Styria

Styria

Slovenian: Štajersko; Latin: Styria, Stiria

Steyr (= a town in Upper Austria), Mark (= border region)

Styria lies on the south-eastern edge of the Alps and is bordered by four provinces dating back to the Middle Ages (Carinthia, Salzburg, Austria above the Enns/Upper Austria, Austria below the Enns/Lower Austria) and by Burgenland (formerly German West Hungary), which was established in the 20th century. Owing to this location, the territory of Styria lies at the crossroads between the Upper Danube (Bavaria) and the Balkan region, as well as between the Middle Danube region (Pannonia/Hungary) and Northern Italy, resulting in Germanic, Romance, Slavic and Magyar elements having left their mark.

The northern part is high-alpine (up to approx. 3,000 m above sea level), the central part is mountainous (up to approx. 1,500 m above sea level), whilst the south and south-east consist of flat and hilly countryside (up to approx. 600 m above sea level). In 1910, Styria covered an area of 22,423 km².

Styria is one of the nine Federal States of the Republic of Austria.

Until 1919, most of what is now eastern Slovenia (Lower Styria) formed part of Styria, which is why the province was about a third larger up until that point.

The heraldic animal is the Styrian panther (white on a green background). The regional colours are green and white. The patron saint of the region is St Joseph (since 1784).

The earliest evidence of human settlement dates back to the Palaeolithic period and covers all parts of the country except the high mountains, but does not allow for any concrete conclusions regarding inter-regional connections. During the Bronze and Iron Ages, and even more so following the migration of Celtic tribes in the 3rd century, there was an increase in exchange processes that can now be documented. From 15 BC until the collapse of the Western Roman Empire (476 AD), the country belonged to the Roman Empire as part of the province of Noricum, with the most significant impetus for development coming from the south-west. With the migration of the Germanic Lombards from Pannonia to northern Italy and the influx of Slavs (as far as the mountain valleys) and the Avars (as far as the lowlands) from the south-east, a massive population shift and, to a large extent, resettlement took place in the second half of the 6th century.

The policies of the Carolingian (later: Holy Roman) Empire led to the establishment of border marches on the south-eastern edge of the Alps, facing the middle Danube region, where the Avars ruled in the 6th–8th centuries and the Magyars from the late 10th century onwards. From this border zone, which underwent several reorganisations, Styria emerged in the 12th century, governed by the noble family of the Traungauers (Upper Austria, with its centre at Steyr). Upon their extinction in 1192, the Babenbergs, who ruled in Austria both above and below the River Enns (later: Upper and Lower Austria), took over the region. Following the extinction of this ruling family (1246), the kings of Bohemia and Hungary initially sought to claim this inheritance, but the German Emperor Rudolf of Habsburg transferred the fief (1278) to his own family. In the 15th century, the German Emperor Frederick III resided in Graz for a time. In the late Middle Ages, the Counts of Cilli (Slovenian: Celje) emerged as rivals to the Habsburgs in the struggle for sovereignty over the region, but this conflict ended with the assassination of Count Ulrich (1456). The Counts of Cilli also played an important role as magnates in the medieval Kingdom of Hungary; Barbara of Cilli (1390–1451) even became Queen of Hungary, Bohemia and the German Empire as the wife of Sigismund of Luxembourg.

The situation in the region changed following the Habsburgs’ conquest of the Bohemian and Hungarian lands in 1526, as well as due to the Ottoman raids that had been taking place since the late 15th century. On the one hand, its status as a border region with the ‘Balkans’ – which had become Muslim – led to increased cooperation with the neighbouring duchies of Carinthia and Carniola, as well as the Kingdom of Croatia (as part of Hungary), in order to organise the defence against the Turks (military frontier in Croatia-Slavonia); on the other hand, this also increased the influence of Vienna as the seat of the court authorities and the policy of networking among the so-called hereditary lands that emanated from there. A key period for Styria was the time between 1564 and 1619, during which, as a result of a partition of the inheritance, the provincial capital Graz was elevated to the seat of the Inner-Austrian line of the dynasty. Consequently, the duchies of Carinthia and Carniola, the counties of Inner Istria and Gorizia, and the city of Trieste were all subject to a common regime. These interregional ties persisted later on, albeit with diminishing significance. A new situation arose in the 19th century when the Slovenian national movement sought a united Slovenia (from 1848 onwards), which called the traditional regional structure into question and led to a conflict brewing between the German and Slovenian sections of the population.

