Seite - 174 - in Die Repräsentation der Habsburg-Lothringischen Dynastie in Musik, visuellen Medien und Architektur - 1618–1918

174 Sektion II: Herrscher, Staat, Nation raised to honour the Emperor, which were initiated exactly by pro-regime oriented individuals. Namely, already after the promulgation of the annexation, the building contrac- tor Ignaz Langer prompted the idea of constructing a “worthy monument to the Emperor” in Sarajevo.49 As the response of different associations, institutes, officials and citizens was quick50, a board for the construction of the monument, consisting of eminent citizens and representatives of all confessions in Sarajevo, was formed in December 1908.51 After the initial enthusiasm52, the initiative of gathering volun- tary funds for the monument came to a halt, so that several times during the course of 1910, the board and Langer as its spokesman had to remind the people via an- nouncements in the press of their “duty to raise a monument in honour of the Em- peror” which would be a sign of their “filial love, unbreakable trustiness and servile loyalty”.53 After the concert that was held in September that same year with the aim of collecting contributions54, it became clear that there was no capacity for raising a monument to the Emperor. Therefore, it was neither defined what the monument should look like nor where it should be placed. Only one year later, in 1911, the question of the imperial monument was raised again, and this actually happened during the planning of the future building of the Parliament. At the special session of the Sarajevo Municipality in March, the proposal to construct the parliament building at the east entrance to Sarajevo, right across the City Hall, was adopted.55 On this occasion, the idea of building a bridge over the river Miljacka forming a square that would connect these two buildings was unani- mously accepted, as was the proposal from no less a person than the Muslim minister Mustaj-bey Mutevelić to raise a monument to “His Majesty” on this very square.56 What the entire project could have looked like can be seen in one of the architectural designs submitted to the competition for the parliament building which was held in 1912 (Fig. 3).57 Even though this plan made by the architect Anton Floderer earned only the third place and shows certain deficiencies in the topographic display of the town, it quite clearly illustrates the requirements of the authorities in terms of creating a square that would include a “worthy monument of the Emperor”.58 Had it come to the realisation of the project and had the war that broke out in 1914 not entirely abolished the plans, this potential monument to Franz Joseph would have played a multifaceted role. Apart from being a statement of loyalty by the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina, or rather by the ruling class which owed its privileged posi- tion to the new political framework, this monument would also have been an explicit symbol of the power of the Habsburgs. Placed at the centre of the new urban zone, built according to the logic of west-European architectural thought and done so at the very centre of the former Ottoman core of Sarajevo, the monument would have