The Stakes of Theatre Patronage in the Habsburg Monarchy’s Eastern Lands at the Turn of the 19th Century (1790–1810)

The present paper offers a comparative analysis of the motivation and the economical strategies of theatre patrons from the late 1780s up to the 1810s in the eastern part of the Habsburg Monarchy (Kingdom of Hungary, Kingdom of Croatia, Principality of Transylvania and the Kingdom of Galicia-Lodomeria). By reconsidering the range of ideal entrepreneurial theatrical types, such as court, noble, municipal and bourgeois commercial theatres, this study explores hybrid patronage strategies, revealing a complex set of incentives and multiple sorts of both private and public actors. Firstly, an emphasis is placed on the formal and informal collaborations between private investors and high officials who indirectly supported the construction of these theatres. Secondly, the importance of profit-based businesses used for social rise which motivated theatrical patronage is discussed.