he had made arrangements with his Foreign Ministry and the Chamber of Commerce to report on interesting things in Persia. In 1866, he was appointed first Austrian honorary consul in Tehran, but not recognized by the Persian authorities as being in Persian service. Nevertheless his reports became very important for diplomatic as well as commercial relations (F. Gasteiger; Slaby, p. 98). The first person to serve as Persian honorary consul in Vienna was a Mr. Foedes, followed by Emmanuel Goldberger (HHStA, F9, 45; Slaby, p. 112).

In the meantime Austria had lost its leading position in Germany, and was no longer a member of the “Deutscher Bund” confederation. The emperor had to come to an agreement with the Hungarians, and thus from 1867 onwards it was the Austro-Hungarian empire.

Oriental countries were invited to exhibit their products at the World Fair, which was planned in Vienna for 1873. Even a booklet written in Persian by Polak, describing the products which should be displayed, had been published and distributed in Persia (Polak, 1873). On the occasion of this fair, permanent diplomatic relations between Austria and Persia were established. Count Dubsky von Trebomyslice was appointed as the first Austrian minister to the Persian Court, and arrived in 1872 to invite the shah officially to the World Fair. Nāṣer-al-Din accepted willingly, thus becoming the first shah ever to visit Europe. On 20 April 1873, the Shah and his entourage left Tehran, traveling through Russia, Germany, England, France, Switzerland and Italy to Vienna (Busse, p. 379). In the meantime Mirzā Malcolm Khan Neẓām-al-Molk, the Persian minister in London, had been co-accredited to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, and had come to Vienna to make preparations for the visit of his shah. The Persian legation in residence in Vienna was established only in 1878.

The shah was solemnly received by Emperor Franz Joseph I and treated with exceptional courtesy during his stay in Vienna. He paid a visit to the World Fair, in particular to the Persian pavilion. Exhibits consisted mostly of carpets, silk, silk embroidery, shawls, wooden intarsia, copperware and old manuscripts. Impressed by what he had seen in the other pavilions and by a military parade, the shah sought Austrian help to reorganize his own army and administration. The Austrians promised help with regard to the administration, but they still had to consider Russian interests with respect to military help (Slaby, pp. 112-126; Schindler and de Norman, trans., pp. 255-96; Kochwasser, p. 55). The postal service was reorganized successfully by Gustav Riederer von Dachsberg, and the mint by Franz Pechan von Prägenberg, though this latter reorganization was only initially successful. When he was ordered to reduce the standard of the coins he quit the service (Curzon, I, p. 466; Polak, ÖMO 1876, pp. 186-88; Riederer, ÖMO 1876, pp. 17-22).

Five years later, however, there was a fundamental change of opinion in Vienna: Amin-al-Dawla, who had come to Vienna to prepare the second European trip of the shah, renewed the request for assistance in military matters and received a favorable reply. Dispatching such a mission was now considered by the Austrians as a chance to weaken Russian influence and to open new markets for export. Furthermore, the political situation had changed. While on the one hand Russia had been strengthened by the Russian-Turkish War of 1877, on the other hand it had been forced by the Berlin Congress to accept the occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina by Austria. Relations between these two countries therefore grew tense and Austria no longer had to consider Russian interests in Persia.

The shah arrived in Vienna on 5 July 1878. The reception was more or less the same as 5 years earlier, but the preparations for this visit had improved significantly. All documents for carrying out the host’s reform plans had been compiled properly and the minister of war, leaders in commerce and trade, and arms manufacturers all attended the reception (Curzon, I, pp. 587-88). The new Austro-Hungarian Minister Count Zaluski presented his credentials to the Shah on July 8, and Narimān Khan Mamigoniān Qawām-al-Salṭana was appointed the first Persian minister in residence to the Court of Vienna. The shah visited the arsenal and was particularly impressed by the display of modern arms. He was especially interested in the new Austrian guns invented by General Uchatius. On 14 July 1878, Nāṣer-al-Din Shah left Vienna, while Nerimān Khan and Nāẓer-Āqā Khan, the minister in Paris, remained in Vienna to arrange everything for the Austrian military mission and the payment for the purchased arms (Schindler and de Norman, trans., Diary 2, pp. 234-71).

For the military mission 11 officers, 1 corporal and 1 bandmaster were selected. Their assignment was to drill the “Austrian Corps,” as it was called henceforth, comprising 7,000 soldiers: six infantry battalions, one rifle battalion, three batteries, one engineering corps and three military bands. The group departed from Tarnopol on 12 November, headed by General Gasteiger Khan; although he was not part of the official mission, the shah had asked for his assistance.

The weaponry order brought a significant change to Austro-Persian trade and commerce. By the end of the 1850s and the beginning of the 1860s, Austria was the fourth largest exporter to Persia, and the fifth largest importer (Blau, p. 155; Issawi, p. 134; Kochwasser, p. 65). Exported goods included ironware, steel goods, cutlery, gold braids, embroidery, clothes, matches, liquor and wine. The imports comprised mainly carpets, fruit, woolens and cotton. The weaponry order meant a boom in exports: 10,000 Werndl rifles with 3 million cartridges, 1,500 revolvers with half a million rounds of ammunition, and 18 Uchatius guns (9 cm) with three thousand shells. These arms deals continued: in 1882, 8,194 Werndl rifles including bayonets were ordered (KA 1882, Präs. 56-6/1); 4 batteries of mountain guns (7 cm) arrived in 1883; in 1888 20 Uchatius guns were brought; in 1883 20,000 Werndl rifles were ordered; and even in 1906/7 75% of all weaponry orders went to Austria, worth 200,400 qerāns (HHStA, Reports Leg. Tehran, 3 Nov 1878, 20 Feb 1881, 16 Nov 1883; ÖMO 1909, pp. 61-91). Sometimes it was not easy to get payment for the arms, such as 154,058 fl. for Werndl rifles (HHStA, Rep. Leg. Tehran, 5 Feb 1885), but finally all debts were paid.

After arriving in Tehran, the Austrian military mission had its first surprise, on discovering that Russian instructors had been committed to the cavalry, and that this unit was to become the core of the Persian brigade of Cossacks. It was paid for entirely by the governor in Tiflis, which meant that Persian authorities did not have any influence on it. The Austrians, however, had to face plotting and intrigues; the power play of the sycophants at court bought from abroad and above all, the sepahsālār (commander-in-chief), a friend of the Russians, made life difficult for them. These were the reasons why the official Austrian military mission ended after only three years. Henceforth, Austrian officers entering Persian services were only appointed with private contracts (KA, Report Schemua). Nāṣer-al-Din Shah realized only too late that he had missed a chance, since the Austrians had an excellent reputation as instructors of the armed forces. Evidence of this was furnished by the renewed Persian requests to Austria for further official military missions to be sent.

Yet the political situation had changed. The weakness of the Qājār Empire was all too evident. They were unable to resist Russian and British “pénétration pacifique.” Persia was becoming like a quasi-protectorate. Nāṣer-al-Din Shah was well aware of this situation; he approached the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Germany in 1880 with a plea for the neutralization of Persia under the auspices of the Dual Alliance (Martin, p. 201; Shuster, p. 29; HHStA, Tel. 3 Feb 1880). The Persian efforts lasted until 1885, when both powers gave the definite answer that they were unable to provide any guarantees because the distances involved made any intervention impossible (HHStA, Rep. Leg. Tehran, 14 Jan 1885).

