Anton Günther (Oldenburg)

Count Anton Günther

Count Anton Günther von Oldenburg on his gray apple crane

Postage stamp of the German Reich from 1945 on the 600th anniversary of the granting of city rights to Oldenburg

Count Anton Günther von Oldenburg and Delmenhorst (born November 10, 1583 in Oldenburg ; † June 19, 1667 in Rastede ) from the House of Oldenburg , was an absolute sovereign and imperial count of Oldenburg (1603–1667) and Delmenhorst (1647–1667) within the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation .

Anton Günther is regarded as an outstanding ruler in terms of regional history, who developed his counties economically and was able to skillfully keep them out of the turmoil of the Thirty Years' War .

biography

youth

His parents were Count Johann VII of Oldenburg (1540–1603) and Elisabeth von Schwarzburg-Blankenburg . The last and politically cleverest count of the Oldenburg state dynasty, Count Anton Günther, made many trips to the royal courts in Germany and other European countries as a young man. This gave him a good insight into the political situation in the European world. The foreign policy connections he made in the process later benefited his country.

Sovereign and monarch

When his father died in 1603, he took over the government at the age of 20 and immediately continued the goals that his father Johann had started: building dykes on the Jade Bay and obtaining the Weser tariff . Both achievements meant outstanding indoor d. H. economic and foreign policy successes.

The "dyke builder"

In 1615 the damming ( Ellenser Damm ) of the Black Brack was completed near Ellens . In 2000, Jück Grodenland was wrested from the sea and the state of Oldenburg as such was enlarged accordingly; at the same time the connection between Oldenburg and Jever was established and all efforts of the East Frisian counts to expand to the Jade were stopped. In 1643 the Seefeld was diked and Grafische Vorwerk set up. This action marks the end of the diking of the Lockfleth , which has been driven by the Oldenburg counts since 1514 .

The Weser Customs

In 1612 Count Anton Günther demanded the introduction of a Weser tariff for all merchant ships using the Lower Weser in order to cover the allegedly high costs of securing the Lower Weser fairway. This led to a violent conflict with the Hanseatic city of Bremen . It was not until 1622 that Count Anton Günther was able to obtain the approval of the Electors and Emperor Ferdinand II for the introduction of the Weser tariff. The granting of the customs rights took place in 1623. In the reason for the granting it was recognized that Oldenburg was entitled to compensation for the maintenance of the beacon on the island of Wangerooge and the expenses for the bank reinforcements on the Oldenburg coast. Despite the confirmation of customs rights, Bremen refused to pay customs. In the Peace of Westphalia of 1648 the Weser tariff was repeatedly confirmed. Bremen continued to offer resistance and was therefore taken under imperial ban from 1652 to 1653 . Only with the Regensburg settlement at the Reichstag in Regensburg in 1653 did Bremen recognize the Oldenburg customs sovereignty, which in some years brought the state more than 100,000 Reichsthaler .

See also : Elsflether Weserzoll

Sovereign European foreign policy

During the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), Prince Count Anton Günther was almost the only one of the German states to largely protect his country from hardship, misery and devastation through his clever and refined policy of neutrality towards the warring powers and individual military leaders . Breeding draft horses for the artillery also turned out to be profitable. This earned him the admiration and love of his subjects. A legend tells that Anton Günther was even able to prevent the league general Graf von Tilly from the imminent attack on the city of Oldenburg by giving him valuable horses and giving him a passable exit route through the moors. In 1635 he gave the Neuenfelde estate near Elsfleth to the former Swedish, now Electoral Saxon field marshal Wolf Heinrich von Baudissin .

