Mark an der Drau

The ' (German for "March on the (river) Drava") was a historical territory of the Holy Roman Empire and its predecessors during the Middle Ages. It came into being during the second half of the 10th century, covering an area from the eastern border of the Carolingian Carantanian ' of (that is, the Drava valley between the mouth of the Vellach and Schwabegg) to Pettau (modern Ptuj) in the territory of Friedau (Ormož). After 1147 it was attached to the ' forming the March of Styria/Carantania, which later gave rise to the Duchy of Styria. Other designations for the territory include ' ('March of Pettau'), ' ('March beyond the Drava forest'), ' ('County beyond the Drava forest'), ', ', and ' ('lower Carantanian March').

Geography

The territory of the march corresponded to that of the Gau of Zistanesfeld, which straddled the river ' (Drava), south of where the Mur approaches it.

The Carinthian County of Jaun (also Jaune, Jaunetal) probably had its eastern border check-point in Hohenmauthen ( Muta), beyond which, down the Drava, began the dense Drava forest, which only thinned out again when it reached Marburg (modern Maribor, which first appeared after 1147). In Feistritz (Bistrica pri Rušah, approx. 10 km west of Maribor and which as of 1992 forms part of Bistrica ob Dravi) lay an internal border customs point which is attested from 1093, where it is named as a customs point of the "March of Pettau", an alternative name for the march which is derived from its central settlement Pettau (modern Ptuj).

The course of the ' ( sl, Velka Črmenica) ditches were accepted as the border within the Drava forest itself. The territories west of this line — Mahrenberg (Radlje ob Dravi), Hohenmauthen (Muta), Saldenhofen (Vuzenica) and Windischgraz (Slovenj Gradec) — still belonged in the narrow sense to the Duchy of Carinthia (from 976). In the north the march extended as far as the crest of the Kozjak Mountains, in the east to the river Mur and in the south to the Sann- Drann-watershed. The eastern border with the Kingdom of Hungary was poorly defined; the lordship of Ankenstein (Borl) was an autonomous territory (Allod) until the reign of Maximilian I; Polstrau (Središče ob Dravi) on the other hand was a Hungarian fief of the Archbishopric of Salzburg until 1803. (Ebner)

History

Formation

Following the German victory at the Battle of Lechfeld in 955 the Hungarian threat was lifted for the time being, and in the subsequent years (970–980) the Holy Roman Empire was secured through the establishment of a wide belt of border marches against south-eastern threats. These included the March of Austria (contemporarily ' in Latin or ' in Old High German), the ' (the Carantanian march, later the March of Styria), the ', the ' (which at that time extended far to the south over the Sava river and encompassed the Windic March), and the Marches of Carniola and Istria. The marches of Verona and Friuli had already been integrated into what would become the northern half of the empire by 952.

A count (') named Rachwin was mentioned in 980, in whose ' (county) a man named Willihalm (father of the later Margrave Wilhelm von der Sann) was granted the later lordship of Weitenstein (Vitanje) by Kaiser Otto II.

In 985 due to the intervention of Duke Henry of Carinthia, Otto III gave count Rachwin 15 ' (a unit of land equivalent to the Scottish and English Oxgang) in Rosswein ( Razvanje, south of Maribor). This is probably the same count Rachwin who was named in 980.

Until about 1005 the territory of Aribo, ' (Margrave in the Jaun valley) was administeredAribo, Markgraf im Jaunetal
be
„Genealogie Mittelalter“
/ref> by a brother of bishop Albuin of Brixen and member of the Aribonids, and who held large amounts of lucrative property in Bavaria, Salzburg, Carinthia and Styria (namely around Leoben and Straßgang), as well as in the Drava and Sann (Savinja) marches.

Church Organisation

In the 12th century several parishes in the area around the Patriarchate of Aquileia (south of the Drava, mostly in modern northern Italy) and the Archbishopric of Salzburg (north of the Drava) – "mother parishes" with vicariates and proprietary church