Slovenian literary history discussed Austrian censorship in Carniola during the Pre-March Era mainly through the conflict between the Romantic poet Prešeren and backward secular and church authorities. This article changes the perspective by examining the paradox of censor as an instrument of imperial thought control and a trained expert resembling the literary critic. In the period of Metternich’s absolutist policing, censorship was inadvertently individualized. How censors relied on their aesthetic judgement, prestige, and strategies is shown by the treat-ment of the almanac Krajnska čbelica by Kopitar and Čop in the 1830s. During the “Slovenian alphabet war,” Kopitar’s Herderianism collided with the Romantic cosmopolitanism of Prešeren and Čop, who advocated the impor-tance of aesthetic autonomy for the national movement. O avstrijski cenzuri na Kranjskem v predmarčni dobi je slovenska literarna zgodovina pogosto razpravljala prek konflikta med romantičnim pesnikom Prešernom in zaostalimi posvetnimi in cerkvenimi oblastmi. Pričujoči članek spreminja perspektivo in poudari paradoks cenzorja kot instrumenta imperialne kontrole uma in usposobljenega strokovnjaka, podobnega literarnemu kritiku. V obdobju Metternichovega (policijskega) absolutizma je cenzura nenamerno postala individualizirana. Kako so se cenzorji oprli na svojo estetsko presojo, prestiž in strategije, dokazuje Kopitarjeva in Čopova obravnava alma-naha Krajnska čbelica. Med »slovensko abecedno vojno« 1833 se je Kopitarjevo herderjevstvo spopadlo s Prešernovim in Čopovim romantičnim kozmopolitizmom, ki je zagovarjal pomen estet-ske avtonomije za nacionalno gibanje.
