Christine von Diez
Christine von Diez (born August 22, 1571 in Siegen , † 1637 in Benfeld ) was the youngest daughter of Anna of Saxony (1544–1577) . The Dutch legal scholar Jan Rubens is considered her father . Christine von Diez is therefore the half-sister of the famous painter Peter Paul Rubens .
The question of paternity was critically examined in two publications by the German-Australian author Maike Vogt-Lüerssen and the Saxon homeland researcher Hans-Joachim Böttcher . However, it is undisputed among historians and archivists that Jan Rubens, who had an affair with Anna of Saxony at the time of conception, must be viewed as the father and not Anna's then husband Wilhelm of Orange . This was most recently stated in the extensive biography “Anna of Saxony. The Scarlet Lady of Orange ”, which the US historian Ingrun Mann presented in 2016, confirms.
Childhood: Siegen and Beilstein
Christine was born on August 22, 1571 at Siegen Castle . By then, her mother had already been charged with adultery with her close adviser and friend Jan Rubens and was placed under house arrest.
Due to a rapidly deteriorating social climate at the castle, where Anna was noticed by, among other things, violent swearing against the family of her husband Wilhelm of Orange, excessive drinking and violence against her staff, she was given a joint decision by Saxony on October 1, 1572, Hesse and Nassau were brought to Schloss Beilstein , a secondary residence in Nassau, where their house arrest continued.
Little Christine accompanied her mother and lived at Beilstein Castle until she was four years old. A maid was responsible for the girl here.
Anna von Sachsen only mentioned her daughter Christine once in the many letters she wrote from Siegen and Beilstein. Her other children, too, whom she no longer had with her, only appeared very rarely in her lifelong correspondence. Anna made in Beilstein more and more the impression of a physically and mentally seriously ill person.
When Wilhelm of Orange divorced Anna in 1575 because of her adultery, she was brought back to her homeland by order of her uncle, Elector August von Sachsen , where she died in 1577 under miserable circumstances, walled up almost alive. Offers from her brother-in-law, Count Johann VI. von Nassau-Dillenburg had repeatedly refused to come back to his residence.
Childhood: Dillenburg
When Christine was brought to Dillenburg in 1575, she was nicknamed "von Diez", because the county of Nassau-Diez was originally intended as part of her mother's widow's pension.
She grew up at Dillenburg Castle under the care of the lady-in-waiting Magdalena Kreutzer (the "old Kreutzin"). Christine preferred to play with Juliane, Maria, Anna Sibylla and “was particularly friends with Philipp ”, the children of Count Johann VI. (the brother of William of Orange) and his wife Elisabeth von Leuchtenberg, by the way, all older than her. Christine was treated like their own child by the couple with the support of grandmother Juliane von Stolberg "for Christ's mercy" - not exactly a matter of course for a bastard .
The upbringing of children in related families was often practiced at that time by the House of Nassau and the dynasties with which it was closely related, partly due to circumstances, partly also to strengthen strategic connections. Illegitimate descendants were also included in this practice.
It is uncertain whether the little girl noticed anything about her origins at this time. Historians believe that it was nothing more than a rumor or a low whisper that could have affected an ignorant child.
The happy childhood years were over when Christine was 10 years old. Elisabeth von Leuchtenberg died in 1579, shortly afterwards the Kreutzerin and in 1580 the elderly Juliane von Stolberg. Thereupon Johann had the “woman's room” in the castle dissolved. The other children were housed at friendly count courts, but for Christine only the Keppel monastery came into question. That wasn't such a bad choice, though.
Keppel
Keppel Abbey near Hilchenbach , around 20 km north of Siegen, still exists today. A grammar school with event and conference rooms is housed in the spacious, representative buildings.
Originally, Keppel was a Premonstratensian monastery , which Wilhelm the Rich dissolved during the Reformation and converted into a Protestant monastery . In addition to "20 virgins to be admitted" who had decided entirely for a religious life, a school was set up for underage girls. Here they should be prepared for an energetic, civic life in accordance with the Protestant work ethic ,
"So that afterwards, the sooner and better, they come to good marriages, services and other opportunities, to nourish themselves with God and honor, and thus for themselves, who may be useful and beneficial to themselves and others all the time of their lives."
