Background
His father, Norbert senior, was a physician, an Imperial Councillor and member of the Austrian Reichstag, who was interested in art and photography.
His father, Norbert senior, was a physician, an Imperial Councillor and member of the Austrian Reichstag, who was interested in art and photography.
He attended schools in Brixen and Innsbruck and served as a nurse during the Franco-Prussian War.
His interest in hunting led him to give up his studies and take positions as a game warden and forester, first for the estates of Count Ernst II, then in Schillersdorf, Upper Silesia, for Nathaniel Meyer von Rothschild., but he had to quit due to an illness. At the beginning of World War I, despite being 64 years old, he volunteered for the Kaiserjäger Regiment and served on the front lines, later becoming a Major in the Kaiserschützen. He retired to Lana after the war and wrote the hunting novel Peter Rießer, der Wildmeister von Hinterriß.
In 1871, following his faather"s wishes, he began studying economics, eventually attending schools in Leipzig, Breisgau and Freiburg, where he was a member of the Corps Suevia Freiburg.