A short case study of two German knights von Königsegg

Abstract

This article is a short case study of two members of two lineages of the von Königsegg family. They were uncle and nephew, and, although two generations apart, they served in Malta. Graf Franz Anton Ignaz von Königsegg-Rothenfels (1672-1744), occupied high offices in the Order and reached the age of 72. Joseph Anton von Königsegg-Aulendorf (1728-1754), served on a galley of the Order and as a soldier on mainland Europe. He died very young, at the age of 25.

Having sons in the Order was very relevant to the social and political context of the self-image of the Roman Catholic German nobility, confirming the prestige of the Order as a status magnet for Europe’s nobility. There might have been also an element of inter-German competition going on, as was the case with the other langues. The presence of one’s coat of arms somewhere in or on a building or edifice in Malta, a name connected to the building of a fortification, galley or church or the presence of the name of a noble family at St John’s Co-Cathedral had become an objective on its own.