At probably the largest conference in the 500 th year since the death of the 'last knight', international experts shed light, from a wide range of perspectives, on his impact on politics and culture. Character, rifts and upheaval in a period of transition', which took place from 18 to 23 March 2019 in Innsbruck, Wels and Vienna.

Hollegger is one of the organizers of the conference 'Maximilian I (1459-1519). 'As a politician, Maximilian believed in progress and repeatedly instigated reforms', explains Manfred Hollegger from the Institute for Medieval Research of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (OeAW). After growing up in the world of the Middle Ages, he experienced the transition to modern times in his adult years.

An important component of his success was his modernity. Probably his most central legacy is that, through clever war policy and strategic marriages, he laid the foundation for the rise of the Habsburg dynasty to a world power. But not even an emperor can do everything. Only with one position, things did not go his way: 'your good father, Maximilian, future pope,' he once wrote in a letter to his daughter. Maximilian's career path was an impressive one: Duke of Burgundy from 1477, Roman-German King from 1486, ruler of the Habsburg Hereditary Lands from 1493 and Holy Roman Emperor from 1508 until his death on January 12 1519.

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