1.
History of Austria
–
The history of Austria covers the history of Austria and its predecessor states, from the early Stone Age to the present state. The name Ostarrîchi has been in use since 996 AD when it was a margravate of the Duchy of Bavaria, Austria was dominated by the House of Habsburg from 1273 to 1806, when the Holy Roman Empire came to an end. When this empire collapsed in 1918, Austria was reduced to the main German speaking areas of the empire, however this union was forbidden by the Allies at the Treaty of Versailles. Following the First Republic, Austrofascism tried to keep Austria independent from the German Reich, but in 1938 it was annexed by Nazi Germany with the support of the large majority of the Austrian people. After the Second World War Austria again became an independent republic as the Second Republic in 1955, the history of Austria raises a number of questions. Should it be confined to the current Republic of Austria, or to all lands formerly ruled by the rulers of Austria, should Austrian history include 1938–1945 when it did not exist. Within Austria there are regional variations, and parts of Austria have at various times wished to become part of adjacent countries. Human habitation of current Austria can be traced back to the first farming communities of the early Stone Age. In the late Iron Age it was occupied by a Celtic culture, at the end of the 1st century BC this became part of the Roman Empires lands to the south of the Danube, and was incorporated as the Province of Noricum around 40 AD. The most important Roman settlement was at Carnuntum, in the 6th century, another Germanic people, the Bavarii occupied these lands until it fell to the Frankish Empire in the 9th century. Around 800 AD Charlemagne established the outpost of Avar March in what is now Lower Austria, to hold back advances from Slavs and Avars. In the 10th century an eastern outpost of the Duchy of Bavaria, bordering Hungary, was established as the Marchia orientalis or Margraviate of Austria in 976 and this Eastern March, in German was known as Ostarrîchi or Eastern Realm, hence Austria. The first mention of Ostarrîchi occurs in a document of that name dated 996 CE, from 1156 the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa created an independent duchy under the House of Babenberg, until its extinction in 1246, corresponding to modern Lower Austria. The 15th and early 16th century saw expansion of the Habsburg territories through diplomacy and marriages to include Spain. This expansionism, together with French aspirations and the resultant Habsburg-French or Bourbon-Habsburg rivalry were important factors shaping European History for 200 years, by 1526 Ferdinand had also inherited the kingdoms of Bohemia, and Hungary after the Battle of Mohács which partitioned the latter. However the Ottoman Empire now lay directly adjacent to the Austrian lands, even after the unsuccessful first Siege of Vienna by the Turks in 1529, the Ottoman threat persisted for another one and a half centuries. The 16th Century also saw the spread of the Reformation, from around 1600 the Habsburg policy of recatholicisation or Catholic Renewal eventually led to the Thirty Years War. Originally a religious war, it was also a struggle for power in central Europe, eventually the pressure of the anti-Habsburg coalition of France, Sweden, and most Protestant German states contained their authority to the Austrian and Czech lands in 1648
2.
