Uriel of Gemmingen

The title of this article is ambiguous. Further meanings are listed under Uriel von Gemmingen (disambiguation) .

Archbishop Uriel von Gemmingen

Uriel von Gemmingen (born June 29, 1468 in Michelfeld ; † February 9, 1514 in Mainz ) came from the Gemmingen-Michelfeld line of the southern German noble family of the Lords of Gemmingen . From 1508 to 1514 he was Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Mainz . He was at the head of the largest German church province and was one of the seven electors ; as Arch Chancellor for Germany he had the highest rank. Uriel von Gemmingen was a representative of the internal church reform.

Life until 1508

Uriel von Gemmingen was one of 21 children of Hans von Gemmingen (1431–1487) to Michelfeld, called Keckhans and his wife Brigitta von Neuenstein . Only ten of the children reached adulthood, a brother of the same name born in 1460 died shortly after birth. He received his first lessons in the collegiate school of St. Peter in Wimpfen . Like his brothers Georg and Erpho , Uriel became a canon in Speyer and Worms. His brother Georg promoted and supported him. The sister Els von Gemmingen (1466-1532) officiated from 1504 as prioress of the Magdalenenkloster in Speyer . A valuable antiphonal has been preserved from her . At the age of fifteen Uriel von Gemmingen was already living as a candidate for a canonical under the Scholaster , the head of the cathedral school , in the Mainz cathedral monastery , where he had received a benefice in 1483 . In 1483 Uriel studied at the University of Mainz . In 1484 the Mainz cathedral chapter gave him leave of absence for four years to study at the University of Paris and in 1488 for another two years to study at the University of Padua , where he obtained a doctorate in both Roman law and canon law .

After 1501 Uriel was custodian at Worms Cathedral and as such sworn in at the Imperial Court of Justice as an assessor, then bailiff in Mombach . In 1505 he renounced his benefice in Speyer after he had become dean of the cathedral in Mainz . In this office he supported the Provost in leading the church service and in managing assets. The Mainz Cathedral Chapter elected Uriel von Gemmingen on September 27, 1508 - as the successor to the late Jakob von Liebenstein - as Archbishop of Mainz. The enfeoffment with the regalia , the secular sovereignty, took place in April at the Reichstag in Worms.

Archbishop of Mainz

Uriel von Gemmingen on his tomb

Uriel von Gemmingen was now at the head of the largest German ecclesiastical province, the ecclesiastical province of Mainz . As Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Mainz he was Arch Chancellor for Germany and Imperial Prince , among the Electors he had the highest rank. Only as a minister of the Church could a member of a lower noble family achieve this position. Uriel's political possibilities did not correspond to his high rank, because his archbishopric power had been severely restricted in the negotiations with the cathedral chapter preceding the election. In his election surrender he had to accept restrictions in the areas of finance, jurisdiction and territorial and alliance policy. In addition, Uriel was burdened in his politics by the long-standing disputes with the Electorate of Saxony over the city of Erfurt. In addition, his work was made even more difficult by the high financial obligations of the Mainz chair . The Archbishop of Mainz acquired a certain importance in terms of imperial politics as director of the Kurheinische Reichskreis from 1512.

Like his older brother Georg von Gemmingen , cathedral provost and archdeacon in Speyer, who died in 1511, Uriel also tried to put an end to the abuses that were widespread in the church in his diocese . He fought the cohabitation , demanded from the clerics the fulfillment of their spiritual duties and a dignified appearance in public. In order to restore decaying monastic discipline, he ordered visitations to monasteries. He urged his vicar general and the commissioners to summon all priests and, if necessary, to instruct them in the correct exercise of their official duties, the correct administration of the sacraments, the imposition of appropriate penalties and also the correct interpretation of the Gospels in the sermon .

Aschaffenburg was part of the secular territory of the Archdiocese of Mainz as early as the 10th century . The city developed into an important administrative center and was often the residence of the archbishops. In 1509 Uriel von Gemmingen appointed the painter and master builder Mathias Grünewald to be his court painter in Aschaffenburg. Grünewald led the renovation of the old castle there. He belonged to the bishop's court and for this reason received an archbishop's coat of arms.

In 1510 Uriel von Gemmingen protested as Archbishop of Mainz against the actions of Johannes Pfefferkorn , who also had Jewish books confiscated and burned in Mainz. Emperor Maximilian I set up a commission of inquiry, and Uriel von Gemmingen was appointed chairman. Above all, Johannes Reuchlin, who was appointed to the commission, sharply condemned the Pfefferkorns company initiated by the Dominicans and advocated an understanding approach to Judaism. The literary feud between the humanists for Reuchlin on the one hand and Pfefferkorn with the Dominicans on the other, which was becoming ever more acute, continued when Uriel died. - Uriel's brother Georg was friends with the Strasbourg humanist Jakob Wimpfeling , and one can assume that Uriel's attitude to life was also shaped by humanism .

Epitaph in Mainz cathedral; Inscription: Urieli de Gemmingen archiepiscopo Moguntino, principi electori, viro singulari vitae gravitate animique constantia praeclaro, qui posteaquam sedit annos IIII, menses IIII, dies XIII, aetatis suae anno XLV, a Christo nato nato MDXIIII V idus piddarii vitontifica cum depontificon.

Uriel von Gemmingen died on February 9, 1514 at the age of only 45 as a result of a stroke that he had suffered two days earlier. On February 12th he was buried in the cloister of Mainz Cathedral. His successor - Archbishop Albrecht von Brandenburg - had a grave monument erected for him, which is still in the central nave of the cathedral on the first northern pillar in front of the monastery choir . According to an apparently contemporary entry in the sacristy book of the Mainz cathedral chapter, Uriel appears to have been a serious, strict man who conscientiously fulfilled his duty.

