List of ministers plenipotentiary of the Austrian Netherlands

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In the eighteenth century, it became the norm for the Archduke of Austria, who was lord of the Netherlands by inheritance, to appoint a diplomat with the rank of minister plenipotentiary to represent his interests at the court of the governor-general of the Netherlands in Brussels. The minister plenipotentiary served as an intermediary between the courts of Vienna and Brussels and as a check on the development of any independent policy in the latter. The post of governor was gradually reduced to a primarily ceremonial function—especially during the tenure of the first Cobenzl—and the minister plenipotentiary became the de facto supreme authority in the Netherlands.[1]

Notes

  1. Officially "Great Master of the Court" and then governor-general ad interim from 1741 until 1744.
  2. The Austrian Netherlands were under French occupation in 1792–93.
  1. Janssens 2006, p. 247.

Sources

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