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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 April 2022
Austrian chancellor Metternich's Europeanism is often disputed. It has been claimed that he strove only to strengthen Austrian power within the German Confederation and to establish Austrian hegemony in Central Europe, with European interests and the Concert of only secondary concern. The objective of this article is to analyze Metternich's opinions and acts during selected European crises and events between 1840 and 1848, arguing that his approach to resolving them or dealing with their consequences shows that during this period his primary objective was to maintain European peace. He wanted to achieve this by demonstrating the moral consensus of, ideally, all the great powers by abating tense nationalist sentiments, calling for the observance of international agreements and the respect of rights, adopting preventive measures, and warning against or drawing attention to possible negative consequences of the crises for peace in Europe. Metternich's attempt at preserving European peace at all costs was mainly a result of his personal experience of revolution and almost a quarter century of warfare with France. By the 1840s, however, Metternich's style of peace management was rejected as anachronistic, resulting in several military conflicts in subsequent years. Considering the events of the last century that led to European integration, however, his Europeanism deserves a more forgiving evaluation.
1 To date, Heinrich Ritter von Srbik's Metternich: Der Staatsmann und der Mensch (2 vols., Munich, 1925) is the most comprehensive biography of Metternich. Many other biographies and studies of Metternich's policies followed, often primarily based on Srbik's work or documents in Metternich's estate. For a detailed discussion of older Metternich research see Rumpler, Helmut, “Der ‘Stratege und Visionär’ an der Zeitenwende vom Ancien Régime zur Moderne. Anmerkungen zur neuen Metternich-Biographie von Wolfram Siemann,” Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung 125 (2017): 165–76CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. 165–69.
2 On the question of the German national movement and nationalism see Otto Dann, Nation und Nationalismus in Deutschland, 1770–1990 (Munich, 1992); Jörg Echternkamp, Der Aufstieg des deutschen Nationalismus, 1770–1840 (Frankfurt, 1998); Hagen Schulze, Der Weg zum Nationalstaat: die deutsche Nationalbewegung vom 18. Jahrhundert bis zur Reichsgründung (Munich, 1997).
3 Franz Herre, Metternich (Prague, 1996), 320.
4 Kraehe and Billinger look at Metternich's German policy, with the former initially focusing on the period of Metternich's rivalry with Napoleon and subsequently on negotiations at the Congress of Vienna. Billinger to some extent follows Kraehe, concluding that the key to understanding Metternich's solution to the German question is his socially conservative mindset, in which monarchs and aristocrats maintained sanity in the world and ensured the peace and security that their subjects demanded. According to Billinger, Metternich was primarily concerned about Austria's peace and security, but he felt that his philosophy applied in general. See Enno E. Kraehe, Metternich's German Policy, vol. 1, The Contest with Napoleon, 1799–1814 (Princeton, 1963) and vol. 2, The Congress of Vienna, 1814–15 (Princeton, 1984); and Robert D. Billinger Jr., Metternich and the German Question: States’ Rights and Federal Duties, 1820–1834 (Newark, DE, 1991). See also Billinger's work on the Rhine Crisis, “They Sing the Best Songs Badly: Metternich, Frederick William IV, and the German Confederation during the War Scare of 1840–1841,” in Deutscher Bund und deutsche Frage, 1815–1866, ed. Helmut Rumpler (Munich, 1990), 94–113. Here, he analyzes the positions of Metternich and Frederick William IV on German nationalism and compares their vision of Germany's future against the background of the war scare of 1840.
5 Reinerman gives a thorough analysis of Metternich's policy toward the Papal States between 1809 and 1838, noting Metternich's efforts to reform the temporal side of the papacy to transform it into a reasonably efficient government in the hope of stemming demands for revolutionary political innovations. Alan J. Reinerman, Austria and the Papacy in the Age of Metternich, vol. 1, Between Conflict and Cooperation, 1809–1830 (Washington, DC, 1979) and vol. 2, Revolution and Reaction, 1830–1838 (Washington, DC, 1989).
