I. General

Today's Republic of Austria (the official designation since 1920) corresponds, with diminished borders, to the Habsburg estate, i.e. the territories in the Danube and eastern Alpine area acquired by the Habsburgs in the 13th–15th centuries forming the center of the imperial Hausmacht. The name Austria first occurs in 996 in the form “Ostarrichi” (“Eastland”). Originally a reference to what …