chapter 5, section 5.

See, also, FRANKS (MEROVINGIAN EMPIRE): A. D. 511-752.

[Image: HABSBURG POSSESSIONS]

[Image: HABSBURG POSSESSIONS]

[Image: AUSTRIA-HUNGARY]

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AUSTRIA: The Name.

"The name of Austria, Oesterreich--Ostrich as our forefathers wrote it---is, naturally enough, a common name for the eastern part of any kingdom. The Frankish kingdom of the Merwings had its Austria; the Italian kingdom of the Lombards had its Austria also. We are half inclined to wonder that the name was never given in our own island either to Essex or to East-Anglia. But, while the other Austrias have passed away, the Oesterreich, the Austria, the Eastern mark, of the German kingdom, its defence against the Magyar invader, has lived on to our own times. It has not only lived on, but it has become one of the chief European powers. And it has become so by a process to which it would be hard to find a parallel."--

_E. A. Freeman, The Historical Geography of Europe, volume 1,