The noble Levičnik family, founded by Albert Levičnik, the president of the provincial court in Ljubljana, was a branch of a big and renowned family from Železniki. Holding the office of administrator, Albert’s father, Georg Levičnik (1812–1876), first served in Carinthia—in Paternion and Obervellach —until the second half of the 1840s, when he was transferred to Carniola and performed his duties in Ribnica, Škofja Loka, and Kranjska Gora. While still serving in Carinthia, he married Albertina Grübler and in early 1846 awaited with her the birth of their son Albert in Kolbnitz in the Möll Valley.

Like his father, Albert decided to pursue a career in law and, on completing his studies in Vienna, served in various courts in Carniola and especially in Lower Styria. In the early 1880s, he accepted the invitation of Alois Pražák, Minister of Justice, to become his secretary. In this capacity, Albert assisted in drawing the so-called Pražák Language Decree, which, among other things, introduced the use of the Slovenian language in Slovenian courts. Following the minister’s resignation in the early 1890s, Levičnik left Vienna and returned to Ljubljana, where he took up office at the provincial court, first appointed as senior judicial councilor, then as vice president, and finally in 1898 as the president of the court. During his presidency, Ljubljana built a new courthouse, which now houses the District Court of Ljubljana, the High Court of Ljubljana, and the Supreme Court of the Republic of Slovenia. He retired at his own request twelve years later, in 1910. On that occasion, the emperor granted him nobility in recognition of his loyal and outstanding service.

The decision on Levičnik’s ennoblement was signed in November 1910; three months later, after paying a special tax, he was also granted the honorific Edler. For his coat of arms, he selected an eagle, the usual emblem of state administrative service, and fasces alluding to his legal career. The coat of arms is still carved on his grave in Železniki Cemetery.

Albert von Levičnik was married twice and had six sons. The older three were born in his first marriage to Jožefina Pock from Ptuj, and he fathered the other three with his second wife Frančiška Guzelj from Škofja Loka. In her book on Železniki, Vida Košmelj-Beravs remembered Levičnik as a thick-set man who would spend his summer months walking his six sons in single file to a tavern for lunch. During their walks, he would always make several stops along the way, tapping his cane against the ground to gather his sons around him and explain to them the peculiarities of Železniki. He died in Ljubljana in 1934, at age eighty-eight. He is buried in Železniki.

Sources:
Rugále, Mariano in Preinfalk, Miha: Blagoslovljeni in prekleti. 2. del: Po sledeh mlajših plemiških rodbine na Slovenskem. Ljubljana: Viharnik, 2012, pp. 99–105.