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MOLNAR, Mónika F.
Raimondo Montecuccoli’s Relations with the Ottomans in the 17 th Century
Raimondo Montecuccoli (1609-1680) was an Italian nobleman who had an important role in the war between
the Habsburg and Ottoman Empires. On the one hand as a general he was actively fighting against the Ottomans, writing
reports, military plans and diplomatic documents, on the other his writings on military theory and strategy represent the
highest level of scientific approach of the West in the given period. He also published a small description on the situation
of Ottoman and non Ottoman Hungary. Furthermore he was involved in Viennese politics, intrigues, diplomatic games,
and he had relations to Istanbul as well. Through the analysis of the documents of his military and theoretical activity we
can have an image of how Western intellectuals that were in a direct contact with the Ottomans saw them, how they perceived
‘the Other’, and on the contrary, how the Ottomans saw his personality, or more generally speaking, what kind of
personal interactions were between the Western and Ottoman parts during this period. As a case study, I will concentrate
on a specific and well-documented – from both sides, by Ottoman and Western sources – episode of Montecuccoli’s military
career, namely the Ottoman Military Campaign of 1663-1664 in Hungary. The present paper is part of an ongoing larger
project that aims to analyze the personal network of Italian military writers and diplomats between Vienna and Istanbul in
the 17 th century, in which among Montecuccoli, I investigate other similar personalities, such as Luigi Ferdinando Marsigli,
Antonio Carafa and Carlo Ruzzini.
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