As already mentioned, world trade was continuously increasing. Austria, being in no position to compete with England in Persia for the sea route via the Gulf, directed her goods to northern Persia via Batumi, and from there, in customs-free transit, through Transcaucasia to Baku and Julfa. The result was that Russian goods, squeezed out of the markets of southern Persia, could no longer hold on to the northern markets, into which competing goods from Austria and Germany entered through Batumi. With the end of free transit through Russia in 1883, foreign trade in northern Persia was dealt a heavy blow (HHStA, Pol.A. XXVIII, Karton 9); thus, Russian trade enjoyed immediately a great advantage and began to expand rapidly (Issawi, p. 145). Austria eagerly attempted to remove the Transcaucasian “Transitverbot,” accusing the Russians of “questionable practices,” but this was in vain (Martin, p. 54). This meant that Austrian trade had to follow the route Trabzon-Erzurum-Tabriz. As Tabriz remained the most important place for trade it seemed necessary to have an Austrian consulate in this town. Moritz Horner, who had been sent to Tabriz by the Ministry of Commerce and the Export-Association in 1877 to study there the possibilities of commerce, had settled in the town as an independent tradesman, and now applied for the function of an honorary consul, but was refused by the Foreign Ministry. For the next years the French consul had to represent the Austro-Hungarian empire (Riederer, p. 186; ÖMO 1878, p. 190; HHStA, F8, 238). As the trade flow from the North had become difficult, the interested powers began to look to the South. Provided that the harbor of Mohammerah (Ḵorramšahr) could have been improved — a plan which Franz Columbari, the first Austrian in Persian service, had proposed 55 years earlier (Slaby, pp. 53) — and a road could have been built via Šuštar and Solṭānābād (Arāk) to Tehran, the distance would have been a third that of the journey from Trabzon to Tehran. A precondition for this undertaking was free shipping on the Kārun up to Ahwāz. The Austrians would have had the advantage of free access to southern Persia as the Austrian “Lloyd” was already operating in the Persian Gulf, e.g. the steamer “Calypso” between Bušehr and Basra in 1888 (HHStA, XXVIII/10/Rep. 88a, 5 November 1888). In 1888, sailing on the Kārun was allowed, but only for 10 years, and nobody wanted to make the necessary investment under these conditions.

In 1889, Nāṣer-al-Din Shah made his third trip to Europe to visit the World Fair at Paris, staying also in Vienna from 23 to 26 August, before continuing to Budapest. A carpet exhibition held in Vienna in 1891 was a remarkable success. As very fine and precious carpets were on display and Vienna was one of the most important trading centers for oriental carpets, the exhibition encouraged many to buy Persian carpets (Scala, Catalogue, 1891, pp. 5-10).

Nāṣer-al-Din Shah was murdered on 1 May 1896, and his son Moẓaffar-al-Din succeeded to the throne. He followed the example of his father by visiting Vienna in 1900, 1902 and 1905. In 1906, the struggle for the Persian constitution started and after a period of turmoil the shah had to sign the relevant bill. Elections were held and at the beginning of 1907 Moẓaffar-al-Din and the crown prince signed the constitution. Just a few days later the shah died and was succeeded by Moḥammad-ʿAli. The troubles surrounding the constitution were exploited by Russia and Britain to strengthen their grip on Persia. The north of the country was declared the Russian sphere of influence, while the south was that of the British, and a neutral zone was left to divide the two. The finances of Persia remained under foreign control (Kochwasser, pp. 89). This agreement caused new disturbances and eventually the shah abolished the constitution. This was the signal for revolution, Moḥammad-ʿAli Shah was forced to abdicate and go into exile in 1909 (Slaby, pp. 248). Aḥmad Mirzā, who was only 11 years old, became shah, and Zell-al-Solṭān was appointed regent. After many troubles and changes in the regency, in 1911 the ex-shah tried to regain power. He landed in Astarābād, equipped with Austrian guns and ammunition, but finally he had to leave the country for good (Slaby, pp. 256).

When new disturbances shook the country in 1911 the Russians used it as an opportunity to occupy large areas of Azarbaijan. Again Vienna was asked by the Persians to intervene through diplomatic channels, but refused. The Austro-Hungarian empire, having annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908, had enough troubles already with the Russians and did not want to disturb the already tense relations further.

In the years before the outbreak of World War I, diplomatic relations between the two countries were kept at a low level. In 1912, Count Hugo Logothetti became the new Austro-Hungarian minister in Tehran, and in 1913 the consulate in Tabriz was reopened, with Franz Ertelt serving as honorary consul. Before this, the Austrian physician Dr Andreas Klodzianowski had held this post between 1897 and 1904, while for the rest of the time the French protected Austrian interests. The Persian minister in Vienna was Mirzā Moṣṭafā Khan Ṣafā-al-Mamālek, and the Persian honorary consulates were situated in Vienna, Budapest, Trieste and Brno.

The reopening of the consulate had become necessary because of the demands of the merchants. The Austro-Oriental Trade Company had been operating in Tabriz since 1908, and in 1913 the Orient Carpet Company was established. Besides these two companies, there were several Austrian merchants of minor importance also based in Tabriz (Litten, p. 265; Slaby, pp. 252,262).

The difference between the figures for Austrian exports to and imports from Persia given in independent studies and the figures published officially by the Austrian Ministry of Commerce is remarkable. Figures in independent studies are much higher than the official statistics. Furthermore, these figures are given sometimes according to the Persian calendar and sometimes according to the European one. On the basis of a variety of sources (Statistik; ÖMO 1907, pp. 72-74, ÖMO 1917, pp. 341-61; Jäger, pp. 62; Grothe, p. 65; Issawi, pp. 137—267; Zugmayer, pp. 84, 87, 188), the approximate figures are:

During the second decade of the Islamic Republic of Iran, diplomatic relations with Austria intensified and the following agreements were concluded: Agreement on International Road Transport (BGBl 134/1989, 13 July 1989) Air Transport Agreement (BGBl 9/1991, 10 January 1991) Agreement on Reciprocal Promotion and Protection of Investments (signed in Tehran, 15 February 2001) Agreement on Mutual Assistance and Co-operation in Custom Matters (signed in Vienna, 11 March 2002) Agreement for the Avoidance of Double Taxation with Respect to Taxes on Income and on Capital (signed in Vienna, 11 March 2002)

Besides these agreements a mixed Austro-Iranian economic commission has been meeting regularly to discuss further projects and proceedings. In 1991, a delegation of members of the Iranian parliament visited Vienna (ÖZA 1991, p. 77), Vice-Chancellor Alois Mock paid an official visit to Tehran (ÖZA 1991, p. 80) and Federal President Kurt Waldheim made a state visit to Iran in June of the same year. He was received by State President Rafsanjāni, who informed him that the Islamic Republic was interested in opening up to the West. At the end of his visit Waldheim paid a visit to the Austrian camp for Kurdish refugees in Orumiya, and was asked to prolong Austrian aid to this area (ÖZA 1991, p. 135).