Austria
–
Austria, officially the Republic of Austria, is a federal republic and a landlocked country of over 8.7 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Hungary and Slovakia to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, the territory of Austria covers 83,879 km2. The terrain is mountainous, lying within the Alps, only 32% of the country is below 500 m. The majority of the population speaks local Bavarian dialects of German as their native language, other local official languages are Hungarian, Burgenland Croatian, and Slovene. The origins of modern-day Austria date back to the time of the Habsburg dynasty, from the time of the Reformation, many northern German princes, resenting the authority of the Emperor, used Protestantism as a flag of rebellion. Following Napoleons defeat, Prussia emerged as Austrias chief competitor for rule of a greater Germany, Austrias defeat by Prussia at the Battle of Königgrätz, during the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, cleared the way for Prussia to assert control over the rest of Germany. In 1867, the empire was reformed into Austria-Hungary, Austria was thus the first to go to war in the July Crisis, which would ultimately escalate into World War I. The First Austrian Republic was established in 1919, in 1938 Nazi Germany annexed Austria in the Anschluss. This lasted until the end of World War II in 1945, after which Germany was occupied by the Allies, in 1955, the Austrian State Treaty re-established Austria as a sovereign state, ending the occupation. In the same year, the Austrian Parliament created the Declaration of Neutrality which declared that the Second Austrian Republic would become permanently neutral, today, Austria is a parliamentary representative democracy comprising nine federal states. The capital and largest city, with a population exceeding 1.7 million, is Vienna, other major urban areas of Austria include Graz, Linz, Salzburg and Innsbruck. Austria is one of the richest countries in the world, with a nominal per capita GDP of $43,724, the country has developed a high standard of living and in 2014 was ranked 21st in the world for its Human Development Index. Austria has been a member of the United Nations since 1955, joined the European Union in 1995, Austria also signed the Schengen Agreement in 1995, and adopted the euro currency in 1999. The German name for Austria, Österreich, meant eastern realm in Old High German, and is cognate with the word Ostarrîchi and this word is probably a translation of Medieval Latin Marchia orientalis into a local dialect. Austria was a prefecture of Bavaria created in 976, the word Austria is a Latinisation of the German name and was first recorded in the 12th century. Accordingly, Norig would essentially mean the same as Ostarrîchi and Österreich, the Celtic name was eventually Latinised to Noricum after the Romans conquered the area that encloses most of modern-day Austria, around 15 BC. Noricum later became a Roman province in the mid-first century AD, heers hypothesis is not accepted by linguists. Settled in ancient times, the Central European land that is now Austria was occupied in pre-Roman times by various Celtic tribes, the Celtic kingdom of Noricum was later claimed by the Roman Empire and made a province
3.
Hallstatt culture
–
It is commonly associated with Proto-Celtic and Celtic populations in the Western Hallstatt zone and with Illyrians in the eastern Hallstatt zone. Parts of Britain and Iberia are included in the expansion of the culture. Social distinctions became increasingly important, with emerging elite classes of chieftains and warriors, society was organized on a tribal basis, though very little is known about this. Only a few of the largest settlements, like Heuneburg in the south of Germany, were rather than villages by modern standards. In 1846, Johann Georg Ramsauer discovered a prehistoric cemetery near Hallstatt, Austria. Eventually the excavation would yield 1,045 burials, although no settlement has yet been found and this may be covered by the later village, which has long occupied the whole narrow strip between the steep hillsides and the lake. Some 1,300 burials have been found, including around 2,000 individuals, with women and children, nor is there a princely burial, as often found near large settlements. The community at Hallstatt was untypical of the wider, mainly agricultural, culture and these had been worked from time to time since the Neolithic period, and in this period were extensively mined with a peak from the 8th to 5th centuries BC. The style and decoration of the goods found in the cemetery are very distinctive. Finds at Hallstatt extend from about 1200 BC until around 500 BC, in this period, people were cremated and buried in simple graves. In phase B, tumulus burial becomes common, and cremation predominates, little is known about this period in which the typical Celtic elements have not yet distinguished themselves from the earlier Villanova-culture. The Hallstatt period proper is restricted to HaC and HaD, corresponding to the early European Iron Age, Hallstatt lies in the area where the western and eastern zones of the Hallstatt culture meet, which is reflected in the finds from there. Hallstatt D is succeeded by the La Tène culture, Hallstatt C is characterized by the first appearance of iron swords mixed amongst the bronze ones. For the final phase, Hallstatt D, daggers, almost to the exclusion of swords, are found in western zone graves ranging from c, there are also differences in the pottery and brooches. Halstatt D has been divided into the sub-phases D1-D3, relating only to the western zone. Major activity at the site appears to have finished about 500 BC, many Hallstatt graves were robbed, probably at this time. There was widespread throughout the western Hallstatt zone, and the salt workings had by then become very deep. By then the focus of mining had shifted to the nearby Hallein Salt Mine, with graves at Dürrnberg nearby where there are significant finds from the late Hallstatt
4.
