Convention between Austria and Turkey on the Danubian Principalities (Convention of Boyadji-Keuy)
establishment of an Offensive and Defensive Alliance, a more
intimate understanding with respect to the eventuality when an
active advance of one of the High Contracting Parties may
impose on the other the obligation of a mutual Protection of
the Territory of both, was to form the subject of a Special Agree-
ment to be considered as an integral part of the Treaty.
Their Majesties have not been able to divest themselves of
the consideration that the indefinite continuance of the Occu-
pation of the Territories on the Lower Danube, under the Sov-
ereignty of the Ottoman Porte, by Imperial Russian troops,
would endanger the political, moral, and material interests of
the whole German Confederation, as also of their own States,
and the more so in proportion as Russia extends her warlike
operations on Turkish Territory.
The Courts of Austria and Prussia are united in the desire to
avoid every participation in the War which has broken out
between Russia, on the one hand, and Turkey, France, and Great
Britain, on the other, and at the same time to contribute to the
restoration of general Peace. They more especially consider the
Declarations lately made at Berlin by the Court of St. Peters-
burgh, to be an important element of pacification, the failure of
the practical influence of which they would view with regret.
According to these Declarations, Russia appears to regard the
original motive for the Occupation of the Principalities as
removed by the concessions now granted to the Christian sub-
jects of the Porte, which offer the prospect of realisation. They
therefore hope that the replies awaited from the Cabinet of Rus-
sia to the Prussian propositions, transmitted on the 8th, will
offer to them the necessary Guarantee for an early withdrawal
of the Russian troops. In the event that this hope should be illu-
sory, the Plenipotentiaries named, on the part of His Majesty
the Emperor of Austria, Freiherr Baron von Hess and Count
Thun, and on the part of His Majesty the King of Prussia, Baron
Manteuffel, have drawn up the following more detailed Agree-
ment with respect to the eventuality alluded to in the above-
mentioned Article II of the Treaty of Alliance of this day :
Aggression on Territories of one of the Contracting Parties
to be repelled by Military Forces of the other.
SINGLE ARTICLE.—The Imperial Austrian Government will
also on their side address a communication to the Imperial Rus-
sian Court with the object of obtaining from the Emperor of
Russia the necessary orders that an immediate stop should be
put to the further advance of his Armies upon the Turkish Ter-
ritory, as also to request of His Imperial Majesty sufficient
Guarantees for the prompt Evacuation of the Danubian Princi-
palities; and the Prussian Government will again in the most
emphatic manner, support these communications with refer-
ence to their proposals already sent to St. Petersburgh. Should
the answer of the Russian Court to these steps of the Cabinets of
Vienna and Berlin—contrary to expectation—not be of a
nature to give them entire satisfaction upon the two points
afore-mentioned, the measures to be taken by one of the Con-
tracting Parties for their attainment, according to the terms of
Article II of the Offensive and Defensive Alliance signed on this
day, will be on the understanding that every hostile attack on
the Territory of one of the Contracting Parties is to be repelled
with all the Military Forces at the disposal of the other.Cases in which Offensive Advance only shall be made.
But a mutual Offensive Advance is stipulated for only in the
event of the incorporation of the Principalities, or in the event
of an attack on or passage of the Balkan by Russia.Ratifications.
The present Convention shall be submitted for the Ratification
of the High Sovereigns simultaneously with the above-men-
tioned Treaty.
Done at Berlin, the 20th April 1854.
(L.S.) HESS.
(L.S.) THUN.
(L.S.) MANTEUFFEL.3.1161 Convention between Austria and
Turkey relative to the occupation of the Danu-
bian Principalities (Convention of Boyadji-
Keuy)
Alliance Members:Austria-Hungary and Turkey
Signed On:June 14, 1854, at Boyadji-Keuy (Istanbul, Turkey). In force
until March 30, 1856, with the signing of the peace treaty ending the
Crimean War.
Alliance Type:Defense Pact (Type I)
Source:British Foreign and State Papers,vol. 44, p. 90.
Additional Citations:Key Treaties for the Great Powers, 1814–1914,
vol. 1, p. 308.SUMMARY
As part of its campaign to win Russian withdrawal from and subse-
quent control of the Danubian Provinces during the Crimean War,
Austria signed a defense pact with Prussia but also needed to make
arrangements for safe management of the territory after a Russian
concession. The Ottomans, who were interested in rolling back Rus-
sian gains and in garnering help to do so, found common ground with
Austria and agreed to an alliance that provided for joint occupation of
the Danubian Provinces until the end of the conflict.
The agreement marked Austria’s formal entry into the war, a move it
had previously been wary of, though no hostilities were required to
eject the Russians from the provinces or to defend them from recap-
ture. The Treaty of Paris, signed in March of 1856, marked the end of
the Crimean War and the alliance between Austria and the Ottoman
Empire, as the condition demanding it—Russian occupation of the
provinces—was effectively over.Alliance Text
HIS Majesty the Emperor of Austria, fully recognising that the
existence of the Ottoman Empire within its present Limits is
necessary for the maintenance of the Balance of Power between