REVIEW: Ancient Advice for the Twenty-First Century

A Habsburg suggests that his family’s strengths could help us all

The Habsburg Way: Seven Rules for Turbulent Times by Eduard Habsburg. Sophia Institute Press, 2023. 157 pp., $17.95

Like many Americans, I’m at least a little fascinated, secretly, by European dynasties and their ancient titles. I stumbled across this author on Twitter last year (back when it was still Twitter): Eduard Habsburg—or, more properly, Eduard Karl Joseph Michael Marcus Koloman Volkhold Maria Habsburg-Lothringen, Archduke Eduard of Austria, Hungary’s Ambassador to the Holy See and Sovereign Military Order of Malta. That got my attention.

He is smart, funny, informative, slightly self-deprecatory, and always affable, even to the occasional troll. “When I wrote a sympathetic tweet the day that Queen Elizabeth died, I was called an ‘inbred moron,’” he writes in the first chapter. Here’s a guy from a thousand-year-old family that was for many centuries supremely powerful, and he tweets, for heaven’s sake, takes himself lightly, and tells a great story. An in-depth interview about the book and author reveals him to also have been a screenwriter and animated cartoon producer.

Habsburgs were monarchs of one European nation or another from 1282 to 1918, and a Habsburg was emperor of the Holy Roman Empire almost continuously from 1440 to the empire’s dissolution in 1806. Franz Joseph ruled as Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary for sixty-eight years (1848-1916), and played a role in the outbreak of World War I. Charles I of Austria ruled as Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary from 1916 to 1918, was exiled, died in 1922, and is currently “Blessed Charles,” on his way to sainthood. The history of the Habsburgs is the history of the last thousand years in Europe. 

Now the eminently Catholic Sophia Institute Press has asked Habsburg to write a book about his family—a family which is still thriving and producing lots of children. The book sports a bold, unironic title and is curiously hard to describe. It’s at once history, memoir, and—most importantly—“self-help.” Yet it’s a highly rewarding alloy, a brisk palate-cleanser after Prince Harry’s sad renunciation and denunciation of the British royal family in his own recent memoir, Spare. 

I know almost none of my own family’s history. It simply wasn’t a topic of conversation when I was a child. To grow up in a gigantic family whose entire long history has been documented, made public, celebrated, taught to schoolchildren, and ceaselessly researched and argued about: What must that be like? 

“Today, young Habsburgs often first discover who they really are in school,” Habsburg writes. “The fact is, from 1273 until almost the present day members of the Habsburg family were intimately involved in nearly every decade of European history. Not infrequently, a history teacher will lift his eyes and end a sentence saying ‘but this is surely something that Mr. Habsburg can tell us more about?’ Alas, Mr. Habsburg, who is usually blushing in the last row, typically knows little or nothing more about it.”

“At some point,” he continues, “a young Habsburg begins to read books that mention the family history, and suddenly a portrait in an uncle’s apartment gets a backstory. Then—if you are a young Habsburg—you discover that there are portraits of your ancestors in nearly every famous museum of the world. If you look carefully, you might see the Order of the Golden Fleece dangling around their necks. As you get older, you may be invited to centenary memorial celebrations, in front of a statue of some emperor perhaps, where Schützen guards in traditional costumes and with historic weapons salute the family and fire salvos to celebrate the remembrance. It is hard not to be in awe of your own family’s past—particularly when you also meet ardent monarchists for whom the Habsburg family is a hope for the future, not simply a reminder of the past.”

Yes, he just said the quiet part out loud. This is one of several instances where Habsburg mentions meeting people who long for the good old days of monarchy. As an American, I grew up believing that a democratically elected government is a vast improvement over a king—but considering what the federal government has become in my lifetime, who am I to say that Habsburg’s nostalgia is misplaced?