Domestic, agricultural and trade policy

Coat of arms of Oldenburg silver guilders (28 Stüber) around 1640

Back of Oldenburger Silbergulden (28 Stüber) around 1640

As a lover and breeder of beautiful horses, he promoted Oldenburg horse breeding in the country. The fact that he was derisively dubbed the “ stable master of the Holy Roman Empire” because of this did not bother him. Because of its policy of neutrality, administration and economy, agriculture and trade, craft and art, literature and music flourished. The military and military policy played a subordinate role. In 1608, Count Anton Günther issued the “Ordinance because of the Oldenburger Krahmer-Marckte” to stimulate trade. Since then, the Kramermarkt has become one of the largest North German fairs and still refers to Count Anton Günther, who led the annual pageant on his gray-apple crane . In October 1656 he set up a regular horse riding post from Oldenburg to Bremen. He also tried to bind important people to the country: for example, he gave his long-time friend and advisor, the Brunswick ambassador and mining entrepreneur Philipp Adolf von Münchhausen (1593–1657), newly diked marshland in Middoge near Jever.

Territorial expansion of the country

In 1623 he acquired the glory of Kniphausen and in 1647 inherited the county of Delmenhorst from the Delmenhorst count Christian IX, who died childless . It thus reached the largest area in the country.

Death and division

Coat of arms of Count Anton Günther

After sixty years of reign, Anton Günther died in his hunting lodge in Rastede . A marriage entered into in 1635 with Princess Sophie Katharina von Holstein-Sonderburg, a daughter of Duke Alexander von Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg , remained childless. His illegitimate son, who later became Count Anton von Aldenburg, came from a previous liaison with Freiin Elisabeth von Ungnad . He transferred the office of Varel , the glory of Kniphausen, the Vogtei Jade and the Hahn Vorwerk as a separate, semi-sovereign state, the county of Aldenburg . His sister Magdalene , married. Princess of Anhalt-Zerbst , he considered the hereditary rule of Jever .

Since Anton Günther had no legitimate offspring, he determined to Lehnserben the county Oldenburg-Delmenhorst to from the home Oldenburg coming King of Denmark and the Dukes of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf . The Oldenburg house was connected to Anton Günther via the branch line from the county of Delmenhorst . 1667 therefore inherited the next male relative, the King of Denmark Frederick III. the county. Administratively, the territory was administered by the German Chancellery in Copenhagen. According to Anton Günther's request, the Danish king appointed Anton von Aldenburg as governor for Oldenburg and Delmenhorst.

In 1773, under Friedrich August von Holstein-Gottorp (1711–1785), the Duchy of Oldenburg became an independent country in the Holy Roman Empire . The new dynasty (until 1918) succeeded in reuniting the three historical parts of the country.

Memberships

Anton Günther was a member of the Fruit- Bringing Society under the name of Der Inaudible .

Honors (examples)

Depiction of Count Anton Günther, who is still popular today, at the Kramermarkt parade in Oldenburg (2013)

• Historical illustrations of the count in many reproductions
• The Graf Anton Günther School in Oldenburg got his name. On the outside wall of the school next to the main entrance there is a 5 by 5 meter wall mosaic of Count Anton Günther on horseback , which Wilhelm Tegtmeier created in 1959. In 2006 a memorial was erected, which the high school graduate Florian Müller built and donated to the school.
• In Elsfleth in front of the Anton Günther's hunting lodge, a bronze equestrian statue of the count has been standing on his white horse since 2008, created by the Oldenburg sculptor Michael Ramsauer .
• The Hotel Graf Oldenburg was named after him. A large mural of Count Anton Günther is on the north wall of the house, created around 1894/1895 by the painter August Oetken on behalf of the architect Ludwig Klingenberg , brother of the industrialist Klingenberg in Berlin and the patriotic association he heads. With his fresco, Oetken created one of the landmarks of the cityscape of Oldenburg.
• In 2011 an initiative presented an equestrian statue that had already been cast and has since been promoting its installation on a public square in Oldenburg . Critics accused the initiative of resorting to an outdated absolutist iconography of rulers. In addition to the Oldenburg citizens' associations, the Nordwest-Zeitung published in Oldenburg supported the monument initiative in vain. The statue is now on the grounds of an Oldenburg gas station in front of a car wash, because a sufficiently representative place could not be found.
• The Güntherstraße in Bremen in the New Town was named after him.

