Christian Detlev zu Rantzau

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Christian Detlev zu Rantzau

Christian Detlev zu Rantzau (* 1670 ; † November 10, 1721 in Barmstedt ) was an imperial count of the imperial county of Rantzau .

He was a grandson of the first Imperial Count Christian zu Rantzau . Christian Detlev took over the inheritance from his father Detlev zu Rantzau after he died in 1697 on the Drage estate . His rule was marked by disputes with the Danish King Christian V , who was also Duke of Holstein . Christian Detlev was allegedly murdered by his brother Wilhelm Adolf zu Rantzau .

The belligerent count

His father had agreed with the Norwegian viceroy Ulrik Fredrik Gyldenløve that Christian Detlev should marry his daughter. The Gyldenløves came from an illegitimate branch of the Danish royal family. Christian Detlev broke the agreement and refused the marriage. He did not pay an outstanding contractual penalty of 30,000 Reichstalers , with which he incurred the resentment of the Danish king. The relationship with the Danish royal family worsened after the imperial count complained to the emperor of the empire about the Holstein duke because of territorial disputes with Christian V.

Christian Detlev had a bad reputation in his county. He was considered despotic and exhausted his subjects so financially that there were repeated uprisings. To combat this, he asked for the help of Georg Heinrich von Görtz in 1705 , who served as guardian for the Gottorf Duke Karl Friedrich . Görtz then sent 60 dragoons to the county, which remained after the unrest had ended. The Gottorf family were interested in Christian Rantzau's property and offered him 201,000 thalers for the county, which he did not want to sell. The small occupying power nevertheless remained on the Rantzau lands and officials were even sent from Schleswig to take over the administration of the county and to swear the population to the Gottorf Duke. The Danish king and the German emperor protested, but did not intervene. Only with the events of the Great Northern War and the fall of the House of Gottorf in 1713 did these disputes come to an end for the time being.

Christian Detlev traveled to Berlin in 1714 , where he was imprisoned in 1715. He was accused of sodomy , the then common term for homosexual acts. Since the Reichsgraf was never married and various witnesses could be found for the allegations, he was sentenced to imprisonment in Spandau . During this time his brother Wilhelm Adolf zu Rantzau took over the administration of the imperial county. Christian Detlev was given the opportunity to buy himself out, but he did not raise the 50,000 thalers demanded by the Prussian king .

In 1720 he was released from captivity due to the emperor's objection and returned to Barmstedt to his castle in Rantzau . While his brother Wilhelm Adolf had successfully represented him there and gained some popularity among the people, Christian Detlev continued his earlier, dissolute lifestyle.

The murder

The memorial stone to Christian Detlev zu Rantzau in the Vosslocher forest

In 1721 the imperial count was in the Barmstedt Forest together with a companion on a snipe hunt when a bullet fired from the undergrowth hit him and fatally injured him. If it was initially assumed that it was a tragic accident, shortly afterwards the brother Wilhelm Adolf was suspected of murder. Up to the present it could not be proven whether and to what extent the accusations were correct. Wilhelm Adolf was nevertheless arrested as the instigator of the murder and imprisoned in Akershus in 1726 , a lieutenant named Detlev Prätorius was sentenced to death and beheaded, and other alleged confidants were whipped and branded. The county and the goods Drage , Breitenburg and Rantzau were soon confiscated by the Danish king.

At the alleged crime scene in the Vosslocher Forest near Barmstedt, a memorial stone today commemorates the murder of Christian Detlev zu Rantzau.

Interesting

Christian Detlev Rantzau was a cousin of Constantia von Cosel , the most famous of the mistresses of Augustus the Strong . During his imprisonment in Spandau he is said to have kept the marriage contract signed by August hidden there, which the king needed to separate from Countess Cosel without causing a stir.

literature

Commons : Christian Detlev zu Rantzau  - collection of images, videos and audio files
  • Richard Haupt: Barmstedt and Rantzau , Vollbehr & Riepen, approx. 1920
  • Henning v. Rumohr: castles and mansions in western Schleswig-Holstein . Weidlich Verlag, Würzburg, 1988
  • A fictional representation pseudonymously published in the gazebo two years before the Second Schleswig-Holstein War assumes a Danish participation in the murder of Christian Detlev.
    Wikisource: "JE Mand": A Dark Story  - Sources and Full Texts

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