The Almanach (formerly ZEDHIA – Zentraleuropäisches digitales wirtschafts- und gesellschaftshistorisches interaktives Archiv) is a collection of digitised, systematically organised sources for research into economic and social history. The Almanach is based on the publisher Compass-Verlag's publications and offers over 2 million pages from more than 68,000 individual editions.
An overview of the most important contents
- Published between 1868 and 2003, Compass provides comprehensive information on Austrian companies, public finances and economic history data relating to the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The "Personen-Compass" is also a valuable source for genealogical research.
- The ‘Zentralblatt für Handelsregistereintragungen’ (Central Register of Commercial Registry Entries) documents company legal transactions such as formations, conversions and liquidations from 1902 to 2001 in over 140 volumes.
- The weekly economics journal ‘Der Tresor’ (1872–1919) focused on joint-stock companies, government securities and detailed financial and economic analyses in Austria-Hungary.
- The ‘Amtsblatt zur Wiener Zeitung’ (Official Gazette of the Wiener Zeitung), published from 1812 to 2023, contains laws, regulations and judicial reports as well as commercial and trade notices.
- As the official press organ of the German Empire and Prussia, the ‘Deutsche Reichsanzeiger und Preußische Staatsanzeiger’ (including its predecessors under other titles) provides insights into political and economic developments from 1819 to 1945.
The Almanach has a wide range of applications in research, scholarship and practice. Its historical business directories can be used to trace company histories in detail and compile company chronicles. In addition, the data from the commercial and company registers provides insights into corporate legal processes such as formations, conversions and liquidations. Sector and market analyses are helpful for understanding economic structures and how they change over time, while economic and company reports offer comprehensive insights into macroeconomic developments and historical trends. Biographical information on business leaders and economic networks completes the portfolio.
It is easy to search the full texts of the digitised documents using the search interface, and search results can be filtered and sorted by time period, document type or publication series. The results list shows publications in which the search terms were found and specifies the number of pages on which they appear. You can click on ‘Details’ to open a pop-up window with information about the respective publication. If you have registered for a personal account, you can save results by clicking on the star in the ‘Favorit’ column. Your search terms will be highlighted in yellow in the full-text view. You can browse the digitised publications, enlarge the display, download individual pages and set bookmarks.
Since July 2025, the Almanach has been integrated into the Wirtschafts-Compass platform. University of Graz members can access the Almanach from anywhere on campus or remotely via VPN by clicking on ‘Uni Graz Auto-Login’. Registering for an account enables users to create bookmarks and use other features. Existing ZEDHIA accounts, including bookmarks, have been transferred to the Almanach. The University Library accepts no liability for the processing of your data by the provider.
Please pay attention to both the publisher’s and the university library’s terms of use.
The Almanachis accessible from anywhere on campus via unikat and DBIS (switch to English at the top of the page). University members can access it remotely via VPN. Please note: enter https://univpn.uni-graz.at/ub in the VPN address field.
Have you discovered our video tutorials on unikat, literature research and literature management? We also offer training courses during the semester. You can find more information under Support & Courses.
If you have any questions about this database, please contact ub.zeitschriften(at)uni-graz.at.