Office Schönberg (Odenwald)

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The office of Schönberg was a historical administrative unit in the County of Erbach , the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt and, from 1806 to 1822, of the Grand Duchy of Hesse in its province of Starkenburg . In 1822 the office of Schönberg was added to the Lindenfels district, which was newly created in 1821 . The administrative seat was the castle or the later Schloss Schönberg in the Odenwald .

history

Schönberg Castle was first mentioned in a document in 1303 under the name castrum Schonenberg , in an arbitration award between the Lords of Breuberg and the Schenken von Erbach because of the Erbach and Schönberg palaces . The region around Schönberg Castle was part of the "Mark Heppenheim" that Charlemagne and Heppenheim gave to the imperial monastery of Lorsch on January 20, 773 . When after the decline of the monastery, in 1232 Emperor Friedrich II. The empire abbey Lorsch to the archbishopric Mainz and his bishop Siegfried III. Submitted by Eppstein for reform, the area of ​​the later office of Schönberg was in the possession of the Count Palatine .

In the year 1339 the castle was then in the possession of the Schenken von Erbach because from this year comes a document in which the Schenk Konrad von Erbach his wife Kunigunde, nee. Brugge, with will of his lords Pfalzgraf Rudolf , with a quarter of the castle Schoenberg to the slopes belong to Schoenberg, Elmshausen, Wilms home, Gronau, Zell and Reilenbach, bewittumt . In 1398 , Count Palatine Ruprecht Schenk enfeoffed Eberhard von Erbach with half of the fortress Schönberg and its part of the associated villages, and in 1438 Count Palatine Ludwig IV left the same fiefdom to the donor Otto von Erbach. In 1443 this fiefdom was renewed by Ludwig IV to the donors Konrad, Phillip and Otto von Erbach.

In the course of the Landshut War of Succession in 1504, the castle and the entire valley were devastated by the troops of Landgrave Wilhelm . As executor of the imperial ban imposed on the Electoral Palatinate, he led a campaign against the Electoral Palatinate and its allies, including the Counts of Erbach. After the armistice concluded in 1504, the taverns in Erbach complained against the Hessian Landgrave Wilhelm to surrender the castle. In 1507, Emperor Maximilian referred this complaint to the Imperial Court of Justice. The dispute ended in 1510 with a settlement after the castle was returned to the taverns of Erbach, but subject to permanent opening for Hesse. Schenk Eberhard received three quarters and Schenk Valentin a quarter of the castle as a Hessian man fief. 1530 belonged to the office and castle Schönberg the villages Schönberg, Elmshausen , Wilmshausen , Mitlechtern and Scheuerberg . The "high jurisdiction" over the places was exercised from time immemorial by the Zent Heppenheim , whose highest judge was the burgrave on the Starkenburg (over Heppenheim ), first mentioned in 1267 . In 1532, Count Palatine Ludwig V enfeoffed the Schenk Eberhard von Erbach with the castle and the same accessories as in 1530. In the same year, the Erbach taverns were raised to the status of imperial count and were thus directly subject to the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire (German Nation) . In the 16th century, the Reformation also found its way into the Odenwald. By 1544, the Counts of Erbach had introduced the Lutheran creed for their county , which the subjects had to follow.

In 1536, a dispute between Count Eberhard von Erbach and Landgrave Philipp von Hessen because of the half-office of Schönberg is recorded. Then in 1546 a settlement and arbitration ruling between Count Palatine Friedrich and Count Eberhard, Valentin and Georg von Erbach because of the office of Schönberg. In 1558 the Counts of Erbach were able to secure another right when they were awarded the previously disputed hunt in the office of Schönberg from the Electoral Palatinate. Since there were several incidents in the border area between the Electoral Palatinate and the County of Erbach due to the confusing territorial affiliation, the Palatinate Elector Friedrich III came to an agreement on June 4, 1561 . with the brothers Georg, Eberhard and Valentin, Counts of Erbach, about an area swap. As a result, the villages Lautern , Gadernheim and Reidelbach belonging to Palatinate Thalzent , as well as the share in Reichenbach came to the County of Erbach and the Erbach villages Mittershausen , Mitlechtern, Scheuerberg, Schannenbach , Knoden , Breitenwiesen and Oberlautern to the Palatinate. In 1588 Count Georg von Erbach entrusted the two Lehnesdörfer Zell and Reichenbach with 3000 florins according to the will of the Count Palatine Johann Casimir . This was to redeem the city ​​of Pfalzburg founded by George Johann I von Pfalz-Valdez , which he gave to Duke Karl III for 400,000  florins . of Lorraine had pledged. This sum never came together, so that the city fell to the Duchy of Lorraine on October 1, 1590 after the repurchase period had expired .