In subsequent years high-ranking officials have been coming and going to the capitals of each other’s countries. When the United States, still boycotting Iran, tried to put Austria under pressure in 1996 to consider Iran as an “enemy,” the Austrian federal chancellor rejected this request (ÖZA 1996, p. 308). Austrian Federal President Thomas Klestil visited Tehran in September 1999 and met with President Moḥammad Ḵātami to solve together the pending problem of the protection of foreign investment in Iran (WB, 9 September 1999). The agreement was ready to be signed in February 2001, as listed above. The most recent Iranian state visit to Austria was made by President Ḵātami in March 2002. Many issues were discussed and the atmosphere of this meeting gave the assurance that Austro-Iranian diplomatic and commercial relations would continue at a high level.

ii. Iranian studies

Many of the Austrian Iranologists and their scholarly achievements are discussed in the surveys s.v. GERMANY iii. and iv. The present entry is intended as a synthetic history of the organization of Iranian studies (1) up to 1918 in all the Habsburg “hereditary countries,” which included the present Czech Republic and Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Bosnia, also parts of Poland, Romania, and Ukraine, and (2) since 1918 in the Republic of Austria exclusively.

Ancillary beginnings (1524–1754). Valuable information on Persia was often reported by Austrian envoys (Hans Christoph Freiherr von Teufel zu Guntersdorf, 1587; Georg Tectander, 1602-5), travelers (Heinrich von Poser und Groβnedlitz, 1620–25), and Jesuit missionaries (P. Alexander de Rhodes, P. Grueber). However, the earliest orientalists in Austria were Johann Jesen (the Bohemian physician of Emperor Rudolf II [r. 1576-1612]) and Sebastian Tengnagel (1574–1636, native of Büren, in Guelders [in the present-day Netherlands]), the second custodian of the Imperial Library; the latter, although more conversant in Turkish than in Persian, bequeathed some New Persian manuscripts to the Hofbibliothek (some may have been acquired earlier). The Vienna Library preserves the oldest extant New Persian manuscript in Arabic script, the pharmacopoeiea Ketāb al-abnia wa’l-ḥaqāʾeq al-adwia of Abu Manṣur Mowaffaq Heravi (q.v.), copied in 1056 CE by the poet Asadi (q.v.; facs. ed. by F. R. Zeligmann, Vienna, 1859).

Iranian studies arose from diplomatic relations, in Austria somewhat later than in Bohemia, Hungary, or Poland. Until 1750, the government’s aim was to meet the practical need to instruct professional interpreters (dragomans, entitled Sprachknaben). Although the first contacts were established in 1524 on the occasion of the Persian embassy of Father Petrus de Monte Libano to Emperor Charles V (r. 1519-56), the legates (Austrian ambassadors) were content with employing Christian natives or sending young men (from 1578) to Istanbul to acquire a practical command of the languages. The first Imperial Court Interpreter (Hofdolmetscher) was appointed in 1661, in the person of François de Mesgnien Meninski (1623–97), who was a distinguished expert in the languages used in the Muslim kingdoms. In 1674, the Sprachknaben-Institut (under the auspices of the Internunciature in Istanbul) was established in Vienna, on the model of training institutions in France and Poland; and courses in Oriental languages were instituted at the University of Vienna by Gianbattista Podestà (1624–1703). The oldest printings in Austria in modern Oriental languages date from the same period (Podestà, Tractatus varii de linguis orientalibus, praecipue Arabica, Persica et Turcica, Vienna, 1669; P. Bedik, Cehil Sutun, seu explicatio utriusque celeberrimi, ac pretiosissimi Theatri quadraginta columnarum in Perside Orientis, Vienna, 1678). These works were soon superseded by Mesgnien’s Thesaurus linguarum Orientalium, Turcicae, Arabicae, Persicae …, published in Vienna in four volumes between 1680 and 1687, which for 150 years remained a standard, especially in Jenisch’s 1780 reprint. This flowering did not last long. Podestà’s courses met with only slight success (a total of three students completed the three-year course) and were discontinued after 1677. The Paraemia Locmani sapientis (1703) by Mesgnien’s pupil and successor as Hofdolmetscher (official Interpreter), John Adam Lacheviz, is of little value. After it, and Podestà’s scarcely distributed Cursus grammaticalis linguarum orientalium, arabicae scilicet, persicae et turcicae (3 vols., Vienna, 1703), Oriental studies in Austria remained static for 50 years, since the collapse of the Safavid kingdom in 1722 severely restricted regular diplomatic relations and official concern with Persia.

Enlightened orientalism: the translation epoch (1754–1848). The situation changed in 1754, when, under the impetus of the Chancellor Prince of Kaunitz-Rietberg, the Kaiserlich-königliche Akademie der Orientalischen Sprachen (k.k. Orientalische Akademie), was founded with eight Sprachknaben and a ten-year curriculum. This school of advanced training seemed at first to be intended for a utilitarian goal similar to that of the former initiatives, even though New Persian was not included among the languages taught. However, the Orient, viewed as the “source of Light,” now fascinated both enlightened aristocrats and influential freemasons (cf. the figure of Sarastro Zarathustra in the Magic Flute), so that the Academy was building one of the most effective bridges to the exclusive Austrian nobility and a diplomatic career. Among the first group, Franz Maria Freiherr von Thugut succeeded Kaunitz as chancellor in 1794, and Bernhard (later Freiherr) von Jenisch was appointed in 1780 as trustee of the Imperial Library; the third director, Father Franz Höck, S.J., became Rector Magnificus of the University of Vienna in 1802. A patron enabled a library to be assembled, with 87 Persian manuscripts and hundreds of documents. The tide of the publications flowed again: Ignaz Lorenz Freiherr von Stürmer, Anthologia Persica, seu selecta e diuersis Persis auctoribus exempla in latinum translata (Vienna, 1778); Berhard von Jenisch and Franz Höck, Mohammed Mirchond. Historia priorum regum Persarum post firmatum in regno islamismus, persice et latine (Vienna, 1782); Johann Friedel, Fragmente über die Literaturgeschichte der Perser, nach dem Lateinischen des Baron C.E.A. Reviczky von Rewissnie (Vienna, 1783).

