sentences:  During the 12th century the region became a territory of the church-state of Salzburg, and remained so for more than 400 years.The Khuenburg family, a significant branch of Salzburg nobility, owned large swaths of territory until the late 19th century.War and natural disasters that affected the eastern and southern parts of today's Austria hardly ever spared the Sulm valley, with the probable exception of migratory locusts of which there is no local record, even during times when other parts of Styria suffered severely.