Abstract A map of epicenter locations of the Eastern European Alpine system was compiled and, together with focal solutions and geologic data for recent deformation, was used to relate recent seismicity to a regional tectonic system. The seismicity data show a scattered distribution for most of the Carpathian-Pannonian region but, along the western edge of the Pannonian basin and in the Eastern Alps and Dinarides, several distinct seismic zones can be recognized. A linear zone of seismic activity in the Eastern Alps (Mur-Murz-line) strikes northeast into the southern Vienna basin. Focal mechanisms indicate left-slip along this zone, and the southern Vienna basin may be extending east-west as a pull-apart basin. To the southwest, this transform-like fault zone and its associated seismicity end abruptly in two north-south trending grabens that exhibit east-west extension (Lavant and Metnitz Valleys), lb the south, these grabens end in Yugoslavia in a dextral strike-slip fault system that trends southeast along the strike of the Dinaric Alps. A left-stepping offset between two dextral fault segments in this system results in roughly north-south crustal shortening and uplift near the ends of the two fault segments (Medvednica zone).