Still more active were Jakob von Wallenburg (1763–1806), Josef Freiherr von Hammer-Purgstall (1774–1856) and Vinzenz von Rosenzweig Ritter zu Schwannau (1791–1865). Wallenburg’s translation of Jalāl-al-Din Rumi’s Maṯnavi perished, and his untimely death broke off his translation of Ferdowsi’s Šāh-nāma. Parts of it were printed in Hammer-Purgstall’s Fundgruben des Orients (Vienna, 1809-19), and A. de Bianchi edited his Notice sur le Schah Name de Ferdoussi (Vienna, 1810). Hammer-Purgstall’s famous Mahomed-Schemsed-din Hafi;s’ Divan, (Tübingen, 1813-14) influenced Goethe’s Westöstlicher Diwan and revealed the universal significance of Persian poetry. This was only a small part of his oeuvre, which included history (e.g., a ten-volume Geschichte der Osmanen, Pest, 1827-33; and Geschichte der Ilchane, d.i. der Mongolen in Persia, Darmstadt, 1842) and Persian, Arabic, and Turkish literature (e.g., Geschichte der schönen Redekunst Persiens vom 4. Jahrhundert der Hedschira … Mit einer Blüthenlese aus 200 persischen Dichtern, Vienna, 1818; see DAWLATŠĀH SAMARQANDI). Hammer-Purgstall, who was decorated with nineteen Orders and who personified orientalism in Europe through his relations with the aristocracy and the literati, crowned his career by fostering the foundation of the Imperial Academy of Sciences in 1847, of which he became the first president. To his pupil Rosenzweig, professor at the Academy from 1817 to 1847, we owe Joseph und Suleika, historisch-romantisches Gedicht … des Mewlana Abdurrahman Dschami (Vienna, 1824; see JĀMI, MAWLĀNĀ); Auswahl aus den Diwanen des gröβten mystischen Dichters Persiens, Mewlana Dschelaleddin Rumi (1838); and a translation of Ḥāfeẓ, Der Diwan des groβen lyrischen Dichters Hafis (1858), which is superior to that by Hammer-Purgstall.

Vienna was becoming the most active center for living Oriental languages. The Mechitarist monks, coming from Venice, founded an abbey in Vienna; here they developed a library of Armenian manuscripts, which is now second only to Erevan, and the largest collection of Armenian coins (catalogued by P. Z. Bedoukian). They established presses for Oriental languages, from which came, e.g., J. Markwart, Skizzen zur historischen Geographie und Geschichte von Kaukasien (Vienna, 1928). Also, the kaiserlich-königliche Hof-und Staats-Druckerei became, under the direction of Alois Auer Ritter von Welsbach (1813-69), the most versatile press in the German-speaking area, with 104 different typefaces in 1851. The second Avestan typeface (after the very ugly Berlin one of 1825) was cast there in 1847, and Pahlavi and Pazand type with all the ligatures were first made there in 1850. Other printing houses subsequently acquired an Avestan typeface, but not a Pahlavi one, so even works published in other countries had to be printed in Vienna if they required Pahlavi type. Among them were most of Friedrich Spiegel’s philological works (Huzvâresch-Grammatik, Leipzig, 1851; Avesta, die heiligen Bücher der Parsen, zum ersten Male herausgegeben, Vienna, Hof- und Staatsdrückerei, 1853–55; Avesta, die heiligen Bücher der Parsen, zum ersten Male übersetzt, Leipzig, 1863; Commentar über das Avesta, Leipzig, 1864–69), Heinrich F. J. Junker’s The Frahang i Pahlavīk (Heidelberg, 1912), and J. M. Unvala’s Neryosangh’s Sanskrit version of the Hōm Yašt (Vienna, 1924). The state presses also served as centers for language teaching (with lectures on Persian, Arabic, Turkish, or Sanskrit), as Auer required typographers to know the languages they set.

The first European scholarly description of Muslim India (together with Afghanistan) and of Nāder Shah’s reign is owed to the Bozen [Bolzano] Jesuit, Josef Tieffentaller. Johann Philipp Wesdin, better known under his name as a Carmelite, Paulinus a Sancto Bartholomaeo, syndic of the Oriental Missions in Rome and a native of Hof in Lower Austria (1748–1806), wrote the first attempt to interpret the Brahmanic religion, using J. F. Kleuker’s translation of the Avesta. He also, following Sir William Jones’ recognition of the Indo-European language family (1786), published the earliest list of lexical correspondences between Sanskrit, Avestan, Latin, and Germanic (1798). In an appendix he also established that Avestan was not a corrupted form, as Jones had asserted, but a linguistic cognate of Sanskrit. Following in his footsteps, the Jesuit Josef Dobrovský (1753-1829) compared Sanskrit and Avestan with Old Church Slavonic as early as 1806.

Delayed modernization (1848-1918). Despite these achievements, by the middle of the 19th century Austrian Oriental studies had fallen behind in three respects. Firstly, it remained belles-lettres in the true baroque and Enlightenment tradition, the foremost aim of which was translating and popularizing the ever-living treasuries of Oriental poetry and wisdom. Elegant rendering took precedence over philological minuteness or erudite apparatus. This practice earned Hammer-Purgstall fame outside the narrow scholarly circle but also provoked criticism for inaccuracies. In fact, except for the amateur linguist Paulus a Sancto Bartholomaeo, they took absolutely no part in the great archeological debates of the early 19th century, the controversy about the authenticity of the Avesta brought back by Anquetil-Duperron, or the decipherment of the Achaemenid cuneiform inscriptions by Grotefend (q.v.).

Secondly, until the university reform of Leo Graf Thun-Hohenstein in the 1850s, only the medieval Faculties of theology, medecine, and law were represented in the Austrian universities, where teaching, but no research, was allowed. The Ph.D. degree was not introduced in Vienna until 1872. The curriculum of the Orientalische Academie became more technical and detached from research after 1848 (even more so after 1898, when it was reorganized in the k.u.k. Konsularakademie); it no longer served to satisfy the encyclopedic curiosity of aristocrats and diplomats about the Orient, but rather to meet the practical need for political agents. Elsewhere, chairs for Indology or comparative linguistics were created—at the Collège de France and in Bonn (1818, the latter for August Wilhelm von Schlegel), in Berlin (1821, for Franz Bopp), and in Oxford (1833). (Von Schlegel’s brother Friedrich, likewise an Indologist and one of the founders of Comparative Grammar—a term he introduced—was a Chancellery secretary in Vienna. He continued to lecture into the 1820s but soon ceased to keep up with the progress of Indology.) Learned societies were founded—the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal (1780), the Société Asiatique (1822), and the Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft in Leipzig (1845). Such developments prompted no response in Austria. The Professor for Protestant Theology Johann Georg Wenrich (1787–1847) tried to echo Rasmus Rask and Bopp, but his Commentatio of 1827 is but a (well-informed) compilation of all hitherto published works and remained isolated and unnoticed. Wenrich set up a course in Sanskrit as early as 1825, but it attracted no student.

Thirdly, between 1850 and 1885 a new paradigm emerged in all the historical sciences (excluding the classics), of which the neogrammarian revolution in linguistics is only one, albeit the most conspicuous, manifestation. This paradigm can be summarized as a plea for a scientific methodology in the human sciences, contrary to the earlier antiquarian spirit, and it called for literary and scholarly studies to be kept separate (pace Friedrich Rückert). To describe its process, the term “analytic idealism” is perhaps the most appropriate. That is, each piece of evidence was to be clearly dated and located, made to testify to only its own time and place. This procedure leads to the definition of distinct, and supposedly homogenous, stages; these can be rationally described and related to the adjacent, earlier and later stages by application of abstract, logical principles. Accordingly, uchronic and diatopic typologies (in Alexander von Humboldt’s manner) were discarded, and each field began to be split according to linguistic or chronological criteria. As a result, Old and Middle Iranian (and sometimes New Eastern Iranian too) became (and remain today) mostly the domain of Indo-Europeanists, since the Old Iranian languages constitute one of the branches of Indo-European; whereas Persian was subsumed under Oriental studies along with Semitic languages and Turkic. The dawn of this movement for Iranian studies may be found in Theodor Benfey’s review of Hermann Brockhaus’s Vendidad and Friedrich Spiegel’s Avesta (Göttingische Gelehrte Anzeigen, 1850, pp. 1193–1236; 1852, pp. 1953–76; and 1853, pp. 57–93), in which Benfey inaugurated what might be called the “Vedizing School” along with Rudolf von Roth and Martin Haug. The movement manifested itself in the growing suspicion of local traditions, in the endeavor to distinguish (and in certain cases to over-distinguish) different layers in a building or a text, and in the predilection for the oldest monuments rather than for younger ones, even when the latter were better preserved or more attractive. All this led to a race to discover and secure the oldest testimonia.