Accordingly, in addition to religious education, reading, writing and arithmetic, the curriculum included all manual skills to run a household, from spinning, sewing and knitting to distilling and cooking to gardening and looking after the cattle. These skills, which her mother Anna had so frowned upon, would benefit Christine enormously in her later life.
The stay in Keppel lasted much longer than initially planned and in 1586/87 the headmistress warned for the first time that her pupil from Dillenburg would soon have reached the end of his studies.
The young woman is described as a “fine person” with “fear of God, good behavior, strangely good understanding and innocence”.
Efforts for Christine's future
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While Christine stayed in Keppel, Johann VI., Who still felt responsible for her, sparked a never-ending hustle and bustle to persuade the other parties concerned, namely Hesse, Saxony and the Orange in the Netherlands, to take care of the maintenance to contribute something to the child and also to provide a handsome trousseau, so that a marriage into the nobility was possible.
He pointed out that "this poor innocent white is left by everyone, however". Due to the freedom war of the Netherlands against Spain, which he supported to the brink of national bankruptcy, he himself was at the end of his financial possibilities.
In correspondence, the matter was still felt to be so delicate that Christine's name was encrypted. Mostly the talk was of "the child" or "Christinus".
Christine herself was also constantly writing letters to her relatives, but just as little received a response. Hesse and Saxony did not feel responsible and the Prince of Orange, who was fighting for his life and the existence of the Netherlands, no one dared to ask about the illegitimate child of his second wife.
Several marriage plans, which were launched from the Dillenburg residence, petered out again for a variety of reasons, although the future husband was not expected to have a large property. But it should be a “fine, pious, young fellow”.
Similar to her mother Anna of Saxony, it became clear to Christine at this stage that Johann VI, the ruling Count of Nassau-Dillenburg and the only living brother of Wilhelm von Oranien, was the only one she could rely on. She was all the more afraid that she would be completely alone if Johann died. She could no longer appeal to William of Orange, because he had been murdered in 1584.
The older Christine got, the more critical she felt about her situation. She herself had known about her real parents since 1590, "what she grieved and complained about to the highest". What's more, her origins penetrated the pen too, whereupon she felt observed and cut.
In 1595, when she was 24 years old, had long outgrown her schooling and was immediately noticeable because of her external appearance, Johann reported about her:
“She feels it painful that she should be locked up like a prisoner all her life and not have friends like her companions who would address her and visit her. She had nowhere to go, or speak to anyone, without drawing a major reprimand for the sake of her origins and deplorable condition. Their shame would be made known and spread more and more. "
There were also material needs. Christine once wrote to the count that she didn't even have any more money for a new petticoat. The old one was no longer usable after two years of constant patching.
The letter to Moritz of Orange
Things changed when Christine did what she wasn't supposed to: she wrote directly to Moritz von Oranien in May 1595 .
Moritz was the first-born son of Christine's mother Anna and her husband Wilhelm von Oranien. He had assumed the role of his father in the struggle for independence against Spain and, in contrast to this, was to prove himself to be an important and successful military leader.
Moritz decided to pay Christine an annual pension of 594 guilders and, in the event of her marriage, to pay a dowry of 16,000 guilders. As a guarantee for this he pledged the income of a small lordship near The Hague. In return, Christine had to waive all further claims and agree not to approach the House of Orange-Nassau with any further information.
16,000 guilders was a considerable sum. The historian Hellmuth Gensicke described it as a "very rich settlement" and a bridegroom was not long in coming.
Marriage, offspring and move to Langendernbach
Christine married on December 3, 1597 Johann Wilhelm von Welschenengsten called Bernkott (* around 1570 , † 1636 ), who came from a family living in the border area between Wildenburg , Nassau and Sayn . The wedding took place at Dillenburg Castle, where the couple initially lived. Their three children were probably born here.