6 Sked attempts to dispel numerous myths linked to the Metternich era, challenging the traditional interpretation that Europe in the first half of the nineteenth century was at the mercy of forces that Metternich could neither understand nor control. He declares that if historians have dismissed Metternich's fears as unfounded and have instead chosen to interpret him as a reactionary, unable to grasp the impact of the progressive forces of history alongside the rise of the new capitalist middle class, then it is they who in fact have fallen prey to illusions. Alan Sked, Metternich and Austria: An Evaluation (New York, 2008).
7 In Metternich's latest biography, Metternich: Strategist and Visionary, Wolfram Siemann divides the prince's life into seven phases that shaped his experience and influenced his later acts. Siemann criticizes earlier biographies for not taking these into account and for limiting their research to published sources from Metternich's estate or from Heinrich Srbik's book. Wolfram Siemann, Metternich: Stratege und Visionär. Eine Biografie (Munich, 2016; in English translation Metternich: Strategist and Visionary, Cambridge, MA, 2019).
8 The author of several monographs of extraordinary importance and many papers on Metternich, Miroslav Šedivý takes some account of the 1840s in his research. Of particular relevance are Metternich, the Great Powers and the Eastern Question (Plzeň, 2013), in which Šedivý puts forward an exhaustive analysis of Metternich's policy regarding the Eastern question, and Crisis among the Great Powers: The Concert of Europe and the Eastern Question (New York, 2017), in which he examines the Rhine Crisis, a topic he also addresses in “The Austrian Empire, German Nationalism and the Rhine Crisis of 1840,” Austrian History Yearbook 47 (2016): 15–36 and “Metternich and the Rhine Crisis (1840),” Prague Papers on History of International Relations 10 (2006): 65–92. Šedivý concludes that the Rhine Crisis exposed the principal deficiencies of the European state system and the general distrust of the behavior of the European Concert during the Pre-March period; the origin, course, and manner by which the crisis was settled proved that the conduct of the great powers was characterized by little respect for legal norms and scant willingness to create new ones that would limit their often self-serving conduct. According to Šedivý, a careful historian of the Rhine Crisis and international relations of its era cannot avoid the impression that it was not the Ottoman Empire but the European state system that was crumbling. It is important to stress, however, that Šedivý ends his research in 1840 or 1841.
9 German historian Harald Müller focuses somewhat on Austrian foreign policy during the 1840s, though he does so in relation to Prussian policy, in his study Im Widerstreit von Interventionsstrategie und Anpassungszwang: Die Aussenpolitik Österreichs und Preussens zwischen dem Wiener Kongress 1814/15 und der Februarrevolution 1848 (Berlin, 1990). His work is markedly influenced, however, by the author's political sentiments when he claims that the core foreign policy principle that arose from Austria and Prussia's ties to the leadership of the monarchist alliance system and the Holy Alliance was to stand against Europe's social development from a feudal to a civil society using all available means and methods. Rather than political history and international relations, Müller is interested in the social and economic aspect of the foreign policy of both great powers, with his main focus on Prussia.
10 An exception here is Alfred Regele's unpublished dissertation, in which the author primarily focuses on the circumstances of Cracow's incorporation into the Danube Monarchy and its customs system. Despite his engagement with this period of Metternich's influence, his scope disregards the larger foreign policy circumstances of the affair. Alfred Regele, “Die Einverleibung des Freistaates Krakau 1846” (PhD diss., University of Vienna, 1951).
11 Richard Metternich-Winneburg, ed., Aus Metternich's nachgelassenen Papieren, 8 vols. (Vienna, 1881–84).
12 They disagree, for example, with Srbik's opinion that Metternich was an earnest and intelligible thinker who rose above specific Austrian problems and became a great statesman and a “good European.” Srbik's biography has long been considered canonical. Information taken from his work is treated as authoritative even when unequivocally refuted by more recent research. Siemann points out that Srbik overly relied on personal memoirs and used archival documents rather randomly, influencing his judgment of Metternich and leading to contradictions in his biography. Siemann also argues that Srbik's picture of Metternich is affected by his ideological prejudices. Srbik's work, therefore, should be approached with skepticism. Siemann, Metternich: Stratege und Visionär, 21–30.
