Austria historical timeline

Chronology

1. 788 — Charlemagne conquers the area, encourages colonisation and introduces Christianity. As part of Eastern Francia the core lands pass to the house of Babenberg.
2. 976 — Austria is created as a prefecture of Bavaria, and the marchia Orientalis is given to Leopold I. The earliest written record of the name is from 996, as Ostarrîchi — the word behind Österreich.
3. 1156 — The Privilegium Minus raises Austria to a duchy. The Babenbergs acquire the Duchy of Styria in 1192, and with Frederick II's death in 1246 the line ends.
4. 1278 — Ottokar II of Bohemia, who had taken control of Austria, Styria and Carinthia, is defeated at Dürnkrut by Rudolph I of Germany. From here until the First World War, Austria's history is largely the history of the Habsburgs.
5. 1438 — Duke Albert V is chosen to succeed his father-in-law Emperor Sigismund; he reigns a year, but from then on every Holy Roman Emperor is a Habsburg. Austria becomes an Archduchy in 1453.
6. 1477 — Maximilian marries Maria of Burgundy and acquires most of the Netherlands for the family; his son Philip marries Joanna of Castile in 1496. The Habsburg method is dynastic rather than military, and this is where it shows.
7. 1526 — After the Battle of Mohács, Bohemia and the unoccupied part of Hungary come under Austrian rule. Ottoman expansion brings frequent war, including the Long War of 1593–1606, and the Turks raid Styria nearly twenty times.
8. 1683 — The Battle of Vienna breaks the Ottoman advance into Europe, with John III Sobieski of Poland in command of the relief. The Great Turkish War that follows brings most of Hungary under Austria, formalised at the Treaty of Karlowitz.
9. 1792–1801 — War with Revolutionary France costs the Austrians 754,700 casualties, followed by successive defeats at Napoleon's hands.
10. 1814–1815 — The Congress of Vienna settles the questions left by the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars and the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire. The Austrian Empire emerges as one of the continent's four dominant powers, and the German Confederation is founded under Austrian presidency.
11. 1867 — The Ausgleich, the Austro-Hungarian Compromise, creates a dual sovereignty — the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary under Franz Joseph I — after the suppressed Hungarian Revolution of 1848 and the loss to Prussia.
12. 1914 — Archduke Franz Ferdinand is assassinated in Sarajevo by Gavrilo Princip; Franz Joseph declares war on Serbia and it escalates into the First World War. Austria-Hungary had annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908.
13. 1918 — Defeat and collapse produce the Republic of German-Austria, and the First Austrian Republic in 1919.
14. 1933 — Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss ends the First Republic with what he called the “self-switch-off of Parliament”, establishing an autocratic regime tending towards Italian fascism. In February 1934 members of the Schutzbund are executed and the Social Democrats outlawed; a new constitution follows on 1 May, and Dollfuss is assassinated on 25 July.
15. 1938 — Schuschnigg announces a referendum on independence for 13 March. On 12 March Austrian Nazis take over the government and German troops occupy the country, preventing the vote; on 13 March Austria is annexed by the Third Reich and ceases to exist. The Aryanisation of Jewish Austrians' property begins immediately, in an extra-legal “wild” phase before it is made bureaucratic.
16. 1945 — Vienna falls on 13 April in the Soviet offensive. On 27 April Renner, Schärf, Kunschak and Koplenig declare Austria's secession from the Third Reich and set up a provisional government. The country is then divided into Allied occupation zones and governed by the Allied Commission, its treatment shaped by the Moscow Declaration of 1943.
17. 1955 — The Austrian State Treaty of 15 May restores full independence. On 26 October the last occupation troops leave and parliament declares perpetual neutrality — “in all future times Austria will not join any military alliances and will not permit the establishment of any foreign military bases”. That date is the National Day, and Austria joins the United Nations the same year.
18. 1995 — After a referendum in 1994 carried by two thirds, Austria joins the European Union on 1 January. It signs the Lisbon Treaty in 2007 — and, neutral throughout, keeps out of NATO.