Albrecht III. (Bavaria)

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Albrecht III. rejects the Bohemian royal crown , print based on the history painting by Johann Georg Hiltensperger (around 1825) in the Hofgartenarkaden in Munich

Albrecht III. the pious (born March 27, 1401 in Wolfratshausen , † February 29, 1460 in Munich) from the House of Wittelsbach was Duke of Bavaria-Munich . His name is linked to the Agnes Bernauer affair ; His promotion of the arts and the church, but also the expulsion of the Jews, were formative for the future.

Early years

youth

Albrecht was the son of Duke Ernst of Bavaria-Munich with Elisabetta Visconti . He was born at the castle in Wolfratshausen, where his parents resided for years during the unrest in Munich. At times Albrecht grew up with his aunt, the Bohemian Queen Sophie, in Prague , learned Czech and studied at the university there. He fought in the Bavarian War in 1422 in the Battle of Alling , in which his father saved his life.

Duke Albrecht at the Battle of Alling, pictured at the Agnes Bernauer Festival 2019

Agnes Bernauer affair

The division of Bavaria-Straubing in 1429

As administrator of his father, he lived from 1433-1435 mainly in the Munich part of the Straubinger Ländchen . Between 1431 and 1440 Albrecht also had the " Pluedenburg " near Munich converted into his country seat. This expansion was perhaps caused by the relationship between Albrecht (who was known as a “lover of tender women”) and Agnes Bernauer .

Since the Duke's son Albrecht took part in a tournament in Augsburg in February 1428 , it is often assumed that he met Agnes on this occasion and brought him to Munich shortly afterwards. In a Munich tax list dated 1428, a pernawin is already mentioned as a member of his court, who is probably Agnes Bernauer. By the summer of 1432 at the latest, Agnes Bernauer was a fixture at the Munich court. She managed to arrest the robber baron Münnhauser, who had fled to the Alte Veste , and aroused the anger of Count Palatine Beatrix , Albrecht's sister , with her self-confident demeanor . It is possible that Agnes and Albrecht were already married at this point, but there is no concrete evidence of a marriage.

Duke Ernst saw this inappropriate relationship as a threat to the succession. He had Agnes Bernauer arrested and drowned on October 12, 1435 near Straubing in the Danube , while Albrecht and his relative Heinrich XVI. von Bayern-Landshut was on the hunt. Together with Ludwig VII of Bavaria-Ingolstadt , Albrecht then initially planned military steps against his father.

After the reconciliation with his father, Albrecht married Duchess Anna von Braunschweig-Grubenhagen in 1436 , with whom he then had ten children, and became co-regent. Their common confessor was the monastery reformer and spiritual writer Johannes Rothuet from Indersdorf , who had also contributed to appeasing the relationship between son and father, which was disrupted by the execution of Agnes Bernauer, and thus to preventing a civil war in the duchy.

Duke of Bavaria-Munich

Territorial policy

After his father's death in 1438 Albrecht became Duke of Bavaria-Munich. His young cousin Adolf was a co-heir of the duchy until 1441, but he soon died, which subsequently led to an inheritance dispute between Albrecht and Bayern-Landshut.

After the death of King Albrecht II in 1439, the Kingdom of Bohemia continued to be divided into two parties: The Roman or Austrian party under Ulrich II von Rosenberg and the Kalixtine National Party, which was led by Hynek Ptáček von Pirkstein . A state parliament in Prague unanimously elected the Bavarian duke as the new king in 1440. However, due to the difficult circumstances and with consideration for King Albrecht's later son Ladislaus Postumus , he finally refused the Bohemian royal crown that was offered to Albrecht . Later he compared himself with Georg von Podiebrad and reached an agreement with his sons.

Apart from a nationwide campaign against robber barons in 1444 and 1445, Albrecht hardly developed any other political activities. In 1444 he joined forces with the Electoral Palatinate , Palatinate-Neumarkt and the Bishop of Regensburg , and in 1445 again with the Electoral Palatinate and Württemberg to form a state peace . So Albrecht had the notorious robber baron Paul Zenger tracked down in his lair in Neuhaus near Cham and ordered 50 knights to have their heads cut off in Straubing. Albrecht was also against the cities and the estates , especially in the new part of Straubing, where the constant absence of the former dukes in Holland and the " Ottonische Handfeste " of 1311 had given greater freedom.