Uriel's early and sudden death gave rise to speculation. In the family chronicle of the Barons von Gemmingen, Stocker reports a "fact that is told as unquestionable by a manuscript ": In Aschaffenburg, Uriel killed his cellar master in anger with his band knife after he surprised him one night while stealing wine. Gripped by bitter remorse, he set out for Mainz a short time later, accompanied by 150 horsemen. Despite the dense fog, he rowed alone over the Rhine in a small boat during the night and went to Martinsburg , where he fell ill and died a few days later. This story still seems to be worth telling among wine lovers, according to a magazine. “Some writers think,” writes Stocker, that Uriel's death was only faked and the slain cellar master was buried in his place with episcopal and princely honors and pomp in the Mainz Cathedral . He is said to have gone to Italy himself, lived in a Carthusian monastery for many years and only received a simple burial after his death. Stocker also mentions a document dated May 8, 1514, kept in Munich , in which the head of the archbishopric chancellery in Mainz informed the Bavarian Duke Wilhelm that the archbishop suffered a stroke on May 7 and that there was fear for his life. In 1724 the grave in Mainz Cathedral was opened, where mortal remains with episcopal insignia such as miter and staff were found.

The extremely significant and very high quality tomb in Mainz Cathedral was once attributed to Hans Backoffen or Franz Maidburg , but according to recent research it was made by a previously unknown master. The epitaph shows Uriel kneeling between the diocesan patrons Martin von Tours and Bonifatius , who in turn intercede with the crucified, whose blood is caught in a chalice by an angel. The figures, capitals and canopies of the 4.75 m high and 1.85 m wide epitaph are made of Eiffel tuff, while the framing parts are made of gray sandstone. The monument character is in the foreground, since the actual grave of the archbishop is in the memorie.

literature

• The article essentially follows the chapter Uriel , in: Gerhard Kiesow: Von Rittern und Predigern. The Lords of Gemmingen and the Reformation in Kraichgau. regional culture publisher, Ubstadt-Weiher 1997 p. 24f.
• Horst Faulde: Uriel von Gemmingen Archbishop of Mainz (1508–1514). Contributions to its history. Dissertation Erlangen 1955.
• Bernd Röcker: Uriel von Gemmingen - Archbishop of Mainz, Elector and Imperial Chancellor 1508–1514 , in: Kraichgau. Contributions to landscape and local research , volume 20, 2007, pp. 211–222.
• Carl Wilhelm Friedrich Stocker: Family chronicle of the barons of Gemmingen . Heilbronn 1895.
• Franz Xaver Remling : History of the bishops of Speyer . Vol. 2, ND Pirmasens 1975.
• Franz Falk : The provost Georg von Gemmingen, Wimpheling's friend. In: Historical-political papers for Catholic Germany 121 (1898) pp. 869–886.
• Georg Dehio : The master of the Gemmingen monument in Mainz Cathedral . In: Yearbook of the Prussian Art Collections 30/1909, pp. 139–152.
• Paul Kautzsch: The Mainz sculptor Hans Backoffen and his school . Leipzig 1911, esp. Pp. 33-41.
• Wolf Goeltzer: The case of ›› Hans Backoffen ‹‹. Studies on sculpture in Mainz and on the Middle Rhine at the end of the late Middle Ages, part 1 . In: Mainzer Zeitschrift 84–85 / 1990, pp. 1–78, especially pp. 60–70. * Wolf Goeltzer: The case ›› Hans Backoffen ‹‹. Studies on sculpture in Mainz and on the Middle Rhine at the end of the late Middle Ages, Part II . In: Mainzer Zeitschrift 86/1993, pp. 1–62, here pp. 21, 52.
• Winfried Wilhelmy: An artist without a work, a work without an artist: Hans Backoffen and the holy abbot of the Frankfurt Liebieghaus . In: Valentina Torri (ed.): The holy abbot. A late Gothic wooden sculpture in the Liebieghaus . Berlin 2001, pp. 103-111.
• Yves Hoffmann: Franz Maidburg in Cologne, Mainz and Fürstenwalde? On the attributions of two sacraments in Cologne and Fürstenwalde as well as the epitaphs of Dietrich von Bülow in Fürstenwalde and Uriel von Gemmingen in Mainz . In: Mitteilungen des Freiberg Altertumsverein 101/2008, pp. 29–50

Web links

Commons : Uriel von Gemmingen  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• History on the website of Hornberg Castle

Individual evidence

1. ^ Website on the Lords of Neuenstein
2. ↑ Falk p. 870 note 4.
3. ^ Charles Clémencet : L'Art de vérifier les dates , p. 137
4. ↑ Remling, p. 215, note 716.
5. ↑ Faulde pp. 29-35.
6. ^ Lit .: Franz Falk
7. ↑ Faulde p. 12.
8. ↑ Stocker p. 220.
9. ↑ Elmar M. Lorey : When the wine was still prescribed by the doctor. Of the joys of rediscovery. In: RheingauForum (magazine for wine, history, culture), volume 9, issue 1, 2000. ( online on the website of Elmar M. Lorey)
10. ↑ Friedhelm Jürgensmeier: The Diocese of Mainz - From Roman times to the Second Vatican Council , Frankfurt am Main 1988, p. 171 (still with attribution to Backoffen).
11. ^ Andreas Tacke: Continuity and caesura: Ernst von Wettin and Albrecht von Brandenburg series of publications by the Moritzburg Foundation, Wallstein Verlag, 2005, ISBN 9783892449553 , p. 317.

predecessor	Office	successor
Jakob von Liebenstein	Elector Archbishop of Mainz 1508–1514	Albrecht of Brandenburg