Aulic Council

The Aulic Council (from the Latin aula, court in feudal language, in Antiquity a hellenistic type of grand residence, usually private) was originally an executive-judicial council for the Holy Roman Empire.

Known in German as the Reichshofrat(h) (literally meaning Court Council of the Empire) it was one of the two supreme courts of the Empire, the other being the court of the imperial chamber (Reichskammergericht). It had not only concurrent jurisdiction with the latter court, but in many cases exclusive jurisdiction, in all feudal processes, and in criminal affairs, over the immediate feudatories of the Emperor and in affairs which concerned the imperial Government.

When Napoleon I's gains after the Battle of Austerlitz culminated in the end of the Holy Roman Empire (most of the territory was transferred to a french-dominated German Confederation, under the French Emperor, which disappeared after Bonaparte's total defeat in 1814), it became a war council for the Austrian Empire.