ALTHAN, MICHELE FEDERICO d'. - Cardinal, viceroy of Naples, born at Glatz (Silesia) in 1682, died at Vácz
(Hungary) in 1734. Canon of Olmütz and Breslau, auditor of the Austrian Rota in Rome (1714–18), bishop of Vácz and councillor of state of Hungary in 1718. Clement XI created him cardinal in 1719. Having joined the imperial council, he was entrusted with representing the Empire before the Holy See. At the Conclave of Innocenzo XIII he exercised the alleged right of veto against Card. Paolucci. In a letter to Card. de Bissy, which was published, he vigorously protested against the rumours spread by the Jansenists that the emperor had rejected the bull Unigenitus (1722). His action contributed greatly to the reconciliation of imperial with pontifical authority after the War of the Spanish Succession. In 1722 he became viceroy of Naples and remained in office for six years. In 1729 he returned to his Hungarian diocese, to which he devoted himself until the day of his death.