professional training; textile production; second half of the 19th and early 20th century; state and non-state officials; students of textile schools; Cisleithanian part of the Habsburg Monarchy, Austrian Silesia

This study deals with the issue of the changes in the professional training of those who participated in textile production during the industrialisation process in the second half of the 19th and early 20th century, when the mechanised factory mass production overshadowed the traditional forms of production and final treatment of textiles based on handiwork. It introduces the newly forming education possibilities, the birth of the system of textile education, the attitude of both the state and non-state officials and, last but not least, also the students of textile schools. In the first part of the study we will present the general tendencies based on knowledge from the Cisleithanian part of the Habsburg Monarchy, while the second part presents a more detailed insight into textile education on the territory of the so-called Austrian Silesia from the mid-19th century until the First World War.