Austria's Ancient History: A Country's Age Explored

Austria's history can be traced back to the Paleolithic age, when the area was inhabited by the Hallstatt Celtic culture. In the 2nd century BC, a Celtic state called Noricum developed around the region's ironworks. The Romans arrived in 200 BC and by 15 BC, they dominated the entire area.

In the 5th century, the Bavarians controlled the territory between the eastern Alps and the Wienerwald region. In the 9th century, Charlemagne, the king of the Franks, established a territory in the Danube valley known as the Ostmark (Eastern March). In 996, the Ostmark was first referred to as Ostarrichi, a clear forerunner of the modern German word Österreich (Austria).

In the 11th century, the Babenberg family took control of the Ostmark, which became a duchy in 1156. The Duchy of Austria was one of the extensive feudal possessions of the Babenberg family until 1246, when the Babenberg dynasty came to an end.

In the 13th century, the Habsburg dynasty rose to power and ruled Austria for over six centuries, until 1918. During this period, Austria became a major imperial power in Central Europe and expanded its territory through strategic alliances and marriages.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, Austria went through significant political changes, including the fall of the Habsburg monarchy after World War I, the unification with Germany during World War II, and the restoration of independence as the Second Austrian Republic in 1955.

Today, Austria is a federal parliamentary republic and a member of the European Union. It is known for its rich history, culture, and contributions to music and the arts.

The country's name

The name Austria is derived from the Latinisation of the German name 'Ostarrîchi', which first appeared in a document in 996. The word is probably a translation of Medieval Latin 'Marchia orientalis' into a local (Bavarian) dialect. The name 'Austria' was first recorded in the 12th century, when the Danube basin of Austria was the easternmost extent of Bavaria.

The Roman Empire

The area that is now Austria was conquered by the Roman Empire in 16 BC and made a province called Noricum which lasted until the year 476. The regions of today's Austria which were not located within the province of Noricum were divided between the Roman provinces of Pannonia, which encompassed parts of eastern Austria, and Raetia, which encompassed the areas of present-day Vorarlberg and Tyrol.

Present-day Petronell-Carnuntum in eastern Austria was an important army camp turned capital city in what became known as the Pannonia Superior. Carnuntum was home to 50,000 people for nearly 400 years.

After the fall of the Roman Empire, the area was first invaded by the Germanic Rugii which made this region part of their "Rugiland". In 487, most of modern Austria was conquered by Odoacer, a barbarian soldier and statesman from the Middle Danube, which incorporated most of today's Austria in his Kingdom of Italy. By 493, it was conquered by the Germanic Ostrogoths which created their own kingdom, the Ostrogothic Kingdom. Following the Kingdom's fall the area was invaded by the Alemanni, Baiuvarii, Slavs, and Avars.

Charlemagne, King of the Franks, conquered the area in 788, encouraged colonisation, and introduced Christianity. As part of Eastern Francia, the core areas that now encompass Austria were bequeathed to the house of Babenberg. The area was known as the marchia Orientalis and was given to Leopold of Babenberg in 976.

The Habsburgs

The Habsburg monarchy was a collection of empires, kingdoms, duchies, counties and other polities ruled by the House of Habsburg. The Habsburgs became prominent in Europe due to the dynastic policy pursued by Maximilian I, who married Mary of Burgundy, thus bringing the Burgundian Netherlands into the Habsburg possessions. Their son, Philip the Handsome, married Joanna the Mad of Spain, thus acquiring Spain and its territories for the Habsburgs.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire

The Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, also known as the Ausgleich, established a dual sovereignty and marked the beginning of the Empire. The Austrian and Hungarian states were co-equal in power, conducting unified diplomatic and defence policies, with "common" ministries of foreign affairs and defence maintained under the monarch's direct authority. A third finance ministry was responsible for financing these "common" portfolios.

The Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia, an autonomous region under the Hungarian crown, was a third component of the union, negotiating the Croatian-Hungarian Settlement in 1868. After 1878, Bosnia and Herzegovina came under Austro-Hungarian joint military and civilian rule until it was fully annexed in 1908, provoking the Bosnian Crisis.

The Empire played a significant role in the lead-up to World War I, with the assassination of the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914 serving as a catalyst for the conflict. On 28 July 1914, Austria-Hungary declared war on the Kingdom of Serbia, marking the beginning of the First World War. The Empire suffered significant casualties during the war, with approximately 1.2 million military deaths, and eventually succumbed to defeat.

The end of World War I signalled the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, with the Kingdom of Hungary and the First Austrian Republic emerging as its successors. The Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, signed between the Allies and the newly formed Republic of Austria, and the Treaty of Trianon, signed with the Republic of Hungary, finalised the Empire's demise. The rest of the Empire's territory was divided among Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Italy, and Romania.

The Republic of Austria

The area of today's Austria has been inhabited since at least the Paleolithic period. Around 400 BC, it was inhabited by the Celts and then annexed by the Romans in the late 1st century BC. Christianization in the region began in the 4th and 5th centuries, during the late Roman period, followed by the arrival of numerous Germanic tribes during the Migration Period.

Austria, as a unified state, emerged from the remnants of the Eastern and Hungarian March at the end of the first millennium, first as a frontier march of the Holy Roman Empire. It then developed into a duchy in 1156, and was made an archduchy in 1453. Being the heartland of the Habsburg monarchy since the late 13th century, Austria was a major imperial power in Central Europe for centuries and from the 16th century, Vienna also served as the Holy Roman Empire's administrative capital.

Before the dissolution of the empire two years later, in 1804, Austria established its own empire, which became a great power and one of the largest states in Europe. The empire's defeat in wars and the loss of territories in the 1860s paved the way for the establishment of Austria-Hungary in 1867.

After the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in 1914, Emperor Franz Joseph declared war on Serbia, which ultimately escalated into World War I. The empire's defeat and subsequent collapse led to the proclamation of the Republic of German-Austria in 1918 and the First Austrian Republic in 1919. During the interwar period, anti-parliamentarian sentiments culminated in the formation of an Austrofascist dictatorship under Engelbert Dollfuss in 1934. A year before the outbreak of World War II, Austria was annexed into Nazi Germany by Adolf Hitler, and it became a sub-national division. After its liberation in 1945 and a decade of Allied occupation, the country regained its sovereignty and declared its perpetual neutrality in 1955.

Austria is a federal parliamentary republic and representative democracy with a popularly elected president as head of state and a chancellor as head of government and chief executive. Austria has the 13th highest nominal GDP per capita with high standards of living. The country has been a member of the United Nations since 1955 and of the European Union since 1995. It hosts the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and is a founding member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and Interpol. It also signed the Schengen Agreement in 1995, and adopted the euro currency in 1999.

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