ABSTRACT
This chapter uses a series of encounters with the heritages of the Ottoman Siege of Vienna to interrogate the construction and use of place in political uses of the past. Traces of the 1683 siege are scattered across the urban Viennese landscape, particularly at Kahlenberg, a hilltop suburb where forces gathered in 1683 to break the siege.
The juxtaposition between local and global, seen through the interaction with heritages of 1683, provides a foundation for considering scales of belonging, and the heritage of a single historical moment is used to consider how belonging is expressed through the uses of the past.
Three “encounters” with the heritage of 1683 are detailed, each built upon walks through the urban landscape around Vienna and the analysis of political discourse relating to 1683. Visits to heritage sites are presented alongside interaction with an annual far-right march commemorating the anniversary of the breaking of the siege. Through these encounters, the chapter outlines how place and past are used by far-right groups, within a digitally integrated public sphere, to construct a socially, spatially, and temporally located belonging on multiple scales.
