Peter von Hagenbach

Hagenbach in court
Bern Chronicle of Diebold Schilling the Elder

Current facade painting: Judgment on Peter von Hagenbach Landvogt on May 9, 1474 by K. Falkner 2001

Peter von Hagenbach (* around 1420; † May 9, 1474 in Breisach am Rhein ) was a knight from an Alsatian-Burgundian noble family. From 1469 until his fall in 1474 he was governor of the Burgundian pawnlands on the Upper Rhine .

In 1474, Hagenbach was overthrown by an uprising against his brutal rule. He was sentenced to death by an ad hoc criminal court of the Holy Roman Empire for the crimes committed under his reign and executed. This court is considered the first modern international criminal court.

Origin and youth

On his father's side, Peter von Hagenbach came from a family belonging to the lower nobility in Sundgau (Upper Alsace), who named themselves after a castle not far from Dannemarie . Since 1351 the ancestors were in a feudal relationship with Habsburg - Austria . The castle ("the Hagenbach law, as the one with the ditch is encompassed") was burned by the confederates in 1466 and fell into disrepair. The village of Hagenbach , owned by the father , still exists.

The father Anton von Hagenbach, who was in the Habsburg service, was first mentioned in 1400. From 1419 he was referred to several times as a citizen and conductor of Thann . In 1428 Anton von Hagenbach became mayor of Thann. From 1440 he was ducal councilor at the court of Ensisheim . Anton von Hagenbach married Catherine, the widow of Jean de Montjustin, Lord von Belmont . The mountain castle of the same name, which was a Mömpelgardisches afterlehen of the Free County of Burgundy, is located southeast of L'Isle-sur-le-Doubs . Catherine already had two sons from her first marriage: Etienne and Philippe. The year of marriage and the year of birth of the later Peter von Hagenbach are unknown.

Hagenbach had three siblings: Johann, Isabelle and Stephan (* 1426). Peter von Hagenbach grew up in Schloss von Thann and Schloss Belmont and was raised bilingual from an early age. In all likelihood he was taught in a monastery in Franche-Comté . The private correspondence and handwritten notes from Hagenbach that have been preserved are all in French. Peter von Hagenbach, who had inherited the title and property of Belmont from his mother, was thus in a superordinate fiefdom relationship with the Duke of Burgundy. Like other aristocrats in the Sundgau, Hagenbach hoped that Burgundy would give him protection and better career opportunities.

Career

In 1443, Peter von Hagenbach took part as Lord of Belmont in a campaign by Duke Philip to Luxembourg . In the same year he joined the Knightly Order of St. George and made his first marriage to Marguerite d'Accolans, a noblewoman of the Free County of Burgundy . Of the five children in this first marriage, one son and two youngest daughters survived childhood.

A hostage-taking of Hagenbach is reported in the Basel Chronicles . On July 25, 1448, Peter von Hagenbach captured the Basel merchant and banker, Mr. Marquard von Baldeck, with whom he had dined the evening before, and kidnapped him at Belmont Castle with the intention of extorting a ransom. However, at the behest of Duke Philip, Hagenbach had to release Marquard immediately. A justification letter from Hagenbach dated January 10, 1449 on the accusations of the Habsburg bailiff Thuringia von Hallwil in this matter has been received.

At the beginning of the fifties, Hagenbach was mentioned under the name "Aquenbacq" or "Archembault" at the Burgundian court. 1453 Hagenbach took as a follower and Chamberlain of the Duke of Cleves Johann in Lille at the Feast of the Pheasant part of Duke Philip. A position as chamberlain with the Elector of the Palatinate and a position as educator of the Wuerttemberg prince von Mömpelgard followed.

In 1458 Philip the Good appointed Hagenbach deputy grand master (commander) of the artillery ( Lieutenant du grand maître d'arttillerie ). From 1461 the position as councilor and court master in the service of the Count of Charolais , who later became Charles the Bold of Burgundy, was decisive for the further course of life . Hagenbach uncovered a murder plot by Valets Coustain, a French agent, against Karl and thereby earned the trust of the future duke. After years of quarrels with Duke Philip, Charles the Bold came to power in 1465. Hagenbach was entrusted with diplomatic tasks as envoy to the Count Palatine .

