Janko Drašković (Hungarian: Draskovich János; 20 October 1770 – 14 January 1856) was a Croatian politician who is associated with the beginnings of the Illyrian movement, a 19th-century national revival.

Drašković advocated for the protection of Croatian interests against the threats of Germanisation and Magyarisation in the Habsburg monarchy, and subsequently in the Austrian Empire, Drašković preferred gradual political reforms; he became a leading figure in the Croatian national revival following the 1832 publication of the Dissertation, a manifesto outlining the main political, cultural, economic, social development and cohesion problems in Croatia.

The institution, which was initially named Matica ilirska, was established to promote literacy and knowledge in Croatia – in the national language – to improve the economic circumstances of the country and its people.

[1] Four other members of the family were viceroys, holding the title of Ban of Croatia,[1] and Ivan III Drašković was also royal lieutenant in Hungary as Palatine.

[5] According to custom, issues of common interest were regulated through consensus in the Diet's Upper House, and the Sabor often rejected claims by Hungarian governmental bodies to interfere in state administration in Croatia.

The transfer of power was intended to be temporary, until Croatia regained territories previously lost to the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire.

Janko's early education consisted of tutoring at the family's estates at Brezovica and Rečica in Croatia, and at Csíkszereda in Transylvania (now Miercurea Ciuc, Romania).

He rejoined the military, fighting in anti-Napoleonic volunteer units in 1802, 1805 (in the Dalmatian theatre of the War of the Third Coalition), and 1809–1811, ultimately becoming a Colonel and thus matching his father's rank.

Drašković, and the two Croatian delegates to the Lower House of the Hungarian Diet, Herman Bužan and Antun Kukuljević Sakcinski, were tasked with representing Croatia's views on several issues, especially with emphasizing the temporary nature of the 1790 decision on the Lieutenancy Council, and advocating the union of the Habsburg realm of Dalmatia, the Croatian Military Frontier and the Free City of Rijeka with Croatia.

[12] In response to the policies aimed at centralisation of the Lands of the Crown of Saint Stephen and Magyarisation of Croatia, the Croatian national movement emerged among nobility and the more wealthy bourgeoisie in the first half of the 19th century.

[25] Dissertation, which was printed in Karlovac by Joan Nepomuk Prettner,[26] was written in the Shtokavian dialect—the most-widely used dialect that was promoted by Gaj—[23] as an instruction to future Croatian delegates to the Hungarian Diet.

[27] He called for a restoration of the authority of the Ban of Croatia, the establishment of an independent government without breaking of constitutional bonds with Hungary, use of the national language as the official language in the lands which would—apart from the Triune Kingdom of Croatia—encompass the demilitarised Military Frontier and later Bosnia and the Slovene Lands bordering Croatia, proposing the territory be called the "Great Illyria" or "Illyric Kingdom".

Drašković assumed the imperial authorities in Vienna would support the plan[17] because Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor, had established the Kingdom of Illyria in parts of the Slovene Lands, Istria and Croatia after the French had left the Illyrian Provinces.

[27][c] The Sabor accepted Drašković's ideas but they were not universally popular among Croats, and were criticised as feudal and Austro-Slavism incapable of achieving trialism in the monarchy.

[17] Croatian nobility and clergy supported the national movement as a means to frustrate Hungarian plans to abolish feudal institutions and grant Protestantism in Croatia status equal to that of Roman Catholicism.

[17] In 1838, Drašković published Ein Wort an Illyriens hochherzige Töchter, a manifesto aimed at curbing the spread of Germanisation among women of Croatian nobility and attracting them to the Illyrian movement.

[30] In the same year, three Illyrian reading rooms (Ilirska čitaonica) were founded – largely due to Drašković's efforts – in Varaždin, Karlovac, and Zagreb.

[31] In his speech at the founding of Matica ilirska, Drašković stated its main purpose was the spreading of science and literacy in the national language, providing youth opportunities for education.

He said Yugoslavist ideas were the basis of the Dissertation with the leading role in the unification intended for Croatia as the South Slavic land with the greatest degree of political rights left intact.

In Communist-ruled Yugoslavia, this view was again reversed by literary historians such as Krešimir Georgijević [hr], who ascribed Drašković a ceremonial role in the Illyrian movement as a member of the feudal class and saw the Dissertation as a feudal manifesto – a view that was congruent with that of the state authorities that Drašković, as any nobility, could at best be portrayed as sympathetic to the French Revolution.

[34] The Croatian State Archives is preserving in its collection works created through Drašković's public activities,[35] as well as a portion of his private and official correspondence.