The Historical Road Maria Theresia in the Călimani Mountains - Past, Present and Future

The Roman road Maria Theresia is known for its historical heritage; in the past, the troops of the Austro-Hungarian Empire housed weapons and food here. Built hundreds of years ago, the route crosses the Călimani mountains. In the elaboration of this article I applied as a research method the case study, which allowed me access to some historical and military information, namely the fact that the historical road had been designed since the time of Emperor Joseph II, but it was completed only in 1820, during the reign of Emperor Francis I of Austria. This study allowed me to collect certain data related to the way in which this road is valued and is attributed remarkable tourist values, and all this through the project undertaken by the Tășuleasa Social Association, which aims to arrange this route as thematic path, precisely to rediscover the imperial road with the value of a historical monument, but also to highlight the natural setting of the Călimani Mountains. Throughout the investigations and the documents studied, I found that many volunteers joined this great project, to keep a road with a distant history practicable. From this case study, it appears that this road has been so well valued that it manages to attract more and more tourists, eager to know both the history of these places, but also to participate in the organized marathon or for a simple hike.

Italian Wars, 1494–1559

According to the Florentine historian Francesco Guicciardini, Italy enjoyed peace and plenty in the years around 1490. From 1494 it was plunged into what he and others regarded as a series of “calamities,” triggered by the French kings Charles VIII (r. 1483–1498) and Louis XII (r. 1498–1515), who claimed to rule the kingdom of Naples and the duchy of Milan, respectively. Francis I (r. 1515–1547) retained the claim to Milan, and the wars themselves continued through the reign of Henry II (r. 1547–1559). Rule over Naples was contested and secured by Ferdinand II of Aragon (r. 1479–1516) and maintained by his Iberian successors. Milan was an imperial fief, so was contested by Ferdinand’s grandson Charles V in his capacity as Holy Roman emperor (r. 1519–1556). The conflicts waged in Italy in the names of these various princes between 1494 and 1559 are collectively known as the Italian Wars. They include the War of the League of Cambrai (1508–1516), that of the League of Cognac (1526–1530), and the War of Siena (1552–1559). This article approaches the wars by means of Reference Works and Overviews specifically devoted to the Italian Wars, though it is also worth teasing information from histories of Renaissance Warfare. Contemporary Sources provide innumerable angles on a subject that can be difficult to define beyond events on the battlefield or the besieged city and are therefore subdivided into four types: Memoirs and Chronicles, Histories, Official Records, and cultural evidence, the last of which appears under the heading Art of War, Art and War. Some publications deal with individual episodes or short spans of time and therefore feature in a Chronology of War, itself subdivided at the death of Louis XII/accession of Francis I, 1494–1515 and 1515–1559. The biographical genre—Lives and Times—is the most obvious way of dealing with the leading protagonists, who tended to be Princes, but group studies are also relevant when one turns to Subjects and Citizens who contributed to the conflicts in some form or other. Some authors have confined their research to military history, including the recruitment of soldiers, their pay, and provisions, as well as their activities on the battlefield, but the Italian Wars witnessed so much overlap between the lives of Soldiers and Civilians that they are brought together in the penultimate section of the article, which then concludes with the miscellanies that are Collections of Papers.

Baron Alexander Stroganov’s Mission to Vienna (1761): Dynastic Policy and Symbolic Communication

The article is based on the materials from Russian and Austrian archives and devoted to lesser-known circumstances of the preparation and course of the 1761 diplomatic mission of Baron A.S. Stroganov to Vienna on the occasion of the wedding of the heir to the throne, Archduke Joseph, with Isabella of Parma. The embassy is considered in the context of symbolic communication through ceremonial gestures between St. Petersburg and Vienna. It emphasised the particularly friendly nature of the relationship between the two dynasties and two courts, not only united by a bilateral treaty and membership in the anti-Prussian alliance during the Seven Years War but also symbolically related as godparents. A.S. Stroganov was a young aristocrat without proper experience in the field of diplomacy and of the modest court rank of Kammer-Junker. The appointment was explained by his kinship with Chancellor M.I. Vorontsov whose daughter Anna officially accompanied her husband on the trip. The imperial ambassador to St. Petersburg Count Nicolaus Esterházy spared no effort to smooth over the awkwardness and find benevolent patrons for the young couple in Vienna. European education and the exceptional personal qualities of the ambassador allowed A. Stroganov to fulfil the commission with honour and receive the title of a Count of the Holy Roman Empire from Emperor Francis I as a reward. The embassy became the last page in the history of relations between St. Petersburg and Vienna on the eve of the break of bilateral relations and Russia’s withdrawal from the Seven Years War in 1762.

