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Habsburg Monarchy |
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Habsburg Monarchy (alternatively Habsburg Empire) refers to the territories ruled by the Austrian branch of the House of Habsburg (1278-1780), and then by the successor House of Habsburg-Lorraine (since 1780), between 1526 and 1867/1918. The capital was Vienna (from 1583 to 1611 Prague).
The monarchy from 1804 to 1867 is usually referred to as the Austrian Empire and from 1867 to 1918 as Austria-Hungary. In some contexts, the term Habsburg Empire might also refer to extended Habsburg family possessions once ruled solely by Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, or to the Spanish Empire ruled by the Spanish branch of the house.
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The Habsburg family originated with the Habsburg Castle in modern Switzerland and after 1278 came to rule in the Austria (the Habsburg Hereditary Lands). The Habsburg family grew to European prominence with the marriage and adoption treaty by Emperor Maximilian I at the First Congress of Vienna in 1515 and the subsequent death of adopted Louis II (King of Bohemia and Hungary and Croatia)in 1526. Archduke Ferdinand of Austria, the younger brother of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, was elected the next King of Bohemia, Croatia and Hungary following the death of Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia, in a battle against the Turks at Mohács. From this point the Monarchy grew to a size where at times it ruled more than half of Europe.
Names of the territory that (with some exceptions) finally became Austria-Hungary:
The Hungarian parts of the Empire were called "Lands of the St. Stephen's Crown" or "Lands of Holy (St.) Stephen's Crown" (Länder der Heiligen Stephans Krone).
The Bohemian (Czech) Lands were called "Lands of the St. Wenceslaus' Crown" (Länder der Wenzels-Krone).
| History of Austria |
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| Ancient times |
| Hallstatt culture |
| Noricum |
| March of Austria |
| Babenberger |
| Privilegium Minus |
| Habsburg era |
| House of Habsburg |
| Holy Roman Empire |
| Archduchy of Austria |
| Habsburg Monarchy |
| Austrian Empire |
| German Confederation |
| Austria-Hungary |
| World War I |
| Assassination of Franz Ferdinand |
| World War I |
| Interwar Years |
| German Austria |
| First Austrian Republic |
| Austrofascism |
| Anschluss |
| World War II |
| Austria at the Time of National Socialism |
| World War II |
| Post-war Austria |
| Allied-administered Austria |
| Second Austrian Republic |
Names of some smaller territories:
... up and below the Enns (...ober und unter der Enns) (996–1918): This is the historical name of the parts of the Archduchy of Austria that ended up constituting the present-day "Republic of Austria" (Republik Österreich) on November 12th 1918 (after Emperor Charles I had abdicated from the throne for himself). Modern day Austria is a semi-federal republic of nine states (Bundesländer) that are: Lower Austria, Upper Austria, Tyrol, Styria, Salzburg, Carinthia, Voralrlberg and Burgenland and the Capital of Vienna that is a state of its own. Burgenland, came to Austria in 1921 by a referendum from Hungary. Salzburg finally became Austrian in 1816 after Napoleonic wars (before it was ruled by prince-archbishops of Salzburg as an sovereign territory). Vienna, Austria's capital became a state in January 1st 1922 after it had been residence and the capital of the Austrian Empire (Reichshaupt und Residenzstadt Wien) for the Habsburg monarchs during centuries. Upper and Lower Austria, historically were parted into "Austria up the Enns" and "Austria below the Enns" (nowadays Enns river is the state-border between Upper- and Lower Austria). Upper Austria was enlarged after the Treaty of Teschen (1779) in following of "War of the Bavarian Succession" by the so called Innviertel ("Inn Quarter"), formerly part of Bavaria.
The territories ruled by the branch changed over the centuries, but the core always consisted of four blocs:
Over the course of its history, other lands were, at times, under Austrian Habsburg rule (some of these territories were secundo-genitures, i.e. ruled by other lines of Habsburg dynasty):
The boundaries of some of these territories varied over the time period indicated, and others were ruled by a subordinate (secundo-geniture) Habsburg line. The Habsburgs also held the title of Holy Roman Emperor between 1438 and 1740, and again from 1745 to 1806.
The various Habsburg possessions never really formed a single country - each province was governed according to its own particular customs. Until the mid 17th century, all of the provinces were not even necessarily ruled by the same person - junior members of the family often ruled portions of the Hereditary Lands as private apanages. Serious attempts at centralization began under Maria Theresa and especially her son Joseph II in the mid to late 18th century, but many of these were abandoned following large scale resistance to Joseph's more radical reform attempts, although a more cautious policy of centralization continued during the revolutionary period and the long Metternichian period which followed.
An even greater attempt at centralization began in 1849 following the suppression of the various revolutions of 1848. For the first time, ministers tried to transform the monarchy into a centralized bureaucratic state ruled from Vienna. The Kingdom of Hungary, in particular, ceased to exist as a separate entity, being divided into a series of districts. Following the Habsburg defeats in the Wars of 1859 and 1866, this policy was abandoned, and after several years of experimentation in the early 1860s, the famous Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867 was arrived at, by which the so-called Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary was set up. In this system, the Kingdom of Hungary was given sovereignty and a parliament, with only a personal union and a joint foreign and military policy connecting it to the other Habsburg lands. Although the non-Hungarian Habsburg lands, often, but erroneously, referred to as "Austria," received their own central parliament (the Reichsrat, or Imperial Council) and ministries, as their official name - the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council - shows that they remained something less than a genuine unitary state. When Bosnia and Herzegovina were annexed (after a long period of occupation and administration), they were not incorporated into either half of the monarchy. Instead, they were governed by the joint ministry of finance.
Austria-Hungary collapsed under the weight of the various unsolved ethnic problems that came to a head with its defeat in World War I. In the peace settlement that followed, significant territories were ceded to Romania and Italy, new republics of Austria (the German-Austrian territories of the Hereditary lands) and Hungary (the Magyar core of the old kingdom) were created, and the remainder of the monarchy's territory was shared out among the new states of Poland, Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later Yugoslavia), and Czechoslovakia.
The Habsburg monarchy should not be confused with various other territories ruled at different times by members of the Habsburg dynasty. The senior Spanish line of the Habsburgs ruled over Spain and various other territories from 1516 until it became extinct in 1700. A junior line ruled over Tuscany between 1765 and 1801, and again from 1814 to 1859. While exiled from Tuscany, this line ruled at Salzburg from 1803 to 1805, and in Würzburg from 1805 to 1814. Another line ruled the Vorlande from 1803 to 1805, and Modena from 1814 to 1859, while Empress Marie Louise, Napoleon's second wife and the daughter of Austrian Emperor Francis, ruled over the Duchy of Parma between 1814 and 1847.
For a historical account, see:
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