13 On nineteenth-century international relations, for example: Carsten Holbraad, The Concert of Europe: A Study in German and British International Theory, 1815–1914 (New York, 1971); Paul W. Schroeder, The Transformation of European Politics, 1763–1848 (Oxford, 1994); Simpson, Gerry, Great Powers and Outlaw States: Unequal Sovereigns in the International Legal Order (Cambridge, 2004)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Francis R. Bridge and Roger Bullen, The Great Powers and the European States System, 1814–1914 (Harlow, 2005).
14 Matthias Schulz, Normen und Praxis: das Europäische Konzert der Großmächten (Munich, 2009), 589–90 and 626.
15 Paul W. Schroeder, Metternich's Diplomacy at Its Zenith, 1820–1823 (Austin, 1962), 251.
16 Šedivý, Metternich, the Great Powers and the Eastern Question, 802–3; Šedivý, “Metternich and the Rhine Crisis (1840),” 66 and 70–73; Gruner, Wolf D., “Der Deutsche Bund, die deutschen Verfassungstaaten und die Rheinkrise von 1840,” Zeitschrift für bayerische Landesgeschichte 53 (1990): 51–78Google Scholar, at 65; Heinrich Lutz, Zwischen Habsburg und Preussen: Deutschland, 1815–1866 (Berlin, 1998), 200–1.
17 Sked, Metternich and Austria, 96–98.
18 Lerchenfeld-Aham to Ludwig I of Bavaria, Vienna, 17 Oct. 1840, Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv (BHStA), Ministerium der auswärtigen Angelegenheiten (MA), Wien, 2409; Maltzan to Werther, Vienna, 8 Aug. 1840, Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz (GStA PK), HA III, Ministerium der auswärtigen Angelegenheiten I (HA III, MdA I), 6033.
19 Metternich to Apponyi, Vienna, 23 Oct. 1840, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 6:462.
20 Metternich to Trauttmansdorff, Vienna, 24 Nov. 1840, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 6:468 and 471; Maltzan to Werther, Vienna, 13 Feb. 1841, GStA PK, HA III, MdA I, 6034; Šedivý, Crisis among the Great Powers, 152.
21 Metternich to Apponyi, Vienna, 24 Nov. 1840, Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv (HHStA), Staatenabteilungen (StAbt), Frankreich Dipl. Korr., 319.
22 Ibid.
23 Šedivý, Crisis among the Great Powers, 133; Guillaume de Bertier Sauvigny, Metternich: Staatsmann und Diplomat für Österreich und den Frieden (Gernsbach, 1988), 486.
24 Lerchenfeld-Aham to Ludwig I of Bavaria, Vienna, 8 Nov. 1840, BHStA, MA, Wien, 2409; Metternich to Frederick William IV, Vienna, 9 Oct. 1840, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 6:468 and 470; Metternich to Erberg, Vienna, 19 Dec. 1840, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 6:482–83.
25 Metternich to Apponyi, Vienna, 4 Jan. 1841, HHStA, StAbt, Frankreich Dipl. Korr., 322.
26 Pechlin to Krabbe-Carisius, Frankfurt a. M., 3 Sept. 1841, Rigsarkivet, Departementet for de Udenlandske Anliggender, Frankfurt a. M. 1471.
27 Thomas Nipperdey, Deutsche Geschichte, 1800–1866: Bürgerwelt und starker Staat (Munich, 1983), 356 and 362. More on the revisionist view of the German Confederation and its significance in the history of Germany in Wolf D. Gruner, Der Deutsche Bund 1815–1866 (Munich, 2012). See also the new research in the context of the extensive edition project “Quellen zur Geschichte des Deutschen Bundes” launched by the Historical Commission at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences.
