Herzogseinsetzung

Ducal Coronation (Carinthia): These ceremonies, unique in legal history, held on the installation of a new duke in Carinthia started at the Fürstenstein, an antique column fragment in the Carolingian palatinate Karnburg. The first detailed description of the ceremonies was made by Johann von Viktring on the occasion of the installation ceremony of Count Meinhard II of the Tirol 1286 as Duke of Carinthia. It tells of the new duke being asked questions by the Herzogbauer (a rural freeholder) in Slavic language as to who he was, whether he was going to be a fair judge and whether he was a believer and defender of the Christian faith. On the Herzogstuhl at the Zollfeld Plain the oath was taken, rights and freedoms were confirmed, feudal tenure was confirmed or newly invested and the actual act of paying homage to the new Carinthian duke took place. The first documented installation was that of Duke Hermann of the Sponheim dynasty 1161. Numerous Carinthian dukes underwent this act on the "Herzogstuhl": the installation ceremony with the act of paying tribute on the "Herzogstuhl" of Meinhard von Tirol (1286), the Habsburgs Otto (1335), Albrecht (1342), Rudolf IV (1360) and Ernst von Inner-Österreich (1414) have been documented. The ceremony for Duke Ernst in 1414 was of particular importance: he was the last Habsburg to undergo this complex ceremony in its historically binding sequence - the rural-democratic custom on the Fürstenstein in Karnburg, the festive high mass in the church of Maria Saal and finally the feoffment and tribute act at the Herzogstuhl on the Zollfeld. Others who received personal homage on the "Herzogstuhl" were the Archdukes Karl (1564) and Ferdinand (1597). The last to undergo these ceremonies were Ferdinand III in 1631 and Ferdinand IV in 1651, though not in person but through authorized representatives. After that the ritual installations were no longer held at the "Herzogstuhl" on the Zollfeld, but in the Landhaus in Klagenfurt. The installation that ended this tradition was that of the Emperor Karl VI, the last Habsburg to be paid homage to in the Großer Wappensaal coat-of-arms hall of the Landhaus in Klagenfurt by the provincial diets in 1728.