March of Austria

Margraviate of Austria
Ostarrîchi
State of the Holy Roman Empire
976–1156
Map of the Margraviate of Austria within the Duchy of Bavaria circa 1000 CE.   Austria   Other parts of Bavaria   Rest of the German Kingdom
Capital		Melk
Languages		Austro-Bavarian German
Religion		Roman Catholic
Government		Feudal monarchy
Margrave of Austria
•	976–994	Leopold I (first Babenberg margrave)
•	1136–41	Leopold IV¹ (last margrave)
Historical era		Middle Ages
•	Established	976
•	Disestablished	1156
Preceded by Succeeded by Duchy of Bavaria Duchy of Austria
1: Also Dukes of Bavaria from 1139.

The Margraviate of Austria was a southeastern frontier march of the Holy Roman Empire created in 976 out of the territory on the border with the Kingdom of Hungary. Originally under the overlordship of the Dukes of Bavaria, it was ruled by margraves of the Franconian Babenberg dynasty. It became an Imperial State in its own right, when the Babenbergs were elevated to Dukes of Austria in 1156.

In contemporary Latin, the entity was called the marcha Orientalis ("Eastern march"), marchia Austriae, or Austrie marchionibus. The Old High German name Ostarrîchi first appeared on a famous deed of donation issued by Emperor Otto III at Bruchsal in November 996. The phrase regione vulgari vocabulo Ostarrîchi, that is, "the region commonly called Ostarrîchi", probably only referred to some estates around the manor of Neuhofen an der Ybbs; nevertheless the term Ostarrîchi is linguistic ancestor of the German name for Austria, Österreich.

Later the march was also called the Margraviate of Austria (Markgrafschaft Österreich) or the Bavarian Eastern March (Bayerische Ostmark, the second word being a German translation of marcha orientalis, though no example of this usage in relation to Austria is known before the 19th century) to differentiate it from the Saxon Eastern March (Sächsische Ostmark) in the northeast. During the Anschluss period of 1938–45 the Nazi authorities tried to replace the term "Austria" with Ostmark.