In 1607 a contract was signed between the Counts of Erbach and the Electoral Palatinate because of the tithe to be paid by the Office of Schönberg to the Office of Starkenburg in Mainz . In 1711 the office of Schönberg is burdened with a debt of 45,000  florins to a Frankfurt trading company.

After the devastation in the Landshut War of Succession, the office was able to recover until the Thirty Years' War , which began in 1618. In the last years of peace in particular, there was lively construction activity in the castle and the villages. In 1622 at the latest, however, the office of Schönberg also suffered from the war, when the office was raided and plundered several times by the league troops . In the mid-1630s, the Swedish-French War was the bloodiest chapter of the Thirty Years' War. The chroniclers of that time reported from the region: “Plague and hunger rage in the country and decimate the population, so that the villages are often completely empty”. When peace was signed in 1648, the population in the region had shrunk to a quarter, and many villages were deserted for years. After a short period of peace, the French Reunion Wars followed , which brought new afflictions to the region. In the autumn of 1696, during the War of the Palatinate Succession, Schönberg Palace was attacked. It was not until the Peace of Rijswijk in 1697 that the French withdrew behind the Rhine.

In 1717 the Erbacher Grafenhaus was divided and Schönberg Castle became the seat of the younger line Erbach-Schönberg under Count Georg August von Erbach-Schönberg. This received the offices of Schönberg and King and half of the reign of Breuberg . Another feudal deed has been preserved from 1722 in which Count Palatine Carl Philipp III. leaves the Schoenberg Castle and the associated villages to the Count of Erbach as a fief.

The late 18th and early 19th centuries brought far-reaching changes to Europe. As a result of the Napoleonic Wars , the Holy Roman Empire (German Nation) was reorganized by the Reichsdeputationshauptschluss of 1803. This last set of laws of the old empire implemented the provisions of the Peace of Luneville and ushered in the end of the old empire. Under pressure from Napoléon , the Confederation of the Rhine was founded in 1806 , this happened with the simultaneous withdrawal of the member territories from the Reich. This led to the laying down of the imperial crown on August 6, 1806, with which the old empire ceased to exist. On August 14, 1806, Napoleon elevated the Landgraviate of Hessen-Darmstadt to the Grand Duchy , against joining the Confederation of the Rhine and placing high military contingents in France , otherwise he threatened an invasion. The County of Erbach was mediated by the Rhine Federation Act and largely incorporated into the newly founded Grand Duchy of Hesse, including the “Office of Schönberg”. The office was initially retained as a civil office.

As early as December 9, 1803, the judicial system in the Landgraviate of Hessen-Darmstadt was reorganized through an executive order. The “Hofgericht Darmstadt” was set up as a court of second instance for the Principality of Starkenburg . The jurisdiction of the first instance was carried out by the offices or the landlords . The court court was the second instance court for normal civil disputes, and the first instance for civil family law cases and criminal cases. The superior court of appeal in Darmstadt was superordinate . With this the Zente and the associated central courts had lost their function. The regulations also applied in the Grand Duchy of Hesse, founded in 1806.

After Napoléon's final defeat, the Congress of Vienna in 1814/15 also regulated the territorial situation for Hesse and confirmed that the County of Erbach was part of the “Principality of Starkenburg” of the Grand Duchy of Hesse. As a result, provinces were formed in the Grand Duchy in 1816 and the area previously known as the “Principality of Starkenburg” was renamed “Province of Starkenburg” .

In the edict of February 17, 1820, the rights of mediatised landlords in the area of ​​the Grand Duchy of Hesse were regulated. This remained valid even after the constitution came into force on December 7th of the same year. The edict was finally repealed with the “Law on the Conditions of the Classes and Noble Court Lords” of April 15, 1848, which was passed as a result of the March Revolution in 1848 and came into force on August 9, 1848. After the edict of 1820, the lower jurisdiction remained in the competence of the landlords and was exercised in their districts in the first and second instance by their own officials. Furthermore, the gentlemen remained:

  • All of their possessions, even if they only owned them as fiefs from the emperor and empire for the duration of their male sex before the medialization .
  • all previously received tithes, basic interest rates and validities
  • all income flowing from the bondage
  • all previous gradients of mines, forests, hunting and fisheries
  • the taxes and fees that the civil servants have received up to now
  • the road and bridge fees for public roads for their maintenance
  • the noble cheering and affirmative ransom money
  • the duty exemption of all home needs
  • the exemption from road and highway money in their class lords.