As a result of the Treaty of Saint-Germain (1919), the southern part of Styria, which was predominantly populated by Slovenes, was annexed to the newly founded Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later: the Kingdom of Yugoslavia). The plight of the German-speaking minority remaining in Lower Styria, who lived mainly in the towns of Marburg/Maribor, Cilli/Celje and Pettau/Ptuj, strained Austrian-Yugoslav relations. Following the Third Reich’s invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941, Lower Styria was incorporated into the Reichsgau Styria (until 1945). The seizure of power by the Communist-led partisan movement resulted in the expulsion, imprisonment or execution of thousands of German-speaking Lower Styrians. (Austrian) Styria was under British occupation from 1945 to 1955, before the British army withdrew following the signing of the Austrian State Treaty on 15 May 1955. In 1978, with the involvement of the Styrian provincial government, the Alps-Adriatic Working Group was founded, facilitating cooperation between neighbouring regions with different political systems. Although the break-up of Yugoslavia (1991) and Slovenia’s accession to the European Union (2004) triggered efforts to come to terms with the past, there was no official recognition of the remnants of the former German ethnic group on Slovenian soil.

Styria, whose Alpine heartland broke away from the Duchy of Carinthia in the 11th century, was elevated to the status of a duchy in 1180. Following several changes in sovereignty, the region became part of the so-called Habsburg ‘hereditary lands’. From the time of the Austro-Hungarian Compromise (1867), Styria was one of the Crown Lands situated in the Cisleithanian half of the Danube Monarchy. Following the collapse of the empire in 1918, the province became one of the nine Federal States of the Republic of Austria.

Under the estates-based provincial constitution, the Duchy was subdivided into quarters for centuries, to which the individual manorial estates were assigned. This structure lost its significance in the 18th century as a result of the administrative reforms of Maria Theresa and Joseph II. The estates-based provincial constitution was incorporated, with adaptations, into the constitution of the unified state during the constitutional era (1848–49, 1860–1918). Following the abolition of feudal subjecthood (1848/49), the manorial estates were transferred to the newly created municipalities. After the First World War, 17 of the 26 districts remained part of Austria.

In 1910, the population of Styria totalled 1,394,699 inhabitants; of these, 403,981 Slovenes (83 per cent) and 73,148 Germans (15 per cent) lived in Lower Styria. The population was, and remains, unevenly distributed geographically, as the mountainous north has always been far less densely populated than the hilly and lowland areas in the south. Urbanisation and industrialisation in the 19th century led to a shift from the countryside to the towns, and to migration from Lower Styria to the Greater Graz area (the provincial capital and an industrial centre) and to the Upper Styrian coal-mining region of Leoben-Donawitz.

The country’s economic strength is based on its geographical location between the Mediterranean and Central Europe (trade, industry), on its range of resources (pasture and arable land, forests, deposits of precious metals, ores and coal, salt extraction, hydropower), on the presence of different climate zones (winter sports in the north, wine-growing in the south) and on technical innovations (iron smelting, vehicle manufacturing, scientific and technological research), which can be traced back primarily to the technical colleges established since the 19th century and which have consolidated the country’s industrial sector. From the 19th century onwards, tourism also gradually began to play a role, as evidenced by the thermal spas in Eastern, Southern and Lower Styria and the climatic health resorts.

Right up until the 19th century, society in Styria was structured along feudal lines into estates (nobility, the Church, townspeople, peasants). Mining (silver, salt, ore, coal) and ironworking had already given rise to a small class of entrepreneurs in earlier times, which grew with industrialisation as a result of immigration from the West and the East. The majority of the population were serfs who, following the emancipation of the peasants (1848/49), for the most part possessed only small to very small plots of land and therefore sought additional income in the markets and towns. Nevertheless, there was no large-scale emigration overseas, as had occurred in neighbouring German West Hungary (Burgenland from 1921). The ethnic structure essentially comprises two major groups: the Germans (settlers from Bavaria in the Early and High Middle Ages and, later, newcomers from various regions) and the Slovenes (Alpine Slavs and their descendants). Whilst the Alpine Slavs in the northern and central parts of the region were assimilated by the German settlers over the course of the Middle Ages, they retained their majority in the lowlands, although larger or smaller German-speaking enclaves formed in the towns and market towns there. Economic incentives in the 19th and 20th centuries led to processes of assimilation affecting both ethnic groups. In 1900, 70.50 per cent of the population of Styria were German-Austrians (983,252 people) and 29.37 per cent were Slovenian-Austrians (409,684 people).

