Otto I. (Gurk)

Otto († July 30, 1214 in Strasbourg ) was Otto I's chosen bishop ( Elekt ) of Gurk .

Otto was a nephew of the former Gurk bishop Wernher . He was provost of St. Florian Monastery in Upper Austria and from 1212 also of Salzburg. After the death of Gurk Bishop Walther von Vatz, there was a one-year vacancy . New disputes between the Salzburg Archbishop and the Gurk Cathedral Chapter delayed the replacement. Since the final choice fell on the Salzburg cathedral provost Otto in 1214, the archbishop emerged victorious in a dispute that was already pending in Rome. Before Otto could receive his ordination, however, he died on July 30th of the same year, about two months after his election. According to legend, he was poisoned. Despite his short reign, Otto went down in the history of the diocese as the finisher of the Gurk Bishop's Chapel and thus the Gurk Cathedral . He was buried in Gurk Cathedral next to Bishop Wernher , the miter hovers over the chalice on his grave slab, as he only died as an elected, not an consecrated bishop. He was venerated as a saint by the people.

literature

• Jakob Obersteiner: The bishops of Gurk. 1072–1822 (= From Research and Art. 5, ISSN  0067-0642 ). Verlag des Geschichtsverein für Kärnten, Klagenfurt 1969, pp. 77–79.
• Erwin Gatz (ed.): The bishops of the Holy Roman Empire. 1198 to 1448. A biographical lexicon. Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-428-10303-3 .