Radkersburg was first mentioned in writing in 1182, while the documentation of its settlement and establishment as a town dates back to 1299. Nearly 120 years later, in 1421, the Hospital of the Holy Spirit was also mentioned for the first time, though this charitable institution may be significantly older. In 1542, its inhabitants were allowed to move into the Augustinian Monastery that had been abandoned during the Reformation, but fires in the years 1595 and 1607 burned the building down to its foundations. Sources from 1595 distinguish between the town hospital and the so-called Grieà hospital in the townâs castle keep below St. Peterâs Church (today Gornja Radgona, Slovenia). This protestant institution of the âgriesserâ, the inhabitants of the suburbs, was taken over by the city council after they had left and their institution declined. The actual town or public hospital was used by the Capuchins who initiated a new, quiet phase of re-conversion in Radkersburg. Based on a source from the first half of the 18th century, the following investigates to what extent the hospital in Radkersburg was characteristic of the Duchy of Styria and principally served as an old-age home. Although there is no evidence of source materials of the cityâs secular foundation charters in the Styrian State Archives in Graz and important questions thereby remain unanswered, the instruction for the hospital master (July 8th 1781), a comprehensive list of those who applied to be submitted to the hospital (104 applicants) as well as further archival sources help to determine the group of people who were primarily taken care of until 1920.