Povijesni prilozi, Vol. 45 No. 70, 2026.
Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.22586/pp.v45i70.cybrtm85
The River on Which Depends the Salvation or Destruction of This Land. The 1578 Habsburg Campaign on the River Una in the Reports of Hans Kobenzl
Tomislav Matić
orcid.org/0000-0003-3648-7407
Abstract
This paper examines the letters sent by Hans Kobenzl, confidential adviser or Archduke Charles II of Austria, to Duke Albert V of Bavaria. Archduke Charles was preparing a large military operation on the Habsburg-Ottoman border in Croatia and the Bavarian duke, as his father-in-law, was interested in receiving news about it, partly because he had secured the funding for the expedition in the Imperial Reichstag. The archduke’s operation, the so-called Croatian Expedition, was caused by the Ottoman expansion over the river Una in the previous few years, which left many of the Habsburg fortresses along the river in Ottoman hands and critically endangered the largest remaining one, Bihać. It was believed that the fall of Bihać would directly endanger the archduke’s domain of Inner Austria. Kobenzl describes the goals of the expedition as primarily supplying Bihać with provender, artillery and reinforcements, and reconquering as many fortresses along the Una as possible without a direct clash with Ottoman forces. His letters to the Bavarian duke offer a detailed description of the course of the expedition.
Keywords
early modern history; military history; diplomacy; Croatian history; Habsburg-Ottoman wars
Hrčak ID:
349446
URI
Publication date:
15.7.2026.
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