From 1273 Albert ruled as a
landgrave over his father's
Swabian (
Further Austrian) possessions in
Alsace. In 1282 his father, the first German monarch from the
House of Habsburg, invested him and his younger brother
Rudolf II with the duchies of
Austria and
Styria, which he had seized from late King
Ottokar II of Bohemia and defended in the 1278
Battle on the Marchfeld. By the 1283
Treaty of Rheinfelden his father entrusted Albert with their sole government, while Rudolf II ought to be compensated by the Further Austrian Habsburg home territories – which, however, never happened until his death in 1290. Albert and his Swabian appear to have ruled the Austrian and Styrian duchies with conspicuous success, overcoming the resistance by local nobles. King Rudolf I was unable to secure the succession to the German throne for his son, especially due to the objections raised by Ottokar's son King
Wenceslaus II of Bohemia, and the plans to install Albert as successor of the assassinated King
Ladislaus IV of Hungary in 1290 also failed. Upon Rudolf's death in 1291, the
Prince-electors, fearing Albert's power and the implementation of a
hereditary monarchy, chose Count
Adolf of Nassau-Weilburg as
King of the Romans. An uprising among his Styrian dependents compelled Albert to recognize the sovereignty of his rival and to confine himself for a time to the government of the Habsburg lands at
Vienna. He did not abandon his hopes of the throne, however, which were eventually realised: In 1298, he was chosen German king by some of the princes, who were bothered about Adolf's attempts to gain his own power bases in the lands of
Thuringia and
Meissen, again led by the Bohemian king Wenceslaus II. The armies of the rival kings met at the
Battle of Göllheim near
Worms, where Adolf was defeated and slain. Submitting to a new election but securing the support of several influential princes by making extensive promises, he was chosen at the
Imperial City of
Frankfurt on 27 July 1298, and crowned at
Aachen Cathedral on 24 August. Although a hard, stern man, Albert had a keen sense of justice when his own interests were not involved, and few of the German kings possessed so practical an intelligence. He encouraged the cities, and not content with issuing proclamations against private war, formed alliances with the princes in order to enforce his decrees. The serfs, whose wrongs seldom attracted notice in an age indifferent to the claims of common humanity, found a friend in this severe monarch, and he protected even the despised and persecuted Jews. Stories of his cruelty and oppression in the
Swiss cantons (cf.
William Tell) did not appear until the 16th century, and are now regarded as legendary. Albert sought to play an important part in European affairs. He seemed at first inclined to press a quarrel with the
Kingdom of France over the
Burgundian frontier, but the refusal of
Pope Boniface VIII to recognize his election led him to change his policy, and, in 1299, he made a treaty with King
Philip IV, by which his son Rudolph was to marry Blanche, the King's half-sister. He afterwards became estranged from Philip, but in 1303, Boniface recognized him as German king and future emperor; in return, Albert recognized the authority of the pope alone to bestow the
Imperial crown, and promised that none of his sons should be elected German king without papal consent. Albert had failed in his attempt to seize the counties of
Holland and
Zeeland, as vacant fiefs of the
Holy Roman Empire, on the death of Count
John I in 1299, but in 1306 he secured the crown of
Bohemia for his son
Rudolph III on the death of King
Wenceslaus III. He also renewed the claim made by his predecessor, Adolf, on Thuringia, and interfered in a quarrel over the succession to the
Hungarian throne. The Thuringian attack ended in Albert's defeat at the
Battle of Lucka in 1307 and, in the same year, the death of his son Rudolph weakened his position in eastern Europe. His action in abolishing all tolls established on the
Rhine since 1250 led the Rhenish prince-archbishops and the
Elector of the Palatinate to form a league against him. Aided by the
Imperial cities, however, he soon crushed the rising. == Death ==