HABSBURG (ASBURGO). - Swiss castle on the Aar. The dynasty that took its name from it originated in Alsace, and the first certain figure is a WERNER, bishop of Strasbourg at the beginning of the 11th century; his nephew WERNER was count in Aargau after 1082; but the family acquired power rather slowly in the lands of present-day Switzerland and the surrounding places, so that by the time of Emperor FREDERICK II it could by then emerge from mediocrity. Its greatest fortunes, however, begin with the appointment of RUDOLF (b. 13 May 1218) as king of Germany, which took place at Frankfurt in Sept. 1273 and which put an end to the long interregnum that had in fact lasted since 1254. The new sovereign concerned himself only in words with effectively asserting his rights in Italy, or with receiving the imperial crown (cf. Dante, Purg., VI, 103; VII, 94 ff.); he directed his policy instead toward expanding his dominion in south-eastern Germany, overthrowing the power of Ottokar II of Bohemia, his principal adversary (d. 26 Aug. 1278), winning for himself Austria, Styria, Carniola and the Wendish March; a little later (1335) Carinthia too became part of the Habsburg possessions. After Rudolf died in 1291, his son ALBERT received the royal crown only in 1298, and held it until 1 May 1308, when he was killed and was succeeded by Louis of Luxembourg; his son FREDERICK (1214) attempted to take it back, but had Louis of Bavaria against him and in the war that followed was defeated (d. 13 Jan. 1330). Faced with the House of Luxembourg, which later regained the kingdom and the empire and also occupied Bohemia, the House of H. passed into second place; it nevertheless preserved its original possessions and the lands acquired at the end of the 13th century, adding the Tyrol to them. Another FREDERICK appears at Constance during the Council, but without managing to prevail against the actions of Sigismund; only after the latter's death (1437) did ALBERT II of H., of the Albertine branch, become king of Germany. At his death, which occurred shortly afterward (24 Oct. 1439), FREDERICK III (of the Leopoldine branch of Styria) held the German empire until 1493. Besides the rights over Hungary and Bohemia, which he never ceased to claim, he succeeded in securing Burgundy (which then included the Netherlands) for his house thanks to the marriage of his son MAXIMILIAN, later king of the Romans. In turn PHILIP, son of Maximilian, married Joanna the Mad, daughter of Alfonso king of Aragon and Isabella queen of Castile; so that at the death of these two sovereigns, Philip and then his son CHARLES found themselves to be heirs of the Spanish kingdoms; and since Philip had already died, at the death of his grandfather Maximilian (1519) CHARLES (I of Spain, and V of Germany) joined to the Spanish kingdoms also the kingdom of Germany with Burgundy, besides the kingdom of Naples conquered by the Aragonese in 1501 and the rights over the duchy of Milan, contested by the king of France. To all this must be added the possession of the East Indies, which were being discovered after 1492. Against this boundless power, which threatened to absorb all of Europe, Francis king of France rose up, seeking the help of England and of anyone who could be an enemy of Charles, not excluding the Turk, and in particular the rebellious German princes and supporters (especially for political reasons) of the new Protestant doctrines. Charles thought it advisable to divide this group of kingdoms with his brother FERDINAND, to whom he entrusted Germany with Hungary, which in 1526 had remained without a king, and with Bohemia, and kept all the rest for himself. At his abdication (1556) his son PHILIP II remained king of Spain, the Netherlands, Naples and the rest and perpetuated the dynasty until CHARLES II, who died in 1706, when the Bourbons of France installed themselves there, losing the Netherlands however. Ferdinand I held the imperial crown, which he transmitted to his son MAXIMILIAN II and then to his grandsons RUDOLF II and MATTHIAS.
(propr. B. Urgenhart)
At Matthias's death in 1619 the crown went to FERDINAND II, son of Charles of Styria, second-born son of Ferdinand I, one of the most convinced supporters of Catholicism and of its rights in Germany; and this direct branch died out in 1740 with the death of CHARLES VI. It was then that CHARLES ALBERT of Bavaria, son of a sister of Charles VI, claimed the throne of Germany; but the latter, by virtue of a "pragmatic sanction" issued by him, had established that his heir should be his daughter Maria Theresa, wife since 1736 of Francis I, duke of Lorraine.
The empire of Germany thus passed into the branch of H.-Lorraine, which acquired the grand duchy of Tuscany at the death of Gian Gastone, the last of the Medici (d. 1737) and then also the duchy of Modena at the death of the last Este: Tuscany indeed fell to PETER LEOPOLD and then to his son FERDINAND III and his descendants; Modena to the son of Peter Leopold's brother and to his son.
The Napoleonic wars led in 1804 to the suppression of the Holy Roman Empire and of the kingdom of Germany; other kingdoms had been forming: those of Prussia, Bavaria, Hanover, Württemberg. FRANCIS II instead assumed the title of emperor of Austria, king of Hungary and of Bohemia; he constituted for his own advantage the Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia by joining to the ancient duchy of Milan the Italian territories of the suppressed republic of Venice; and since Tuscany and Modena were in the hands of his relatives, he was able to exercise a decisive preponderance over the Italian princes. The reconquest of Hungary during the 18th century led the House of H. to extend its European and Christian influence along the entire course of the Danube and over all the surrounding lands; but against the dynastic absolutism of its policy, which nevertheless ensured order and good administration, new tendencies were arising. While the German nation shifted its center of action from Vienna to Berlin, the other nations: Italy, Bohemia, Hungary and later the South Slavs aimed at total independence. The House of H. understood too late that with the progress of the times it was becoming a desperate thing to maintain the old positions, even if these had generally been anything but harmful; and in the world war of 1914-18 it was swept away together with that of the Hohenzollerns of Prussia, which had made every effort to supplant it in the direction of European policy.
The last of the H. to reign were: FERDINAND I, son of emperor FRANCIS, who, because of the insurrections of 1848, had abdicated in favor of FRANCIS JOSEPH, his brother's son. After the latter died, following a very long reign, during the war, in 1916 he was succeeded by CHARLES FRANCIS JOSEPH, his great-grandnephew, who ceased to reign two years later and died in exile in Madeira, a prisoner of the Allies, losing in large part also the family's patrimonial fortune.
BIBL.: sources