1602 the family moved to the south of Westerburg located village Langendernbach where Bernkott dowry his wife a Adelshof, called the courtyard house bought.
In 1602 Langendernbach was still in the middle of the county of Nassau-Dillenburg. Due to the after the death of John VI. In 1606 the division of the estate, which had several small aristocratic courts and rich meadows in the Elbbachtal , was added to the newly formed county of Nassau-Hadamar , which fell to Johann's youngest son, Johann Ludwig . This would play a disastrous role in Christine and Bernkott's later life.
Johann Wilhelm von Welschenengsten called Bernkott
The von Welschenengsten family, who belonged to the lower nobility as Junkers, named themselves after their original origin from Welschen Ennest near Olpe in Westphalia. Initially, the Wildenburg counts were served , but in the mid-14th century their main residence was moved to Hachenburg in the county of Sayn.
The eldest brother Heinrich Balthasar, Saynischer Hofrat, inherited most of the family property near Hachenburg, Johann Wilhelm inherited the valuable "House Andernach" on the Rhine and some farms in the counties of Sayn and Wied . The youngest brother Hermann remained single and lived in Johann Wilhelm's household until his untimely death.
In contrast to his older brother, Johann Wilhelm (now called Bernkott) embarked on a military career and went into Nassau service, like his great-uncle Konrad in 1527 as a bailiff in Beilstein . Bernkott brought it to the burgrave in Dillenburg in 1597, so he was responsible for the important office of military organization and defense of the castle.
In addition, Bernkott was made captain of Count Johann VI. launched "Landrettungswerk" for Nassau. Significant in the development of the modern standing army of conscripts, Johann VI. from 1584 on nationwide militias and had them trained militarily in order to be prepared for the attack of the Spaniards feared by him against the Westerwald relatives of William of Orange. A captain was the commander of those conscripts in a particular district.
In 1602, Bernkott was handed over as "Lieutenant Colonel" the operational management of the military troops of the Wetterau Counts' Association , certainly a high military honor. Later he also served other gentlemen, such as Hanau-Münzenberg and Brandenburg.
Bernkott was interested in many things. He also tried his hand at being an entrepreneur, bought a coal mine and had rock samples examined for gold and silver.
His biographer Josef Hörle describes the "rough, aggressive and nerdy warrior" Bernkott as "a Junker of a little known sex who was ambitious and not sensitive and who could use the rich dowry for his advancement".
The sources also emphasize several times how Bernkott actively helped people in need, such as an impoverished old woman, or that in 1612, when hunger was rampant in Langendernbach, he gave the community the money for 40 Malter grain (around 3500 kilos of rye) advanced to distribute it to those in need.
Jähzorn changed at Bernkott with friendly sociability. So he threatened the stubborn steward of a small good at Ellar , which he wanted to buy, "soon to shave his beard" and grabbed his sword. Then Bernkott thought better of himself and drank “two measures of wine” with the “bad farmer”, who was just called the “bad farmer”.
Bernkott had two people who balanced his temper. On the one hand, this was his “indulgent and patient” wife Christine, who was described by her sons-in-law as a “pious marital noble woman”. On the other hand, he could rely on manager Theis Hörlen, "who reconciled the sudden nature of his Junker and the stubbornness of the peasants in a healthy way".
Life in the courtyard house
The courtyard house was built in 1556 by Oswald von Obentraut and his wife Magdalena von Reifenberg .
Like the Reifenberg, the Obentraut were an old noble family from the Westerwald region. They got their name from the later village Aventrothe (also: Abintrode) between Langendernbach and Wilsenroth. Several generations of the Obentraut served as Westerburger Burgmannen from the 14th to the 16th century .
The couple, who remained childless, bequeathed the courtyard house to a branch of the family in the Palatinate. The last owner from there was Johann Barthel von Obentraut. Bernkott bought the property from him in 1602 for 9,000 guilders, an amount that he could take from his wife's dowry.