The new paradigm, having originated in Germany, was slow in reaching the Dual Monarchy, especially the University of Vienna. Four illustrations are worth citing. (1) Although supported by Hammer-Purgstall and Alexander von Humboldt, Theodor Benfey’s nomination to the professorship of comparative linguistics was refused by the Ministry of Culture in 1849, while Anton Boller (1811-69), whose most durable contribution remains the connection of Japanese with Mongolian and Turkic, was eventually appointed as Extraordinarius (associate professor) in June 1850 and as Ordinarius in 1855. (2) Austria-Hungary, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, and Spain were the few Western countries that did not send any expeditions to Central Asia and the Turfan Basin, except for a geological one under Dr. A. Regel; the Budapest-born Marc Aurel Stein traveled on behalf of the British Government of India. (3) No archeological institute was established, nor were excavations undertaken in Syria, Mesopotamia, or Persia. (4) At the end of the Monarchy the Museum of Fine Arts in Vienna (Kunsthistorisches Museum) owned only 4,000 coins. In comparison, despite shortage of resources, the Republic of Austria has, since 1918, purchased twice as many, notably the collection of E. von Zambaur in 1928.

Up to 1900, most of the Viennese professors who taught or published on Iranian topics remained polymaths rather than historians or comparative linguists in the new sense; Bedřich Hrozńy complained of not having found a competent teacher in Vienna, and Th. Nöldeke deemed his Viennese sojourn (1854–57) unfruitful. Nöldeke was nevertheless elected corresponding fellow of the Academy in 1887, and he published in its Sitzungsberichte—e.g., Persische Studien on Greek loanwords in New Persian, an edition of the Alexander Romance, and a Syriac history of the last Sasanian kings (590-642 CE) written ca. 680 (now known as the Khuzistan Chronicle; Baumstark, p. 207 and n. 11). Boller’s successor was the universal linguist Friedrich Müller (1834-97), who wholly rejected the neogrammarian method (see, e.g., his review of Paul Horn’s Grundriβ der neupersischen Etymologie in WZKM 7, 1894, p. 189). Thus his earlier contributions are more useable than his later works, in which antiquated theories often persisted. Good examples are his “Über die Stellung des Armenischen im Kreise der indogermanischen Sprachen” (Sitzungsberichte der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Phil.-hist. Classe [SKAW] 84, 1877, pp. 211-32), which criticizes H. Hübschmann’s separation of Armenian from Iranian languages, and “Die semitischen Elemente der Pahlawi-Sprache” (SKAW 136/10, 1897, p. 3) against Spiegel’s and Nöldeke’s interpretation of the Semitic words in Pahlavi texts as ideograms and against the neogrammarians. Another universal scholar (now fallen into oblivion) was the professor of history Maximilian Büdinger (1828–1902), who published studies on the Medes and Cyrus as well as on La Fayette and Columbus.

This state of affairs did not have exclusively negative results. The Austrian “backwardness” manifested itself in research directions which the new paradigm neglected and which became fashionable only later—unwritten and modern languages, Trümmersprachen (extinct languages known only through fragmentary or secondary evidence), toponymy, decorative arts, applied sciences, and contemporary studies. Five main research directions can be noted.

(1) Political sciences. Ottokar Freiherr Schlechta von Wssehrd (1825-94), dragoman and diplomat, in addition to producing translations in Hammer-Purgstall’s tradition, studied the juridical and political issues of Oriental countries and published terminological dictionaries.

(2) Geography. Wilhelm Tomaschek (1841-1901), professor of geography in Graz and later in Vienna, broke new ground in the toponymics and historical ethnography of Central Asia and southern Siberia, which he never visited. His Centralasiatische Studien comprises a toponymical survey of Sogdiana, which still retains its value despite the rough method, and a similarly useful analogical glossary of the Pamir languages. Most of his intuitions concerning Alexander’s path in eastern Iran have proved more exact than have linguistically more elaborate proposals; and, however flawed his studies about the Scythians may be, they nevertheless gave impetus to further research for some fifty years.

(3) Art and technology. Out of commercial desire for Persian wares (especially carpets) came the creation of the Orientalisches Museum in 1875 (after 1896 called Kaiserlich-königliches Handelsmuseum), the Hochschule für Welthandel–Lehranstalt für orientalische Sprachen (where, for instance, Jerzy Kuryłowicz studied in 1912-14 and 1919-20), and the Österreichische Orient-und Überseegesellschaft (1875-1918). In the organ of the Überseegesellschaft, entitled Österreichische Monatsschrift für den Orient, Josef Ritter von Karabaček, M. Haberlandt, and Moritz Dreger published articles on Persian art, and Alois Riegl (1858–1905) his earliest book. Riegl’s interest in even minor arts, and in functional architecture to the extent that they reveal the spirit of a civilization, was shared by Josef Strzygowski (1862-1941), who tried to assert a Sasanian (via Armenia) and Central Asiatic impulse in the birth of Romanesque art. The studies of J. von Wiesner (1838-1916) on Persian textiles and Central Asian paper remained unequalled up to the 1960s. Emanuel Graf Ludolf (1823-98) gathered an Oriental art collection, which is now kept in the Francisco-Carolinum Museum in Linz.

(4) Natural history. Apart from the universities, the various educational, diplomatic, and military missions to Persia gave rise to fieldwork. Theodor Kotschy (1813-66) brought back from his travel (1835–43, partly with J. Russegger) 300,000 botanical specimens, including many types now in the Natural History Museum. The role of Austrian subjects in the creation of the Dār-al-fonun (q.v.) in 1852 or in the development of Tehran in 1869–74 fall beyond the scope of the present survey, but their reports deserve mentioning: August Kříž (often written Kržiž; 1814-86) drew the first maps of Tehran and of the Alborz (q.v.) range and subsequently studied the indigenous astrolabe. Jacob Eduard Polak (1818-91), who introduced modern medicine in Iran, discovered fossil deposits in Azarbaijan and led an expedition across the Alborz in 1882. He also wrote a travel account, which contains excellent descriptions of Persian life and customs. Later botanical surveys were carried out by J. A. Knapp, Otto Stapf, and F. Nabelek (1909-10), geological ones by E. Tietze, H. Pöhlig, A. Rodler, and Carl Ludolf Griesbach. A zoological survey was carried out by the ichthyologist V. Pietsmann. At a time when urbanism was not acknowledged as a scholarly discipline, Ernst Diez, shortly before World War I, completed a survey of Khorasan province, which thus far had been poorly documented; he published his work subsequently as Iranische Kunst (Vienna, 1944).

