Burgenland
Burgenland is the easternmost and least populous state or Land of Austria. It consists of two Statutarstädte (towns with a charter) and seven districts with in total 171 municipalities. It is 166 km long from north to south but much narrower from west to east (only 5 km wide at Sieggraben).
Geography
Burgenland is the 7th largest of Austria's 9 provinces (Bundesländer),
at 3,966 km². The highest point in the province is Geschriebenstein, at
884 metres, the lowest point is 114 metres, near Apetlon.
Burgenland has a very long border: To the west it borders the Austrian provinces of Niederösterreich and Steiermark. To the northeast it borders Slovakia, Hungary to the east and Slovenia to the farthest south.
Burgenland and Hungary share the Neusiedler See, known for its reed, shallowness as well as the mild climate throughout the year. The Neusiedler See is Austria's largest lake serving as a large tourist attraction bringing ornithologists, sailors and wind/kite surfers into the region north of the lake.
Administration
In Burgenland there are 2 Statutarstädte and 7 districts.
History of Burgenland
Between Hungary and Austria
The first inhabitation of Burgenland dates back to the Stone Age. During the
Roman Empire it formed the core of the province of Pannonia. After the battle
at Augsburg (955), Germanic settlers started to inhabit the area. In 1043 a
peace treaty between Kaiser Henry III and King Aba Sámuel of Hungary
fixed the western border of Hungary along the Leitha river. The territory of
the present-day Burgenland became the western border-zone of Hungary until 1920.
The majority of the population was mainly Germanic except the Hungarian border-guards of the frontier (gyepu). Germanic immigration was also continuous in the Middle Ages from the neighbouring Austria. In the 16-17th centuries German Protestant refugees arrived in Western Hungary to take shelter from the religion wars of the Holy Roman Empire.
After 1440 the territory of present-day Burgenland was occupied by the Habsburgs of Austria, and in 1463 the northern part of it (with the town of Koszeg) became a mortgage-territory according to the peace treaty of Wiener Neustadt. In 1477 King Matthias Corvinus of Hungary reoccupied, but in 1491 it was mortgaged again by King Ulászló II of Hungary to Kaiser Maximilian I. In 1647 Kaiser Ferdinand II returned it to Hungary. In the 17-18th centuries wealthy Catholic landowner-families, for example the Esterházys and Batthyánys dominated the region.
After the demise of the Austrian-Hungarian monarchy in 1918, the German inhabitants of Deutsch-Westungarn intended to join Austria. According to the 1910 census 291,800 people lived on the territory of present-day Burgenland. Among them 217,072 were German-speaking (74%), 43,633 Croatian (15%) and 26,225 (9%) Hungarian. Roma people were counted according to their mother language.
The decision about Deutsch-Westungarn was fixed in the peace treaties of Saint Germain and the Trianon. Despite diplomatic efforts by Hungary, the victorious parties of World War I set the date of Burgenland's official unification with Austria as August 28, 1921. In fact, the occupation by the Austrian police and customs was stopped on the same day, hindered by sharpshooters who offered armed resistance with the support of Hungary.
1921: The ninth state of Austria
With the help of Italian diplomatic mediation, the crisis was almost resolved
in the autumn of 1921, when Hungary committed to disarm the sharpshooters by
November 6, 1921, with the caveat of a poll about the unification of certain
territories, including Ödenburg (Sopron), the designated capital of Burgenland,
and eight other communities. The poll took place from 14 December to 16 December,
and resulted in a clear (but doubted by Austria) vote of the people for Hungary.
Contrary to the other ('Cisleithanian') present Austrian states, Burgenland did not constitute a specific Kronland. Because of its different historical roots at the time of its formation it did not have its own 'regional' political and administrative institutions such as a Landtag (representative assembly) and Statthalter (imperial governor).
On July 18, 1922, the first elections for the parliament of Burgenland took place. To cope with the changeover from Hungarian to Austrian jurisdiction, a lot of interim arrangements were made. The parliament decided in 1925 on Eisenstadt as the official capital of Burgenland, and moved from the various provisional estates throughout the country to the newly built Landhaus in 1929.
The first Austrian census in 1923 registered 285,600 people in Burgenland. The ethnic composition of the province slightly changed: the percentage of Germans increased compared to 1910 (227,869 people, 80%) while the percentage of Hungarians rapidly declined (14,931 people, 5%). This change was due to the emigration of the Hungarian civil servants and intellectuals after the union with Austria.
In 1923, emigration to the United States of America, which started in the late
19th century, reached its climax; in some places up to a quarter of the population
went overseas.