The Christianisation of Styria, which originated from the Archdiocese of Salzburg and its missionary centres, began in the 8th century and came to an end in the 11th century. The establishment of separate dioceses (Seckau in 1218 for the Oberland and parts of the Unterland, and Lavant in 1228 for parts of the Unterland) reflects the growth of regional ecclesiastical autonomy. The Reformation brought about significant upheavals, as the majority of the population converted to Protestantism. However, with the establishment of the Jesuit University, Graz became one of the most important centres of the Counter-Reformation, particularly as Ferdinand II (1578–1637), who was primarily responsible for this, was born in Graz. The reform policies of Joseph II (1741–1790) also marked a profound turning point in ecclesiastical development, resulting in the secularisation of many monasteries and the introduction of a new system of parish boundaries. Before the First World War, the Duchy of Styria was home to approximately 1.4 million Catholics, around 22,000 Lutherans and some 3,000 people of the Jewish faith.

The Universalmuseum Joanneum in Graz celebrated its 200th anniversary in 2011. It not only houses a collection covering various subject areas (art, archaeology, folklore, minerals, etc.), but also fulfils an educational mission in the interests of the local population, with Archduke Johann (1782–1859) – one of the brothers of Franz I (1768–1835). The Styrian Provincial Library evolved from a reading room founded in 1812; its collections cover all historical parts of the province. The Styrian Provincial Archives is Austria’s largest regional archive, with collections extending beyond the borders of Styria. Since their foundation (in 1815 and 1899 respectively), the Styrian Music Society and the Graz Opera have pursued the aim of familiarising the local audience with the works of classical music.

The educational landscape is based primarily on the universities in Styria: in the Austrian part, these are the Karl-Franzens University, founded in Graz in 1585 (re-established in 1827), the Graz University of Technology (founded in 1811, expanded in 1874) and the University of Music and Performing Arts (founded in 1963 as an academy), as well as the Montanuniversität in Leoben (founded in 1840, expanded in 1975). In the Slovenian part of the former Duchy of Styria, the first Schools of the University of Maribor (German: Marburg) date back to 1975. The catchment areas of these academic institutions include not only the immediate region but also, to varying degrees, all the countries of south-eastern Europe.

Everyday culture is traditionally underpinned by four pillars – folk culture (town festivals, music and dance events, exhibitions on rural and village themes, Styrian cuisine, Styrian wines); ‘high’ culture (concerts, operas, readings, exhibitions, museums); sports culture (including international skiing and ski-jumping competitions, motor racing); and cooperation with neighbouring countries Hungary, Croatia, Slovenia and north-eastern Italy (Trieste and Friuli-Venezia Giulia) (gastronomy, festivals, art exhibitions, trade fairs).

Among the country’s best-known composers are Johann Josef Fux (1660–1741), who rose to the position of court Kapellmeister at the Viennese court, Anselm Hüttenbrenner (1794–1868), who collaborated with Ludwig van Beethoven and Franz Schubert, and Hugo Wolf (1860–1903), who hailed from the small town of Windischgrätz/Slovenj Gradec in Lower Styria. In the decades around 1900, Wilhelm Kienzl (1857–1941), a native of Upper Austria, shaped the Styrian music scene as a composer and director of the Musikverein. Contemporary music is represented by the ‘Steirischer Herbst’, which was launched in 1967 and is dedicated, amongst other things, to promoting avant-garde music. Folk music bands also play a major role, serving as a bridge between generations throughout the region.

The most important repositories for the history of books are the monastic libraries (for example, Admont Abbey houses the world’s largest monastic library) as well as the University Library (approx. 3 million volumes) and the Styrian Provincial Library (over 700,000 volumes) in Graz. The development of book printing in Styria began in the mid-16th century and reached its peak with the Widmannstetter printing house in Graz (1585–1806). After that, only the Leykam and Kienreich printing houses (both in Graz) were able to retain a certain degree of regional significance.

