This article analyzes a collection of narratives concerning the Russian occupation of Lviv (Lwów, Lemberg), the capital of the Austrian Crownland Galicia, between September 1914 and June 1915 in the initial phase of World War I. These narratives were produced and published in Polish and German between 1915, when Lviv was still occupied, and 1935, sixteen years after it had been included in a reborn Poland. One might assume that the relatively uneventful occupation constituted a negligible experience in the context of the dramatic developments of this period: the Great War and the subsequent Polish-Ukrainian and Polish-Soviet wars. And yet, memories of the Russian occupation were tenaciously perpetuated and cultivated. In this article I attempt to answer the multipronged question: Why did the occupation attract so much attention, and from whom, and what made its memories survive the subsequent dramatic conflicts and changes of political regimes relatively intact? Hence, my analysis regards the formation of collective memories at the intersection of individual experiences, group and national identities, and strategies of accommodating the unpredictably changing political realities.

Wrote Miklós Zrínyi (Nikola Zrinski) in the mid seventeenth century about those who died fighting against the Ottomans. The poet, who himself was engaged in both politics and war, defined Hungarian identity as Christian and premised on warfare unto death against Muslims.

The Utraquist Church of Bohemia was unique among the late medieval defections in Western Christendom from the Church of Rome in that it involved the separation of an entire church, organized on a national territory, not merely an underground resistance of relatively isolated and scattered groups of sectarians, like the Waldensians or the Lollards. Moreover, the Bohemian Reformation was linked with a major social upheaval, the Hussite Revolution, lasting from 1419 to 1434, which historians have viewed as an early specimen, if not a prototype or the first link in the chain, of the revolutions of the early modern period in the Euroatlantic world: the Dutch, the English, the American, and the French revolutions. Building mainly on the Bohemian Reform movement that had gathered momentum since the mid-fourteenth century, the Utraquists' defiance of Rome, leading to the Hussite Revolution, was sparked by the burning of Jan Hus at the Council of Constance on July 6, 1415.

One of the ironies of the Revolution of 1848 in Austria is that one of the most attacked institutions, the Roman Catholic Church, was able to draw the most benefit from the revolutionary upheaval. By the time Cardinal-Archbishop Eduard Milde returned to his palace in the Wollzeile from his safe mountain retreat, the dreaded Katzenmusik (mock serenading) had died down and it was clear that real social reform, not to speak of social revolution, was dead as well. Along the way, however, Catholic agitators, including Catholic priests, had learned how to use the revolution to further their own purposes.

Prevention of public violence is a primary task of an ordered state. If rioting occurs, it is usually a serious setback for the government in power, a sign of weakness or even forthcoming collapse, an injury to the citizens' commitment. During a riot, governmental leaders are often taxed to the ultimate because they may lose control of the society in the uncharted waters of the mob; their policy-decisions can sink while awaiting enforcement. The rioters who participate in collective public violence lose their restraint, their individuality that previously caused them to respect authority, and turn to irresponsible acts they would not normally commit. For these reasons established political leaders place a high priority on preventing violence. Should it break out, their automatic inclination is to contain it. Some revolutionaries, on the other hand, see creativity in violence, are even willing to stimulate it, hoping that it will sweep traditional institutions away.

The conflicts between episcopal and Habsburg provincial authorities in late sixteenth-century Upper and Lower Austria can be seen in some ways as a continuation of the investiture controversies of the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The long roots of these later conflicts have been pointed out by local historians of Upper Austria like Karl Eder and Rudolf Zinnhobler. The early modern connections help to explain the particular course of religious reform in the Habsburg Hereditary Lands.

Warren F. Kuehl's list of United States and Canadian doctoral dissertations in history is an important American bibliographical reference work which no historian can afford to neglect. Yet, scholars of the history of the Habsburg monarchy find it difficult to make effective use of this valuable bibliography, for the bulk of the entries which are of potential interest to specialists in the field are listed under numerous subdivisions and are not consolidated under appropriate headings in the topical index. For instance, numerous dissertations dealing with nineteenth-century alliances, with multilateral negotiations involving the Austrian empire, such as the Congresses of Vienna, Paris, and Berlin, or with the diplomatic relations of the Habsburg monarchy and the Austrian Republic with neighboring states are listed under such diverse headings as “Eastern Question,” “Europe, Diplomacy,” “Alliance System and Concert of Europe,” or “Near East.” While most scholars use library catalogs largely for finding works written by particular authors, those who peruse dissertation lists are more often interested in ascertaining what has been written on specific topics.