Maria Catterina Zanini’s Tombstone in the Cloister of the Franciscan Monastery in Graz Anonymous, n. y.

How the Italian Came to Graz

This tombstone of Maria Catterina Zanini is located in the cloister of the Franciscan Monastery in Graz. In the course of Counterreformation, the court of Graz encouraged people from the Romanic Roman-Catholic part of Inner Austria to move to Graz. Aristocrats, court officials, builders, artists and merchants such as the Zanini family not only brought strictly Catholic views to Graz but also Mediterranean customs and Renaissance as an artistic style. In the beginning of the 18th century, they built their own place of worship, the “Welsche Kirche” on Gries Square.