Through charming stories and anecdotes, the author moves easily through the extraordinary highs and lows of Habsburg history as seen through Habsburg eyes. He loves heroic and unheroic Habsburgs alike, unconditionally, because they’re his and he’s theirs. But the book is not intended as a history or a memoir. Habsburg’s main hope is to remind us of things that we shouldn’t need to be reminded of but apparently do. These are turbulent times in the West. Consider the current statistics and trends of marriage, cohabitation, sexual licentiousness (including the sexualization of children), divorce, abortion, lagging birth rates, teen suicides, mass shootings, euthanasia, and assisted suicide. As a nation, we are not a happy people these days. Habsburg recognizes critical behaviors missing in modern Western culture—behaviors that he believes helped his family multiply, prosper, and retain a proud sense of itself even unto the present age.

“So what are the central principles and beliefs that have guided my family for eight hundred years?” he asks. “And how can they be applied in today’s world? A few are obvious: the Catholic faith, for instance. Marriage and family. But there are a number of other elements that comprise the collection of the Habsburg values. In fact, I think that seven key rules constitute the core elements of doing things “the Habsburg Way.{ And anybody can benefit from them; we do not need to “bring back the Habsburgs” or “re-introduce monarchy” (though I’d never say never). I believe that living these ideas—and requiring them from our political leaders—would greatly improve our contemporary world.” 

Habsburg’s suggestions include the following: 

Rule 1: Get married (and have lots of children). This is an ancient concept and practice; we have only recently forgotten its many joys and benefits. 

Rule 2: Be Catholic (and practice your faith). The Habsburgs, of course, have always been as Catholic as Catholic can be. But although the author doesn’t say this—he is, after all, writing about his family—the rule works almost as well if it’s changed to “Worship God (and teach your children to do likewise).” We are becoming an unchurched nation. A recent episode of Jeopardy! made the news when none of the three contestants knew the answer to the following question: “Matthew 6:9 says, ‘Our Father, who art in heaven, [THIS] be thy name.’” 

Rule 3: Believe in the empire (and in subsidiarity). The Holy Roman Emperor ruled over many countries, each with its own king, culture, laws, currency, and pride. Much of his job was to keep peace, honor each country’s distinct nature and needs, and apply necessary laws justly. The Habsburgs, from nearly the beginning, embraced the concept of subsidiarity, encouraging problem-solving and governing decisions at the lowest practicable level rather than imposing them from on high. That’s a far cry from what has evolved in the United States and many other Western nations. 

Rule 7: Die well (and have a memorable funeral). The growth in the use of hospice care in the U.S. is making it possible for more people to die well: in their own home, conscious but with their pain expertly managed, surrounded by loved ones. On the other hand, many of us hope for an easy death rather than a brave one: perhaps in our sleep, before illness or dementia begin their torture. To Habsburg, that’s not “dying well.” As for having a memorable funeral, many people today choose cremation or hold “memorial services” that “celebrate life.” A Catholic funeral liturgy is quite a different affair, focused on Heaven. The Habsburgs do funerals in high style, at least when the head of the family is buried in the family crypt in the Capuchin Church in Vienna. The author describes the centuries-old “Habsburg knocking ritual,” which reminds everyone present that in spite of any titles, the deceased was—and we all are—“mortal and sinful.” This video shows the ritual at Otto von Habsburg’s burial in 2011.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán wrote the book’s foreword. This may surprise those who know European history, and may dismay those who dislike Orbán’s controversial politics. Still, Habsburg is Hungary’s Ambassador to the Holy See, and Hungary and the Habsburgs—two stubborn, independent entities—have been entwined for centuries. “There were indeed times when, without the other, the Hungarians and the Habsburgs would have been swallowed up by history,” Orbán writes. There were also times when they were on opposite sides of a battle: “We shaped each other, and sometimes it hurt.” Still, Orbán writes, “Eduard Habsburg’s book proves how much we think alike.” This is especially true on the issues of the primacy of the family, the value of long-standing cultural traditions, and being Catholic. 

The Habsburg Way is a pleasure to read, regardless of your reason for opening it. Beyond that, adopting some of Habsburg’s ideas personally—and requiring the same of our leaders—just might help us save ourselves in these terrible times. 

Jane Greer is a Catholic formalist poet whose recent collections include Love like a Conflagration (2020) and The World as We Know It Is Falling Away (2022), both from Lambing Press. She lives in North Dakota.

^{Image: House of Habsburg (Wikimedia)}