28 Schroeder, Metternich's Diplomacy, 255.
29 Šedivý, Metternich, the Great Powers and the Eastern Question, 808.
30 Relevant documents from the National Archives in London, specifically Beauvale's report from Königswart of 29 Aug. 1840 with the attached league project and Ficquelmont's memorandum, were published in 1930 by American historian Frederick Stanley Rodkey. Beauvale to Palmerston, Königswart, 29 Aug. 1840, The National Archives, London (TNA), Foreign Office (FO) 7/291; Rodkey, Frederick Stanley, “Suggestions during the Crisis of 1840 for a ‘League’ to Preserve Peace,” American Historical Review 35, no. 2 (1930): 308–16CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 310.
31 Rodkey, “Suggestions during the Crisis of 1840,” 312–13.
32 Miroslav Šedivý, “Projekt ligy k zachování míru v Evropě (1840): Svatá, nebo Severoatlantická aliance,” in Moderní Evropan první poloviny 19. století: k životnímu jubileu profesora Dušana Uhlíře, ed. Marian Hochel (Prague, 2019), 287–301, at 299–300.
33 Irmline Veit-Brause, Die deutsch-französische Krise von 1840: Studien zur deutschen Einheitsbewebung (Cologne, 1967), 44–45; Šedivý, Metternich, the Great Powers and the Eastern Question, 808–9; Palmerston to Beauvale, London, 23 Oct. 1840, TNA, FO 7/289; Rodkey, “Suggestions during the Crisis of 1840,” 308.
34 Šedivý, Crisis among the Great Powers, 172; Schroeder, Transformation of European Politics, 749: “Meanwhile he avoided anything provocative of France and let Prussia's proposals for a genuine federal military reorganisation run aground. It was a typical Metternichian victory. Austria's interests were protected, peace was preserved, and a potential crisis was defused; but the fundamental problem (in this case, making the Bund a more effective instrument of Germany's defence without endangering its neighbours or upsetting the delicate German equilibrium) was not solved or even confronted.”
35 Miroslav Šedivý, “Od Vídeňského kongresu k první světové válce: kontinuita versus diskontinuita dějin mezinárodních vztahů dlouhého 19. století,” Dvacáté století, no. 2 (2018): 24–43, at 37; Matthew P. Fitzpatrick, Liberal Imperialism in Germany: Expansionism and Nationalism, 1848–1884 (New York, 2008), 27–42; Horst Gründer, Geschichte der deutschen Kolonien (Paderborn, 2012), 19–24; Dirk van Laak, Über alles in der Welt: Deutscher Imperialismus im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (Munich, 2005), 51–55.
36 Henry Cord Meyer, Mitteleuropa in German Thought and Action, 1815–1945 (The Hague, 1955), 12; Franz Joseph Grobauer, Ein Kämpfer für Europa: Metternich (Vienna, 1961), 276; Helmut Rumpler, Eine Chance für Mitteleuropa: Bürgerliche Emanzipation und Staatsverfall in der Habsburgermonarchie (Vienna, 2005), 206–7.
37 Šedivý, Miroslav, “Rakouské císařství a kolonialismus v době předbřeznové,” Historický obzor 25, no. 1–2 (2014): 16–21Google Scholar, at 20–21; Šedivý, Miroslav, “From Hostility to Cooperation? Austria, Russia and the Danubian Principalities, 1829–1840,” Slavonic & East European Review 89, no. 4 (2011): 630–61Google Scholar, at 657.
38 William Carr, Schleswig-Holstein, 1815–1848: A Study in National Conflict (Manchester, 1963), 109; Alexa Geisthövel, Eigentümlichkeit und Macht: deutscher Nationalismus 1830–1851: der Fall Schleswig-Holstein (Stuttgart, 2003), 166–67.
39 Geisthövel, Eigentümlichkeit und Macht, 168–69; Woyna to Metternich, Copenhagen, 29 Aug. 1841, HHStA, StAbt, Dänemark, 109.
