Background
Henry was the eldest son of Count Engelbert I of Sponheim (died 1096), himself the eldest son of Count Siegfried I and his wife, Hedwig, possibly a daughter of Duke Bernard II of Saxony of the Billung family.
Henry was the eldest son of Count Engelbert I of Sponheim (died 1096), himself the eldest son of Count Siegfried I and his wife, Hedwig, possibly a daughter of Duke Bernard II of Saxony of the Billung family.
He was the first ruler of those territories from the Rhenish House of Sponheim. Engelbert had been a supporter of Pope Gregory VII in the fierce Investiture Controversy and therefore had been divested of his county in the Bavarian Puster Valley by Emperor Henry IV in 1091. This resulted in the so-called provincia Graslupp, that is, the estates of Neumarkt and Sankt Lambrecht as well as the Murau region, which had previously belonged to the Carinthian county of Friesach, passing to the March of Styria.
After the death of his godfather, Duke Henry III of Carinthia, the last ruler from the House of Eppenstein, he was enfeoffed with the Carinthian duchy and the Veronese march by Emperor Henry V. He did, however, not inherit Henry"s allodial lands, which passed to the Margrave Leopold of Styria, a member of the Traungau dynasty (Otakars).