lation density even though containing Vienna's suburbs; this is due to large areas of land being predominantly agricultural. The alpine state of Tyrol, the less alpine but geographically more remote state of Carinthia, and the non-alpine but near-exclusively agricultural state of Burgenland are Austria's least densely populated states. The wealthy alpine state of Vorarlberg is something of an anomaly due to its small size, isolated location and distinct alemanic culture.
State populations and capitals
|Pop. rank||State||Capital||Population||Area (km²)||Pop. density||Cities||Towns|
|2||Lower Austria||Sankt Pölten||1,636,287||19,178||85.3||76||497|
The population figures are from 1st January 2015. Areas are given in square kilometres, population density is expressed in inhabitants per square kilometre. For the purpose of the above list, a city is a community defined to be a city by Austrian law; a town is a community not defined to be a city. Many of Austria's cities have population figures on the order of ten thousand inhabitants; some are even smaller.
In terms of boundaries, the present-day states arose from the crown lands of Austria-Hungary, an extensive multiethnic realm with a German-speaking nucleus which emerged as the Republic of Austria after the dissolution of the Dual Monarchy at the end of World War I.
The states of Upper Austria and Lower Austria are essentially equivalent to what were since 1783/84 the two autonomous halves of the Archduchy of Austria, a principality which formed the empire's historic heartland. Salzburg is coterminous with the former Austro-Hungarian Duchy of Salzburg (the former Archbishopric). Similarly, the state of Carinthia descends from the Duchy of Carinthia, the state of Styria descends from the Duchy of Styria, and the state of Tyrol descends from the Princely County of Tyrol; these states had to cede territories to Italy and Yugoslavia when Austria emerged in its present form. Also, the state of Vorarlberg had been a semi-autonomous part of the County of Tyrol since 1861.
The city-state of Vienna was a part of Lower Austria up until 1921. The state of Burgenland is made up of the predominantly German-speaking area that the Kingdom of Hungary until 1921 had to cede to the First Austrian Republic after World War I as a result of the Treaties of Trianon and Saint-Germain-en-Laye.
- Distribution of seats in the Austrian Landtage
- Districts of Austria
- Flags of Austrian states
- Coats of arms of the Austrian states
- ISO 3166-2:AT
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