After Spain, Austria took northern Italy and brought Enlightenment reforms: tax reform, reduced Church power, the first public libraries.
Plan a history trip →1713: Austria gains Milan, Naples (briefly), Sardinia. 1738: Austria trades Naples/Sicily to the Spanish Bourbons for Parma. Keeps Milan/Lombardy and later gets Tuscany (1737, when the Medici line dies out). Maria Theresa (1740–80) and Joseph II (1780–90): reforms that modernized Lombardy (cadastral surveys, suppressed monasteries, opened schools). 1796: Napoleon invades and ends Austrian rule (temporarily).
Milan: Teatro alla Scala (1778, built under Austrian rule), Palazzo Reale (€14, Habsburg-era apartments). Trieste: the most Habsburg-feeling Italian city (remained Austrian until 1918). Canal Grande, Miramare Castle (€10). Florence: Palazzo Pitti’s Habsburg-Lorraine apartments. Mantua: Habsburg influence on the Gonzaga court.