Slovak music culture and music professions during Classicism era

The Classicist period in Slovakia developed between 1760 and 1830. At that time Slovakia was a part of the territory of the Hungary. Musical culture during the reign of Maria Theresa, Joseph II and Francis I evolved in three stages under the infl uence of the European musical tradition and contacts with foreign composers from Austria, Germany and Czechia. People could listen to all sorts of music in opera houses, concert halls, noblemen’s courts, petty bourgeois salons and in the countryside. Musical professions in Slovakia were comparable with those in Central Europe. Musicians’ jobs included those of performers, composers, teachers, writers, theoreticians and organizers of cultural life. Usually, one person held two or more of these positions. Composers wrote works which were performed at various occasions. Music teachers taught at state-run music schools, pedagogical colleges and parochial schools. Manufacturers of musical instruments created a number of new instruments, especially wind instruments, violins and organs, many of which were regarded as being highly signifi cant throughout Europe.

Passages to Fantasy : The Performance of Motion in Cellini’s Fontainebleau Portal and the Galerie François I

In the early 1540s, King Francis I commissioned Benvenuto Cellini to design a bronze portal for the Porte Dorée at Fontainebleau. It consisted of a tympanum depicting the ‘Nymph of Fontainebleau’ in a forest setting. The imagery revived the foundation myth of Fontainebleau as a bountiful hunting ground and water source. Although it was never completed, Cellini’s design presented the forest beyond the doors as a recreational space for the varied motions of the hunting ritual and the palace behind the doors as a space for the more choreographed ambulatory motion of guided diplomatic tours. This essay explores the complementarity in the staging of interior and exterior as zones of visual and somatic pleasure.

«The Silver Age of Piracy»: French pirates in the Atlantic in the first third of the XVI century

The purpose of the study was to find a causal relationship between the activities of king Francis I and the large-scale pirate actions of the captains of the French merchant fleet, Jean Ango. This was necessary to show piracy as a fusion of the military and diplomatic policies of France against Portugal and Spain with the naval experience of warfare on the seas and in the oceans, which had the captains of the merchant fleet of Jean Ango. We can see this connection by the captured and looted of hundreds of ships in Portugal and Spain with the full support of piracy from the French crown. The goal was also to show how France, through piracy and its promotion at the state level, destroyed the system of international agreements and Royal oaths in the Christian world for the sake of its commercial advantage. The author studies and gives examples of numerous acts of piracy, numbering in the hundreds of captured, robbed, and sunk ships, the reasons and conclusions are given why Francis I began to demand Open seas and oceans and why he demanded a revision of the borders of the world in the XVI century. The author has considered and found the answers to the questions of what caused the rupture of international treaties, on the part of Francis I. The author has also revealed and shown the facts of multiple penetrations of France on the territory of Portugal and Spain, which later led to attempts by France to establish settlements in Brazil in 15551559 and Spanish Florida in 15631565, contrary to all international norms and agreements the Popes bulls of 1493 and the Treaty of Tordesillas of 1494 and subsequent ones. The paper shows that the scale and scope of the pirate actions of French pirates in the Atlantic contributed to the formation of piracy as a mass phenomenon and can be called the Silver age of world piracy, which falls on the 16th century, and anticipates the Golden age of piracy of the 17th and 18th centuries. This term is quite appropriate to introduce for this time, especially if it is considered together with the even larger-scale pirate actions of Berber pirates in the Mediterranean, which are quite well known and described in the scientific literature.

Pax et Concordia – Politics and Reform

The challenges to peace and concord throughout Christendom weighed heavily on Paul III throughout his reign and limited his focus on reform. The texts of curial sermons, once again, reveal how the pursuit of Pax et Concordia was viewed culturally as integral to the papal role and its honour. The conflict of 1535-1538 between the Holy Roman Emperor and the French King and a text of Pope Paul reflecting on those events illustrate how sorely tested Paul felt. A 1536 speech of the Emperor, Charles V, also indicates the depth of enmity between him and Francis I. This enmity was an ongoing obstacle to a Council and to reform.