Friedrich Karl, Graf von Schönborn

Friedrich Karl, Graf (count) von Schönborn (born March 3, 1674, Mainz, Ger.—died July 27, 1746, Würzburg) was a prince-prelate, bishop of Bamberg and Würzburg (1729–46). His long reign as vice chancellor of the Holy Roman Empire (1705–34) raised the imperial chancery for the last time to a position of European importance.

After studies at Mainz, Aschaffenburg, and Rome, Schönborn completed his education at the University of Paris. Through the offices of his uncle Lothar Franz von Schönborn, bishop of Bamberg and Mainz, he secured a diplomatic appointment at Vienna (1703) and two years later the vice chancellorship of the Holy Roman Empire. He supported the interests of the small German princes—especially the ecclesiastical states—and successfully opposed the attempted intrusions of Prussia into southern Germany. He sided with the emperor Joseph I in his struggles with the papal Curia, and his own church politics tended to follow a policy of administrative independence from papal control. Acceding to the bishoprics of Bamberg and Würzburg in 1729, he devoted his moderately autocratic rule to the administrative, financial, and educational reorganization of his two jurisdictions. In 1735 he raised the academy at Bamberg to university status and in 1743 revised the university regulations at Würzburg. He remained an unwavering supporter of the house of Austria.