See also

• List of the Counts of Oldenburg

literature

• Johann Friedrich Ludwig Theodor Merzdorf:  Anton Günther, last count of Oldenburg . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 1, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1875, pp. 491-493.
• Hermann Lübbing:  Anton Günther, Count of Oldenburg. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 1, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1953, ISBN 3-428-00182-6 , p. 317 ( digitized version ).
• Friedrich-Wilhelm Schaer: Anton Günther . In: Hans Friedl u. a. (Ed.): Biographical manual for the history of the state of Oldenburg . Edited on behalf of the Oldenburg landscape. Isensee, Oldenburg 1992, ISBN 3-89442-135-5 , pp. 37–40 ( review, inter alia, by Gerold Schmidt, in: Oldenburgische Familienkunde, year 35, issue 4/1993, pp. 774–776).
• Karl Düssmann: Count Anton Günther von Oldenburg and the Peace of Westphalia 1643–1653 . (Oldenburg Research 1) Oldenburg 1935.
• Hermann Lübbing: Count Anton Günther von Oldenburg 1583–1667. A picture of life and time . Oldenburg 1967.
• Markus Evers: Count Anton Günther. On the history of remembrance and the current presence of the oldenburg symbolic figure and 'icon'. In: Mareike Witkowski (ed.): Oldenburg memorial sites. From the castle to the hell of the north, from Count Anton Günther to Horst Janssen. Isensee Verlag, Oldenburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-89995-777-8 , pp. 133-208.
• Markus Evers: A regional place of remembrance in national contexts. German locations of Count Anton Günther von Oldenburg (1583 - 1667) from Vormärz to the present. In: Miloš Řezník, Katja Rosenbaum, Jos Stübner (eds.): Regional places of remembrance. Bohemian countries and central Germany in a European context (studies on European regional history 1). Edition Kirchhof & Franke, Leipzig a. Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-933816-60-3 , pp. 195-215.
• Karl Veit Riedel: August Oetken . In: Hans Friedl u. a. (Ed.): Biographical manual for the history of the state of Oldenburg. Edited on behalf of the Oldenburg landscape. Isensee, Oldenburg 1992, ISBN 3-89442-135-5 , pp. 534-535.
• Gerold Schmidt: The church painter and mosaic artist of historicism Prof. August Oetken (1868–1951), co-designer of the Melanchthon House in Bretten . In: Stefan Rhein and Gerhard Schwinge (eds.): The Melanchthon House Bretten. An example of the Reformation commemoration at the turn of the century . Verlag Regionalkultur, Ubstadt-Weiher 1997, ISBN 3-929366-63-0 , pp. 167–212 (review inter alia by: Rolf Schäfer , in: Oldenburger Jahrbuch. Volume 98, 1998, p. 179)
• Jörgen Welp : The coat of arms decoration of the gravestones of Count Anton I of Oldenburg and Delmenhorst and Countess Sophias in the Oldenburg St. Lamberti Church . In: Oldenburger Jahrbuch 113 (2013), pp. 29–42.

Web links

Commons : Anton Günther (Oldenburg)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Literature about Anton Günther in the catalog of the German National Library
• Publications by and about Anton Günther in VD 17 .
• Count Anton Günther in the culture portal Northwest

Individual evidence

1. ↑ https://www.zeit.de/zeit-geschichte/2017/05/dreissigjaehriger-krieg-westfaelische-frieden-syrien-georg-schmidt-interview/seite-2 , zeit.de, accessed on August 10, 2019
2. ^ Wilhelm Gilly de Montaut: Fortress and Garrison Oldenburg. Oldenburg 1981. ISBN 3-87358-132-9 . Page 11.
3. ↑ Art in public space with one click
4. ↑ ^{a b} Count Anton Günther on the pedestal? ( Memento of January 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Retrieved July 27, 2011.
5. ↑ Press review July 26: Monument protection and advertising ( Memento from January 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on July 27, 2011.
6. ↑ The Oldenburg Count's ride ends at the petrol station In: Delmenhorster Kreisblatt dated July 16, 2015.

predecessor	Office	successor
John VII	Count of Oldenburg 1603–1667	Friedrich III.
Christian IX	Count of Delmenhorst 1647–1667	Friedrich III.