A literary scene characteristic of the region only began to develop in the 19th and 20th centuries. During the ‘Gründerzeit’, the world of the village – which was falling by the wayside – provided inspiration for regional literature (e.g. Peter Rosegger, Hans Kloepfer, Paula Grogger, Max Mell and others). From the late 19th century until the end of the Second World War, a new literary movement emerged in the wake of the nationalist movement, which addressed the concept of the borderlands and inter-ethnic relations (Anastasius Grün, Rudolf Hans Bartsch, and others). In the 1960s, a new circle of writers emerged around the Forum Stadtpark in Graz, which deliberately pursued socially critical and avant-garde paths (Peter Handke, Wolfgang Bauer, Barbara Frischmuth, and others). Writers based in the Styrian-Slovenian region played a particularly significant role in the development of a trans-regional Slovenian literature (e.g. Stanko Vraz, Franz Miklosich).

For centuries, the lowlands of Styria were exposed to military incursions by the Magyars, which is why a stable border with the Kingdom of Hungary did not emerge until relatively late; many of the castle complexes still standing today date back to that period. From the second half of the 15th century, the threat posed by the Ottomans, who had advanced as far as Bosnia and Croatia, grew, making continuous defensive measures necessary from the early 16th century onwards, not only along the southern border but also to protect the provincial capital, Graz. The greatest threat arose in 1532, when the main army of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent ravaged the country on its retreat to Constantinople, and in 1683, during the Second Siege of Vienna. These circumstances led to the construction of the so-called Landeszeughaus (Arsenal), which is home to one of the world’s largest collections of 16th- and 17th-century weapons. During the Kuruc Wars (1703–1711), the ‘Malkontenten’ from Hungary advanced and repeatedly pillaged the eastern border regions. During the Napoleonic Wars, the French army operated in the region on several occasions and laid siege to Graz in 1809. In 1945, the Red Army of the Soviet Union advanced into Styria from the east, before the British Allies took over the occupation of the province (as they did in Carinthia until 1955). There were breaches of airspace in 1991, when the Yugoslav People’s Army flew over the Austrian border on several occasions whilst fighting against Slovenia, which was struggling for its independence.

The culture of memorials began during the period known as the ‘Vormärz’, when the focus was on commemorating the French Wars. Further reasons for the erection of monuments and commemorative plaques stemmed from the public benefit of many achievements in towns, spa towns and even villages. Further impetus for commemorative work stemmed from the First and Second World Wars, when there were many war dead to mourn.

Germans who resettled, fled or were expelled from Yugoslavia during or after the Second World War also contributed to the culture of remembrance (for example, with the Gottschee Memorial in Graz-Mariatrost). In the Slovenian part of Styria, the initiatives were based, on the one hand, on liberation from Habsburg or ‘German’ rule (1918/19) and, on the other hand, on the victory of the communist partisan movement (1945 onwards), initially over the ‘fascist’ forces, then over the bourgeois forces.

The discourse, which has so far been conducted in an unsystematic manner, reflects the historical antagonism between Germans and Slovenes, or between imperial and national history, and encompasses five thematic areas: 1. the willingness or unwillingness of the political leadership of the Habsburg Monarchy (the western half of the Empire) to accommodate Slovenian demands for autonomy; 2. the dominant role played by the German population in Lower Styria in the decades leading up to the First World War, despite being outnumbered; 3. the treatment of the German population of Lower Styria by communist Yugoslavia and Slovenia from the end of the Second World War onwards, with regard to reparations and the recognition of a German minority in present-day Slovenia; 4. the question of the ‘Austrian’ share in the suffering of the Slovenian population between 1941 and 1945; 5. the quantitative and qualitative role of the Slovenian minority in Austrian Styria, which has been insufficiently acknowledged. Research in all relevant archives and from a comparative perspective suggests that a well-developed and balanced picture of the outstanding issues can be expected; yet the willingness to engage in discourse should not be overestimated, as the policies of the Republics of Austria and Slovenia, in contrast to the issue of the Slovenian minority in Carinthia, tend to avoid potential controversies.

