The view of Europe betweeen 19th and 20th centuries was shaped mainly by militarism. It is confirmed by the works of Michael Howard, Ian F.W. Beckett, Martin van Creveld, and also material culture, which is the heritage of those times. Architecture, technology, as well assculptures and paintings created shortly before the First World War are an illustration of how Polish literature reacted to the conflict of 1914–1918. In Tadeusz Kudliński’s novel Smak świata, where the main character is an officer of the Austro-Hungarian artillery, the world is dominated by machines: railway, telephone etc. According to Bjonar Olsen, those things represent material culture in the view of Tim Dant, allowing the main character to keep his identity. The collection of essays Młodości mej stolica. Wspomnienia krakowianina między wojnami provide the reader with a historical view of the war in the Carpathian Mountains and on the Italian front.
Rozpad armii austro-węgierskiej w końcowej fazie I wojny światowej wynikał ze splotu kilku czynników. Były to: kryzys aprowizacyjny dotykający nie tylko ludność cywilną, lecz także żołnierzy; brak wiary w zwycięstwo, spotęgowany klęską podczas ofensywy nad Piave na froncie włoskim (czerwiec 1918); powrót jeńców z niewoli rosyjskiej (marzec-październik 1918) w znacznej mierze zrewoltowanych i zanarchizowanych i wreszcie wzrost nastrojów partykularnych wśród różnych grup etnicznych. Przejawami rozkładu wojska były: masowe dezercje i samowolne przedłużanie urlopów, symulowanie chorób, odmowa wykonywania rozkazów, a w szczególności pełnienia służby frontowej, próby wszczęcia buntu o podłożu politycznym i socjalnym. Władze austro-węgierskie nie potrafiły przeciwstawić się tym tendencjom, licząc na dotrwanie państwa do chwili zawieszenia broni. Włoska ofensywa pod Vittoria Veneto (od 24.10.1918.) w połączeniu z równoczesnym załamaniem się cywilnych struktur władzy państwowej, doprowadziły do błyskawicznego rozkładu armii.
EN
The internal disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian army in 1918 was one of the chief causes of not only the defeat of the Habsburg monarchy in the First World War but also of the breakup of the dual state. That long-term process began in the winter of 1917/18 with the shortages in supplies for the soldiers. Its dynamic was strongly boosted by the return of prisoners of war from Russian captivity on the power of the peace treaty of Brest-Litovsk (March–October 1918), and the defeat by the Piave (July 1918). There were increasing instances of marauding and local rebellions in the rear ranks from the spring of 1918 resulting in the breakdown of discipline and a huge wave of desertions in the summer of that year. The response of the authorities was poor for fear of a civil revolution or a rebellion stimulated by the national context in the event of a brutal use of force. The weakened army limited its activity on the front, passively awaiting the signing of a peace. The last phase of the demise came in October 1918 and resulted from the lack of faith in a quick conclusion to the conflict combined with the hopes of rank-and-file soldiers for the establishment of national states on the wreckage of Austria-Hungary, which was to result in immediate termination of hostilities. In such circumstances, the beginning of the Italian offensive at Vittorio Veneto led to a series of rebellions of line troops. This caused the collapse of the front, the unauthorised return of entire corps to their homes, and the signing of the Armistice of Villa Giusti by the declining monarchy and capitulation to the conditions of the on Italians.
About 400 000 men from the territory of today’s Slovakia enlisted in the First World War. Despite their irreplaceable place in the ranks of the Austro-Hungarian army, in which they fought on the front in Galicia, Serbia, Italy and even on the western battlefield, we have very few authentic memories or testimonies of the period from 1914 to 1918. One of those who has preserved his story from the Great War is Juraj Orosi, a native of the eastern Slovak village of Cabov in the Vranov nad Topľou district. Through his memoirs published in Slovak Defense, we go back to August 1915 and the main hero of our story travels to the Galicia battlefield from where, after various peripetias, he reaches the front again in Romania. However, Orosi’s story does not end with the end of the First World War in 1918, but through his lens we follow the events of the first post-revolutionary years, which were characterised by fighting with the Hungarians or the building and formation of state bodies and the army. Juraj Orosi’s memoirs are a valuable source of knowledge about the times that influenced the younger generation and Juraj Orosi himself. He dealt with his disillusionment with the new conditions by moving to the United States. It was there in 1937 that he published his memoirs of the First World War and the founding of Czechoslovakia in Slovenská Obrana (Slovak Defense).
Can a soldier be a tourist? Can we say that touristic experiences are possible during the war from the anthropological point of view? In this article I tried to find the answers to those questions, using Smak Świata by Tadeusz Kudliński. A soldier, but also a typical tourist, hungry for new experiences, was only accidentally placed in the middle of the war by history. The Tourist Gaze by John Urry and The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America by Daniel Boorstin were very useful during my research and helped to create a new view of Smak Świata novel.
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Dostęp do pełnego tekstu na zewnętrznej witrynie WWW
Artykuł składa się z dwóch części. Pierwsza jest kontynuacją tematu dotyczącego grobownictwa wojskowego w armii austro-węgierskiej w czasie I wojny światowej, a konkretnie organizacją jednostek zajmujących się pochówkami wojskowymi oraz budową cmentarzy wojskowych na terenach Generalnego Gubernatorstwa Wojskowego. Drugą część poświęcił autor opisowi organizacji i działań służb grobowniczych w armiach niemieckiej (na terenach Prus Wschodnich) i rosyjskiej (na ziemi lubelskiej).
EN
The paper consists of two parts. The first one is the continuation of the subject of war-time graves in the Austro-Hungarian Army during the World War I, especially the units dealing with military funerals and the construction of military cemeteries in the area of the General Military Government. The author devoted the second part to describing the organisation and activities of the graveyard services in the German Army (the area of East Prussia) and the Russian Army (Lubelszczyzna Land).
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Dostęp do pełnego tekstu na zewnętrznej witrynie WWW
Artykuł poświęcono historii powstania, organizacji i działaniom służb grobownictwa wojskowego w armii austro-węgierskiej - na szczeblu Ministerstwa Wojny - w latach I wojny światowej. W artykule oparto się w przeważającej części na dokumentach wojskowych z lat 1915-1918, znajdujących się w zbiorze Ministerstwa Wojny monarchii austro-węgierskiej. Dodatkowe informacje pochodzą z Archiwum Państwowego w Krakowie, Państwowego Wojewódzkiego Archiwum we Lwowie oraz literatury przedmiotu.
EN
The paper is devoted to the history of establishment, structure and activities of the graveyard services for the military in the Austro-Hungarian army at the War Ministry level in the years of the World War I. The paper is based mostly on military documents from the years 1915-1918 that were a part of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy War Ministry collection. Additional information comes from the National Archives in Krakow, District Public Archives in Lviv and academic literature.
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