The courtyard house had a few agricultural outbuildings, apartments for the servants and a mill. The property was also much larger than it is today and the main building was secured with a moat and drawbridge. So the courtyard house represented a sizable little aristocratic residence high above the old town center. Bernkott soon expanded the house with the stone cross wing and tower.
The courtyard house included numerous properties subject to tax, which were scattered over 13 Westerwald villages.
Bernkott quickly set about expanding this property and bought more properties. In Langendernbach he acquired five of the ten other farms that existed in the village in addition to the courtyard house: the Klosterhof, the Brambachshof (also known as "Volenhof"), the Rörichshof, the Emmerichshof and the Cuntzenhof. He was not always squeamish, so that Count Johann Ludwig had to intervene from Hadamar.
Junker Bernkott argued that the fields in Langendernbach are extremely fragmented and difficult to cultivate in this condition. In a paper dated July 23, 1626, he also detailed how the peasants tried to trick him with all possible methods when collecting tithing.
It is not known whether the marriage between Bernkott and Christine was happy in today's romantic sense. But the time up to the outbreak of the Thirty Years War in 1618 was probably the best time of her life for Christine. She was the mistress of a small castle, lived in peace and was able to use the skills she had acquired in the Keppel monastery to manage a household and an agricultural estate.
From this time many letters have come down to us from the daughters of William of Orange, from which it emerges that Christine corresponded regularly and lovingly with them, for example with Emilia Antwerpiana and Charlotte Brabantina , both daughters of Wilhelm with his third wife Charlotte de Bourbon . Occasionally Charlotte would send her presents, which was a great pleasure.
Emilia Antwerpiana once sent greetings from Christine to Charlotte Brabantina, noting:
"No servant could love her mistress more than she loves you."
Another time Emilia wrote to Charlotte that Christine did not speak French and that she was very sorry that she could not write to her herself:
“She would so much like to bear testimony of how much she values your efforts to assure her, with your own hand, of the endurance of your dear memory of her. She affirms that she will never forget this favor. She asked me to assure you a lot more, but ... it would take a long time to tell you all about that. In short, your friendliness has taken her heart. "
Christine ("Madame Crétiene") is mentioned 21 times in the first volume of the correspondence between Emilia Antwerpiana and her relatives, edited in 2009 (not including possible other spellings of the name), so the contacts must have been very intense.
Bernkott was often away from home because of his military obligations. In the ten years between 1601 and 1611 he is said to have hardly been to Langendernbach. In Theis (Matthias) Hörle, however, he had a capable and always reliable administrator who wrote: "Madias Horlen bernekod's dinner too long Dermbach."
You needed that too. For in 1611 and 1616, for example, the plague caused great problems. Whole harvests failed. In Langendernbach, 9 out of 44 families were virtually wiped out.
Bernkott and Christine had opportunities to withdraw from the area with the children. For a while, in autumn 1631, people stayed in the Andernach am Rhein house , a residence owned by the Bernkotts, a large property with arable land, gardens and a vineyard.
Bruch Castle
From 1624 Bernkott also had a renaissance castle at Bruch an der Wied , which Georg V. von Sayn-Wittgenstein had pledged to him. He was able to pay a total of 1,600 gold guilders and 700 Reichsthaler to Georg in cash.
With Gensicke it can be assumed that the family lived most of the time in Schloss Bruch between 1624 and 1636. Bernkott will hardly have leased the prestigious property for a lot of money and then leave it empty. In contrast, the courtyard house looked downright rural and poor. Here one could not receive the noble families with whom the children were married in an appealing way. So in 1630 the daughter Catharina married Arndt von Quernheim, who came from a Westphalian noble family .
The Thirty-Year War
During the Thirty Years' War , Langendernbach and the Hofhaus, like the entire Westerwald, were massively affected by changing troops of various origins.
In 1624 and 1626 there were attacks on the villagers. In 1632 and 1633 it was the Swedes, in 1634 and 1635 Count Mansfeld's troops, who marched through the villages, demanding contributions, confiscated, plundered, pillaged and murdered. In addition, at times over half of Langendernbach's able-bodied men were drafted into the Nassau troops. The income of the courtyard house fell accordingly.
