Johann Beckenschlager

Bishop's coat of arms from the Salzburg Missal by Berthold Furtmeyr (BSB Clm 15708)

The entrance hall to his living quarters at the Hohensalzburg Fortress, built by Johann Beckenschlager around 1485

Entrance with the coat of arms of Beckenschlager to his living quarters at the Hohensalzburg Fortress

Johann Beckenschlager , also Johann Beckensloer , Johann Pfluger or Johann Peckensloer , (* around 1428 in Breslau ; † December 15, 1489 in Salzburg ) was Archbishop of Gran and as Johann III. Archbishop of Salzburg .

Life

Johann Beckenschlager comes from the Beckenloer patrician family from Breslau, his father Marcus had become rich as a cloth merchant and was raised to the Bohemian nobility in 1430. The exact date of birth of Johann is not known; from later reports one has concluded that it was around the year 1428. He was certainly born before 1435.

Johann went to Hungary in the mid-1440s and soon came into contact with the royal court and the humanist and bishop Johann Vitez who worked there, who presumably promoted him. In 1459 Johann Beckenschlager is presumed to be at the University of Ferrara and it can be assumed that he too became familiar with the ideals and practices of Renaissance humanism at an early stage , which later played such an important role in diplomacy and self-expression at the court of the new Hungarian King Matthias Corvinus should play. At the same time, Beckenschlager was also active in military operations.

The Hungarian King Corvinus appointed Beckenschlager for services rendered in 1462 as provost of Fünfkirchen and on May 17, 1465 as Bishop of Großwardein . In 1468 he became Bishop of Eger and in 1473 as successor to Johannes Vitéz Archbishop of Gran ( Esztergom in Hungarian ) and Primate of Hungary .

Because Beckenschlager lost the favor of the Hungarian king more and more, he left Hungary on February 13, 1476 and joined the emperor Friedrich III. whose advisor and financier he became. Beckenschlager was from March 22, 1477 coadjutor for the seriously ill Bishop of Vienna, Leo von Spaur , and from 1480 also administrator of the diocese of Vienna . But he renounced this office when he took office in Salzburg.

Beckenschlager was initially elected administrator of the Salzburg Erzstuhl on November 29, 1481, he received the imperial regalia on December 13, and on January 14, 1482 he received homage from the estates. In 1487, after Rohr's death, Beckenschlager was also able to nominally assume the office of archbishop. He died in Salzburg in 1489.

For most of his reign, Johann Beckenschlager was a diplomat from Emperor Friedrich III. active abroad. As early as 1483, the emperor had appointed the archbishop governor of Styria . He stayed in the Netherlands in 1481 and the winter months of 1483/84 . On June 21, 1486, the emperor appointed him governor of Austria (Upper and Lower Austria), Styria, Carinthia , Carniola , Istria and the Karst. Since May 1486 he was responsible for the recruitment of imperial mercenaries in the war against the Hungarian king Matthias Corvinus .

During his long absences, the regency in Salzburg was essentially taken over by the Salzburg court chancellor, Bishop Georg Altdorfer von Chiemsee. The archbishop, who was already sick, spent the last year of his life at the Hohensalzburg Fortress , which he had purposefully expanded. Above all, he expanded the Hohen Stock here as a princely residence and built bulk boxes (temporarily used as living space) and a workhouse. Beckenschlager also sponsored the extensive work on the multi-volume Salzburg Missal (now Munich) by the Regensburg miniature painter Berthold Furtmeyr .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Gottschalk 1969, p. 103.
2. ↑ Gottschalk 1969, p. 103.

literature

• Moritz Csáky: Johann Beckensloer . In: Matthias Corvinus and the Renaissance in Hungary 1458–1541. Schallaburg '82. Vienna 1982, pp. 271-273.
• Rudolf Leeb among other things: History of Christianity in Austria. From antiquity to the present . Uebereuter, Vienna 2003, ISBN 3-8000-3914-1
• Franz Loidl : History of the Archdiocese of Vienna. Herold, Vienna et al. 1983, ISBN 3-7008-0223-4 .
• Friederike Zaisberger:  Johann III. Basin hit. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 10, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1974, ISBN 3-428-00191-5 , p. 533 ( digitized version ).
• Joseph Gottschalk: Johannes Beckensloer from Breslau († 1489), Archbishop of Gran and Salzburg , in: Archive for Silesian Church History 27 (1969), pp. 98–129.
• Friederike Zaisberger: Bernhard von Rohr and Johann Beckenschlager, Archbishop von Gran, two Salzburg church princes in the second half of the 15th century. Phil. Diss. (Mach.) Vienna 1963.
• Leopold Spatzenegger: Testament Johannes III. Peckenschlager, Archbishop of Salzburg 1482 - 1489 . In: Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Salzburger Landeskunde 7 (1867), pp. 23, 353 - 357.

Web links

Commons : Johann Beckenschlager  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Entry on Johann Beckenschlager on catholic-hierarchy.org

predecessor	Office	successor
Johann Vitez	Bishop of Großwardein 1465–1468	Nikolaus Stolcz de Slantz
Ascanio Sforza	Bishop of Eger 1468–1489	Gábor Rangoni
Johann Vitez	Archbishop of Gran 1473–1487	Ippolito I. d'Este
Leo von Spaur	Administrator of Vienna 1480–1482	Bernhard von Rohr
Bernhard von Rohr	Archbishop of Salzburg 1482–1489	Friedrich V. von Schaunberg