[6] Australia, it may be noted, has woman’s suffrage in all the states (Victoria, the last, adopting it in November 1908), and for the federal assembly.
AUSTRASIA. The word Austria signifies the realm of the east (Ger. Ost Reich). In Gregory of Tours this word is still used vaguely, but the sense of it is gradually defined, and finally the name of Austria or Austrasia was given to the easternmost part of the Frankish kingdom. It usually had Metz for its capital, and the inhabitants of the kingdom were known as the Austrasii. Retrospectively, later historians have given this name to the kingdom of Theuderich I. (511-534), of his son Theudebert (534-548), and of his grandson Theudebald (548-555); then, after the death of Clotaire I., to the kingdom of Sigebert (561-575), and of his son Childebert (575-597). They have even tried to interpret the long struggle between Fredegond and Brunhilda as a rivalry between the two kings of Neustria and Austrasia. When these two words are at last found in the texts in their precise signification, Austrasia is applied to that part of the Frankish kingdom which Clotaire II. entrusted to his son Dagobert, subject to the guardianship of Pippin and Arnulf (623-629), and which Dagobert in his turn handed on to his son Sigebert (634-639), under the guardianship of Cunibert, bishop of Cologne, and Ansegisel, mayor of the palace. After the death of Dagobert, Austrasia and Neustria almost always had separate kings, with their own mayors of the palace, and then there arose a real rivalry between these two provinces, which ended in the triumph of Austrasia. The Austrasian mayors of the palace succeeded in enforcing their authority in the western as well as in the eastern part, and in re-establishing to their own advantage the unity of the Frankish kingdom. The mayor Pippin the Short was even powerful enough to take the title of king over the whole.
At the time of Charlemagne, the word Austrasia underwent a change of meaning and became synonymous with Francia orientalis, and was applied to the Frankish dominions beyond the Rhine (Franconia). This Franconia was in 843 included in the kingdom of Louis the German, and was then increased by the addition of the territories of Mainz, Spires and Worms, on the right bank of the river.
See A. Huguenin, Histoire du royaume mérovingien d’Austrasie (Paris, 1857); Aug. Digot, Histoire du royaume d’Austrasie, 4 vols. (Nancy, 1863); L. Drapeyron, Essai sur l’origine, le développement et les résultats de la lutte entre la Neustrie et l’Austrasie (Paris, 1867); Auguste Longnon, Atlas historique, 1st and 2nd parts.
(C. Pf.)
AUSTRIA. (Ger. Österreich), a country of central Europe, bounded E. by Russia and Rumania, S. by Hungary, the Adriatic Sea and Italy, W. by Switzerland, Liechtenstein and the German empire (Bavaria), and N. by the German empire (Saxony and Prussia) and Russia. It has an area of 115,533 sq. m., or about twice the size of England and Wales together. Austria is one of the states which constitute the Austro-Hungarian (Habsburg) monarchy (see [Austria-Hungary]: History), and is also called Cisleithania, from the fact that it contains the portion of that monarchy which lies to the west of the river Leitha. Austria does not form a geographical unity, and the constituent parts of this empire belong to different geographical regions. Thus, Tirol, Styria and Carinthia belong, like Switzerland, to the system of the Alps, but these provinces together with those lying in the basin of the Danube form, nevertheless, a compact stretch of country. On the other hand Galicia, extending on the eastern side of the Carpathians, belongs to the great plain of Russia; Bohemia stretches far into the body of Germany; while Dalmatia, which is quite separated from the other provinces, belongs to the Balkan Peninsula.
Coasts.—Austria has amongst all the great European countries the most continental character, in so far as its frontiers are mostly land-frontiers, only about one-tenth of them being coast-land. The Adriatic coast, which stretches for a distance of about 1000 m., is greatly indented. The Gulf of Trieste on the west, and the Gulf of Fiume or Quarnero on the east, include between them the peninsula of Istria, which has many sheltered bays. In the Gulf of Quarnero are the Quarnero islands, of which the most important are Cherso, Veglia and Lussin. The coast west of the mouth of the Isonzo is fringed by lagoons, and has the same character as the Venetian coast, while the Gulf of Trieste and the Istrian peninsula have a steep coast with many bays and safe harbours. The principal ports are Trieste, Capodistria, Pirano, Parenzo, Rovigno and Pola, the great naval harbour and arsenal of Austria. The coast of Dalmatia also possesses many safe bays, the principal being those of Zara, Cattaro and Ragusa, but in some places it is very steep and inaccessible. On the other hand a string of islands extends along this coast, which offer many safe and easily accessible places of anchorage to ships during the fierce winter gales which rage in the Adriatic. The principal are Pago, Pasman, Isola Lunga and Isola Incoronata, Brazza, Lesina, Curzola and Meleda.
The political divisions of Austria correspond, for the most part, so closely to natural physical divisions that the detailed account of the physical features, natural resources and the movement of the population has been given under those separate headings. In this general article the geography of Austria—physical, economical and political—has been treated in its broad aspects, and those points insisted upon which give an adequate idea of the country as a whole.