After the Grand Duchy had received a new constitution in 1820, the administrative reform in 1821/22 saw the separation of jurisdiction and administration for the first time . The civil glorious rights of jurisdiction and administration remained but partially preserved until the 1848th District districts were formed for administrative tasks and the places of the "Office Schönberg" were assigned to the newly created district of Lindenfels in 1822 . District courts have been installed for jurisdiction in the first instance. Fürth became the seat of the newly created Fürth Regional Court, the area of ​​which was congruent with that of the Lindenfels district. The police forces of the former Schönau office included the mayor's offices Elmshausen with Wilmshausen, Gadernheim with Lautern and Raidelbach, Gronau, Reichenbach with Hohenstein (today a forester's house in the Reichenbach district), Rimbach Litzelrimbach (today a settlement in the Rimbach district) and Mönsbach (today as Münschbach a hamlet in the district of Rimbach), Schönberg, Zell and Zotzenbach with Mengelbach (today it belongs to the district of Zotzenbach as Unter-Mengelbach). You will on behalf of the civil rule of the Count of Erbach Schönberg from Landrath managed.

In the territorial territories of the Starkenburg province , there was still a judicial office in Michelstadt for court cases of the second instance, which was subordinate to the court.

With effect from August 1, 1826, in accordance with the announcement, the administration of the district administration's business and the judiciary of the first instance in the former Schönberg office on July 7, 1826, all functions of the dissolved Schönberg office were transferred to the Lindenfels district and the Fürth district court.

Scope of office

When the "Office Schönberg" came to the Grand Duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt in 1806, it had the following scope: Schönberg , Reichenbach , Railbach (former hamlet south of Breitenwiesen ), Elmshausen , Gadernheim , Gronau , Hohenstein , Lautern , Rimbach with Lützelrimbach , Minsbach (today as Münschbach a hamlet in the district of Rimbach), Unter-Möngelbach , Unter- and Ober-Raidelbach (today Raidelbach ), Wilmshausen , Zell , Zotzenbach .

Konrad Dahl reported in 1812 in his historical-topographical-statistical description of the principality of Lorsch, or church history of the Upper Rhinegau about the office of Schönberg:

