Spittal an der Drau (German Spittal an der Drau, Slovenian Špital
ob Dravi) is an ancient city in Austria, in the west of the federal
state of Carinthia. The city is located on the banks of the Drava
River at the confluence of the small river Steyr.
In 1191,
Otto II, Count of Ortenburg, together with his brother Hermann,
founded a hospital (Hospital, Spittl) and a church in the upper
reaches of the Drava. Later, a small town grew up around the city,
which, after the end of the Ortenburg dynasty, came under the rule
of the counts of Celje.
In 1457, Spittal received city
rights. At the same time, it was annexed to the Austrian possessions
of the Habsburgs. In 1524, Emperor Ferdinand I granted the city to
one of his Spanish confidants, Gabriel Salamanca, along with the
title of Count of Ortenburg. Salamanca built in Spittal one of the
most beautiful Renaissance palaces in Austria - the Porzia Palace.
Spittal an der Drau lies between the Lurnfeld and the Lower Drautal. The Lieser flows through the city from north to south and then flows into the Drava. Also south of Spittal is the Spittaler's "local mountain", the Goldeck. The municipality of Spittal extends partly over the south bank of the Millstätter See.
In 1191, Count Otto II von Ortenburg and his brother, the
archdeacon Hermann von Ortenburg, founded a hospital (Spittl) with a
chapel on the Lieserufer near today's parish church, which the
Salzburg Archbishop Adalbert confirmed in a document on April 11,
1191. The hospital, which gives the place its name, was intended for
the care of pilgrims who traveled south over the Katschberg and the
Radstädter Tauern. The emerging settlement on the right bank of the
Lieser was protected by a tower castle belonging to the
Ortenburgers, which probably stood on the site of today's castle.
In 1242 Spittal an der Drau was elevated to a market, the
convenient location at the confluence of Möll and Lieser in the Drau
as well as the toll and rafting rights on the Drau caused an initial
economic boom. In 1324 the market is mentioned as the seat of a
judge. In 1403 Spittal was given the right to hold four annual
markets lasting several days and one weekly market. In 1408 they got
the exclusive rights for the Drava rafting and iron transport from
the nearby Krems near Gmünd. The people of Gmünd had to have the
iron transported by the Spittalers and declare customs here. After
the Ortenburgers died out in 1418, rule over the Counts of Cilli
came to the rulers, the Habsburgs. Friedrich III. could assert the
county against claims of the Counts of Gorizia. In 1457 Spittal was
given the right to elect judges and councils itself. In 1478 the
market was destroyed by the Turks invading Carinthia, in the
following decades feuds, peasant revolts and the war with the
Hungarians under Matthias Corvinus, which resulted in years of
occupation of the entire region, brought prosperity; In 1522 the
market finally burned down completely. The hospital was then rebuilt
on the eastern bank of the Lieser and now houses the Carinthia
University of Applied Sciences.
In 1524 Gabriel von Salamanca
received the county of Ortenburg, a Spaniard and favorite of
Ferdinand I. From 1533 onwards he had the Porcia Castle built in the
Renaissance style. His descendants named themselves after the county
of Ortenburger. The area was largely Protestant when, in the course
of the Counter Reformation in 1600, an armed commission under the
governor, Count Johann von Ortenburg, tried to force the population
to re-enter the Catholic Church under threat of banishment and
expropriation.
In 1662, the French-born Princes Porcia became
landlords and lords of the castle. In the 18th century there was a
second economic boom as a result of the emerging iron industry and
the associated trade and commerce. This heyday ended in 1797 when
the market burned down in the course of the French Wars. In 1809
there were again fighting with Napoleon's troops near Spittal, all
of Upper Carinthia and East Tyrol then fell to France through the
Peace of Schönbrunn, and Spittal was assigned to the Carinthie
department in the French province of Illyria. After the end of the
coalition wars, this status was terminated in 1814. In 1829 the
market burned down again. In 1871 the train connection to the
southern railway came.
After the formation of the communities
in the Austrian Empire in 1849/50, Markt Spittal grew into a large
community in 1865 through the incorporation of the six local
communities Baldramsdorf, Molzbichl, Edling, Lendorf, Lieserhofen
and Amlach, but shrank back to almost its original size in 1886/87.
Since then, only St. Peter-Edling (1964) and Molzbichl (1973) have
been incorporated again, and parts of the Millstatt and Ferndorf
area were connected in 1973, whereby Spittal acquired a portion of
the Millstätter See south bank.
In autumn 1919, during the
Carinthian defensive battle, Porcia Castle was the seat of the
Carinthian provincial government for some time. In memory of this,
Spittal an der Drau was promoted to town on the occasion of the 10th
anniversary of the Carinthian referendum in 1930.
In the time
of National Socialism, Spittal an der Drau was next to Wolfsberg and
the Loiblpass one of the locations of a prisoner of war camp in
Carinthia. Two grave fields called “Russian cemeteries” with the
remains of around 6000 prisoners of war and forced laborers who died
under the inhuman camp conditions are a reminder of this time. The
station was bombed in 1944, and craters from misdirected projectiles
can still be found in the forest in the Fratres district.
After the end of the Second World War, the city was occupied by the
British and ruled from Graz.