Golden era of lager breweries in the southern Austro-Hungarian empire

Abstract

This paper reviews the context and continuity of beer production in the southern Austro-Hungarian Empire during the period of the dual monarchy or Dualism (1867-1914). Brewing, which in this region dates from the mid-18th century, was the first activity with characteristics of industrial production. The development of breweries is considered through four spatial levels: industrial building/complex; settlement (Pancevo, Vrsac, Veliki Beckerek, Becej, Apatin); the province of Vojvodina (the southern part of Habsburg Monarchy, later the Austro-Hungarian Empire and now in Serbia); and Central Europe. The research concentrates on discovering the role of beer production in the industrialisation and urbanisation of Vojvodina during the period of Dualism and contains descriptions of representative examples in an urban context, a spatial concept, technological processes, and construction and architectural design. Different lager beer production sites have been analysed to define types of breweries according to the position of the basic functional units of the production process. The changes in the social system are discussed in relation to the determination of housing models and types of public buildings in industrial complexes. Focusing on the five oldest breweries in Vojvodina, this paper demonstrates not only the importance they had as generators of local development, but also that they were an echo of the technological and architectural codes of Central Europe.