“We now come to the Graeflich Erbachischen places belonging to Cent Heppenheim or the office of Schönberg. This office extends like an arm from the Odenwald to close to the Bergstrasse, and is a fairly fertile district, and also blessed with good wines. It belongs to a count's line of Schenken von Erbach, which is named Erbach-Schönberg, and which has jurisdiction in it. One has to note:
  1) Since the Count's residence palace Schönberg ( Mons speciosus ) is half an hour from Bensheim on a mountain, from which one has an excellent view. Nothing can be determined with certainty about the age of this castle, it was probably only built in the middle ages, and was a permanent place in the Odenwald during the times of the law of the fist and afterwards. This castle, together with its members, was initially Lorscher, and afterwards it was a Palatinate fiefdom, and as such the latter came to the House of Erbach. The Erbach taverns initially owned it as a Ganerbehaus, and a special truce was therefore built, of which Schneider delivers a certificate (No. LIII.). As a result, it became the residential palace of the Counts of Erbach-Schönberg, who have kept it in beautiful condition up to now. An altar fund was previously donated in this castle chapel. The garden by the castle is very pleasant and worth seeing.
  2) The village of Schönberg lies like half a moon around the mountain on which the castle stands, and on the Ziegelbach. It is parish in Bensheim, but the residents go to church in Gronau because they are mostly Lutheran. The place has 54 residential buildings and 402 inhabitants therein. Down at the end of the village is a mill. On the opposite side of Schönberg Palace is the Petersberg.
  3) Wilhelmshausen, also called Willmshausen and Willmannshausen, is a small village on the Lauterbach or Ziegelbach, above Schönberg with 11 houses and 78 residents.
  4) Ellmannshausen or Eimshausen is again a little further and above the previous village, 1 hour from Bensheim, also on the Ziegelbach, but is quite larger, and has 274 residents in 32 houses. At this place there are lead pits, the third part of which was given to the House of Erbach as a fief of the Electoral Palatinate. Both places parish to Bensheim.
  5) Reichenbach, a parish village one hour above Schönberg and on the Lauterbach. It is very old and comes under this name in the Lorsch Wildbannsbeschreibung from 1012. It is probably also the Reonga that appears in the Heppenheim border description 796. In 1514 this place was still directly owned by the Palatinate, and had a Palatinate scooping dish as well as two other dishes from the Schenken zu Erbach and Herr von Ulner, which both Güther and serfs had in it. The old villages of Oreuelbach and Hahnredt also belonged to the Palatinate courts. In 1561 said Reichenbach, like Lautern, Gadern and Railbach, was ceded to Erbach in exchange for the Electoral Palatinate; however, the latter has left its villages Mitlechtern, Knoden, Breitenwisen, Schannebach, Scheuerberg and Ober-Laudenbach at Kurpfalz, the latter then became the top office Lindenfels what concerns the vogteiliche jurisdiction, pulled the penny jurisdiction remained was still as I said, by the year 1714 at the Oberamt Heppenheim.
  The synodal registers at Würdwein Archidoec. Mog. TI p.468, according to Reichenboch was also a branch of Bensheim in older times, because the local church is still called Gliali Ecclesia in 152l. However, the taverns in Erbach probably soon founded a parish there, for as early as 1523 it is said that the taverns Eberhard and Valentin presented to the parish church in Reichenbach.
Reichenbach has 60 residential buildings and 545 residents. Below the village on the Lauter is a paper mill that has a good finish.
  Not far from Reichenbach, but a little to the side is
  6) Hohenstein, a small village of 8 houses with 47 residents, is just half an hour from Reichenbach.
  7) Lautern, a small village half an hour above Reichenbach an der Lauterbach ( Luitra ), appears in the Lorsch Wildbannsbeschreibung (1012) under the name Luddera . Like the previous one, it is a branch of Reichenbach, has 18 houses and 22 souls.
  8) Gadern or Gadernheim, a sizeable village (branch of Reichenbach) of 64 houses and 441 souls, is due to the origins of the Luitra , and is already mentioned by name in the Heppenheim parish description (805). From Bensheim this place is two hours away from Reichenbach but three quarters of an hour.
  9) Zell ( Cella ) a fairly sizeable village, half an hour from Bensheim and an hour from Heppenheim, and located on the Mühlbach or Meerbach , is an old place that in Trad. Laur. occurs several times. He had early on a church, what a certain Billungus the monastery Lorsch, together with all associated income presented with the cond that the Prior or else a clergyman there three times every week to worship ( Divina ) perform should. (Cod. Laur. No. 3811). This church or chapel was dedicated to h Michael, as is evident from the Necrologio Laurezham, which can be found in Book VII of the Deeds. Also in the following this Fillalkirche (von Bensheim) was kept and you can still really see some rudera of it, after which every year from Bensheim in procession, and a sermon is held to maintain the old parish and church property. Zell is quite long, has 64 houses and 358 residents. There are three mills on the Meerbach.
  10) Gronau, a Lutheran parish village, an hour and a half from Bensheim and half an hour from Schönberg, is also called Grunau and Grünau in old documents. It is located in a beautiful green valley on the Meerbach, from which Schneider also wants to derive his name. In the Erbachisch Historie p. 296, the tailor just mentioned makes the old branch church in Gronau, which is a donated Beneficium for h. Anna had an old parish church and parish, which is certainly wrong, because from the fact that local chaplains sometimes also called pastors (plebanos), as in document no. LV. at Schneider; the case seems to be a well-known matter and no real parish law can be derived from it. In the old parish register of the Bensheim parish in 1462 there is Mr. Athel Pastor in Reichenbach, and even before that he is called Johannes Athelem Plebanus in Reichenbach, and yet this was not a pastor, but only chaplain to Reichenbach, like au Wurdwein 1.c. illuminated, and also seems to flow from it, because he was buried in Bensheim.
  Gronau has 60 houses and 337 residents. Below the village but on the side there is a mill.
  11) Railbach, also called Reitelbach and Raitelbach, a small village on the borders of the former Oberamt Lindenfels and on the road that runs from Reichelsheim to Bensheim, from which the latter city is 2 hours away, is one of those places which from Electoral Palatinate were left to Erbach by exchange. It contains 63 human souls in 8 houses. It is cured in Ober- and Nieder-Railbach.
  12) Rimbach a parish village, which is completely separate from the other localities, and lies between Fürth and Möelenbach on the Weschmtz, as it really occurs in the Heppenheim mark description (774) under the name Rintbach . It is also named in a Lorsch document from the year 877 (No. 4l. Cod. Lauresh). So it's a very old place. His parish, however, is not that old, because it belonged to Mörlenbach as a branch before the Reformation, as we can see from the old Worms synodal register from 1466, where it occurs under the name Rumpach with Mörlenbach. In this place, the Archstate of Mainz still had a castle and apartment (house and castle barn) in the 16th century; which Gerhard Vetzer owned as a Mainz fiefdom, but was given as a fiefdom to the donor Conrad von Erbach von Kurmainz in 1409, which subsequently remained with this Grafliches Haus.
  Rimbach currently has 9 houses and 698 residents. It's a strong one from Fürth - but only half an hour away from Mörlenbach.
  13) Zotzenbach is also a considerable place, and a branch of Rimbach, which is half an hour away. In front of this it had a special chapel and a chaplain, to whom Schenk Heinrich bequeathed a Malter Korn annually in 1381. This place used to have a special court back in 1475, as we can see in the certificate from Schneider No. 39. 5. p. 563 teaches. Zotzenbach contains 55 houses and 432 inhabitants.
  14) Lützel-Rimbach is a hamlet and branch of Rimbach, from which it is half an hour away. It only has 3 houses with 22 souls.
  15) Monsbach or Meisenbach also called Münschbach, is also a hamlet near Rimbach with 6 houses and 84 souls.
  16) Mengelbach is no less a small hamlet of 5 houses and 44 souls, three quarters of an hour from Zotzenbach. The hamlets of Ritschweier (Rutschweiler or Ritschweiler) and Kanzelbach, which still belong to the office of Schönberg, do not belong here, but they will be discussed elsewhere.
  The whole office of Schönberg, with the exception of these two small villages, includes 1 castle and 16 villages and hamlets, in which there are 626 residential buildings and 3815 inhabitants. "