(5) Cultural studies. Pastoral care or proselytism in modern Iran, with its social, but also cultural, issues, remains on the agenda of the Missionshaus St. Gabriel in Mödling; founded in 1889, it houses a rich library. It formerly published the anthropological journal Anthropos, which moved to Posieux, Switzerland, in 1938.

Nevertheless, the ministers of education and the Council of the University Professors felt committed to closing the gap between Austria-Hungary and Germany, and they endowed autonomous institutes for each discipline. At the University of Vienna, the Oriental Institute was founded in 1886; and one year later it began publication of the journal Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes (WZKM). The Institute for Linguistics was established in 1923. In addition to these measures, German professors were hired. Thus Eduard Sachau (1845-1930) succeeded Goldenthal in the chair for Oriental languages in 1869. Although he left for Berlin in 1876, his Viennese researches demonstrated how much light might be shed on Iran by using the sources from neighboring cultures. In “Neue Beiträge zur Kenntnis der zoroastrischen Literatur” he published fragments of Avestan in Arabic script; his expertise in Arabic sources bore fruit in his still authoritative Chronologie orientalischer Völker von Albîrûnî (Leipzig, 1876; English tr. The Chronology of Ancient Nations, London, 1879) and in his “Zur Geschichte und Chronologie von Khwarizm”; and he undertook the scientific edition of the Christian Syriac law texts in Syrische Rechtsbücher (Berlin, 1907-14), which remains irreplaceable for the laws compiled in the Sasanian empire (for the Byzantine tradition see now W. Selb and H. Kaufhold, Das syrisch-römische Rechtsbuch, Vienna, 2002). Friedrich Müller was succeeded in comparative linguistics by the Berliner Paul Kretschmer (professor, 1898-1938). The professor for Roman law Paul Koschaker (1879–1951) turned, under the influence of Hugo Winckler and Nikolaus Rhodokanakis, to Mesopotamian and Elamite law during his stays in Graz (1905-8), Innsbruck (1908-9), and Prague (1909-14). Alois Musil (1868-1944, cousin of the litterateur Robert Musil) was professor of biblical auxiliary sciences and Arabic at the Catholic Theological Faculty, 1909-18, and, after World War I, professor in Prague; he is mainly known for his Omayyad excavations, but he also studied medieval and modern Iran.

In other universities of the Austrian empire the German model was introduced generally earlier and more easily. In Graz, the first professor for comparative linguistics (1871-77) was Johannes Schmidt, the co-editor of the leading journal Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung. His successors Gustav Meyer (1877-97) and Gustav Meringer (1898-1930) were not particularly interested in Iranology, but in 1902 a professorship for “Orientalische Philologie, Arische Abteilung” was created for Johann Kirste (assistant professor 1895-1920), a Pahlavi paleographer who held fast to some unlucky asseverations of his master Friedrich Müller, such as the phonetic value /r/ for the Bactrian letter taken from Greek aspirate rho (which actually is Bactrian /š/) or the interpretation of the Semitic ideograms in Pahlavi as loanwords.

In Prague the Indo-Europeanist Georg Curtius was invited as early as 1845, followed in 1850 by the equally famous August Schleicher, who, however, felt himself uncomfortable in the neo-absolutist “Bach System” and the devout Catholic ambience; after him came Alfred Ludwig (1832–1912; associate professor 1860, professor 1871–99), who earned fame for his translation of the Rig Veda, but also studied the Avesta, Baluchi (Balōčī) epics, and Pashto. In 1877 and 1879 were appointed the first Privatdozents (unpaid professors)—respectively, Max Grünert (1849–1929, for whom a professorship was created in 1886) and Jaromír Břetislav Košut (b. 1854, d. 1880). Grünert defined himself as a “schoolmaster” and wrote a successful Neu-Persische Chrestomathie (Prague, 1881); Košut’s published Nachlaβ included a rendition and a study of Ḥāfeẓ. After the division of the Ferdinand-Charles University into a German university and a Czech one in 1882, Grünert stayed in the former; and Rudolf Dvořák (1860-1920) was appointed as assistant professor at the latter in 1884 (in 1896, professor). Dvořák was primarily an Arabist, but he published a study of the Persian loanwords in the Qurʾān (SKAW 118/4, 1889, pp. 481-562) and fine translations of Persian poetry in Czech. His students were Jaromir Borecky, Jindrich Endlicher, and Jan Rypka, who similarly devoted themselves to New Persian literary history.

In Cracow, Jan Hanusz’s (1858–87) untimely death delayed the creation of a chair for comparative and Sanskrit studies until 1894, when it was assumed by Jan Baudouin de Courtenay (1845-1929). This great linguist did not publish on Iranian languages and resigned in 1900 in favor of a call to St. Petersburg. His successor was Johannes von (Jan) Rozwadowski (1867–1935), whose researches on Iranian languages appeared from 1914 onward in the journal he had co-founded, Rocznik Orjentalistyczny. Working at the same time was the first Cracovian orientalist, Tadeusz Kowalski (1889–1948). The Iranologist Hans Reichelt (1877–1939), author of the Awestisches Elementarbuch, held the chair of comparative linguistics at the University of Czernowitz (endowed 1875) from 1911 to 1919.

In Hungary, Oriental studies developed in a different perspective. Since the time of the Byzantine historiographers, the origins of the Hungarians had been ascribed to the Huns and the Turks. This view, based on history rather than on linguistics, was adopted by Joseph Deguignes (Histoire des Huns, et des peuples qui en sont sortis, Paris, 1751; Histoire générale des Huns … jusquà present, Paris, 1756-58) and by the first Privatdozent in Oriental languages at the University of Budapest, Johann Repiczky (lived 1817–1855); it remained commonplace in Hungary until J. Budenz. Thus Turkology and Central Asian studies, not Indo-European studies, benefited from the Romantic, passionate search for national antiquities, whilst Iranology was not deemed worthy of a separate professorship before 1946, when it was created for Sigismund Telegdi. The quest for the ancestral fatherland led Alexander Csóma de Korös to the Himalayas in 1823-30. The same urge took Ármín Vámbéry (Hermann Wamberger 1831–1913), disguised as a dervish, to Bukhara and Samarkand (1863-64), the first European scholar after the Russian spy Alexandre Demaisons to visit these cities. He brought back with him the New Persian and Turkic manuscripts collected by Daniel Szilágyi, one of H. L. Kossuth’s fellow exiles. In 1865, Vámbéry procured a position as teacher at the university, and he held a professorship from 1870 to 1905. His popular geographic descriptions enjoyed the greatest success, but his Geschichte Bocharas oder Transoxaniens (Stuttgart, 1872) is not reliable. He came from a very poor family and remained a lifelong autodidact more apt at discovering the Orient and at evoking it empathically than at studying it scientifically. J. Neméth, whose contributions to Iranian studies came after the war, filled his vacant chair only in 1915.

