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Overcoming the Iron Gates: Austrian Transport and River Regulation on the Lower Danube, 1830s–1840s

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 June 2016

Luminita Gatejel
Luminita Gatejel*
Affiliation:
Institute for East and Southeast European Studies (Regensburg)
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Abstract

This article deals with early efforts to facilitate steam navigation between Vienna and Constantinople along the Danube. In addition to analyzing the complex negotiation processes that enabled the first regulation project at the so-called Iron Gates, a narrow gorge situated at the Austrian-Ottoman border, it assesses ways in which the new shipping connection transformed the cultural and spatial perceptions of travelers. The article argues that even though the plan for making the Iron Gates navigable was set out on the drawing boards of engineers and in the cabinets in Pest and Vienna, local circumstances changed its practical implementation in a number of important ways. The success of this major engineering operation relied on close cooperation among hydrological experts, state representatives, and entrepreneurs, all of whom had different stakes in the project but still shared a common interest. Establishing a shipping connection to the Black Sea along the Danube was thus the result of an alignment of interests among Hungarian, Viennese, and local Ottoman authorities; a careful match between theoretical knowledge and practical engineering work; and, last but not least, the surmounting of a mental separation between “Orient” and “Occident.”

Der vorliegende Aufsatz beschäftigt sich mit den frühen Versuchen die Dampfschifffahrt entlang der Donau zwischen Wien und Konstantinopel zu erleichtern. In diesem Zusammenhang wird nicht nur der komplexe Verhandlungsprozess analysiert, der die erste Regulierung am Eisernen Tor ermöglichte, sondern auch die Art und Weise beleuchtet, wie die neue Schiffsverbindung die kulturellen und räumlichen Wahrnehmungen der Reisenden verändert hat. Dabei wird argumentiert, dass der Plan das Eiserne Tor navigierbar zu machen zwar auf den Reißblättern der Ingenieure und in den Kabinetten von Pest und Wien entworfen wurde, die lokalen Gegebenheiten aber dessen praktische Umsetzung in vielerlei und wichtiger Hinsicht veränderten. Der Erfolg dieser bedeutenden Ingenieursleistung beruhte auf der engen Zusammenarbeit zwischen hydrologischen Experten, staatlichen Repräsentanten und Ingenieuren, die aus unterschiedlichen Gründen in das Projekt involviert waren, aber dennoch alle ein gemeinsames Interesse hatten. Die Errichtung einer Schiffsverbindung entlang der Donau zum Schwarzen Meer war also das Ergebnis von 1. Interessensüberschneidungen zwischen ungarischen, Wiener und örtlichen ottomanischen Regierungsbehörden; 2. einem umsichtigen Zusammenspiel zwischen theoretischen Kenntnissen und praktischer Ingenieursarbeit; und 3. der Überwindung der mentalen Trennung zwischen “Orient” und “Okzident”.

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Articles
Information
Central European History , Volume 49 , Issue 2 , June 2016 , pp. 162 - 180
Copyright
Copyright © Central European History Society of the American Historical Association 2016 

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35 Ibid., 270–73.

36 Šedivý, “From Hostility to Cooperation,” 646–48.

37 Ibid., 649; Majláth, Gróf Széchenyi István Munkái, vol. 2, 21–24.

38 Šedivý, “From Hostility to Cooperation,” 650.

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40 Ibid., 267–69, 503–5, 549–51.

41 Ibid., 260–62.

42 Ibid., 268.

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44 Majláth, Gróf Széchenyi István Munkái, vol. 1, 482.

45 Ibid., 476.

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49 The allure of potential economic benefits was an important means of persuasion only for the newly established Wallachian and Serbian authorities, who hoped that economic gains would strengthen their claims of independence from Constantinople. See ibid., 644.

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53 Cioc, The Rhine, 55–56.

54 Ibid., 58.

55 Oplatka, Graf Stephan Széchenyi, 227. In his search for a technical solution, he published a series of articles about this challenge of nature; see Széchenyi, Donauschiffahrt, 44–60.

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76 Ibid., 214; Michael J. Quin, A Steam Voyage Down the Danube. With Sketches of Hungary, Wallachia, Servia, Turkey (Paris: Baudry's European Library, 1836), 100–1.

77 Adolphus Slade, Travels in Germany and Russia (London: Longman, 1840), 174–75. Similar accounts include Vane, A Steam Voyage to Constantinople, 118–23; Quin, A Steam Voyage Down the Danube, 100; Cumming, Notes of a Wanderer, 213–14.

78 Beattie, The Danube, 209.

79 Arnold, “Danube River,” 316–17.

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81 Széchenyi, Donauschiffahrt, 88.

82 Majláth, Gróf Széchenyi István Munkái, vol. 1, 244; Barany, Stephen Széchenyi and the Awakening of Hungarian Nationalism, 268.

83 Széchenyi, Donauschiffahrt, 92.

84 E. W. B., “Reise mit den Österreichischen Dampfschiffen auf der Donau und auf dem Schwarzen Meere, von Wien nach Constantinopel,” Wiener Zeitung, Aug. 10, 1836.

85 Ludvig von Forgatsch, Die schiffbare Donau von Ulm bis in das Schwarze Meer (Vienna: Beck'sche Universitätsbuchhandlung, 1849), 46.

86 Slade, Travels in Germany and Russia, 176; Quin, A Steam Voyage Down the Danube, 112–13.

87 Széchenyi, Donauschiffahrt, 176–77.

88 Alois W. Schreiber, Die Donaureise von der Einmündung des Ludwig-Kanals nach Constantinopel (Heidelberg: Joseph Engelmann, 1939), 7–11; Forgatsch, Die schiffbare Donau von Ulm bis in das Schwarze Meer, 45–46.

89 M. M., “Steam Navigation of the Danube,” The Morning Chronicle, Dec. 10, 1834.

90 Ibid.; Beattie, The Danube, 209; Quin, A Steam Voyage Down the Danube, 114.

91 See, e.g., Cumming, Notes of a Wanderer, 214.

92 Grössing et al., Rot-Weiss-Rot auf blauen Wellen, 32–38.

93 Wex, Gustav, “Über die Schiffbarmachung der Donau am Eisernen Thore und an den sieben Felsbänken oberhalb Orsova,” Zeitschrift des Österreichischen Ingenieur-Vereines 24, no. 10 (1872): 281–90Google Scholar.

94 Lagendijk, Vincent, “Divided Development: Post-War Ideas on River Utilisation and their Influence on the Development of the Danube,” The International History Review 37, no. 1 (2015): 80–98Google Scholar.