SECKAU, ABBEY OF

Benedictine, in the Diocese of Graz-Seckau, Styria, Austria, founded with Augustinian canons from salzburg cathedral in 1140; a double monastery until c. 1500. It came under an elected provost with the creation of the See of Seckau in 1218 by Abp. Eberhard II of Salzburg. In 1782 joseph ii suppressed it, but Benedictines from beuron resettled it in 1883. Abbot Ildefonse Schober (1887–1908) rebuilt church and abbey. Under Abbot L. Zeller, Seckau restored the abbey of St. Matthias

(Trier) in 1922. After 1926 Abbot Benedict Reetz established a secondary school (gymnasium) and printing press and made Seckau a center of the liturgical movement, notably by publishing the Seckau popular Breviary. The abbey was restored in 1945 after suppression in 1940. The Romanesque basilica (three naves, three apses, no transept, flat roof) was built in Saxon style (1143–64). The tomb of Archduke Charles II (c. 1600) is late Renaissance, and the huge monastery is 17th-century Renaissance. In 1963 H. Boeckl completed frescoes of the Apocalypse in the Angel Chapel, and a crucifixion group

was raised over the new main altar in 1964. Gold work is done in the abbey today. Seckau's MSS are in the University of Graz. Since 1932 the abbey has published Seckauer Hefte and Seckauer geschichtlichen Studien.

Bibliography: b. roth, Seckauer Apokalypse und ihre Deutung (Vienna 1961); Seckau: Geschichte und Kultur (Vienna 1964). v. redlich, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed. j. hofer and k. rahner, 10 v. (2d, new ed. Freiburg 1957–65) 9:560–561.

[v. redlich]