Summary: The events of 1738–1739 in the Banat region were part of the larger Austro-Turkish War. Romanian insurgents, reacting to shifting power and hardship, launched attacks on German and Habsburg settlements, leading to brutal reprisals from imperial and local militias. Combined with plague and famine, the conflict reduced entire towns to ruins. Both Ottoman and Austrian authorities struggled to reimpose control, leaving behind a devastated and depopulated frontier.

Content

During the late 1730s, the Banat region—situated between the Habsburg and Ottoman Empires—became the stage for severe unrest, destruction, and suffering. The area, inhabited by a mix of ethnic Germans, Serbs, and Romanians, had long been contested between imperial powers. When war broke out again between Austria and the Ottoman Empire in 1737, the fragile stability of the borderlands collapsed. The events that followed left deep scars on the region’s people and landscape. [1]

In the early part of the conflict, Ottoman authorities attempted to maintain local order by appointing loyal leaders. One such decree named a man called Andrea as the head of several villages, including Gerlistye, Goruja, Csuda, Novacz, and others. This appointment reflected the Ottoman effort to stabilize their frontier administration. However, as imperial forces advanced and retreated across the territory, control shifted frequently, and local populations were caught between the armies. [2]

By 1738, open violence had spread. Romanian insurgents and local bandits began attacking settlements associated with the Habsburg colonization effort. German villages such as Weisskirchen, Detta, Denta, and Csakova were looted and destroyed, their inhabitants killed or enslaved. The town of Vršac (Werschetz) suffered particularly badly: it was stormed, plundered, and set ablaze in September 1738. To make matters worse, plague soon followed, bringing further devastation to an already ruined landscape. Contemporary accounts speak of death, famine, and terror beyond description. [3][4]

The Habsburg authorities responded with military force. From Temesvár, Serbian and Hungarian militia units were dispatched to suppress the rebellion. Villages believed to harbor insurgents—such as Klissura, Szlatina, and Kriesova—were attacked and burned. By early 1739, coordinated imperial campaigns led by General Lentulus and other officers pushed deep into the Banat, killing or capturing many of the rebels. Several skirmishes are recorded, including one near Jassenova where 50 insurgents were slain and others taken prisoner. Many survivors fled across the Danube into Ottoman Serbia. [5]

The Ottoman administration also sought to reassert authority. In the summer of 1739, Turkish officers in Orsova gathered more than two thousand disaffected Romanians, organized them into armed companies, and placed them under Turkish supervision to guard the mountain passes. Heavy tributes were imposed on nearby villages to fund these forces, revealing the degree of local exhaustion and subjugation after years of conflict. [6]

Later that year, Austrian forces regained ground. When Pancsova was retaken by Colonel von Baren in August 1739, the Habsburgs once again controlled the valleys of the Nera and Karas rivers. This victory marked the end of one of the darkest chapters in the Banat’s history, although the population remained shattered for years to come. [7]

References

1. Sabine Jesner, “Personnel Management during Times of Crisis. The Austrian Banat and the Austro-Russian-Turkish War (1736-1739),” Istraživanja: Journal of Historical Researches (2016).
2. Memoria Satului Românesc, “Banatul în timpul războaielor din 1737–1739,” Memoria Satului Românesc (2012).
3. Costin Feneșan, “Epidemia de ciumă din Banatul Timișoarei şi din Transilvania din 1738 – Ecouri în presa din Europa,” Analele Banatului XXII (2014).
4. Kakucs, “Armed Civic Guards … Oraviţa … attacked … Romanian rebels … 4 June 1738,” Analele Banatului (2022).
5. Sabine Jesner, ibid.; see also Analele Banatului, vol. XXIV (2015), on the campaigns of General Lentulus.
6. Memoria Satului Românesc (2012); Feneșan (2014).
7. Jesner (2016); Treaty of Belgrade (1739), in Encyclopaedia Britannica, accessed 2025.

Book used

Geschichte der kön. Freistadt Werschetz herausgegeben aus Anlass des 1000jähr. Bestandes von Ungarn vom Munizipal-Ausschusse der königl. Freistadt Werschetz. Volume 1, Felix Milleker. 1886