ABSTRACT
The characteristics of territories in the Habsburg Empire determined the status of the cities we are concerned with. Most were regional capitals, if not the capital of a hereditary crown land, like Zagreb, or capitals of more recently acquired provinces, like Czernowitz in Bucovina or Sarajevo in Bosnia-Herzegovina. They were designated as “Landeshauptstadt.” This designation was not without controversy, as in the context of the rivalry between Cracow and Lemberg for supremacy over Galicia, with the former city, once the royal seat and place of burial of the Polish kings, resenting the latter being designated as the official capital of the province. In the new regulations enacted in the empire after the revolution of 1848, city autonomy was strictly controlled. A new category was created in 1850: the statutory towns (Statutarstadt), whose administration was distinct from the provincial assembly (diet or Landtag). Trieste had a peculiar status because it was at the same time a statutory town and crown land: therefore, its municipal assembly also had the attribution of a Diet. 1 In 1850, the other statutory town of this study was Brünn. In the 1860s and 1870s, Czernowitz and Lemberg were added to the list. 2 In each of these cities, the mayor was elected by the town council, but the nomination was to be confirmed by imperial decree.
