Lukas von Graben zum Stein
Lukas von Graben zum Stein (until 1500 Lukas von Graben) († 1550 at Stein Castle), lord of Stein, was a Carinthian-Gorizian nobleman and military leader of the Counts of Gorizia and the Habsburgs. He came from the Sommeregger line of Von Graben, whose members held important offices at the time of the last Counts of Gorizia, and through whose work the Renaissance culture also found its way into East Tyrol.

Biography

Family von Graben 
Lukas von Graben was born the son of the important nobleman Virgil von Graben of the Von Graben family and Dorothea Arnold, née Herbst von Herbstenburg. However, since this marriage was not legally binding, his children could not accept their father's inheritance. One of his cousins was Ladislaus Prager, Hereditary Marshal of the duchy of Carinthia and Chamberlain of Emperor Frederik III. According to Bucelin, Lukas von Graben was married to a daughter of Georg Hellssen, with whom he had three daughters and two sons, who inherited the Stein fief: 
 Margaretha von Graben zum Stein, married to Leopold Göstels von Mülbach (1542)
 N of Graben zum Stein, married N of Moors
 Catharina von Graben zum Stein, married Christoph Mühlsteuers in Flaschberg in 1540
 Hans von Graben zum Stein, the older († 1587–91), married to Anna Straufen and remarried in 1576 with Margarita Manndorfferin (von Manndorff), Lord of Stein
 Georg von Graben zum Stein (mentioned 1570; † 1595), Lord of Stein; married to Kunigunde (née Von Gendorf, widow Von Vasold) no descendants; Lord of Stein

Heritage 
Lukas von Graben was unable to take over his father's inheritance due to his father's illegal marriage. As a result, the von Graben family lost the important fief of Sommeregg. The inheritance passed to Lukas von Graben's cousin Rosina von Graben von Rain and to the barons von Rain zu Sommeregg. Lukas was enfeoffed by the emperor with Heinfels, the manor and castle Schwarzenegk (Schwarzenegg) on the Karst, Črni Vrh (Divača in Slovenia), and the manor and Stein Castle. In 1500 he was given the suffix Zum Stein by the later Emperor Maximilian I. Stein remained in the family until 1664.

Career

Controversy over the County of Gorizia 
When the last Count of Gorizia, Leonhard, was about to die at the end of the 15th century, the two neighboring states, the Austrian Habsburg monarchy and the Republic of Venice, began to fight the inheritance. In 1498 Lukas von Graben was given command of the gorizian Burghut, the defense of the capital and residential city of Gorizia and its surroundings, by his father Virgil von Graben, kaptein (governor) of the County of Gorizia. The Venetians tried to win over Lukas von Graben, but he refused, also because of his father's strict guidelines. The Venice Council of Ten offered to appoint Lukas von Graben as their supreme commander in Friuli. However, since Virgil von Graben ended the contract with Venice about the succession in the County of Gorizia and negotiated with Emperor Maximilian, this appointment was no longer made. Equipped with precise instructions from his father, Lukas von Graben intervened as commander of the Gorizia troops in the war with the Republic of Venice. But since his attempts also failed, Friuli and the city of Gorizia were handed over to the Venetian troops in 1500. A short time later Gorizia was won back by imperial troops for Maximilian of Austria. After the Gorizian inheritance in favor of the Habsburgs, the Venetians saw their failure solely in the actions of Messrs Virgil and Lukas von Graben. Lukas von Graben and his father were modestly rewarded in relation to their immense merits.

Imperial service 
In 1500, Emperor Maximilian gave his "loyal, dear" Lukas von Graben the dominion of Stein as a fief due to his "great services" in winning the County of Gorizia.

During the Venetian War of 1508, Von Graben zum Stein belonged to the Lienz War Chamber as Chief Provisioner (a sort of Purser) under the Supreme Commissioner Erich I of Brunswick-Lüneburg.

Lukas von Graben zum Stein was in the favor of Emperor Maximilian throughout his life, so he demanded on 25 October 1514, in his instruction to the Krainer councils and the commissaries of the Krain (Carniola) estates that, among other things, "Our faithful dear Lucas von Grabn zum Stain near Traberg servants from our county of Tyrol" to strengthen the defense against the Republic of Venice.

Notes

External links 
 Hermann Wiesflecker: Die Grafschaft Görz und die Herrschaft Lienz, ihre Entwicklung und ihr Erbfall an Österreich (1500)

1550 deaths
People from Spittal an der Drau District
Medieval Austrian knights
Year of birth unknown
15th-century Austrian people
16th-century Austrian people