 In the 1890s, the Austro-Hungarian Navy began building large, modern cruisers, beginning with the protected cruisers of the Kaiser Franz Joseph I class. The Marinesektion, the executive committee of the Navy, decided to follow the Kaiser Franz Joseph I-class ships with a more powerful vessel, a larger, better armed armored cruiser, as the type had begun to gain prominence in foreign navies. The Austro-Hungarians requested design proposals from five British shipyards, though none of them were awarded the contract. The Navy gave the contract for "torpedo-ram cruiser C", as it was provisionally titled, to Stabilimento Tecnico Triestino, the Austrian dockyard in Trieste. The two subsequent armored cruisers, Kaiser Karl VI and Sankt Georg, were improved versions of this design.