40 “Deutschland, das Meer und Dänemark,” Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift, Erstes Heft (Stuttgart, Tübingen, 1842): 227–58; Woyna to Metternich, Copenhagen, 21 Mar. 1842, HHStA, StAbt, Dänemark, 109.
41 Geisthövel, Eigentümlichkeit und Macht, 169; Steefel, The Schleswig-Holstein Question, 5–6.
42 Srbik, Metternich, 2:109.
43 Metternich to Canitz, Königswart, 22 Aug. 1846, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:256–59; Metternich to Vrints-Berberich, Vienna, 27 Jun. 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:445–47.
44 Steefel, The Schleswig-Holstein Question, 5–8.
45 Metternich to Handel, Königswart, 7 Aug. 1846, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:252–54.
46 Metternich to Canitz, Königswart, 22. Aug. 1846, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:256–59.
47 Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:264.
48 Schulz, Normen und Praxis, 132, 144, and 589–90.
49 Radosław Paweł Żurawski vel Grajewski, Ognisko permanentnej insurekcji: powstanie 1846 roku i likwidacja Rzeczypospolitej Krakowskiej w “dyplomacji” Hotelu Lambert wobec mocarstw europejskich, 1846–1847 (Cracow, 2018), 182.
50 Lutz, Zwischen Habsburg und Preussen, 307.
51 Arthur Herman, Metternich (New York, 1932), 239.
52 Metternich's memorandum of 6 Nov. 1846, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:276–88; Metternich to Apponyi, Vienna, 4 Jan. 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:354.
53 Metternich to Trauttmansdorff and Colloredo-Wallsee, Vienna, 29 Nov. 1846, HHStA, Staatskanzlei (StK), Preussen, 191; Metternich to Apponyi, confidential writing, Vienna, 4 Jan. 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:356.
54 Remak, Joachim, A Very Civil War: The Swiss Sonderbund War of 1847 (Boulder, CO, 1993)Google Scholar, 14 and 20.
55 Herman, Metternich, 240; Müller, Im Widerstreit von Interventionsstrategie und Anpassungszwang, 557–62.
56 Metternich to Bombelles, Vienna, 24 Feb. 1841, HHStA, StAbt, Frankreich Dipl. Korr., 322; Metternich to Trauttmansdorff, Vienna, 24 Jan. 1845, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 188.
57 Herman, Metternich, 240–41; David A. Ward, 1848: The Fall of Metternich and the Year of Revolution (London, 1970), 101.
58 Trauttmansdorff to Metternich, Berlin, 3 July 1845, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 187; Trauttmansdorff to Metternich, Berlin, 19 Feb. 1845, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 187; Kast to Metternich, Carlsruhe, 21 Feb. 1845, HHStA, StK, Baden Dipl Korr, 43; Metternich to Philippsberg, Vienna, 7 May 1846, HHStA, Gesandtschaftsarchiv (GsA), Bern, 38; Metternich to Dietrichstein, Vienna, 28 Oct. 1846, HHStA, GsA, Bern, 38.
59 Metternich to Ugarte, Vienna, 2 Feb. 1845, HHStA, StK, Württemberg, 37.
60 Herman, Metternich, 241; Rieben, Hans, Prinzipiengrundlage und Diplomatie in Metternichs Europapolitik: 1815–1848 (Aarau, 1942), 166Google Scholar; Bonjour, Edgar, Geschichte der Schweizerischen Neutralität: Vier Jahrhunderte Eidgenössischer Aussenpolitik, vol. 1 (Basel, 1970), 193–95Google Scholar.
61 Canitz to Bülow, Vienna, 19 Mar. 1845, GStA PK, HA III, MdA I, 6037/1; Metternich to Trauttmansdorff, Vienna, 20 May 1845, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 188; Metternich to Trauttmansdorff, Vienna, 3 July 1845, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 188.
62 Metternich to Apponyi, Vienna, 7 June 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:449; Metternich to Trauttmansdorff, Vienna, 10 June 1847 HHStA, StK, Preussen, 194.
