VORARLBERG, the most westerly province of Austria, covers an area of 1,005 sq.m. and stretches from the Arlberg pass to the Rhine and Lake Constance. The southern boundary is formed by the limestone range of the Rhatikon Alps (Scesaplana, ft.) and part of the crystalline Silvretta massif (Piz Buin, 10,880 ft.). The zones of which these are part stretch across the province from south-west to north-east. North of the Kloster valley the dolomitic limestone builds the western end of the Lech tal Alps, rising above 8,85o ft., which merge, beyond the Walser valley, into the heights of the Bregenzer Wald. The southern slopes of these are of dolomite and more than 6,500 ft. in height but northward the limestone is replaced by the softer sandstones, marls and conglomerates of the flysch zone with a general sof ten ing of the landscape. In this region, near Bregenz, lignite occurs, hut elsewhere power is obtained from the mountain streams, rich in falls, and fed by plentiful annual precipitation (8o in.). The climate in the Rhine valley, sheltered and mild, influenced by fohn winds, suits vine and fruit cultivation and its influence stretches far up the fertile tributary valley of the Ill.
Of the total area 88% is productive land but of this 30% is occupied by forests and only 31% is cultivated ground, the re mainder being natural or artificial pasture. Cattle-rearing and the production of milk are therefore important and in this respect Swiss influence is more evident than elsewhere in Austria. So, too, the industrial development of Vorarlberg reflects Swiss con tacts, for the manufacture of textiles, particularly cotton goods, has grown with the advantage of cheap power in Bludenz, Dorn birn and Feldkirch. The working of embroidery for the ware houses of St. Gallen is a flourishing home industry.
The population— 157,338 (1934), German in speech, Cath olic in faith—shows a tendency to concentration in small towns along the valleys of the Rhine and the Ill, the principal lines of rail traffic, but no town is large, only two exceeding 10,000 inhab itants, viz., Dornbirn, the chief industrial centre, and Bregenz, the provincial capital.
The name of the district means the "land that is beyond the Arlberg Pass," that is, as it seems to one looking at it from the Tirol. This name is modern and is a collective appellation for the various counties or lordships in the region which the Habs burgs (after they secured Tirol in 1363) succeeded in purchasing or acquiring—Feldkirch (1375, but Hohenems in 1765 only), Bludenz with the Montafon valley (1394), Bregenz (in two parts, 1451 and 1523) and Sonnenberg (1455). After the annexation of Hohenems (its lords having become extinct in 1759), Maria Theresa united all these lordships into an administrative district of Hither Austria, under the name Vorarlberg, the governor residing at Bregenz. In 1782 Joseph II. transferred the region to the province of Tirol. The lordship of Blumenegg was added in 5804, but in 1805 all these lands were handed over, by virtue of the peace of Pressburg, to Bavaria, which in 1814 gave them all back, save Hoheneck. In 1815 the present administrative arrange ments were made. The building of the Arlberg railway (1880 1884), however, effected a considerable strengthening of the economic and political interests of Vorarlberg with the remainder of Austria.