Austrian beer production by Kronland in 1865

I bet that title has dragged in loads of casual readers. They're in for a special treat. 19th-century statistics.

Did I mention that I have a thing about the Austro-Hungarian Empire? I find it bizarrely fascinating. Not sure why. Maybe it's reading about Emperor Jozef II in history lessons. But I'm not here to bore you with tales from school. I'm here to bore you with ancient statistics.

Obtaining meaningful statistics spanning a century or so is pretty tricky in central Europe, where the borders have moved a few times. And countries have come and gone. You can just about put together some modern countries from the numbers below. The Czech Republic, for example, is Böhmen and Mahren (Bohemia and Moravia). Modern Austria is approximately Niederösterreich, Oberösterreich, Salzburg, Steiermark, Kärnthen and Tirol und Vorarlberg. Though part of Tirol is now in Italy.

Now I've come up with enough bullshit for there to be room for a nice beer label, we can get on with looking at the numbers. In particular, I'll be mentioning a point I touched on recently: where was the first industrialised Austrian brewing? I would have got it wrong, had I guessed.

Here's the table:

Austrian beer production and no. breweries in 1865
Kronländer	no. breweries	output (Austrian eimer)	output (hl)	beer tax (Austrian guilders)	average output per brewery (hl)
Niederösterreich	127	2,864,015	1,621,183	3,780,114	12,765.22
Oberösterreich	286	958,256	542,423	1,096,879	1,896.58
Salzburg	76	315,144	178,388	364,642	2,347.21
Böhmen	1028	5,416,962	3,066,284	6,092,531	2,982.77
Mähren	281	1,233,405	698,172	1,370,688	2,484.60
Schlesien	80	283,742	160,613	326,463	2,007.66
Ostgalizien	189	456,593	258,456	433,841	1,367.49
Westgalizien	124	276,853	156,713	267,184	1,263.82
Bukowina	20	48,681	27,556	43,714	1,377.80
Steiermark	125	547,500	309,914	710,467	2,479.31
Kärnthen	203	148,954	84,316	167,990	415.35
Krain	23	45,732	25,887	55,366	1,125.51
Küstenland	2	1,016	575	1,218	287.55
Tirol und Vorarlberg	143	291,843	165,198	332,282	1,155.23
Ungarn und Serbien	286	846,383	479,097	854,114	1,675.16
Croatien und Slavonien	27	45,522	25,768	44,706	954.36
Militärgrenze	34	52,040	29,457	50,403	866.39
Siebenbürgen	84	110,576	62,592	106,316	745.14
Total 1865	3,138	13,943,217	7,892,591	16,098,918	2,122.06
Source:
“Bericht über der Welt_Ausstellung zu Paris im Jahre 1867, volume 7”, 1868, page 125.

Take a look at the production by brewery column. You'll see, I'm sure, that one region was way ahead of the others: Niederösterreich. In particular Vienna. 1,388,257hl of the Niederösterreich total was brewed in Vienna.

What would I have guessed as the region with the largest breweries? Bohemia, of course. That being the first part of the Austrian Empire to industrialise. And being reasonably well known for a certain type of pale lager.

But think about it more deeply and it's not such a surprise. Vienna was a large and comparatively wealthy city, capital of a large empire. And it was Dreher's brewery in Vienna, not Bürgerbräu in Pilsen, that kick started the modernisation of the Austrian brewing industry. The 22 breweries in Vienna produced on average 63,102 hl. Massively more than the average of around 2,000 hl. Dreher's brewery at Kleinschwechat was the largest in the country, producing 230,995 hl in 1865. The second largest Liesing, also in Vienna, churned out just 155,778.

That's it. For the moment. But you never know when I might get an Austro-Hungarian urge again.