Vehicles as 'Civilization': The Steamship Transport between the Danube and the Black Sea in the Second Half of the 19th Century

• In Event: Steamers, Quarantines, and Dams: Building Infrastructure on the Lower Danube and in the Black Sea: Late 18th and 19th Centuries

Abstract

The paper follows, first, the symbolic geography approach, related to the postcolonial studies (the construction of stereotypical images of the “Orient” /E. Said/, “the Balkans” /M. Todorova/, “Eastern Europe” /L. Wolff/), by analyzing the Austrian Lloyd’s travel guides to the Orient. Its focus is on the images and expectations of the steamship route Rousse – Varna - Constantinople. The Austrian Lloyd Travel Guides clearly postulated the trains and ships as a modern, civilizational “home”, guarding the travelers from the uncultivated, unknown, exotic and dangerous land that the steamers pass by. Second, the text, follows the methodology of the cultural history of technology, and analyzes the establishment of modern transport infrastructure, perceived as a civilizational achievement, in the region between the Lower Danube – (the port city of Rousse), and the Black sea region (the port city of Varna). It will compare the external foreign perspective towards the region in the second half of the 19th century represented by the specific genre of the Austrian Lloyd travelers’ guide. As a reference point, it will present the internal, once again foreign, perspective by the Habsburg/Austro-Hungarian consulate reports of Adolf Tedeschi from Varna. It was the interplay between introducing the actual modern technologies of the time and the construction of narratives of the “Orient”, such as the cultural sights worth to be seen, the exoticism of the Hinterland in comparison to the waterfront, which shape the image of the city of Varna. All that in the high peak of the newest technological breakthrough – the steamers.

Author

• Lyubomir Raychev Pozharliev, Justus-Liebig-U of Giessen (Germany)