The German phrase kaiserlich und königlich (, Imperial and Royal), typically abbreviated as k. u. k., k. und k., k. & k. or Hungarian: cs. és k. (in all cases the "und" is always spoken unabbreviated), refers to the Court of the Habsburgs in a broader historical perspective (see below). Some modern authors restrict its use to the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary from 1867 to 1918. During that period, it indicated that the Habsburg monarch reigned simultaneously as the Emperor of Austria and as the King of Hungary, while the two territories were joined in a real union (akin to a two-state federation in this instance). The acts of the common government, which only was responsible for the Imperial & Royal ("I&R") Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the I&R Ministry of War and the I&R Ministry of Finance (financing only the two other ministries), were carried out in the name of "His Imperial and Royal Majesty" and the central governmental bodies had their names prefixed with k. u. k.
Read more about Imperial And Royal: Symbolic Employment of und or u., Other Uses
Famous quotes containing the words imperial and/or royal:
“Their bodies are buried in peace; but their name liveth for evermore.”
—Apocrypha. Ecclesiasticus, 44:14.
The line “their name liveth for evermore” was chosen by Rudyard Kipling on behalf of the Imperial War Graves Commission as an epitaph to be used in Commonwealth War Cemeteries. Kipling had himself lost a son in the fighting.
“High from the summit of a craggy cliff,
Hung o’er the deep, such as amazing frowns
On utmost Kilda’s shore, whose lonely race
Resign the setting sun to Indian worlds,
The royal eagle draws his vigorous young”
—James Thomson (1700–1748)