Mohammed IV mobilized an army of 300,000 men and sent it forth under his vizier, Kara Mustapha, to destroy and conquer Europe. Reaching Vienna July 7, 1683, the army quickly invested the city and cut it off from the world.
The enemy was repulsed in 12 September 1683, and legend has it that 500 sacks of coffee beans were left behind by the fleeing Turks.
Geor Franz Koltschitzky a native of Poland, also formerly an interpreter in the Turkish army, entered Austrian history by successfully passing through the Turkish line, in disguise, in Mid-August 1683 to deliver messages about conditions in Vienna to Charles V, Duke of Lorraine, who was heading up a relief army prepared to come to the city’s rescue.
He won himself undying fame with coffee his principle reward.
After the siege of 1683, Koltschitzky brewed and sold coffee at the house in the Domgasse, quite near St, Stephen’s Square.
At first the Viennese resisted wholesale consumption of the brew because of its bitterness, but when Koltschitzky discovered by chance that the addition of sugar made the taste more palatable, trade became brisk.
On January 17, 1685, Johannes Diodato obtained the first permit in Vienna to open a coffeehouse, although he probably had operated it earlier without benefit of the legal protection from competition that the license afforded.
He finally secured a royal monopoly from Leopold I on the sale of coffee in the city for twenty years.
First coffeehouse in Vienna, Austria
