LINZ, capital of the Austrian duchy and crownland of Upper Austria, and see of a bishop, 117 m. W. of Vienna by rail. Pop. (1900) 58,778. It lies on the right bank of the Danube and is connected by an iron bridge, 308 yds. long, with the market-town of Urfahr (pop. 12,827) on the opposite bank. Linz possesses two cathedrals, one built in 1669–1682 in rococo style, and another in early Gothic style, begun in 1862. In the Capuchin church is the tomb of Count Raimondo Montecucculi, who died at Linz in 1680. The museum Francisco-Carolinum, founded in 1833 and reconstructed in 1895, contains several important collections relating to the history of Upper Austria. In the Franz Josef-Platz stands a marble monument, known as Trinity Column, erected by the emperor Charles VI. in 1723, commemorating the triple deliverance of Linz from war, fire, and pestilence. The principal manufactories are of tobacco, boat-building, agricultural implements, foundries and cloth factories. Being an important railway junction and a port of the Danube, Linz has a very active transit trade.
Linz is believed to stand on the site of the Roman station Lentia. The name of Linz appears in documents for the first time in 799 and it received municipal rights in 1324. In 1490 it became the capital of the province above the Enns. It successfully resisted the attacks of the insurgent peasants under Stephen Fadinger on the 21st and 22nd of July 1626, but its suburbs were laid in ashes. During the siege of Vienna in 1683, the castle of Linz was the residence of Leopold I. In 1741, during the War of the Austrian Succession, Linz was taken by the Bavarians, but was recovered by the Austrians in the following year. The bishopric was established in 1784.
See F. Krackowitzer, Die Donaustadt Linz (Linz, 1901).