Boundaries

Although boundaries feature prominently on our maps of the Empire, this chapter argues that they did not pose a particular obstacle to most travellers until the mid-eighteenth century. One circumstance in which territorial borders became relevant were safe-conduct processions. Neighbouring rulers had to agree on the boundaries at which their escorts handed over travellers, creating an opportunity to confirm, challenge, and negotiate territorial boundaries. Using manuscript drawings and paintings from Mühldorf in Bavaria, this chapter discusses the importance of visual records and the material setting in these situations. However, concerning everyday forms of mobility, borders only played a subordinate role. Self-designed maps show that tolls were not usually levied at territorial boundaries, but at toll stations along important thoroughfares. Before the mid-eighteenth century, the geography of governed mobility is therefore more appropriately understood in terms of channels and corridors than through territories and boundaries, a quality the Empire shared with other polities outside Europe.