Kollegiatstift Altötting

The parishes of Altötting, Waldötting (today's Kastl) and Unterneukirchen were incorporated into the Collegiate Foundation of Altötting. These parishes were staffed with canons. In 1401, Neuötting, Alzgern, Burgkirchen am Wald, Hirschhorn, Perach and Rogglfing were added. In 1404, Eggenfelden was also incorporated, and in 1424, Oberaichbach. The extensive landholdings of the foundation were expropriated in 1803 during the secularization; the parishes became independent.

King Carloman founded the Ötting Monastery in 876/877, to which he handed over the palatine chapel in Altötting and the Mattsee Abbey. In 880, Carloman found his burial place in the monastery he founded. His son Arnulf of Carinthia also died in Altötting in 898 and was buried there. His son Louis the Child, in turn, was born in Altötting in 893. A collegiate church, dedicated to Saints Maximilian and Felicitas, was probably built shortly after the monastery's founding. The Ötting Monastery probably survived the Hungarian invasions in the early 10th century, as isolated references are still preserved from later periods. However, monastic life probably ceased in the course of the 10th, but at the latest in the 11th century.

The Wittelsbach Duke Ludwig the Kelheimer initiated the re-founding of the monastery as a collegiate foundation around 1228. Since the city of Neuötting had been founded in 1224, it was referred to as the Collegiate Foundation of Altötting. It was staffed with twelve canons, who were under the direction of a provost and a dean. In 1231, the foundation was confirmed by Archbishop Eberhard of Salzburg, who at the same time obliged the collegiate canons to observe the Rule of Aachen.

The construction of a new collegiate church had already begun in 1228. In 1245, the three-aisled basilica in the Romanesque style could finally be consecrated. In the course of the increasingly strong pilgrimage to Altötting, the construction of the collegiate parish church of St. Philipp and Jakob, which still exists today, with its associated collegiate cloister, became necessary at the end of the 15th century. The late Gothic hall church was completed in 1511. In 1491, Pope Innocent VIII allowed the introduction of the less strict Passau Rite, which was based on the coexistence of the Passau Cathedral Chapter. Accordingly, from the 16th century onwards, the provost of the wealthy foundation usually no longer resided in Altötting. Around 1500, the scholastic of the collegiate school already had three Latin teachers under him. In 1571, Provost Martin Eisengrein issued a new curriculum for a three-class elementary and Latin school. The warlike conflicts between Bavaria, Austria and the Archdiocese of Salzburg severely affected the foundation. Thus, in 1608, the number of canons had shrunk to only three. In 1627, the number of prebends was increased from eight to ten; however, these were not permanent. Ten years later, in 1637, six chaplaincies were endowed for the singing of the Marian daily offices at the Chapel of Grace. These six chaplains, the Hofmark parish priest and the Wald parish priest, who were assigned to the foundation, rose to the rank of canons in 1672 and formed the so-called "younger collegiate body". Thus, there were now sixteen prebends, of which in the 18th century mostly four remained vacant due to lack of income. At the end of the 18th century, the canons were equipped with violet choir vestments along with chapter insignia. In 1803, the Collegiate Foundation of Altötting was dissolved in the course of secularization.