Caspar von Schönberg (politician)

Caspar von Schönberg (born April 13, 1570 in Schönau ; † June 9, 1629 in Dresden ) was a politician from the Electorate of Saxony.

Life

Caspar von Schönberg's father was Hans Wolf von Schönberg auf Pulsnitz , his mother Ursula von Schönberg nee. Carlowitz . He went to school in Guteborn , and from 1587 for three years to study in Leipzig. A fellow student later said that he had not known anyone from Adel who had so incessantly lay over the books day and night. 1590–1592 he undertook a cavalier tour, which he u. a. led to Strasbourg, Venice, Padua and Rome. Afterwards he stayed in Malta for some time.

In 1599 he became assessor at the Electoral Saxon Court of Appeal, 1601 Court Councilor, 1604 Privy Councilor and President of the Court of Appeal. In 1605 he married Agnes von Haugwitz, the daughter of the electoral councilor Ernst Hans von Haugwitz. The marriage remained childless.

Under Elector Johann Georg I , Caspar von Schönberg rose to become President of the Privy Council. He then shaped Saxon foreign policy for over a decade, especially in the initial phase of the Thirty Years' War, when the Elector left all important strategic decisions to him. In 1619, for example, Schönberg established the alliance between Saxony and Ferdinand of Austria , against the rebels who were united in the Bohemian Confederation . In 1620 Saxon troops occupied Upper and Lower Lusatia on behalf of the Emperor . The two countries came into pledge possession by Electoral Saxony as a replacement for unreimbursed war costs.

Because of his good relations with the Viennese court, Caspar von Schönberg managed to ensure that his brother Hans Wolff, who had participated in the uprising against the emperor in Upper Lusatia, did not have to fear any punishment.

When the Saxon policy of the alliance with the Habsburgs could hardly be continued because the victorious imperialists no longer paid any attention to the Protestant Electoral Saxony, Schönberg died in 1629. His grave was in the Sophienkirche, which was destroyed in 1945 .

swell

• Hoe von Hoenegg: Christian corpse sermon Caspar von Schönberg on Pulsnitz and Gurigk ... 1629
• Hermann Knothe : History of the Upper Lusatian nobility and their goods from the 13th to the end of the 16th century. Leipzig 1879
• Frank Müller: Electoral Saxony and the Bohemian Uprising 1618–1622. Munster 1997.

Web links

• Christian Heinker: Caspar von Schönberg (zu Pulsnitz) (1570–1629) . In: Institute for Saxon History and Folklore (Ed.): Saxon Biography .