The French administration of the Illyrian Provinces ends in 1814, when France is forced to return the provinces to the Austrian Empire.

Under French rule, the region not only has made cultural and economic advances but also has began to develop a sense of Slav unity and national awareness that will mature and manifest itself in the 1830s and 1840s in the powerful literary and political Illyrian movement.

Slovenian intellectuals continue to refine the Slovenian language and national identity, while Austria strives to confine their activities to the cultural sphere.

The pro-Austrian philologist and linguist Jernej Kopitar, who had published the first grammar of the Slovene language in 1808, pioneers comparative Slavic linguistics and creates a Slovenian literary language from numerous local dialects, hoping to strengthen the monarchy and Catholicism.