Pannonia
–
Pannonia was an ancient province of the Roman Empire bounded north and east by the Danube, coterminous westward with Noricum and upper Italy, and southward with Dalmatia and upper Moesia. Julius Pokorny believes the name Pannonia is derived from Illyrian, from the Proto-Indo-European root *pen-, swamp, water, the Ionian Danube fleet reached as far as Boio-Aria, populated until the late 8th century CE by Celts and Slavs under Aryan rulers. Pliny the Elder, in Natural History, places the eastern regions of the Hercynium jugum and he also gives us some dramaticised description of its composition, in which the close proximity of the forest trees causes competitive struggle among them. But even he—if the passage in question is not an interpolated marginal gloss—is subject to the legends of the gloomy forest and he mentions unusual birds, which have feathers that shine like fires at night. Medieval bestiaries named these birds the Ercinee, the first inhabitants of this area known to history were the Pannonii, a group of Indo-European tribes akin to Illyrians. From the 4th century BC, it was invaded by various Celtic tribes, little is heard of Pannonia until 35 BC, when its inhabitants, allies of the Dalmatians, were attacked by Augustus, who conquered and occupied Siscia. The country was not, however, definitively subdued by the Romans until 9 BC, when it was incorporated into Illyricum, the frontier of which was thus extended as far as the Danube. After the rebellion was crushed in AD9, the province of Illyricum was dissolved, the date of the division is unknown, most certainly after AD20 but before AD50. The proximity of dangerous barbarian tribes necessitated the presence of a number of troops. Some time between the years 102 and 107, between the first and second Dacian wars, Trajan divided the province into Pannonia Superior, and Pannonia Inferior. According to Ptolemy, these divisions were separated by a line drawn from Arrabona in the north to Servitium in the south, later, the whole country was sometimes called the Pannonias. Pannonia Superior was under the legate, who had formerly administered the single province. Pannonia Inferior was at first under a praetorian legate with a single legion as the garrison, after Marcus Aurelius, it was under a consular legate, the frontier on the Danube was protected by the establishment of the two colonies Aelia Mursia and Aelia Aquincum by Hadrian. In the 4th-5th century, one of the dioceses of the Roman Empire was known as the Diocese of Pannonia. It had its capital in Sirmium and included all four provinces that were formed from historical Pannonia, as well as the provinces of Dalmatia, following the Migrations Period in the middle of the 5th century, Pannonia was ceded to the Huns by Theodosius II. After the collapse of the Hunnic empire in 454, large numbers of Ostrogoths were settled by Emperor Marcian in the province as foederati, afterwards, it was again invaded by the Avars in the 560s, the Slavs, who first settled c. This language and the culture became extinct with the arrival of the Magyars. The native settlements consisted of pagi containing a number of vici, the cities and towns in Pannonia were, The country was fairly productive, especially after the great forests had been cleared by Probus and Galerius
5.
Raetia
–
Raetia was a province of the Roman Empire, named after the Rhaetian people. It bordered on the west with the country of the Helvetii, on the east with Noricum, on the north with Vindelicia, on the west with Transalpine Gaul and on south with Venetia et Histria. It thus comprised the districts occupied in modern times by eastern and central Switzerland, southern Bavaria and the Upper Swabia, Vorarlberg, the part of Tirol. Later Vindelicia formed part of Raetia, the northern border of Raetia during the times of Augustus and Tiberius was the River Danube. Later the Limes Germanicus marked the boundary, stretching for 166 km north of the Danube. Raetia linked to Italy across the Alps over the Reschen Pass, the Romansh people living in Southeast Switzerland are believed to be direct descendants of the Raetians. However, the lineage of the Romansh people remains incomplete. Little is known of the origin or history of the Raetians, livy states distinctly that they were of Etruscan origin. The Raetians are first mentioned by Polybius, and little is heard of them till after the end of the Republic, there is little doubt, however, that they retained their independence until their subjugation in 15 BC by Tiberius and Drusus. During the reign of Marcus Aurelius, Raetia was governed by the commander of the Legio III Italica, the boundary between them is not clearly defined, but may be stated generally as a line drawn eastwards from the lacus Brigantinus to the Oenus. Much of Raetia prima remained as a political unit, Raetia Curiensis, for several centuries. Some of the valleys, however, were rich and fertile, and produced wine, Augustus Caesar preferred Raetian wine to any other. Considerable trade in pitch, honey, wax, and cheese occurred, the chief towns of Raetia were Tridentum and Curia. The Rätikon mountain range derives its name from Raetia, Alpine regiments of the Roman army This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Raetia. PC von Planta, Das alte Rätien T Mommsen in Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, iii. p.706 Joachim Marquardt, P. pp.16,161,196 Mary B Peaks, The General Civil and Military Administration of Noricum and Raetia. Bagnall, R. J. Drinkwater, A. Esmonde-Cleary, W. Harris, R. Knapp, S. Mitchell, S. Parker, C. Wells, J. Wilkes, R. Talbert, M. E. Downs, M. Joann McDaniel, B. Z. Lund, T. Elliott, cS1 maint, Multiple names, authors list
6.