Added to this were the activities of their own sovereign, Johann Ludwig von Nassau-Hadamar , who was referred to several times as a farmer . He systematically bought farm estates in order to pursue large-scale cattle breeding. So he turned the village of Hölzenhausen north of Westerburg into an estate after the residents had to leave their houses, and founded the farms in Stöcken and Dapprich. For the latter, he bought several forests and meadows from the Langendernbach residents in the 1620s, which further reduced the supply of the village and the courtyard house.
Charges against Bernkott
The Bernkott family was undone by the collaboration between Johann Wilhelm von Welschenengsten and the Swedes , which Johann Ludwig von Nassau-Hadamar and Ferdinand von Bayern , the reigning Elector of Cologne, claimed, and who have been on a seemingly unstoppable triumphal march through Germany since 1631 under Gustavus Adolf found. Allegedly, in 1633, Bernkott had been a colonel in a Swedish troop unit and even helped the Swedes to conquer Andernach.
To this day, the allegations from the sources could not be clearly clarified, but became an occasion to take away their property from the Bernkotts. In 1636, Elector Ferdinand confiscated the Andernach house.
Worse still, Johann Ludwig collected further evidence against the "traitor" Bernkott, confiscated the entire family property on September 1, 1637 with an imperial patent and from then on ran the farms in Langendernbach on his own. The remaining staff was taken over at the same time.
The house was completely cleared out in 1637 by representatives of the Count of Hadamer. Even a box with personal belongings that Christine had been able to bring to Dillenburg was broken into there in June 1638.
Death of Bernkott, escape and death of Christine
Bernkott himself was no longer alive then. After the indictment and a summons to Bonn by the Elector to try him, he fled and returned to Langendernbach via several stops, where he died in 1636.
Christine then sold the horses and released most of the servants. In 1636 she traveled via Hadamar and Strasbourg to Benfeld in Alsace. There her son Hans Henrich was an officer in the Swedish troops, which in 1632 took the Benfeld Fortress with the support of Nassau. Her son-in-law Arndt von Quernheim was now in command of the fortress.
Hans Henrich fell seriously ill in 1637 and died.
Christine died that same year, around Christmas 1637, at the age of 67.
Theis Hörlen and the struggle for goods
Langendernbach and her beloved courtyard house had never seen Christine again. The cellar (manager) Theis Hörlen remained there, who now plowed the fields with a single farmhand and a team of oxen.
Theis, whom Christine called the “honorable and distinguished Mattheis Hörlen, Keller zu long Dernbach, her dearest godfather” shortly before her death and who bequeathed him a farm in the neighboring town of Irmtraut , was again the one on whom all hopes rested. Because the bereaved made unrelenting efforts to get their goods back from Johann Ludwig. The estate should be kept in operation for that long.
And it was Theis Hörlen to whom the letters from Christine's daughters and daughters-in-law were directed, like Juliana on February 28, 1638. Juliana was the young widowed wife of Christine's son Hans Heinrich.
“The crown of my head has fallen off; my friend is buried underground ... Oh, dear godfather, think how I would be if I didn't have my brother-in-law the Colonel and were here alone among the strangers! ... How I asked so heartily to come down to you, and God admit that it may happen soon. Oh my lb. Godfather, I wanted to send you something! So the bot can't take anything with it - but so that you can see that I'm still thinking of you, I'll send your Katharinchen a hair line to wear for me. When we get together, I would really like to stick to you, your wife and children, as I greet you kindly ... "
The man from Weißenberg in the High Westerwald, whose ancestors had served the Nassau Counts for generations, had to cope with a difficult situation, because at the same time his new master Johann Ludwig demanded his full loyalty. Without Hörlen's operational and legal knowledge of the confused situation after 20 years of war, no one would have got the estate up and running.
Return of the courtyard house
After Arndt von Quernheim died, Christine's daughter Catarina married the Alsatian baron Hugo Weyrich von Berstett in 1641 , who was in the imperial service, which also allowed the demands for the return of the goods to be given more emphasis.
