The Importance of Following Through

Emperor Joseph II never saw the victory, whatever its character. The army fighting the Ottomans, Belgium and Hungary both revolted against Austrian rule throughout the rest of the empire peasant revolts and bread riots seized the country. Not a single nobleman came to his defense. Even his brother Leopold abandoned him to die. In January of 1790, a year before the war came to an end, Joseph withdrew all of his reforms and dreams for a peacetime Enlightenment kingdom. He died a month later on February 20th. You can visit him in Vienna's imperial crypt, where 143 Habsburg royalty are entombed, among them 12 emperors and 18 empresses.