• Feliks J. Bister, Peter Vodopivec (eds.): Cultural Interaction in Central Europe. German and Slovenian Culture in the Slovenian Region from the Early 19th Century to the Second World War. Ljubljana 1995 (Austria–Slovenia Academic Library 1).
• Janez Cvirn: The Fortress Triangle. The Political Orientation of Germans in Lower Styria (1861–1914) [The Fortress Triangle. The Political Orientation of the Germans in Lower Styria (1861–1914)]. Maribor 1997.
• Joseph Desput (ed.): From Federal State to European Region. Styria from 1945 to the Present Day. Graz 2004 (History of Styria 10).
• Styria: Bridge and Bulwark. Provincial Exhibition 1986, Catalogue. Graz 1986 (Publications of the Styrian Provincial Archives 16).
• Harald Heppner (ed.): Slovenes and Germans in a Shared Space. New Research on a Complex Topic. Munich 2002 (Book Series of the South-East German Historical Commission 38).
• Klaus-Jürgen Hermanik: A Hidden Minority. A Micro-Study of Bilingualism in the Styrian Micro-Region of Soboth. Weitra [2007] (Provincial Library).
• Joachim Hösler: Slovenia: From its Beginnings to the Present Day. Regensburg 2006 (Eastern and South-Eastern Europe – History of Countries and Peoples).
• Stefan Karner: Styria in the 20th Century: Politics, Economy, Society, Culture. Graz et al. 2000.
• Stefan Karner, Gerald Schöpfer (eds.): When Central Europe Fell Apart. On the Consequences of the Upheaval in Austria and Yugoslavia after the First World War. Graz 1990 (History of Our Time 1).
• Martin Moll: No Truce. The German–Slovenian Nationality Dispute in Styria 1900–1918. Innsbruck 2007.
• Andreas Moritsch (ed.): Alps-Adriatic. On the History of a Region. Klagenfurt et al. 2001.
• Dušan Nećak, Božo Repe: Slovenia. Klagenfurt et al. 2006 (Wieser History: Eastern Europe).
• Othmar Pickl (ed.): 800 Years of Styria and Austria 1192–1992. Styria’s Contribution to Austria’s Greatness. Graz 1992 (Research on the Historical Regional Studies of Styria 35).
• Hans Pirchegger: History of Styria. With particular reference to cultural life. Graz 1949 (reprinted 1976).
• Nova Revija (ed.): Slovenian Historical Atlas. Ljubljana 2011.
• Helmut Rumpler, Arnold Suppan (eds.): History of the Germans in the Territory of Present-Day Slovenia (1848–1941). Vienna, Munich 1988 (Publications of the Austrian Institute for Eastern and South-Eastern Europe 13).
• Gerhard Sewann: Styria. In: Edgar Hösch, Karl Nehring, Holm Sundhaussen (eds.): Encyclopaedia of the History of South-Eastern Europe. Vienna et al. 2004, pp. 661–663.
• Christian Stenner (ed.): Slovenian Styria. A Marginalised Minority in South-Eastern Austria. Vienna et al. 1997 (Studies on South-Eastern Europe II/23).
• Peter Štih, Vasko Simoniti, Peter Vodopivec: Slovenian History. Society, Politics, Culture. Graz 2008 (Publication of the Styrian Provincial Historical Commission 40).
• Arnold Suppan (ed.): Between the Adriatic and the Karawanken. Berlin 1998 (German History in Eastern Europe).
• Ferdinand Tremel: A Land on the Border. A History of Styria. Graz 1966.
• Peter Vodopivec: From Pohl’s Grammar to an Independent State. Slovenian History from the End of the 18th Century to the End of the 20th Century [From Pohlin’s Dictionary to an Independent State. Slovenian History from the End of the 18th to the End of the 20th Century]. Ljubljana 2006.
• Adam Wandruszka, Peter Urbanitsch (eds.): The Habsburg Monarchy 1848–1918 (= The Peoples of the Empire 3). Vienna 1980. Part 1, pp. 248–255; Part 2, pp. 801–838.

• Proceedings of the Historical Society of Styria, Graz (1850 onwards, continued as the Journal of the Historical Society of Styria, Graz [1906 onwards]).
• Historical Society of Styria (ed.): Journal of Local History, Graz (1923 onwards). Publications of the Styrian Provincial Archives, Graz (1–53/54; 1951–2004).
• Publications of the Styrian Provincial Commission, Graz (1896 onwards).
• Časopis za zgodovino in narodopisje [Journal of History and Folklore], Maribor (1904 onwards).
• International Cultural-Historical Symposium Mogersdorf, Eisenstadt (1972 onwards)

Harald Heppner: Styria. In: Online Encyclopaedia on the Culture and History of Germans in Eastern Europe, 2012. URL: ome-lexikon.uni-oldenburg.de/54159.html (accessed 7 March 2012).