Emperor of Austria - The Austrian Empire

The Austrian Empire

The Empire of Austria (Kaisertum Österreich) from 1804 to 1867 consisted of the Habsburg lands as a whole, leaving each land its special definition as kingdom (e.g. Bohemia, Hungary), archduchy (Lower and Upper Austria), duchy (e.g. Carniola) or princely county (e.g. Tyrol). Kaisertum might literally be translated as "emperordom" on analogy with "kingdom" or "emperor-ship"; the term denotes specifically "the territory ruled by an emperor". Austria proper (as opposed to the complex of Habsburg lands as a whole) had been an Archduchy since the 15th century, and most of the other territories of the Empire had their own institutions and territorial history, although there were some attempts at centralization, especially between 1848 and 1859.

In 1866, Austria lost the war with Prussia and Italy. Francis Joseph I war urged to solve the internal problems of his realm and was well advised to provide a substantial rise to the Hungarian nobility, which had stayed in passive resistance to him after the crushed Hungarian revolution of 1848 and 1849: In the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867 (Ausgleich) Hungary was recognized as a self-governing kingdom outside of the Empire of Austria, in exchange for willing to keep the common ruler, army, navy and foreign representation (Real union). Transilvania, Croatia and Slavonia were acknowledged as lands of the Hungarian crown, which were called Transleithania by government officials to distinct them from Cisleithania, the lands remaining in the Austrian Empire from 1867 onwards. These were officially known only as the "Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council" (Die im Reichsrat vertretenen Königreiche und Länder). Unofficially ever since, these territories officially were called Austria from 1915 to 1918 only, despite the fact that all the citizens held the common Austrian citizenship since 1867.

The Empire of Austria broke apart at the end of the First World War in 1918, when the Austrian lands established their independence (Bohemia and Moravia in newly created Czechoslovakia, Galicia in newly created Poland) or adhesion to other states (Bukovina to Romania, Carniola and Dalmatia to Yugoslavia) or were annexed by the victors of war (South Tyrol, Trieste and Istria by Italy). Yet the last Emperor, Charles I, used his imperial title until the end of his life. The Kingdom of Hungary, having terminated the 1867 compromise by October 31, 1918, broke apart similarly.