Bailiffs

The following were handed down as officials:

  • 1614 Michalel Scharf von Scharfenstein (died 1614)
  • 1663 Johann Stefhan Mayen
  • 1673 Administrator Heinrich Rudolf Stegemann
  • 1720 Johann Günter Engelschall
  • 1774 Johann Christoph Joseph

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h Wilhelm Müller: Hessisches Ortnamesbuch - Starkenburg , Darmstadt 1937, pp. 641–642
  2. ^ Manfred Schaarschmidt: The history of Schönberg. January 2003, archived from the original on March 27, 2009 ; accessed on October 15, 2015 .
  3. ↑ Law on the Conditions of the Class Lords and Noble Court Lords of August 7, 1848 . In: Grand Duke of Hesse (ed.): Grand Ducal Hessian Government Gazette. 1848 no. 40 , p. 237–241 ( online at the information system of the Hessian state parliament [PDF; 42,9 MB ]).
  4. ↑ Latest regional and ethnology: A geographical reading book for all classes, 22nd volume: Mecklenburg, Kur-Hessen, Hessen-Darmstadt , Weimar 1823, p. 358ff ( at google books )
  5. ↑ Announcement, the administration of the district administration's business and the judiciary of the first instance in the former office of Schönberg on July 7, 1826 ( Hess. Reg.Bl. p. 178 )
  6. ↑ Wilhelm von der Nahmer: Handbuch des Rheinischen Particular-Rechts: Development of the territorial and constitutional relations of the German states on both banks of the Rhine: from the first beginning of the French Revolution up to the most recent times . tape 3 . Sauerländer, Frankfurt am Main 1832, OCLC 165696316 , p. 26 ( online at google books ).
  7. ↑ L. Ewald: Historical overview of the territorial changes in the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt and the Grand Duchy of Hesse , G. Jonghaus, Darmstadt 1862. ( online at the Bavarian State Library )
  8. ↑ Konrad Dahl: Historical-topographical-statistical description of the Principality of Lorsch, or Church history of the Upper Rhinegau , Darmstadt 1812. S. 97ff ( online at Google Books )