Valvasor’s Contacts with Carinthia and His Survey of Its Land and People

Abstract

Apart from his native Carniola the polymath Johann Weichard von Valvasor (1641–1693) was most strongly tied to Carinthia. Three out of a total of nine volumes authored or published by him deal with it, the number matches that of books which address Carniola. The article discusses, fi rst and foremost, the circumstances of their compilation, which have been disregarded thus far. Valvasor’s survey of the neighbouring duchy to the north was less thorough and comprehensive than that of Carniola. Copper engravings of Carinthian landscape, which were to a great extent based on Valvasor’s own sketches, are his most important original contribution. The fi nancial support of the Carinthian Provincial Diet that he could have hoped for was considerably smaller than that of its Carniolan counterpart, whose fi nancial support of the Glory of the Duchy of Carniola (1689) was substantial. Meanwhile, Topographia Archiducatus Carinthiae antiquae et modernae completa (1688), Valvasor’s main work dedicated to Carinthia, appears to have been published without the Diet’s money. Valvasor’s most prominent Carinthian supporter and proponent was the historian Albert Reichart, abbot of the Benedictine monastery in Sankt Paul im Lavanttal.