Meinhard II was the son of Count Meinhard III of Gorizia and his wife Adelheid, daughter and heiress of Count Albert IV of Tyrol. His father had acquired the County of Tyrol upon the death of his father-in-law in 1253 and already had attempted to gain control over neighbouring Carinthian lands against the forces of Duke Bernhard von Spanheim. However, he was defeated near Greifenburg and had to leave his minor sons Meinhard II and Albert held in hostage by Duke Bernhard's son, Archbishop-elect Philip of Salzburg. After their father's death in 1258, Meinhard II and his brother emerged from the Salzburg custody at Hohenwerfen Castle to secure their Gorizia-Tyrol heritage. In 1259 Meinhard married Elisabeth of Wittelsbach, the widow of the Hohenstaufen king Conrad IV of Germany, about ten years his senior. The joint rule with Albert came to an end, when the inheritance rights to Gorizia and Tyrol were divided in 1271. Meinhard received the County of Tyrol, becoming the progenitor of the Gorizia-Tyrol line of the Meinhardiner dynasty. He and his wife Elisabeth founded Stams Abbey as a proprietary monastery in 1273. The count struggled to acquire the lordship over the Prince-Bishoprics of Trento and Brixen, extended his Tyrolean lands down the Adige River to Salorno, and also acquired several territories in the Inn valley including the important salt mines around Hall. He turned out to be a capable ruler, and therefore is known as the creator of Tyrol as an autonomous Imperial State. Meinhard also had roads built and coins minted, especially the silver coinZwainziger. The type was copied elsewhere in Europe and became widely known as Groschen. Already in 1267 Count Meinhard had once again tried to strengthen the ties with the Hohenstaufen dynasty by accompanying his stepson Conradin of Swabia on his campaign to Italy. However, after Conradin's defeat at the Battle of Tagliacozzo and his execution in 1268, he had to seek new allies. He became a close associate of Count Rudolf of Habsburg, who was elected King of the Romans in 1273 and stuck in a fierce conflict with the mighty king Ottokar II of Bohemia around several "alienated" Imperial territories, which Ottokar had acquired during the preceding interregnum. In 1276 Meinhard married his daughter Elisabeth off to Rudolf's eldest son Albert. Meinhard backed Rudolf's campaign against Ottokar and in turn received Carinthia with the Carniolan march as a pledge in 1276. After Ottokar's defeat in the 1278 Battle on the Marchfeld, King Rudolf formally elevated Meinhard to a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire and finally vested him with the Duchy of Carinthia as a fief at the Imperial Diet of Augsburg in 1286. On September 1, Meinhard was enthroned at the Duke's Chair and thus became the first Carinthian duke of the Gorizia-Tyrol dynasty. In 1286–9 Meinhard issued a vernacular Tyrolean Landrecht, albeit only fragmentarily transmitted upon today. As far as can be ascertained, he had no ancestry in earlier Carinthian ducal families, whereas he was a distant descendant of some early Meranian lords of Istria and Carniola. His investiture of the duchy included a provision that in extinction of his male line, the House of Habsburg would be its heir. This materialized in 1335 upon the death of his son Henry. The Habsburgs also acquired the County of Tyrol from Henry's daughter Margaret in 1363. Meinhard died in 1295 at Greifenburg in Carinthia. His younger son Henry succeeded him as Carinthian duke and in 1307 was even elected King of Bohemia; his eldest daughter Elisabeth by her marriage with Albert of Habsburg became German queen in 1298.