In the violent and cruel suppression of the indignation of Dinant and Liège , Hagenbach commanded the Burgundian artillery. Because of his prominent role in the capture of Dinant, Hagenbach was knighted by Charles the Bold . At the Burgundian court he held the title of chamberlain . Georges Chastellain praised Hagenbach as a "man of honor".

Governor of the Pfandlande

In 1468, Charles the Bold brought Habsburg rule and rights in the Austrian foothills , which included the forest towns , parts of Alsace and Breisgau, to himself from Duke Siegmund of Tyrol . On September 20, 1469, Hagenbach was named Grand Bailli, which corresponds to the office of bailiff , of the pledges, which Burgundy was annexed under the name "Baillage Dauxay et de Ferrate".

Hagenbach took his official seat in Ensisheim . He and his deputy, Hans Bernhard von Gilgenberg, ran a tough regiment. The civil administration of the cities and the guilds were harassed and, as had already happened in Flanders and Brabant , should be abolished. On behalf of his master, Hagenbach set up new customs offices on the borders with Basel and Zurich. Merchants were prevented from attending the Zurzach trade fair in 1471 . In the summer of 1472, the grain transports to Basel were stopped. To finance a war between Burgundy and France, a consumption tax , the Evil Pfennig , was introduced in 1473 . The administration under Hagenbach enforced duties and taxes with the utmost severity and executed three citizens of Thann.

From 1473 Hagenbach tried to abolish the self-government of the two independent cities of Mulhouse and Breisach . In 1473, Hagenbach led the preliminary negotiations on the Burgundian side with the Habsburg side on the marriage project between the heir to the throne Maximilian and Maria and the planned elevation of Charles the Bold to royal dignity. At the direct secret final negotiation in Trier , Hagenbach interpreted the conversation between Charles the Bold and Emperor Friedrich III.

On January 24, 1474, Hagenbach married Countess Barbara von Thengen and Nellenburg for the second time . The festivities in Breisach after Burgundian ceremonies caused a sensation on the Upper Rhine. Hagenbach initially sought dialogue during his reign. As early as 1469 he tried to mediate between the Confederates and their aristocratic adversaries Bernhard von Eptingen and Bilgeri von Heudorf . From 1473, Hagenbach increasingly relied on intimidation and violence. In the final phase of his rule, Hagenbach could only rely on his own protection force and the Picardy mercenaries for lack of trustworthy subordinates. In the end these could only hold the fortresses of Breisach and Thann.

The trial against Peter von Hagenbach

After Hagenbach had apparently successfully consolidated the Burgundian rule in the cities of the Pfandlande by 1473, he was overthrown by an uprising controlled by Bern , Friborg and the Upper Rhine cities in 1474 , during which he was captured on April 11th.

A court formed from representatives of the Upper Rhine cities and the foreland met on May 9, 1474 in the Radbrunnenturm in Breisach, chaired by Hermann von Eptingen, to investigate the Hagenbach case. The court established by the Archduke of Austria consisted of 28 judges from different states of the Holy Roman Empire. The second assessor of the Basel court, Hans Irmi, defended the accused.

Hagenbach was first charged with murder and confiscation perpetrated on citizens of Thann and Breisach, second with the levying of the “Bad Pfennig” and third with disenfranchisement from Breisach. After the accuser was changed during the trial, the fourth and fifth counts were added: breaking oath and wrongdoing against men and women. Hagenbach was found guilty on all counts.

The execution, the estate and the burial of the governor

After Kaspar Hurder, the Weapons King Duke Sigmund, Peter had "entrittert" symbolic of Hagenbach, the decapitated executioner of Colmar the condemned on the evening of May 9, 1474 on the Anger before Breisach Brass Gate. According to the chronicler Erhard von Appenweiler , 6,000 onlookers came to the execution. Servants armed with halberds and swords secured the course of the major event.