63 Metternich to Apponyi, Vienna, 7 June 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:449.
64 Metternich to Kaisersfeld, Vienna, 1 July 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:456.
65 Metternich to Kaisersfeld, Vienna, 1 July 1847, HHStA, GsA, Bern, 38; Metternich to Apponyi, Vienna, 3 July 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:462.
66 Arnim to Frederick William IV, Vienna, 18 Nov. 1847, GStA PK, HA III, MdA I, 6037/3; Metternich to Trauttmansdorff, Vienna, 12 Nov. 1847, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 194.
67 Bonjour, Geschichte der Schweizerischen Neutralität, 1:199–201; Lutz, Zwischen Habsburg und Preussen, 312; Remak, A Very Civil War, 156; Rieben, Prinzipiengrundlage und Diplomatie in Metternichs Europapolitik, 166.
68 Metternich to Apponyi, Vienna, 29 Nov. 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:498; Metternich to Trauttmansdorff, Vienna, 29 Nov. 1847 HHStA, StK, Preussen, 194.
69 Metternich to Colloredo, Vienna, 15 Dec. 1847, Metternich-Winneburg, Papieren, 7:511–17.
70 Bonjour, Geschichte der Schweizerischen Neutralität, 1:204; Trauttmansdorff to Metternich, Berlin, 10 Feb. 1848, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 194.
71 Arnim to Frederick William IV, Vienna, 22 Nov. 1847, GStA PK, HA III, MdA I, 6037/4; Könneritz to Zeschau, Vienna, 2 Dec. 1847, Hauptstaatsarchiv Dresden, 10717 Ministerium der Auswärtigen Angelegenheiten, Wien, 3165; Trauttmansdorff to Metternich, Berlin, 1 Jan. 1848, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 194.
72 This argument is supported, for example, by the statement of the later Austrian foreign minister Friedrich Ferdinand von Beust, who was convinced of the crucial importance of the Sonderbund crisis for Metternich. He wrote in his memoirs that the “Metternich System” did not go bankrupt in March 1848 or February 1848 but in Switzerland the previous year. In his opinion, the inability to intervene in Switzerland was the starting point of later revolutionary events. F. F. von Beust, Aus drei Viertel-Jahrhunderten. Erinnerungen und Aufzeichnungen, vol. 1, 1809–1866 (Stuttgart, 1887), 38.
73 German historian Sven Externbrink talks about the so-called Metternich generation as one influenced by certain shared, identity shaping experiences, such as growing up and socialization in moderate enlightenment and the experience and participation in upheavals of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era. Externbrink raises the question of whether the Vienna peace settlement had not collapsed due to the change of generations. In his opinion, the next generation of rulers and statesmen, born around 1790, lacked a double experience of peace and war that characterizes the socialization of the Metternich's generation, and therefore they were more willing to provoke or cause confrontations to achieve their goals. Sven Externbrink, “Kulturtransfer, Internationale Beziehungen und die ‘Generation Metternich’ zwischen Französischer Revolution, Restauration und Revolution von 1848,” in Das europäische Mächtekonzert: Friedens- und Sicherheitspolitik vom Wiener Kongreß 1815 bis zum Krimkrieg 1853, ed. Wolfram Pyta (Cologne, 2009), 59–78.
74 Metternich to Trauttmansdorff, Vienna, 12 Mar. 1845, HHStA, StK, Preussen, 188; Jenison-Walworth to Ludwig I of Bavaria, Vienna, 16 Nov. 1846, BHStA, MA, Wien, 2414.
75 Arnim to Frederick William IV, Vienna, 19 Oct. 1847, GStA PK, HA III, MdA I, 6037/3; Arnim to Frederick William IV, Vienna, 4 Nov. 1847, GStA PK, HA III, MdA I, 6037/3; Metternich to Ugarte, Vienna, 2 Feb. 1845, HHStA StK, Württemberg, 37; Metternich an Ugarte, Vienna, 8 Oct. 1847, HHStA StK, Württemberg, 38.