Eventually, Austria-Hungary had its share in the publication of Old and Middle Iranian primary sources. Karl W. Geldner’s (q.v.) edition of the Avesta (Avesta. Die heiligen Bücher der Parsen, 3 vols., Stuttgart, 1886–95) was commissioned by the Kaiserliche Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Wien following the recommendation of Sachau and Fr. Müller. Josef von Karabaček became keenly aware of the chance discovery in 1877-78 of papyri in dump tumuli near Arsinoë in the Fayum. The carpet-dealer Theodor Graf facilitated the purchase of a substantial part of them by Archduke Rainer, who made a gift of them to the Emperor Franz Josef (r. 1848-1916) in 1899, and so they entered the Hofbibliothek. These papyri date from the 7th-8th centuries and constitute a rich collection of early Arabic texts. The archive also contains some papyri in Middle Persian, dating from the Sasanian occupation (619-29). Of this group, 580 (not 463, as Hansen, 1938, p. 10, gave erroneously) were kept in Vienna (fully catalogued; see Weber, 1984, p. 27); 66 were acquired by the Prussian consul Travers and are preserved in Berlin; 17 went to St. Petersburg, 6 to Straβburg (present-day Strasbourg), 1 to Göttingen, 7 to Oxford, and 20 to Philadelphia. Unfortunately, in 1937 the Vienna collection was entrusted for restoration to H. Ibscher in Berlin, where it shared (unduly) the fate of the Prussian estates in 1945 and was transferred as war booty to St. Petersburg (then Leningrad), where it still awaits publication. All attempts to negotiate the return of the papyri have so far proved in vain. Only 30 fragments, which resurfaced in Berlin in 1963, were handled back to Vienna in 1981. Thus the Papyrussammlung owns now 21 papyri, 8 parchments (including 3 bilingual), and 1 leather document.

Brilliant individuals but disrupted development (1919–65). The post-World War I period witnessed grave difficulties, and the disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian empire scattered the academic network. The Republic of Austria inherited only three universities—Vienna, Graz, and Innsbruck. Nevertheless, three eminent Iranologists were active between the two world wars: Bernhard Geiger (q.v.), Hans Reichelt, and Paul Tedesco. At the University of Vienna, Geiger was appointed as successor of Leopold von Schroeder in 1920. His scholarly output was irreproachable but spare. Iranology did not thrive in Vienna; of 185 Ph.D. degrees awarded in the Oriental Institute from 1873 to 1938, only 20 had Iranology or “Arisch” (i.e., Indo-Iranian) as major or minor subject, while there were 39 in “Ägyptologie” or “Afrikanistik,” and 110 in Semitic philology (excluding cuneiform studies). It was not Geiger’s fault; between 1923 and 1939, he examined eleven Ph.D. dissertations, almost matching the 12 directed by the Egyptologist W. Czermak. However, he inherited no tradition, worked in isolation, and did not exploit the Rainer papyri. Only one of his pupils took up an academic career (another, the ethnologist Robert Bleichsteiner [1891–1954], who earned his Ph.D. in 1920 with a thesis on the Šāh-nāma of Ferdowsi, had been supervised by Schroeder). That was Paul Tedesco, who during his Viennese years published classics in Middle Iranian studies. In 1921, he proved that the two orthographies used in the Iranian Manichean texts actually represented dialectal variation between Middle Persian and Northwest Iranian (i.e., Parthian); he also reconstructed the verbal endings of Middle and New Iranian languages, identifying the interchange of -a– and -aya-stems; and his 1926 assessment of nominal endings in Sogdian and Khotanese remains valid despite having been based on the meager evidence available at that time. It is still unique in being founded on exhaustive and sorted philological data, which enabled him to define the Sogdian “Rhythmic Law” that governs the whole morphology of that language. However, he procured no position and had to earn his living as a secondary school teacher. In 1938, after the “Anschluβ” of Austria to Hitler’s Germany, both Geiger and Tedesco were dismissed for being Jews and left for the Asia Institute of Columbia University in New York, and later for Yale (Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen [1894-1969], a specialist in Central Asian studies, underwent the same exile). Geiger was replaced by the Indologist (and National Socialist) Erich Frauwallner. Once again Iranology was partitioned, in keeping with German tradition, between scholars of Oriental studies and those of comparative linguistics. Thus, Herbert W. Duda (1900-75), professor of Turkic and Islamic studies from 1943 to 1971, published a New Persian text on Saljuq history (Die Seldjukengeschichte des Ibn Bibī, Copenhagen, 1957). After his retirement and the short professorship of Berthold Spuler (1971-73), the chair was transferred to the Turcologist A. Tietze, and Persian disappeared as a major from the Oriental curriculum. When in 1964 the former k.u.k. Konsularische Akademie, became the Diplomatische Akademie, the two-century old course in New Persian similarly was discontinued.

From 1921 to 1930, Georg Hüsing (1869–1930), a student of Spiegel and Andreas, held a professorship of History of the Ancient East and Iran (he had been Privatdozent since 1912). His contributions to the (pre)history of Mazdaism are, like most others in that period, vitiated by the Andreas theory (see ANDREAS iii.); they appeared bold even to contemporaries in their explicit rejection of Bartholomae. Hüsing was more successful in interpreting Middle Elamite (although somewhat misled by his belief that Elamite was a Caucasian language) and in editing all Elamite texts available to him. His student Franz Wilhelm König (1897–1972) wrote extensively on Achaemenid history and authored, in a forty-year period, two editions of the Middle Elamite corpus (the second one is still authoritative). Severely wounded during World War I, he only taught for a few years at the university (as Privatdozent in the history of the ancient Middle East, 1931-39, professor, 1948-51). He bequeathed his own translation of the Avesta to the Austrian National Library.

The Iranological tradition in Graz was admirably perpetuated by Hans Reichelt (1920-26 as professor of Indo-Iranian, Kirste’s successor, and 1930-39 as professor of Indo-European and Indo-Iranian, succeeding Meringer). Among his works, two studies stand out and are still highly useful: Die soghdischen Handschriften des Britischen Museums (Heidelberg, 1928-31) and “Iranisch“ (in Grundriβ der indogermanischen Sprach-und Altertumskunde, II. Die Erforschung der indogermanischen Sprachen IV/2, Leipzig, 1927, pp. 1-84). Reichelt also connected the Sogdian potential verb construction of kar-/βw– + the past passive participle with a feature of the living Yaγnōbī language, which had been discovered by H. C. Salemann in 1913, with Old Pers. ditam čaxriyā, and with Khotanese (parallels exist in Balōčī too, but not in Avestan pace Reichelt). His successor was Wilhelm Brandenstein (1898–1967, professor from 1941 to 1967); in addition to Elamite studies, in 1958 he and his former student Manfred Mayrhofer published an esteemed handbook on Old Persian grammar (German revised edition, 1964). Another noteworthy pupil of Reichelt was the historian of religion Alois Closs (1893–1984). Private scholars at Graz included Fridrich von Suhtschek-Hauschka (1863-1944), who published four articles between 1928 and 1932 in which he attempted to prove the idea (already proposed in 1864 by Gustav Oppert and possibly containing some truth) that Wolfram von Eschenbach had resorted to Iranian Manichean sources for his Parsifal. However, gross exaggerations and hazardous etymologies discredited his attempt (cf. Reichelt’s review in WZKM 11, 1933, pp. 37-49), so that his opus magnum Parsiwal found no publisher and ended up in the University Library in Graz (Slaje, 1989). Another such scholar was Uto Melzer Edler von Tapferheim (1881–1961), who, besides some articles which refurbished Kirste’s ideas and received a cool response, left to the university library his own translations (e.g., Nāser-e Ḵosrow’s Safar-nāma, published in 1993). He also left two unpublished dictionaries, one for New Persian, the other for Middle Persian, which, although uncritical, are probably the most complete extant in a Western language (cf. El Zarka and Scheucher).

