As finds from various part of the country show, Vorarlberg was already
settled in the Stone Age. Later the Rhaetians came into the country and
practised mining and - up to the lower alpine regions - farming.
In 13 BC a Roman army moved upwards the Rhine and defeated the Rhaetians.
They occupied the land and built roads. As a result of that co-existence
an own language emerged: Rhaeto-Romanic.
After the Romans had left, the Alemannians, a Germanic tribe, came to Lake Constance and into the Rhine valley. In the sixth century the area of Vorarlberg was under the reign of the Franks. In the following centuries, Carolingians, Ottonians and Hohenstaufer reigned the former Vorarlberg, which was torn apart by many feuds.
From the 14th century onwards, the Habsburgs gradually came into control of the area between Lake Constance and the Arlberg. During the Appenzell wars, which
extended from Switzerland to Lake Constance and into the Allgäu region,
large parts were devastated. During the Thirty Years« War even Bregenz
and the surrounding area were affected. At the beginning of the 18th century,
during the Spanish War of Succession, the inhabitants of Vorarlberg defended
their home land against France. During the Napoleonic War, the people of
Vorarlberg defeated the French army at Feldkirch (1799). After the Peace Treaty
of 1805, Vorarlberg was integrated into Bavaria. In 1813 it became part of
Austria again. The 19th century was marked by an economic upturn; in 1884 the
Arlberg mountain railway was completed. After WW I, in 1918, the region seceded
from the Tirol and Bregenz became the capital. After the Nazis integrated
Vorarlberg into the Reichsgau of Tirol, the country suffered severe economic
damage in WW II. After the end of the war Vorarlberg became a federal country of
the Republic of Austria.