Albert VI, Archduke of Austria

Who was Albert VI, Archduke of Austria?

Albert VI, also known as the Prodigal, from the House of Habsburg was, with his elder brother Emperor Frederick III, an Archduke of Inner Austria from 1424 and of Austria from 1457 until his death. According to tradition, Albert was the exact opposite of Frederick, energetic and inclined to thoughtlessness.

Albert was born in Vienna, the son of Archduke Ernest the Iron of Inner Austria and his wife Cymburgis of Masovia. After the death of their father in 1424 he and his brother remained under the tutelage of their uncle Duke Frederick IV of the Empty Pockets, who ruled over Further Austria and the County of Tyrol.

Coming of age in 1436 Albert, though a junior heir of Inner Austria, received no full rulership anywhere for a long time, which caused friction in his relations with his elder brother Frederick. When in 1439 both Duke Frederick IV of Further Austria and King Albert II of Germany, Duke of Austria died, Archduke Frederick assumed the guardianship over their minor sons Sigismund and Ladislaus the Posthumous. As Habsburg patriarch, heir of Inner Austria and regent of Further Austria, Tyrol and the Austria proper, he then ruled over all the dynasty's hereditary lands.