Marcomanni
–
According to Tacitus and Strabo they were Suebian. It is believed their name derives possibly from the Proto-Germanic forms of march and men, *Markōmanniz, the Marcomanni first appear in historical records as confederates of the Suebi of Ariovistus fighting against Julius Caesar in Gaul, having crossed the Rhine from present-day southern Germany. The exact position of their lands at this time is not known, the fact that their name existed before the Romans had territory near the Danube or Rhine raises the question of which border they lived near in order to explain their name. It has been suggested that they may have lived near the conjunction of Rhine and this was described as being within the Hercynian forest and was possibly in the region of modern Bohemia, although this is not certain. By 6 BC, their king, Maroboduus, had established a kingdom there that Augustus perceived as a threat to Rome. Before he could act, however, the revolt in Illyria intervened, eventually Maroboduus was deposed and exiled by Catualda. Catualda was in turn deposed by Vibilius of the Hermunduri the same year, around 50 AD, Vannius was himself also deposed by Vibilius, in coordination with his nephews Vangio and Sido. Tacitus, in the late 1st century mentions the Marcomanni as being under kings appointed by Rome, in the 2nd century AD, the Marcomanni entered into a confederation with other peoples including the Quadi, Vandals, and Sarmatians, against the Roman Empire. This was probably driven by movements of larger tribes, like the Goths, according to the historian Eutropius, the forces of the emperor, Marcus Aurelius, battled against the Marcomannic confederation for three years at the fortress of Carnuntum in Pannonia. Eutropius compared the war, and Aureliuss success against the Marcomanni and their allies, the comparison was apt in that this war marked a turning point and had significant Roman defeats, it caused the death of two Praetorian Guard commanders. The war lasted until Aureliuss death in 180 and it would prove to be only a limited success for Rome, the Danube river remained as the frontier of the empire until the final fall of the West. The Christianisation of the Marcomanni, at least into a Roman orthodox form of Christianity, seems to have occurred under their queen and she corresponded with Ambrose of Milan to bring about the conversion. This was the last clear evidence of the Marcomanni having a polity and it was possibly on the Roman side of the Danube by this time. Soon after, the Pannonian and Danubian area went into a period of turmoil. These Suevi were probably a mix of Suevian groups from the north of Danube and Pannonian basin such as the Marcomanni, Quadi. There, Hermeric swore fealty to the emperor in 410, bracara Augusta, the modern city of Braga in Portugal, previously the capital of Roman Gallaecia, now became the capital of the Suebic Kingdom. The Danubian area meanwhile became the core of Attila the Huns empire, one group of them managed to reform into an independent group after the Battle of Nedao in 454, like many other groups who emerged from Attilas confederation. These Suevi eventually came into conflict with the Ostrogoths, who had been on the side at Nadao
7.
