Carinthia
Carinthia (German: Kärnten) is the southernmost Austrian state or Land; it is chiefly famous for its mountains and lakes.
View on Faaker See and mount MittagskogelIt consists mostly of a basin inside the Alps, with the Carnic Alps and the Karawanken/Karavanke making up the border to Italy and Slovenia. The Hohe Tauern mountain range divides it from the state of Salzburg. To the East lies the state of Styria/Štajerska and it makes up a continuous valley with the eastern part of the Tyrol to the West. Its lakes, including Wörther See, Millstätter See, Ossiacher See, and Faaker See, are a major tourist attraction. The main river is the Drau/Drava.
The capital is Klagenfurt. The next important town is Villach; these two towns are strongly linked economically. Other towns are Althofen, Bad Sankt Leonhard im Lavanttal, Bleiburg , Feldkirchen , Ferlach , Friesach , Gmünd, Hermagor , Radenthein, Sankt Andrä, Sankt Veit an der Glan , Spittal an der Drau, Straßburg, Völkermarkt, Wolfsberg .
Carinthia's main industries are tourism, electronics, engineering, forestry and agriculture. The multinational corporations Philips and Siemens have large operations there.
Carinthia has a continental climate, with hot and moderately wet summers and
long harsh winters. In recent decades winters have been exceptionally arid.
The average amount of sunshine hours is the highest in Austria. In autumn and
winter temperature inversion often dominates the climate, characterised by air
stillness, a dense fog covering the frosty valleys and trapping pollution to
form smog, while mild sunny weather is recorded higher up in the foothills and
mountains.
History
In 745 the former Slavic principality of Karantania became a margraviate of
the Frankish Empire. The March of Carinthia was created in 889 by Carloman,
king of Bavaria and given to his son Arnulf of Carinthia. In 976 Emperor Otto
II separated it from Bavaria and made it an independent duchy within the Holy
Roman Empire. It was given to Otto IV of Habsburg in 1335 and was ruled by the
Habsburg dynasty until 1918. When the Holy Roman Empire was dissolved in 1806,
Carinthia became a constituent land of the Austrian Empire and a crown land
of Austria-Hungary in 1867. After the end of the First World War southern Carinthia
was occupied by troops of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later Yugoslavia)
under colonel Rudolf Maister leading to clashes of arms and violent fights.
The Carinthian Plebiscite on October 10, 1920 determined the lines of division
between what is today the Austrian state of Carinthia and the informal province
of Carinthia (Koroška) within Slovenia. The town of Tarvisio (German: Tarvis,
Slovenian: Trbiž) with the Canal Valley became a part of the Italian province
of Udine.
Original an agrarian state, Carinthia in the 1920s made some efforts to build up a touristic infrastructure like the Grossglockner High Alpine Road and the Klagenfurt Airport as well as the opening up of the Alps attended by the Austrian Alpine Club. However it was hit hard by the Great Depression around 1930 driving the political system in Austria more and more towards extremism. This phenomenon culminated in the years of the Austrofascism (the term is debatable) and the 1938 annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany (Anschluss). At the same time the Nazi party took power everywhere in Carinthia, which became together with East Tyrol a Reichsgau and Nazi leaders like Franz Kutschera, Hubert Klausner and Friedrich Rainer held the office of a Gauleiter. In World War II the cities of Klagenfurt and Villach suffered from air raids, however the Allied forces did not reach Carinthia before Victory in Europe Day May 8, 1945. In the end, Gauleiter Rainer propagated plans of Carinthia being a part of a Nazi National Redoubt (Alpenfestung) but had to surrender to the forces of the British Army. Subsequent attempts of Yugoslavian troops to occupy parts of Carinthia were rejected by the British forces with the consent of the Soviet Union.
Carinthia, East Tyrol and Styria then formed the UK occupation zone of Allied-administered Austria. The Allied occupation ended in 1955 by the Austrian State Treaty, which restored Austria's sovereignty.
Tourist attractions
Gurk CathedralMajor tourist attractions are the cities Klagenfurt and Villach,
St. Paul's Abbey in the Lavanttal, the lakes Wörthersee, Ossiachersee,
Faaker See, Millstätter See, ski resorts Nassfeld/Hermagor, Gerlitzen,
Bad Kleinkirchheim, Heiligenblut, Gurk Cathedral, Hochosterwitz castle, the
Großglockner mountain - Austria's highest mountain - and the Nockberge
for alpine sport.
