The first change was one which brought about for a moment from one side an union which was afterwards to be brought about in a more lasting shape from the other side. This was the annexation of Austria by the kingdom of _Bohemia_. ♦Bohemia a kingdom, 1158.♦ That duchy had been raised to the rank of a kingdom, though of course without ceasing to be a fief of the Empire, a few years after the mark of Austria had become a duchy. The death of the last duke of Austria of the Babenberg line led to a disputed succession and a series of wars, in which the princes of Bavaria, Bohemia, and Hungary all had their share. ♦Ottokar of Bohemia annexes Austria and Styria, 1252-1262. | Carinthia, 1269.♦ In the end, between marriage, conquest, and royal grant, Ottokar king of Bohemia obtained the duchies of Austria and Styria, and a few years later he further added Carinthia by the bequest of its Duke. Thus a new power was formed, by which several German states came into the power of a Slavonic king. ♦Great power of Ottokar.♦ The power of that king for a moment reached the Baltic as well as the Hadriatic; for Ottokar carried his arms into Prussia, and became the founder of Königsberg. But this great power was but momentary. Bohemia and Austria were again separated, and Austria, with its indefinite mission of extension over so many lands, including Bohemia itself, passed to a house sprung from a distant part of Germany. * * * * * ♦House of Habsburg.♦ We have now come to the European beginnings of the second House of Austria, the house whose name seems to have become inseparably connected with the name of Austria, though the spot from which that house drew its name has long ceased to be an Austrian possession. This is the house of the Counts of _Habsburg_. They took this name from their castle on the lower course of the Aar, in the north-west corner of the Aargau, in that southern Swabian land where the Old League of High Germany was presently to arise, and so greatly to extend itself at the cost of the power of Habsburg. ♦Union of Habsburg, Kyburg, and Lenzburg.♦ By an union of the lands of Habsburg with those of the Counts of _Kyburg_ and _Lenzburg_, a considerable, though straggling, dominion was formed. It stretched in and out among the mountains and lakes, taking in Luzern, and forming a dangerous neighbour to the free city of Zürich. ♦Their possession in Elsass.♦ Besides these lands, the same house also held _Upper Elsass_ with the title of Landgrave, a dominion separated from the other Swabian lands of the House by the territory of the free city of Basel. ♦Rudolf king, 1273. | His victories over Ottokar, 1276-1278. | Albert of Habsburg Duke of Austria and Styria, 1282.♦ The lord of this great Swabian dominion, the famous Rudolf, being chosen to the German crown, and having broken the power of Ottokar, bestowed the duchies of Austria and Styria on his son Albert, afterwards King. ♦Meinhard Duke of Carinthia and Count of