Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
volutionaries were now in favour of becoming part of a greater, unified and liberal Ger-
many. This was the difficult Grossdeutsch-Kleindeutsch (Greater Germany-Lesser Ger-
many) question - Germany with or without Austria - and reflects the unsettled relation-
ship between the Austrian and German nations.
The rebels demanded a parliament, and in May and June 1848 Kaiser Ferdinand I is-
sued manifestos which paved the way for a parliamentary assembly a month later. He
packed his bags and his family and fled to Innsbruck. This should have been the end of
the Habsburgs. It wasn't. Parliament passed a bill improving the lot of the peasants, and
Ferdinand cleverly sanctioned this, overnight winning the support of rural folk in the re-
gions. Meanwhile, the Habsburgs received a popular boost when General Radetzky
(1766-1858) won back Lombardy (Italy) in successful military campaigns.
In October 1848, however, the revolution escalated and reached fever pitch in Vienna.
Although this uprising could be quashed, the Habsburgs decided to dispense with Ferdin-
and I, replacing him with his nephew Franz Josef I, who introduced his own monarchical
constitution and dissolved parliament in early 1849. It would only be revived properly in
1867.
By September 1849 it was time to weigh up the damage, count the dead and, most im-
portantly, look at what had been won. Austria was not a democracy, because the kaiser
retained absolute powers that allowed him to veto legislation and govern by decree if he
wished. The revolutions, however, had swept away the last vestiges of feudalism and, by
giving them a taste of parliamentary rule, made state citizens out of royal subjects.
Austro-Hungarian Empire
In 1867 a dual monarchy was created in Austria and Hungary. This was an attempt by the
Habsburgs to hold onto support for the monarchy among Hungarians by giving them a
large degree of autonomy. The Austro -Hungarian Empire would grow to include core re-
gions of Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia-
Herzegovina, as well as regions like the Voivodina in Serbia, and small chunks in north-
ern Italy, Romania, Poland and Ukraine.
Generally it is known as the 'KuK' (
König und Kaiser
; king and kaiser) monarchy -
the kaiser of Austria was also king of Hungary. In practice, the two countries increasingly
went separate ways, united only by the dual monarch and a couple of high-level minis-
tries like 'war' and 'foreign affairs'. This so-called 'Danube Monarchy' or Austro-Hun-
