Regensburg Princes' Day

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The Regensburger Fürstentag of 1623 was an assembly of important imperial estates of the Holy Roman Empire convened by Emperor Ferdinand II . On her, the Palatinate electoral dignity was transferred to the Bavarian Duke Maximilian . The meeting also marks a high point of imperial power during the Thirty Years' War .

Awarded the electoral dignity to Duke Maximilian I of Bavaria at the Regensburg Princely Congress in 1623

prehistory

The last Reichstag met in 1613. Against the background of the denominational disputes in the Reich and the first years of the Thirty Years War, Emperor Ferdinand did not expect a solution to the problems at hand from a new Reichstag.

The imperial power had grown considerably through the victory in the Bohemian War . As a result of his own power of excellence, the electoral dignity was secretly transferred from the outlawed Friedrich V of the Palatinate to Maximilian of Bavaria in 1621. In July 1622 the emperor invited the electors of Cologne , Trier , Mainz , Saxony and Brandenburg as well as the sovereigns of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel , Pomerania , Hessen-Darmstadt , Bavaria , Salzburg and Bamberg to a meeting in Regensburg . The defeated Elector Friedrich V of the Palatinate or his envoy were not invited.

The secret measures to transfer the electoral dignity from the Palatinate to Bavaria had already become public in advance. This, like the planned anti-Protestant measures in Bohemia, led to the Protestant princes, with the exception of Hessen-Darmstadt, canceling their participation. Only Brandenburg and Saxony were represented by envoys. The assembly was therefore dominated by the Catholic estates. The hope of a compromise with the Protestant estates had largely disappeared due to the non-participation of Saxony and Brandenburg.

course

The Emperor had been in Regensburg since November 24, 1622. A short time later, other princes also arrived.

The meeting began on January 7, 1623. A central subject of the negotiations was the planned transfer of the electoral dignity. After extensive deliberations, a compromise was reached in that Duke Maximilian of Bavaria was only made elector for life. A later transfer back to Friedrich's descendants was not categorically excluded.

Bavaria was also given the Upper Palatinate . The Rhine Palatinate was under Spanish administration.

At the end of the meeting on February 25, 1623 Maximilian was solemnly enfeoffed.

meaning

The Fürstentag indicated a strengthened position of the emperor and the Catholic party in the empire. In the course of a possible absolutist tendency of the empire, the princes' day represented an important stage. After all, the emperor was free to choose who would be invited. The rules of procedure were also given by the imperial court. This clearly distinguished this assembly from the Reichstag regulated under Reich law or other estates assemblies.

There was at least the possibility of transforming the imperial assemblies into meetings dependent on the emperor and permanently weakening the estates. However, there were strong counter-trends. The electors' assemblies from 1619 to 1647 were part of the estates tradition. The strength of the estates vis-à-vis the emperor, regardless of their denomination, was evident on the Regensburg Electoral Congress of 1630.

literature