Bishop Otto of Freising, having entered the Cistercian order, had convinced his father, Leopold III, margrave of Austria, to found Heiligenkreuz Abbey in 1133, thus bringing literacy and sophisticated agriculture (including wine making) to the region that will become Vienna.

Becoming abbot of the Cistercian monastery of Morimond in Burgundy about 1136, he had soon afterwards been elected bishop of Freising.

This diocese, and indeed the whole of Bavaria, is at this time disturbed by the feud between the Welfs and the Hohenstaufen, and the church is in a deplorable condition; but a great improvement has been brought about by the new bishop in both ecclesiastical and secular matters.

In 1145, Otto records accounts of the heroic struggles against the Muslims by the legendary Prester (or Presbyter) John, whose domain is believed to be somewhere in southwest Asia or northeast Africa, just beyond the Islamic empire.