After the Bavaria-Ingolstadt line died out in 1447, he left the legacy to Landshut Duke Heinrich XVI without too much resistance, despite a legacy with Ludwig VIII of Bavaria-Ingolstadt in 1439 . Albrecht was put on the defensive by resorting to old Landshut demands, resulting from claims to half of the inheritance of Duke Adolf, his cousin who died in 1441. In the Erdinger Treaty of December 16, 1450, almost the entire Duchy of Ingolstadt went to Heinrich's son Ludwig IX. and Albrecht was only able to secure small parts of the inheritance: Lichtenberg, Baierbrunn and the Swabian court remained as Ingolstadt pledges with Bayern-Munich. Deggendorf also fell back to Albrecht as a Landshut pledge.

Cultural policy

From 1440 until his death, Albrecht's councilors included the learned counselor, diplomat, doctor and well-known writer and translator Johannes Hartlieb . Albrecht also accepted Thomas Pirckheimer into the ducal council. In addition, he gathered numerous artists at his court, which would shape Munich court life for centuries. The first bloom of Munich panel painting around Gabriel Angler and other masters such as Peter Polaner the Younger, Conrad Sachs and Ulrich Neunhauser fell in Albrecht's time as well as literary translations and the promotion of the literary works of Hans Schiltberger and Michael Behaim but also the employment of musicians such as Konrad Paumann .

Religious politics

With the authorization of the Council of Basel , he drove together with Nikolaus von Kues an active monastery reform that strengthened the state rule. In 1455 Albrecht subsequently founded a Benedictine monastery on the Holy Mountain at Andechs . He was considered extremely religious, which earned him his nickname the pious , and had the Bavarian monasteries reformed. Under the influence of his uncle Johannes Grünwalder , the last antipope, Felix V , was temporarily recognized by Albrecht.

Already in 1442 the Jews had been expelled from all of Upper Bavaria by Albrecht, and his descendant Albrecht V later forbade Jews to live in the reunified duchy from December 1551 and confirmed this in 1553. Jewish settlement was only permitted again 250 years later.

Death and succession

Albrecht succumbed to gout in 1460, his long-standing ailment, and he was buried in the monastery church at Andechs . On the day of his death, February 29, his second eldest son Ernst also died in Straubing at the age of 22. Before his death, Albrecht had decreed that only the two eldest sons should rule. This soon led to serious conflicts among his numerous sons, until in 1506 his son Albrecht IV finally enacted a primogeniture law .

children

Albrecht's connection with Agnes Bernauer († 1435), daughter of Bader from Augsburg , did not result in any children. On November 6, 1436 he married Duchess Anna (1420–1474), daughter of Duke Erich I of Braunschweig-Grubenhagen-Einbeck and his wife Elisabeth of Braunschweig-Göttingen in Munich . The marriage had ten children:

literature

  • Helga Czerny: The death of the Bavarian dukes in the late Middle Ages and in the early modern period 1347–1579. Preparations - dying - funeral ceremonies - burial - memoria (= series of publications on Bavarian national history. Volume 146). CH Beck, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-406-10742-7 , pp. 197–206 (also dissertation, University of Munich 2004).
  • Bernhard Glasauer: Duke Heinrich XVI. (1393–1450) the empire of Bavaria-Landshut. Territorial politics between dynasty and empire (= Munich contributions to historical science. Volume 5). Herbert Utz Verlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-8316-0899-7 (also dissertation, University of Munich 2009).
  • Georg A. Gut: Albrecht III., Duke in Bavaria, husband of Agnes Bernauer. The life of the duke and what happened in Munich and Bavaria. Self-published, Munich 1993.
  • Karl Theodor von HeigelAlbrecht III., Duke of Baiern-Munich . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 1, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1875, pp. 231-233.
  • Renate Kremer: The disputes about the Duchy of Bavaria-Ingolstadt 1438–1450 (= series of publications on Bavarian national history. Volume 113). CH Beck, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-406-10694-3 (also dissertation, Mannheim 1989).
  • Gerda Maria Lucha: Chancellery documents, chancellery, council and system of government under Duke Albrecht III. of Bavaria-Munich (1438–1460). Lang, Frankfurt am Main et al. 1993, ISBN 3-631-43942-3 (also dissertation, Munich 1990).
  • Rupert Mittermüller : Albert the Third, Duke of Munich-Straubing. 2 parts, Thomann, Landshut 1867–1869 ( digitized version of the 1st part ).
  • Hans RallAlbrecht III., The benevolent (the pious). In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 1, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1953, ISBN 3-428-00182-6 , p. 156 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Max Spindler , Andreas Kraus (Ed.): The old Bavaria. The territorial state from the end of the 12th century to the end of the 18th century. (= Handbook of Bavarian History. Volume II). 2nd Edition. CH Beck, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-406-32320-0 .

