page_title: Bukovina Germans
section_title: Under the Habsburgs and within the Austrian Empire
hierarchical_section_title: Bukovina Germans / History / Under the Habsburgs and within the Austrian Empire
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Wappendes des Kronlandes Herzogtum Bukowina 1849 bis 1918
context_page_description: The Bukovina Germans are a German ethnic group which settled in Bukovina, a historical region situated at the crossroads of Central and Eastern Europe. Their main demographic presence lasted from the last quarter of the 18th century, when Bukovina was annexed by the Habsburg Empire, until 1940, when nearly all Bukovina Germans were resettled into the Third Reich as a part of Heim ins Reich national socialist population transfer policy.
  According to the 1910 Imperial Austrian census, the Bukovina Germans represented an ethnic minority accounting for approximately 21.2% of the multi-ethnic population of the Duchy of Bukovina. Of those 21.2%, a large proportion was represented by German-speaking Jews. By excluding the Jews, however, the Germans in Bukovina constituted a minority of circa 73,000 people.
  Subsequently, in absolute numbers, 75,533 ethnic Germans were registered in Bukovina when it was still part of the Kingdom of Romania. Historically, some of them developed their own dialect over the course of several hundred years which they called 'Buchenländisch', while others speak a series of other distinct German dialects, depending on their region of origin.
context_section_description: Following the Russo-Turkish War, in 1774–75 the Habsburg Monarchy annexed northwestern Moldavia which was predominantly inhabited by Romanians (as many as 85 percent), with smaller numbers of Ukrainians (including Hutsuls and Ruthenians), Armenians, Poles, and Jews.
  Since then, the region has been known as Bukovina (German: Bukowina or Buchenland). From 1774 to 1786, the settlement of German craftsmen and farmers in existing villages increased. The settlers included Zipser Germans from the Zips region of Upper Hungary (today mostly Slovakia), Banat Swabians from Banat, and ethnic Germans from Galicia (more specifically Evangelical Lutheran Protestants), but also immigrants from the Rhenish Palatinate, the Baden and Hesse principalities, as well as from impoverished regions of the Bohemian Forest (German: Böhmewald).
  Thus, four distinct German linguistic groups were represented as follows:
  Austrian High German (Österreichisches Hochdeutsch) was spoken in urban centres like Cernăuți (Czernowitz), Rădăuți (Radautz), Suceava (Suczawa), Gura Humorului (Gura Humora), Câmpulung (Kimpolung), and Siret (Sereth);
  Bohemian-Bavarian German (Deutschböhmisch or Böhmerwäldisch) was spoken by woodsmen in Huta Veche (Althütte), Crăsnișoara Nouă (Neuhütte), Gura Putnei (Karlsberg), Voievodeasa (Fürstenthal), Vadu Negrilesei (Schwarzthal), Poiana Micului (Buchenhain), Dealu Ederii (Lichtenberg), Bori (early colony in Gura Humorului), and Clit (Glitt);
  Palatine Rhine Franconian (Pfälzisch) and Swabian German (Schwäbisch) was spoken in farming villages like Arbore (Arbora), Bădeuți (Deutsch Badeutz), Frătăuții Vechi (Alt Fratautz), Frătăuții Noi (Neu Fratautz), Ilișești (Illischestie), Ițcani (Itzkany), Satu Mare (Deutsch Satulmare) and Tereblestie;
  Zipser German (Zipserisch) was spoken by mine workers and their descendants in Cârlibaba (Mariensee or Ludwigsdorf), Iacobeni (Jakobeny), Stulpicani (Stulpikany), and elsewhere.
  During the 19th century, the developing German middle class comprised much of the intellectual and political elite of the region; the language of official business and education was predominantly German, particularly among the upper classes. Population growth and a shortage of land led to the establishment of daughter settlements in Galicia, Bessarabia, and Dobruja.
  After 1840, a shortage of land caused the decline into poverty of the German rural lower classes; in the late 19th century parts of the German rural population alongside a few Romanians emigrated to the Americas, mainly to the United States (most notably to Ellis and Hays, both located in Kansas) but also to Canada.
  Between 1849 and 1851, and from 1863 to 1918, the Duchy of Bukovina became an independent crown land within the Austrian Empire (see also: Cisleithania). However, in comparison to other Austrian crown lands, Bukovina remained an underdeveloped region on the periphery of the realm, primarily supplying raw materials.
  The Franz Josephs Universität in Cernăuți (Czernowitz) was founded in 1875, then the easternmost German-speaking university. In 1910–11, the Bukovinan Reconciliation (a political agreement between the peoples of Bukovina and their political representatives in the Landtag assembly on the question of autonomous regional administration) took place between the representatives of the nationalities. During the first round of the 20th century, local German-language literature flourished through the writings of Rose Ausländer, Alfred Kittner, Alfred Margul Sperber, or Paul Celan. Other German writers include mixed Ukrainian-German intellectuals Ludwig Adolf Staufe-Simiginowicz or Olha Kobylianska (remotely related with German poet Zacharias Werner).
caption: The coat of arms of the Duchy of Bukovina conceived by Austrian heraldist Hugo Gerard Ströhl.
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