Helene Kottannerin

Helene Kottanner (née Wolfram; Hungarian: Kottaner Ilona; c. 1400 – after 1470) was a Hungarian courtier and writer. Her last name is spelled variously as Kottanner, Kottanerin, or Kottannerin. She is primarily known to history as the author of memoirs about the years 1439 and 1440, when king Albert II of Germany died and his son Ladislaus the Posthumous was born. Kottanner, who dictated her life story in German, was a kammerfrau to Queen Elizabeth of Luxembourg (1409–1442). She also assisted Queen Elisabeth in a royal succession plot.

Helene was born in a burghlar family from the region of Sopron County.

Helene married twice and bore two children. Her first husband was Peter Szekeres, judge of Sopron, who died in 1431. She then married Johann Kottanner, a burghlar from Vienna. By 1436, both Helene and her second husband were servants of Albert II of Germany, the then Duke of Austria, and his wife Elizabeth. Helene's role in this royal Habsburg household was nanny to the children of Albert and Eliszabeth. Note that, according to the contemporary German custom of calling a wife or sometimes daughter, the alternative names ending in "-in" amount to adding a feminine suffix to her husband's name.

Helene, later a member of Elisabeth's court, wrote a book around 1451 entitled Denkwürdigkeiten (= Reminiscences) in which she provides a first-person account of the theft of the Hungarian Crown of St. Stephen on 20 February 1440. This was an action in which she participated at the request of Queen Elisabeth, widow of King Albert. This crown was considered holy by the Hungarian people. It was then stored at the Hungarian stronghold of Visegrád.

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