Austrians
Historically, Austrians were regarded as ethnic Germans and viewed themselves as such. Austria was part of the Holy Roman Empire and the German Confederation until the Austro-Prussian war in 1866 which resulted in Prussia expelling Austria from the Confederation. Thus, when Germany was founded as a nation-state in 1871, Austria was not a part of it. In 1867, Austria was reformed into the Austro-Hungarian Empire. After the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1918 at the end of World War I, Austria was reduced to a rump state and adopted and briefly used the name the Republic of German-Austria ("Republik Deutschösterreich") in an attempt for union with the Republic of Germany, but was forbidden due to the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (1919). The First Austrian Republic was founded in 1919. The Third Reich annexed Austria with the "Anschluss" in 1938.
Austria – the Nazis' first victim
For the Second Republic to survive meant to make Austrians realize their own national identity, that only was to create. As far back as the 1940s, a new, own history of Austria had been urgently composed to satisfy this purpose: it introduced into existence a special Austrian nation that differed from the German one. Hero's pantheon of this history was made of people that had no connection with Germany within the 20th century, i.e. Leopold the Glorious or Andreas Hofer. In 1946 the 950-year anniversary of the ancient name of Austria () was right on the button. As Austrians formed from a set of ancient nations then, according to Austrian historians, they were not Germans genetically Religion was also different: Austrians are mainly Catholics, Germans – Protestants. The consensual opinion of Austrian scientists stated that a common language could not be the determining factor.