The Peace of Westphalia of 1648 provided for the return to the ownership structure of 1628. And so the descendants of Christine and Bernkott came back into possession of the estate on February 6, 1649. Theis Hörle resumed her service, but after a few years retired to his farm in Irmtrauter, where he died in 1656.
Since then, the buildings and properties of the Hofhaus have had a very eventful ownership history. In the 18th century it belonged as a manorial domain to the Oranien-Nassau government in Dillenburg. Currently (2019) the local company Schmidt Tone has leased the listed building and uses it as a guest house.
The portraits of Christine von Diez
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There are two paintings ascribed to Christine von Diez. Both do not show them.
It was sometimes assumed that the picture of a young girl, also part of the pedigree in the Langendernbach courtyard house, was Christine in a younger age.
In fact, the painting is by Peter Paul Rubens, as Ben van Beneden, the director of the Antwerp Rubenshuis announced in 2015, and probably shows Rubens' daughter Clara Serena. The picture was probably made between 1620 and 1623.
Maike Vogt-Lüerssen spreads the claim on her website klio.org and in her book “Anna von Sachsen” without citing the source that a painting by the Flemish master Adriaen Thomasz Key (1544–1590) with the title “Portrait of a Woman” is the image of the Christine von Diez. With this, Vogt-Lüerssen wants to prove her thesis that the father is not Jan Rubens but Wilhelm von Orange, because she believes she has discovered a similarity between the woman and Wilhelm (p. 89). The painting was taken from kleio.org under the wrong title Christine von Diez in Wikipedia in 2014 and also appeared in numerous other publications.
It is not possible that the picture shows Christine von Diez. Adriaen Key, who also painted a well-known portrait of William of Orange, most likely never came to Germany. After his flight as a persecuted Calvinist from Antwerp to Schelde in 1585 at the latest, he no longer had the opportunity to leave the Netherlands.
At the time, Christine was 14 years old. When Key died in 1589, she was 18 years old, while the picture appears to be of an older woman.
Also the basic monograph Adriaen Thomasz. Key by the Dutch art historian Koenraad Jonckheere does not record any knowledge of who the unknown woman was. Striking and “an exception for the artist's portraits” is the “unusually expensive clothing”.
Christine's foster father Johann VI., Who had dismissed all artists from his court due to his financial problems, will hardly have brought a celebrated and correspondingly expensive artist from the Netherlands to have the "bastard" Christine von Diez painted in the Keppel monastery. The valuable clothing also speaks against it.
The original is in the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rennes .
progeny
- Hans Heinrich († 1637). Married Juliana Loysa von Burckhausen. Two children: Catharina Elisabeth and Loysa Christina.
- Anna Elisabeth. Married Johann Philipp von Dettlingen zu Stotzheim in 1637.
- Catharina († around 1675). First marriage in 1635 to Arndt von Quernheim (1600–1638). Married Hugo Weirich zu Berstett († 1657) for the second time in 1641.
From the first marriage of the daughter Catharina to Arndt von Quernheim, descendants can be traced to this day.
literature
- Ingrun Mann: Anna of Saxony. The Scarlet Lady of Orange. Winged Hussar Publishing, Point Pleasant (New Jersey) 2016, ISBN 978-1-945430-22-0 (penultimate chapter: "Christine").
- Susan Broomhall / Jacqueline Van Gent: Gender, Power and Identity in the Early Modern House of Orange-Nassau . Routledge, London and New York 2016.
- Hans-Joachim Böttcher : Princess Anna of Saxony 1544–1577. A life tragedy . Dresdner Buchverlag, Dresden 2013, ISBN 978-3-941757-39-4 .
- Ilse-Marie Barton: The lonely child of Keppel. In: Siegerländer Heimatkalender 2010, pp. 99-104.
- Josef Quernheim: Of people and walls. The courtyard house in Langendernbach. Langendernbach 2002.
