Graz district

The Graz district at the end of the 18th century, with a brief description

The Grazer Kreis was an administrative unit of the Duchy of Styria in Inner Austria . It was referred to as the northern part of Lower Styria and in 1808 it was still called "Grätzer Viertel".

Emergence

The Grazer Kreis was created as part of the administrative reform under Maria Theresa from 1748. This reform, which replaced the earlier division of Styria into quarters , was introduced under Count Haugwitz and continued from 1760 under Count Kaunitz . Since the end of the 15th century, Styria had five quarters: Judenburg, Enns and Mürz valleys (Brucker Viertel), Vorau (later Hartberg , with Graz), the quarter between Mur and Drau and the Cilli quarter south of the Drau. With the district division and their offices, an administrative institution was created for the first time, which lay between the administrations of the manors and the government level.

With the administrative reforms after 1848, the districts functioned only as a supervisory authority and were replaced in 1867 by the more delicate system of political districts .

location

The Grazer Kreis lay in the area of ​​the Vorauer Quarter, which essentially comprised Eastern Styria and initially only a few parish districts in the northern Grazer Feld west of Graz. At its head was a district chief who ran the district office with officials.

The boundaries of the district soon proved to be inexpedient: many areas in the west of Graz that could have been quickly reached from the city (like the district between Mur and Drau before) had remained assigned to the Marburg district . Your responsible district office was far away in Leibnitz, from 1752 in Marburg . From November 1, 1783, the Graz district was expanded to include the parishes in the Kainachtal and St. Stefan ob Stainz , Stainz , Preding , Hengsberg , Wildon and Lebring ; these areas were withdrawn from the Marburg district.

In 1805 the southern border of the Grazer Kreis was moved further south and the communities between the Stainzbach and the Laßnitz ( advertising districts Stainz and Hornegg near Preding ) were also removed from the Marburg district and incorporated into the Graz district. From then on, the boundaries of the district remained unchanged until it was dissolved by the administrative reform in 1848.

In the north of the Grazer Kreis was on the border north of Frohnleiten (Gamsgraben) the Brucker and in the west, on the Stubalm and Packalm the Judenburger Kreis, in the northeast the district under the Vienna Woods (today's industrial district in Lower Austria with the Bucklige Welt ), im In the east the Hungarian county Eisenburg (Vasvár), in the south and west initially the Marburg district. After the inclusion of the area from the Voitsberg district , the Grazer Kreis bordered in the west with the Klagenfurt district in Carinthia.

In 1788 there were 296,424 inhabitants in the Graz district.

Due to the administrative reform from 1848, the “Grazer Kreis” was retained, but entrusted with other (only administrative) tasks, while the jurisdiction was transferred to the regional and district courts. In addition to the area of ​​its predecessor, this district also included the judicial districts of Radkersburg (with Mureck ), Leibnitz (with Arnfels , Eibiswald and Wildon ) and Stainz (with Voitsberg and Landsberg / Deutschlandsberg ). These areas were previously located in the Marburg district. The new Grazer Kreis had an area of ​​117.7 square miles and 443,012 inhabitants.

• The area of ​​the Grazer Kreis from the 17th to the 19th century
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  The Vorauer, later Hartberger or Grazer Viertel of Styria 1678, forerunner of the Grazer Kreis

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  Until 1783, the Grazer Kreis only comprised the Grazer Feld in the west

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  Enlargements due to changes in the borderline between Grazer and Marburger Kreis in western Styria in the 19th century

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  The Grazer Kreis in the middle of Styria, 1855, already with the indication of the new (three) circles and a schematic representation of the new district boundaries

literature

• Joseph Baptist Schütz: General geography for thoughtful and educated readers or, description of all countries in the five parts of the world, their location, their climate, their natural products, national culture, strangest cities, most beautiful regions, most interesting works of art, ruins and monuments, then their inhabitants, their way of life , Clothing, trade, arts, sciences, religion and constitution Volume 12. Verlag A. Doll. Vienna 1808. pp. 172-173. Schütz, general geography in the Google book search
• Georg Göth : The Duchy of Styria, represented geographically, statistically and topographically . Manuscript for the Grazer Kreis in the Styrian State Archives (publications only for Brucker and Judenburger Kreis)
• Josef Andreas Janisch: Topographical-statistical lexicon of Styria with historical notes and comments Graz. Leykam-Josefsthal 1878–85. Reprint: Graz. Publishing house for collectors 1978–79.
• Fritz Posch: Prehistory and beginnings of the district authorities in Styria. Extended lecture on the occasion of the centenary of the Styrian district authorities in the knight's hall of the Styrian country house in Graz on October 11, 1968. In: Mitteilungen des Steirischen Landesarchivs, Volume 18, Graz 1968, pp. 101–117. Printed in abbreviated form in: Johannes Gründler: Festschrift "100 Years of District Governments in Austria". Self-published by the Austrian federal states (with the exception of Vienna), 1970, pp. 61–71. ( PDF )
• Werner Ogris : State and legal reforms. In: Walter Koschatzky (Ed.): Maria Theresia and their time. A depiction of the period from 1740–1780 on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the empress' death . Residenz Verlag Salzburg and Vienna, 1979, ISBN 3-7017-0236-5 , pp. 56–66.
• Gernot Peter Obersteiner: District Office and District Chief in Styria after 1748. Establishment and activity of the new subordinate authorities of Maria Theresa. In: Historical research in Graz. Festschrift for the 125th anniversary of the Institute for History of the Karl-Franzens-University Graz . Edited by Herwig Ebner, Horst Haselsteiner et al. Self-published by the Institute for History at the Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz, Graz 1990, pp. 195–208.
• Gernot Peter Obersteiner: Die Steirischen Bezirkshauptmannschaften 1868 to 1918. (with history) In: Mitteilungen des Steiermärkisches Landesarchivs 42/43 (1993), pp. 77-98. ( PDF )
• Gernot Peter Obersteiner: The Theresian-Josephinian administrative reforms in front and inner Austria. An overview. In: Franz Quarthal, Gerhard Faix (ed.): The Habsburgs in the German southwest. New research on the history of Upper Austria. Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-7995-0124-X , pp. 415-424.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Schütz, p. 172.
2. ^ Posch: District authorities. P. 103.
3. ^ Walter Brunner: Maps of the Grazer and Marburger Kreis . In: Steiermark Edition, part of Grenzmark-Herzogtum-Bundesland, STE 01014. Archive publishing house. Vienna 1991 ff.
4. ↑ Decree of the Ministry of the Interior of August 23, 1849, which announces the organization of the political administrative authorities in the Crown Land of Styria approved as a result of the highest resolution of August 13, 1849. With the supplement “Most submissive lecture by the most faithful minister of the interior, Alexander Bach, on the organization of the political administrative authorities in the Crown Land of Styria”. Austrian Reich Law Gazette number 373 year 1849 (supplementary volume December 1848 – October 1849), pp. 663–666 (on the Grazer Kreis p. 665 ).