Fieldwork also was resumed in the period between the two World Wars, notably by Alfons Gabriel (1927, 1933, 1937; he collected numerous specimens of desert fauna), Hans Strasser, M.D. (1935, 1961, 1963-66; he made a few Balōčī, New Persian, and also Sanskrit, Bengali, Syriac, and Turkish recordings, now in the Phonogrammarchiv), Reinhold Löffl;er (ethnology), K.-H. Rechinger (1937-67, d. 1998; he initiated the publication of Flora Iranica beginning in 1963), Franz Kasy (1962, lepidopterology), H. M. Steiner (amphibiology), Helmut Flügel and Othmar Friedrich (geology). A long series of limnological expeditions since 1949 have also appeared in print (Ferdinand Starmühlner, Heinz Löffl;er). The geologist Anton Ruttner mapped Iran with the help of his wife, and Otto Thiele and Herwig Holzer worked at the Geological Survey Institute in Tehran. Eminent geographers have been the Viennese professors Gustav Stratil-Sauer (1894-1975; holder of the chair of human geography 1955-62), who traveled to Afghanistan by motorcycle in 1924, and Hans Bobek (1903-90; professor for physical geography 1951-71), who launched six expeditions to Iran between 1934 and 1978. More recently, Hans Pozdena and Martin Seger worked for some time in Tehran.

By the end of the 1960s, Iranian studies was falling into abeyance in Austria and undergoing a progressive deinstitutionalization. The great development of numismatics arose from a private initiative, as Robert Göbl (1919-97), who worked in the auction house Dorotheum between 1953 and 1962, catalogued the Kushan and Hephthalite coins and seals. Even if his earliest readings and absolute chronologies have lost ground, they for the first time set the subject in a scientific and systematic light. His catalogue of the Kushan coins is authoritative. The anthropologist Karl Jettmar (b. 1918) submitted his Ph.D. dissertation in Vienna in 1941. Acting as scientific member of the mountaineering Österreichische Himalaya-Expedition, in 1958 he discovered at Danyor one of the first of the inscriptions to be found on the Upper Indus, which have proved a treasure trove for Prakrit, Sanskrit, and Sogdian alike; he began the publication of the inscriptional material in 1978 (both this epigraphic enterprise and his fieldwork on the Kafirs were carried out under the aegis of the University and the Academy of Heidelberg). Another Iranologist active outside Austrian academic circles is Cardinal Franz König (b. 1905), archbishop of Vienna 1956-85, whose publications (from his Ph.D. thesis at the Gregorian University in Rome, Die Aməša Spəntas im Awesta und die Erzengel im Alten Testament, to Zarathushtras Jenseitsglaube und das Alte Testament, 1964) concentrate on the Iranian influence upon Judaism.

The modern situation (since 1965). Since 1974, the Oriental and Indian Institutes of the University of Vienna have made do with lecturers in New Persian; a practical initiation into Persia’s language and culture is also available of at the Orient-Akademie Hammer-Purgstall (created in 1958). Conversely, Vienna has become, for the first time, a major center for pre-Islamic Iranian studies, mainly due to the organizing efforts of Manfred Mayrhofer (b. 1926) and Robert Göbl. The Institute for Linguistics, which has published the scholarly journal Die Sprache since 1949, has remained a leading facility for Indo-Iranian studies under the professorship of Mayrhofer (1966–89), Jochem Schindler (lived 1944–94; professor, 1987-94), and Heiner Eichner (since 1989). Mayrhofer’s etymological dictionaries of Indic are of paramount importance for Iranian (the evidence of which is always sifted); Schindler’s articles have shown how far-reaching inferences concerning the reconstruction of Indo-European may be drawn from nugae philologicae Avesticae. Amongst his students, Chlodwig Werba habilitated in Indo-Iranian Linguistics (1997), and Agnes Korn in 2003 submitted a Ph.D. dissertation to the University of Frankfurt, entitled Towards a Historical Grammar of Balochi: Studies in Balochi Historical Phonology and Vocabulary. The chairs for Indo-European in Salzburg (O. Panagl, T. Krisch), Innsbruck (H. Schmeja, Privatdozent 1967, assistant professor 1975-94) and Graz (rendered dormant in 2003; H. Mittelberger, professor 1971-2003; his student Manfred Hutter, assistant professor 1991–2000), also provide lectures in Old and Middle Iranian. Manfred Hutter (D.D., Ph.D.) engaged in research on the contacts between Mesopotamia, Judaism, the Aramaeans, and Iran with special regard to Manicheism, but he left for Bonn in 2000. The Grazer professor for classics, Franz Ferdinand Schwarz, has produced an edition of Arrian with extensive commentaries.

In 1965, an Institute for Numismatics (also intended for the pre-Islamic history of Central Asia) was created at the University of Vienna for Robert Göbl. Other departments have touched upon the subject of Iran. Indo-European and Indo-Iranian loanwords in the Uralic languages have been dealt with by Károly Redéi. The Pamir has attracted ethnologists: Karl Graz and Roger Senarclens de Grancy to the Wakhan (three expeditions, 1962, 1970, and 1975) and Maximilian Klimburg to Nuristan. The last-named scholar also investigated the chronology of the Buddhist paintings in Central Asia and established, together with Alfred Janata and Karl Wutt, the small Kafir collection of the Museum für Völkerkunde in Vienna. Erika Bleibtreu is an esteemed specialist of Achaemenid art. G. Rasuly-Paleczek (Institute for Ethnology) has studied the tribal system in Afghanistan.

The most noticeable development has occurred at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Its ongoing project Tabula Imperii Byzantini covers some parts of the Sasanian empire. R. Göbl instituted in 1970 the Numismatic Commission (now directed by M. Alram), with the projects Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum (cf. R. Gyselen) and Coins and History of Bukhara from the first Arab attacks to the Abbasid revolution. Above all, M. Mayrhofer (secretary of the Phil.-Hist. Section, 1970-82; secretary of the whole Academy, 1970–73) founded in 1969 a commission for the elaboration of an Iranian onomastical dictionary (to replace F. Justi’s Iranisches Namenbuch, Marburg, 1895). By 2002, this had grown, under Mayrhofer as chairman and under his successors J. Schindler and H. Eichner, into the Institute of Iranian Studies, headed by Bert G. Fragner. The Institute of Iranian Studies is today unique in Austria in being solely devoted to Iranian studies and in supporting two publication series, the Iranisches Personennamenbuch and the Veröffentlichungen der Kommission (now Institut) für Iranistik. The latter has 29 publications to date, by Ronald E. Emmerick and Prods Oktor Skjærvø, Wolfgang Felix, Jost Gippert, Karl Jahn, M. Mayrhofer, Rüdiger Schmitt, O. Szemerényi, X. Tremblay, L. Zgusta, and others, as well as the edition of the Avestan Aogəmadaēča by K. Jamasp Asa.