- Jean Luc Tulot: Correspondance D'Amélie de Nassau, Duchesse de Landsberg, 1593-1612 . 2009.
- Hellmuth Gensicke : The Bernkott von Welschenengsten. In: Nassauische Annalen 1991, pp. 225-236.
- Alfred Lück: Christine von Diez. In: Siegerland 1977. pp. 108–114.
- Alfred Lück: Siegerland and Nederland. Siegerländer Heimatverein, Siegen 1967.
- Bruch Castle. In: The art monuments of the Rhine province. Sixteenth Volume, Division I: The Art Monuments of the Altenkirchen District. Düsseldorf 1935. pp. 42-44. Here is a drawing of the entire palace complex.
- Josef Hörle: Langendernbach in good and bad days. History of a Westerwald village community. Langendernbach 1957.
- Josef Hörle: Junker Bernkott zu Langen-Dernbach and his cellar M. Hörlen. In: Nassau homeland. Supplement to the Rheinische Volkszeitung. 1/1925. Pp. 4-6.
- Karl Wolf: Christine von Diez. In: Siegerland 1938. pp. 104–107.
- Hans Kruse : Christine von Diez. In: Siegerland 1937. pp. 135–140.
- Hans Kruse: Wilhelm of Orange and Anna of Saxony. A princely marriage tragedy of the 16th century. In: Nassauische Annalen 1934, pp. 1–184.
Web links
- Ingrun Mann: The Scarlet Lady of Orange . Accessible only in parts.
- Entry on Christine von Diez in the Rhineland-Palatinate personal database
- Entry on Christine von Diez in the Hessian biography of the State Historical Information System of Hesse
Individual evidence
- ^ Maike Vogt-Lüerssen: Anna of Saxony. Book on Demand, 2008.
- ↑ Hans-Joachim Böttcher : Princess Anna of Saxony 1544-1577. A life tragedy. Dresdner Buchverlag, 2013. ISBN 978-3-941757-39-4 .
- ↑ See also Anna von Sachsen (1544–1577) #Debate about adultery - fact or "Nassau conspiracy"?
- ↑ Literature for this section: Mann, pp. 189–246, 300; Kruse, Ehetragödie, pp. 84-132; Kruse, Christine, pp. 135-136; Wolf, p. 104.
- ↑ Lück, p. 108
- ↑ Barton, p. 100
- ↑ Broomhall / van Gent, p. 67
- ↑ Literature for this section: Mann, p. 300; Kruse, Christine, pp. 135-136; Wolf, pp. 104-105; Lück, pp. 108-109; Barton, p. 100.
- ↑ Kruse, Christine, p. 136
- ↑ Quotation from Kruse, Christine, p. 136.
- ↑ Kruse, Christine, p. 136
- ↑ Mann, p. 302
- ↑ Wolf, p. 106
- ↑ Kruse, Christine, pp. 137-138
- ↑ the total sum that Nassau-Dillenburg raised for the Netherlands is estimated at an incredible 1.5 million guilders for the small, previously highly indebted county
- ↑ Wolf, p. 106
- ↑ Kruse, Christine, p. 138
- ↑ Gensicke, p. 225
- ↑ Literature for this section: Mann, pp. 300–306; Kruse, Christine, pp. 135-138; Wolf, pp. 104-107; Lück, pp. 108-109; De Dijn, pp. 94-97; Barton, pp. 99-102.
- ↑ Karl Wolf: On the history of the high Westerwald. In: Nassauische Annalen 1950, pp. 181–196; Gerhard Oestreich: Count Johann VII. Defense book for Nassau-Dillenburg 1595. In: Nassauische Annalen 1958, pp. 135–165; Georg Schmidt: The Wetterauer Count Association. Marburg 1989, pp. 138-155.
- ↑ Bernkott was subordinate to a commander-in-chief of all units, who, according to the statutes of the Wetterau Count Association, always had to come from the nobility. See Georg Schmidt: The Wetterauer Grafenverein. Marburg 1989, p. 145.