According to Hagenbach's last will, the body was to be buried in the village of Hagenbach. Hagenbach is said to have bequeathed his golden chain and his 16 horses to the Minster of Breisach. These submissions to the estate are controversial. The will allegedly left to Wilhelm Kappeler, if ever written, has not been preserved. According to other sources, Hagenbach only left a golden signet ring and 100 guilders to the cathedral, which, however, never got there.

Contrary to what Knebel said, according to some historians, Hagenbach was buried before Breisach. The widow Barbara von Thengen later had a small chapel built over the burial site, which had to give way to Vauban's fortifications in the 17th century . After Knebel, Hagenbach's body was transferred to Hagenbach and buried there in the village church.

Tradition building

According to tradition, the villagers decorated the bailiff's grave sculpture with a gold chain and clothes and worshiped him for a long time. From 1796 to 1844, the "Bibliothèque Communale de Colmar" exhibited a mummified skull and two mummified forearms as supposed remains of Hagenbach. In 1844, Pastor Pantaleon Rosmann identified the mummy parts as relics of a Knight of Malta, which came from an order church in Freiburg im Breisgau . You can still find them as “Tête et mains du baron de Haguenbach” ( pseudo head of Bailiff Peter von Hagenbach ) under the stand number “MS 844 / II a 5” in the “Bibliothèque municipale de Colmar”.

According to a folk tale (Paul Strintzi: Le bailli sans repos), the ghost of the executed bailiff is said to haunt the woods around Hagenbach. A few years after the execution, the Freiburg magistrate dealt with the testimony of a Neuchâtel citizen who claims to have seen Hagenbach on horseback in the front row of the Wild Army . The Freiburg city chronicler Wilhelm Fladt wrote a play about Peter von Hagenbach in 1924.

The vengeance of Stefan von Hagenbach

Charles the Bold was bound in the north by the siege of Neuss. In a storm on Neuss, Hagenbach's deputy and successor, Hans Bernhard von Gilgenberg, fell . Charles the Bold initially limited himself to sending Hagenbach's younger brother Stephan von Hagenbach, born in 1426, and Hagenbach's son-in-law Thiebald von Granwiller with a force of 6000 mercenaries to the Sundgau and the Bernese Jura.

From August 18, 1474, southern Alsace was systematically devastated. More than 30 villages, including Pumpfel, today's Bonfol , were devastated or destroyed. The Burgundian Wars began with the intervention of the troops of Basel and the Lower Union on August 26th .

Aftermath

In the legal discussion on the ongoing Nuremberg Trials in 1947 and in the 1950 justification for the Nuremberg Trials , the Nuremberg Principles (Paragraph IV), reference is made to the trial against Peter von Hagenbach. The historian and expert on the German late Middle Ages Hermann Heimpel also made a connection between the Hagenbach Trials and the Nuremberg Trials in 1952. Since then, the trial of Peter von Hagenbach has been viewed or discussed in international law literature as the forerunner of the Nuremberg Trials and the Rome Statute .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Exhibit highlights the first international war crimes tribunal law.harvard.edu, accessed on February 8, 2018 (English)
2. ^ A. Bernoulli (Ed.), Leipzig 1890 and 1895
3. ↑ cf. H. Brewer's gram: Governor Peter von Hagenbach. Chapter III, pp. 229-316.
4. ^ H. Brauer-Gramm: The Landvogt Peter von Hagenbach. Judgment and Enforcement, p. 315.
5. ^ A. Bernoulli: Basler Chroniken. Volume IV: The Appenwiler Chronicle. P. 361.
6. ↑ Rhyming Chronicle: Chapter 137, p. 381.
7. ^ G. Claer-Stamm: Pierre de Hagenbach. L´éxecution, p. 184.
8. ^ H. Brauer-Gramm: The Landvogt Peter von Hagenbach. Judgment and Enforcement, p. 316.
9. ^ G. Claer-Stamm: Pierre de Hagenbach. Adnèxe 7, p. 221.
10. ^ A. Bernoulli: Basler Chroniken. Volume I: Diarium Hans Knebels. P. 91.
11. ^ G. Claer-Stamm: Pierre de Hagenbach. L'éxecution, p. 182.
12. ^ G. Claer-Stamm: Pierre de Hagenbach. Adnexe 7: La pseudo-tête de Pierre de Hagenbach, p. 219, ill. P. 223.
13. ^ G. Claer-Stamm: Pierre de Hagenbach. Adnèxe 7: La légende de Pierre de Hagenbach, p. 219.
14. ^ G. Claer-Stamm: Pierre de Hagenbach. Représailles D´Étiénne de Hagenbach, pp. 192-194.
15. ^ Herman Heimpel: Festschrift for Edmund Ernst Stengel's 70th birthday. P. 443 ff.
16. ↑ see Eduardo Greppi, 1999 icrc.org
17. ↑ see: Message on the Rome Statute 1.2 (PDF)