Lombards
–
The Lombards or Longobards were a Germanic people who ruled large parts of the Italian Peninsula from 568 to 774. In the 1st century AD, they formed part of the Suebi, the Lombard king Audoin defeated the Gepid leader Thurisind in 551 or 552, his successor Alboin eventually destroyed the Gepids at the Battle of Asfeld in 567. The Lombards were joined by numerous Saxons, Heruls, Gepids, Bulgars, Thuringians, and Ostrogoths, by late 569 they had conquered all north of Italy and the principal cities north of the Po River except Pavia, which fell in 572. At the same time, they occupied areas in central Italy and they established a Lombard Kingdom in north and central Italy, later named Regnum Italicum, which reached its zenith under the 8th-century ruler Liutprand. In 774, the Kingdom was conquered by the Frankish King Charlemagne, however, Lombard nobles continued to rule southern parts of the Italian peninsula, well into the 11th century when they were conquered by the Normans and added to their County of Sicily. In this period, the part of Italy still under Longobardic domination was known by the name Langbarðaland in the Norse runestones. Their legacy is apparent in the regional name Lombardy. The fullest account of Lombard origins, history, and practices is the Historia Langobardorum of Paul the Deacon, pauls chief source for Lombard origins, however, is the 7th-century Origo Gentis Langobardorum. The Origo Gentis Langobardorum tells the story of a tribe called the Winnili dwelling in southern Scandinavia. The Winnili were split into three groups and one part left their land to seek foreign fields. The reason for the exodus was probably overpopulation, the departing people were led by the brothers Ybor and Aio and their mother Gambara and arrived in the lands of Scoringa, perhaps the Baltic coast or the Bardengau on the banks of the Elbe. Scoringa was ruled by the Vandals and their chieftains, the brothers Ambri and Assi, the Winnili were young and brave and refused to pay tribute, saying It is better to maintain liberty by arms than to stain it by the payment of tribute. The Vandals prepared for war and consulted Godan, who answered that he would give the victory to those whom he would see first at sunrise. The Winnili were fewer in number and Gambara sought help from Frea, at sunrise, Frea turned her husbands bed so that he was facing east, and woke him. So Godan spotted the Winnili first and asked, Who are these long-beards. and Frea replied, My lord, thou hast given them the name, from that moment onwards, the Winnili were known as the Longbeards. When Paul the Deacon wrote the Historia between 787 and 796 he was a Catholic monk and devoted Christian and he thought the pagan stories of his people silly and laughable. Paul explained that the name Langobard came from the length of their beards, a modern theory suggests that the name Langobard comes from Langbarðr, a name of Odin. Priester states that when the Winnili changed their name to Lombards, they changed their old agricultural fertility cult to a cult of Odin
8.
Bavarians
–
Bavarians are an ethnographic group of Germans of the Bavaria region, a state within Germany. The groups dialect or speech is known as the Bavarian language, native to Altbayern, like the neighboring Swabians and Austrians, Bavarians are traditionally Catholic. There is no distinction between Bavarians and Austrians. The Bavarian language is divided into three dialects, Upper Palatinian is spoken in northern Bavaria. Danube Bavarian is spoken in central and south-eastern Bavaria and in Central, alpine Bavarian is spoken in south-western Bavaria, in southern Austria and in South Tyrol. On the southern side of the river Danube was the Roman controlled province of Raetia, Bavarians are first mentioned in the mid 6th century, in the foothills north of the Alps, on both sides of the Danube river. It is difficult to distinguish the mobile and mixing groups of the Danube in this period archaeologically and they seem to have been closely related to the Lombards who were developing as a force to the east of them. Their legal system shows heavy Roman influence, and their unification appears to have been under a Duke installed by the Franks, Elbe Germans, came from the Elbe river to the north, which was under Thuringian rule, and is where the Lombards had also been. But also more northern groups had moved along the Elbe from the direction of the North Sea, as did some Saxons who joined the Lombards, and possibly the Heruls. Also, East Germanic groups such as the Goths had entered the Pannonian region east of the Bavarians in the leading up to the empire of Attila. These peoples had not only contributed to the Hunnic empire, Slavs and Avars were settling to the north-east, and Goths and Langobards to the east and south were later displaced by Slavs and Magyars. A Diocese of Laureacum had been in existence since the 4th century, in the 8th century moved to Passau, the Bishopric of Regensburg was founded in 739 by Boniface. The Lex Baiuvariorum was a codex of Germanic law, comprising 23 articles of traditional law recorded in the 740s, Bavaria within the Carolingian Empire was bordering on Swabia in the west, Thuringia in the north, Lombardy in the south and Slavic Carinthia in the east. The Duchy of Bavaria was a duchy of the Holy Roman Empire, established in the 10th century. In the 14th and 15th centuries, upper and lower Bavaria were repeatedly subdivided, four Duchies existed after the division of 1392, Lower Bavaria-Straubing, lower Bavaria-Landshut, Bavaria-Ingolstadt and Bavaria-Munich. Munich, now the capital and cultural center of Bavaria, was founded in the medieval period. In 1503, Bavaria was re-united by Duke Albrecht IV of Bavaria-Munich, in 1623, Bavaria was elevated to Electorate. The Kingdom of Bavaria was established at the Peace of Pressburg, the kingdoms territory fluctuated greatly over the following years, eventually fixed at the Treaty of Paris, which established most of what remain the borders of the modern state
9.
