+AUSTRIA+; +BOHEMIA+. The earliest appearance of the Renaissance in the architecture of the German states was in the eastern provinces. Before the close of the fifteenth century Florentine and Milanese architects were employed in Austria, Bohemia, and the Tyrol, where there are a number of palaces and chapels in an unmixed Italian style. The portal of the castle of Mahrisch-Trübau dates from 1492; while to the early years of the 16th century belong a cruciform chapel at Gran, the remodelling of the castle at Cracow, and the chapel of the Jagellons in the same city--the earliest domical structure of the German Renaissance, though of Italian design. The +Schloss Porzia+ (1510), at Spital in Carinthia, is a fine quadrangular palace, surrounding a court with arcades on three sides, in which the open stairs form a picturesque interruption with their rampant arches. But for the massiveness of the details it might be a Florentine palace. In addition to this, the famous +Arsenal+ at Wiener-Neustadt (1524), the portal of the Imperial Palace (1552), and the +Castle Schalaburg+ on the Danube (1530-1601), are attributed to Italian architects, to whom must also be ascribed a number of important works at Prague. Chief among these the +Belvedere+ (1536, by _Paolo della Stella_), a rectangular building surrounded by a graceful open arcade, above which it rises with a second story crowned by a curved roof; the Waldstein Palace (1621-29), by _Giov. Marini_, with its imposing loggia; +Schloss Stern+, built on the plan of a six-pointed star (1459-1565) and embellished by Italian artists with stucco ornaments and frescoes; and parts of the palace on the Hradschin, by _Scamozzi_, attest the supremacy of Italian art in Bohemia. The same is true of Styria, Carinthia, and the Tyrol; _e.g._ +Schloss Ambras+ at Innsbrück (1570). +GERMANY: PERIODS.+ The earliest manifestation of the Renaissance in what is now the German Empire, appeared in the works of painters like Dürer and Burkmair, and in occasional buildings previous to 1525. The real transformation of German architecture, however, hardly began until after the Peace of Augsburg, in 1555. From that time on its progress was rapid, its achievements being almost wholly in the domain of secular architecture--princely and ducal castles, town halls or _Rathhäuser_, and houses of wealthy burghers or corporations. It is somewhat singular that the German emperors should not have undertaken the construction of a new imperial residence on a worthy scale, the palaces of Munich and Berlin being aggregations of buildings of various dates about a nucleus of mediæval origin, and with no single portion to compare with the stately châteaux of the French kings. Church architecture was neglected, owing to the Reformation, which turned to its own uses the existing churches, while the Roman Catholics were too impoverished to replace the edifices they had lost.