Literature used

• H. Brewer's gram: The bailiff Peter von Hagenbach - The Burgundian rule on the Upper Rhine 1469–1474. (= Göttingen building blocks for historical science. Volume 27). Musterschmidt, Göttingen 1957, ISBN 3-89744-075-X . (with a foreword by Hermann Heimpel)
• G. Claerr tribe: Pierre de Hagenbach - Le destin tragique d´un chevalier sundgauvien au service de Charles le Téméraire. Société d´histoire du Sundgau, Altkirch 2004, ISBN 2-908498-16-2 .

literature

• Johannes Knebel : Diary 1473–1479, in: Basler Chroniken. Volumes 2 and 3, Verlag von Hirzel, Leipzig 1880 and 1887.
• Rhyming chronicle about Peter von Hagenbach and the Burgundian Wars from 1432 to 1480: collection of sources for the history of Baden. ed. by Franz Josef Mone in Volume 3, Karlsruhe 1863, literature.at
• Hermann Heimpel : Middle Ages and the Nuremberg Trial. Munster 1952.
• The Breisach rhyming chronicle. In: Karl Langosch (Ed.): Author's Lexicon . Volume 5, 1955, Col. 950-955.
• Hildburg brewer gram: The bailiff Peter von Hagenbach - The Burgundian rule on the Upper Rhine 1469–1474. (= Göttingen building blocks for historical science. Volume 27). Musterschmidt, Göttingen 1957.
• Gregory S. Gordon: The Trial of Peter von Hagenbach. In: Kevin Jon Heller , Gerry J. Simpson (Eds.): The Hidden Histories of War Crimes Trials. Oxford University Press, 2013, ISBN 978-0-19-967114-4 , pp. 13-49.
• Eduardo Greppi: The evolution of individual criminal responsibility under international law. Section 2: Before the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials. (= International Review of the Red Cross. No. 835). 1999, pp. 531-553. icrc.org
• Werner Paravici: Hagenbach's wedding. Chivalrous and courtly culture between Burgundy and the empire in the 15th century. In: Konrad Krimm, Rainer Brüning (Ed.): Between Habsburg and Burgundy. The Upper Rhine as a European landscape in the 15th century. (= Upper Rhine Studies. 21). Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-7995-7821-8 , pp. 13-60.
• Gregor Kemper: The Way to Rome: The Development of International Criminal Justice and the Establishment of the Permanent International Criminal Court. Chapter 1: The proceedings against Peter von Hagenbach from 1474. Lang, Frankfurt 2004, ISBN 3-631-52189-8 .
• Wilhelm Vischer :  Hagenbach, Peter von . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 10, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1879, pp. 345-348.
• Hildburg Brauer-Gramm:  Hagenbach, Peter v .. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 7, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1966, ISBN 3-428-00188-5 , p. 487 ( digitized version ).

Web links

Wikisource: Burgundian Wars  - Sources and full texts

Wikisource: Böse Räthe  - Sources and full texts

Wikisource: By Peter Hagenbach  - Sources and full texts

• Commons: Pfettisheim history of Peter Hagenbach and the Burgundy War