- ↑ Hörle, Langendernbach, pp. 46, 45
- ↑ The exact conversion is difficult to make. In the area there were the Diezer, the Hadamarer and the Limburger Maß. According to Hörle, Langendernbach, p. 119, it could also have been up to 5800 kilos.
- ↑ Hörle, Langendernbach, p. 45
- ^ De Dijn, p. 98
- ↑ Hörle, Langendernbach, p. 49.
- ↑ Literature on this and the previous section: Hörle, Langendernbach, pp. 45–53; Gensicke, pp. 225-236; Kruse, Christine, p. 139; Wolf, pp. 104-107; Lück, pp. 110-111; De Dijn, pp. 97-98; Barton, pp. 103-104.
- ↑ The client was the uncle of the well-known "German Michel" Hans Michael Elias von Obentraut .
- ^ Hellmuth Gensicke: Westerburg. In: Nassauische Annalen 1988, pp. 191–214, here: p. 202.
- ↑ Often confused with the courtyard house.
- ↑ Hörle, Langendernbach, 31–32; Hörle, Junker Bernkott, p. 5.
- ↑ Tulot, p. 37.See also Broomhall / van Gent, 67.
- ↑ Tulot, p. 42. See also Broomhall / van Gent, 75/76.
- ↑ Tulot
- ^ Letter of August 8, 1626, quoted from Hörle, Junker Bernkott, p. 5.
- ↑ Similarly, in 1638 the entire Lutheran county of Nassau-Idstein fell to Johann Ludwig, who, according to his own account, only acquired it so that it did not "fall to strangers". Johann Ludwig urgently needed money. After his conversion to Catholicism, he was appointed Prince and Chief Diplomat by Emperor Ferdinand II. That brought obligations such as a huge loan of 160,000 guilders to be paid to the emperor. The construction of Hadamar Castle, which was necessary for representation, devoured further large sums of money that had to be raised by only around 4,000 subjects.
- ↑ Quernheim; her sister Catarina's husband
- ↑ Hörle, Langendernbach, p. 60.
- ↑ Literature on the last six sections: Hörle, Langendernbach, pp. 45–61; Hörle, Junker Bernkott, pp. 4-7; Gensicke, pp. 225-236; Lück, pp. 110-114; De Dijn, pp. 97-98; Quernheim, pp. 17-27; Schloss Bruch, pp. 42–44.
- ↑ Literature on the last section: Hörle, Langendernbach, pp. 61–67; Kruse, Christine, p. 139; Gensicke, p. 236; Lück, pp. 113-114; Quernheim, pp. 27-32.
- ^ Sarah Cascone: Rubens Painting Cast Off by Metropolitan Museum as a Copy Authenticated as Real .
- ^ Maike Vogt-Lüerssen: Anna of Saxony. Wife of William of Orange. Book on demand. 2008.
- ↑ Maike Vogt-Lüerssen: The Nassauer - Christine von Diez. kleio.org
- ↑ rkd.nl
- ^ Adriaen Thomasz. Key
- ^ Koenraad Jonckheere: Adriaen Thomasz Key (around 1545 - around 1589). Portrait of a Calvinist Painter. Brepols Publishers, Turnhout (Belgium), 2007. pp. 118, 233.
- ↑ Ms. Vogt-Lüerssen interprets well-known portraits of art history several times in “Anna von Sachsen” completely differently than previously known and proven without justification. She does this on the grounds that art historians are "arbitrary (...) that can no longer be stopped."
- ^ Print: Musée des beaux-arts de Rennes. Collection guide. Paris 2000. p. 41. Online: Adriaen Key - Portrait de Femme. Les œuvres phares. Website of the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rennes
- ↑ Literature on the last section: Hörle, Langendernbach, pp. 61–67; Kruse, Christine, pp. 139-140; Gensicke, pp. 227-237; Lück, p. 112.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Diez, Christine von |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Welschenengsten, Christine von |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Daughter of Anna of Saxony |
| DATE OF BIRTH | August 22, 1571 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Wins |
| DATE OF DEATH | 1638 |
| Place of death | Benfeld |