Arms of Skanderbeg - The Long Journey of The Weapons

The Long Journey of The Weapons

The helmet and swords have a dark and confusing history. After the death of Skanderbeg, they were taken to Italy by Skanderbeg’s wife Donika and his son Gjoni. Who inherited them after their death is unknown. The weapons reappeared in the last decade of the 16th century. By 1590 the helmet and one sword were under the ownership of Count Eolfang of Sturnbeng while the other sword lay in the inventory of the Arms Museum of the Archduke Karl of Styria, son of the German Holy Roman Emperor in Gratz, Austria (they appear in the inventory of 30 October 1590). The person who brought the weapons together was the son of the Emperor and brother of Karl, archduke Ferdinand of Tyrol, who, acting under the advice of his Chancellor Jacob Schrenk von Gotzing, bought the weapons and brought them under the same roof. Later, this prince erected the Museum of Ambras, near Tyrol, which he filled with all sorts of war-related material, as well as paintings and portraits of celebrities of that age. In 1806 the weapons were transferred to the Imperial Museum in Vienna, still apart from each other. The helmet and the straight sword were placed in the Maximilian Hall (hall XXV, no. 71 & 92 respectively), whereas the curved sword found its way to the Karl V Hall (hall XXVII, no. 345). The weapons were separated by the curators of the museum, who were uncertain whether or not the swords indeed belonged to Skanderbeg. After the Second World War, the doubts evaporated. On the eve of Skanderbeg’s 500th anniversary, the arms were reunited, not only in the same hall, but in the same display window of the Neue Berg Collection of Arms and Armour in Vienna.