Suebi
–
The Suebi was a large group of related Germanic peoples who lived in Germania in the time of the Roman Empire. They were first mentioned by Julius Caesar in connection with his battles against Ariovistus in Gaul and they actually occupy more than half of Germania, and are divided into a number of distinct tribes under distinct names, though all generally are called Suebi. At one time, classical ethnography had applied the name Suevi to so many Germanic tribes that it appeared as if, in the first centuries AD, classical authors noted that the Suevic tribes, compared to other Germanic tribes, were very mobile and not reliant on agriculture. Various Suevic groups moved from the direction of the Baltic Sea, towards the end of the empire, the Alemanni, also referred to as Suebi, first settled in the Agri Decumates and then crossed the Rhine and occupied Alsace. An area in southwest Germany is still called Swabia, which derives from the Suebi. Other Suebi entered Gaul and some moved as far as Gallaecia, where they established the Kingdom of the Suebi, which lasted for 170 years until its integration into the Visigothic Kingdom. Notably, the Semnones, known to classical authors as one of the largest Suebian groups, also seem to have a name with this same meaning, alternatively, it may be borrowed from a Celtic word for vagabond. Caesar placed the Suebi east of the Ubii apparently near modern Hesse, in the position where later writers mention the Chatti, some commentators believe that Caesars Suebi were the later Chatti or possibly the Hermunduri, or Semnones. Later authors use the term Suebi more broadly, to cover a number of tribes in central Germany. Whether or not the Chatti were ever considered Suevi, both Tacitus and Strabo distinguish the two partly because the Chatti were more settled in one territory, whereas Suevi remained less settled. The definitions of the greater ethnic groupings within Germania were apparently not always consistent and clear, whereas Tacitus reported three main kinds of German peoples, Irminones, Istvaeones, and Ingaevones, Pliny specifically adds two more genera or kinds, the Bastarnae and the Vandili. The Vandals were tribes east of the Elbe, including the well-known Silingi, Goths, and Burgundians, the modern term Elbe Germanic similarly covers a large grouping of Germanic peoples that at least overlaps with the classical terms Suevi and Irminones. In the time of Caesar, southern Germany was Celtic, in addition, also near the Hercynian forest Caesar believed that the Celtic Tectosages had once lived. All of these peoples had for the most part moved by the time of Tacitus, nevertheless, Cassius Dio wrote that the Suebi, who dwelt across the Rhine, were called Celts, which could mean that some Celtic groups were absorbed by larger Germanic tribal confederations. Strabo, in Book IV of his Geography also associates the Suebi with the Hercynian Forest and the south of Germania north of the Danube. He describes a chain of mountains north of the Danube that is like an extension of the Alps, possibly the Swabian Alps. In Book VII Strabo specifically mentions as Suevic peoples the Marcomanni, some of these tribes were inside the forest and some outside of it. Tacitus confirms the name Boiemum, saying it was a survival marking the old population of the place
Austria portal
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Noricum". Encyclopædia Britannica. 19 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 748.
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the 
Media related to Noricum at Wikimedia Commons