Web links

Remarks

  1. On the origin of the Bernauerin:
    • Discussion on Kaspar Bernauer at Marita Panzer: Agnes Bernauer. The murdered 'Duchess' . Pustet, Regensburg 2007, ISBN 978-3-7917-2045-6 , pp. 11-15 .
    • For the Mardi Gras tournament, see the chronicle of Hektor Mülich 1348–1487 . In: The chronicles of the Swabian cities. Augsburg . tape 3 . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1965, p. 70 . Quoted from Alfons Huber: Agnes Bernauer in the mirror of the sources, chroniclers, historians and writers from the 15th to the 20th century. A source and reading book . Attenkofer, Straubing 1999, ISBN 3-931091-45-7 , p. 13 .
    • Claudia Märtl suspects, referring to the scant evidence of an origin from Augsburg, that Agnes attracted Albrecht's attention as a maid at the Munich court. See Claudia Märtl: Straubing. The execution of Agnes Bernauer in 1435 . In: Alois Schmid , Katharina Weigand (Hrsg.): Schauplätze der Geschichte in Bayern . CH Beck, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-406-50957-6 , p. 149–164 , here: p. 154 . Panzer, Agnes Bernauer , pp. 36–37 and p. 170, note 32, rejects this assumption.
  2. On Agnes Bernauer in Munich:
    • Munich City Archives, Tax Office No. 584 , fol. 42 r (after Marita Panzer, Agnes Bernauer , pp. 36–37).
    • City Archives Munich, Chamber Account City of Munich 1431/32 , fol. 50 v (after Alfons Huber, Agnes Bernauer im Spiegel der Quellen , p. 13). See Panzer, Agnes Bernauer , pp. 38–39.
    • City Archives Munich, Chamber Account City of Munich 1431/32 , fol. 51 r (after Alfons Huber, Agnes Bernauer im Spiegel der Quellen , p. 15). See Panzer, Agnes Bernauer , p. 41.
  3. ^ Bernhard Dietrich Haage: A previously unpublished letter from Johannes von Indersdorf. Everyday school life in the Middle Ages. In: Specialized prose research - Crossing borders. Volume 10, 2014, pp. 81–88, here: p. 82.
  4. ↑ In addition Walter Ziegler : The Wittelsbacher and the Bohemian royal throne. In: Alois Schmid , Hermann Rumschöttel (ed.): Wittelsbacher studies. Ceremony for Duke Franz of Bavaria on his 80th birthday (= series of publications on Bavarian national history. Volume 166). CH Beck, Munich 2013, ISBN 978-3-406-10781-8 , pp. 201-229, in particular 208-211.
  5. The dark side. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung. May 17, 2010.
  6. The children of the two mentioned Sibilla Neufarer and Albert vom Hof ​​again and again cannot come from Agnes Bernauer: Sibilla probably had Albrecht III. to his father, but married for the second time in 1444 and at this point already had a son, Albert vom Hof ​​was an illegitimate son of Albrecht IV, who was not born until 1447. See in detail Marita Panzer: Agnes Bernauer. Regensburg 2007, pp. 52–56.
predecessor Office successor
serious Duke of Bavaria-Munich
1438–1460
Johann IV.