Venice repulses Ottoman attacks on Dalmatia for several centuries after the Battle of Mohács, and it had helped to push the Turks from the coastal area after 1693, but by the late eighteenth century, trade routes have shifted, Venice has declined, and Dalmatian ships stand idle.
Napoleon ends the Venetian Republic and defeats Austria; he then incorporates Dalmatia, Dubrovnik, and western Croatia as the French Illyrian Provinces.
France stimulates agriculture and commerce in the provinces, fights piracy, enhances the status of the Orthodox population, and stirs a Croatian national awakening.
In 1814 the military border and Dalmatia return to Austria when Napoleon is defeated; Hungary regains Croatia and Slavonia.
In 1816 Austria transforms most of the Illyrian Provinces into the Kingdom of Illyria, an administrative unit designed to counterbalance radical Hungarian nationalism and co-opt nascent movements for union of the South Slavs.
Austria keeps Dalmatia for itself and reduces the privileges of the Dalmatian nobles.
