Erard I of Brienne-Ramerupt

Coat of arms of Érard by Brienne-Ramerupt

Érard von Brienne (* around 1170 , † 1246 ) was lord of Ramerupt and Venizy . He came from the House of Brienne and was a pretender to the county of Champagne .

Life

Érard was a son of Andreas von Brienne , lord of Ramerput, and Alix (Adelais), mistress of Venizy. His father was a famous knight of the Third Crusade and his mother was a descendant of Prince Floris, a son of King Philip I of France .

His first marriage was a certain Helisende. After she died before 1210, he moved to the Holy Land with his first cousin, John of Brienne , who became King of Jerusalem there .

Journey to the Holy Land

In Acre , around 1213, Érard married Princess Philippa of Jerusalem, who was a daughter of Count Henry II of Champagne and Queen Isabella I of Jerusalem . The marriage took place against the resistance of the Roman Curia, because the couple were related to each other in the ninth degree and therefore not marriageable according to canon law. However, the fourth Lateran Council relaxed these provisions in 1215, which is why the marriage was no longer contested. The legitimate origin of Philippa herself was in doubt, as her mother's first husband, Humfried IV of Toron , had never recognized his forced divorce.

War of Succession for Champagne

Nevertheless, Philippa and Érard tried to fight for their father's legacy, the rich French county of Champagne . The count in office there was Philippa's cousin, the minor Theobald IV , whose legality they have now discussed. The Countess Blanka of Navarre then confiscated Erard's property in France and sent her chamberlain to take him prisoner.

In 1215, Érard and his wife reached Genoa , where he was expected by the count's chamberlain and invited to a duel. Érard was then arrested by the Genoese authorities, who presented the case to a papal commission. After five months in prison, he managed to escape to France. There he was immediately arrested by Countess Blanka in Le Puy-en-Velay , but was soon released again because the arrest had been illegal.

In the spring of 1216, Érard reached Champagne, where he united the disaffected barons of the country and began the war against the countess and her son. With Duke Theobald I of Lorraine he gained a strong ally. In the autumn of 1216, Érard accepted the court of arbitration from King Philip II , who brokered a ceasefire and insisted that the question of power be postponed until Count Theobald IV came of age. But Érard broke the armistice quickly, for which he was excommunicated on April 25, 1217 by the Archbishop of Reims . On February 2, 1218, the Pope also banned him and his colleagues. This also led to the military intervention of the King, Duke of Burgundy and Emperor Frederick II , who was able to capture the Duke of Lorraine in June 1218. Deprived of his most powerful supporter, Érard gave up the fight. On November 2, 1221, he reached an agreement with Countess Blanka in which he and his wife waived their claims. In return, they received a generous financial settlement from the Countess and Érard himself got his family possessions refunded.

The couple returned to Outremer in 1222 . Years later, Érard's sister-in-law, Alice of Cyprus , also claimed champagne.

progeny

From his marriage to Philippa († 1250), Érard had several children:

• Érard von Brienne († February 8, 1250 during the Sixth Crusade )
• Heinrich von Brienne († 1248/49 during the sixth crusade), lord of Venizy
• Maria von Brienne († after 1221), ∞ I.) Gaucher von Nanteuil-la-Fosse ∞ II.) Hugo von Conflans
• Margarete von Brienne († 1275), ∞ Dirk van Beveren
• Héloïse of Brienne
• Isabella von Brienne († 1274/1277), ∞ Henry V, Count of Grandpré
• Johanna von Brienne, ∞ around 1250 Mathieu III. de Montmorency
• Sibylle von Brienne, abbess of Ramerupt
• Alix of Brienne (mentioned around 1245)

literature

• H. d'Arbois de Jubainville : Histoire des Ducs et Comtes de Champagne. Volume 4: 1181-1285. Durand, Paris 1865, online .
• Henri d'Arbois de Jubainville: Les premiers seigneurs de Ramerupt , in: Bibliothèque de l'École des Chartres (1861), pp. 447–451

Individual proof

1. ↑ see Jubainville (1861), p. 450