Conrad von Hanstein

Epitaph in the Katharinenkirche in Oppenheim

Family coat of arms

Inscription on the epitaph

Conrad von Hanstein , also Konrad von Hanstein , (* around 1500 in Bornhagen , Hanstein Castle ; † March 23, 1553, presumably in Mainz ) was a German nobleman and imperial officer who received a magnificent grave memorial in the Katharinenkirche Oppenheim .

Life

He came from the Eichsfeld noble family of the Lords of Hanstein and was born as the son of Caspar von Hanstein, Drost zu Lüneburg , and his wife Ulcke Ellica von Pappenheim .

Conrad von Hanstein studied at the University of Erfurt and joined the military at an early age. In 1531 he was one of the first Eichsfeld aristocrats to support the Reformation .

Hanstein first served under Landgrave Philip I of Hesse . Among other things, he fought in Württemberg in 1534 against the Austrian governor Philipp von Pfalz-Neuburg , where the Hessian landgrave brought the expelled Duke Ulrich back to government after the battle of Lauffen . Then he was a horseman in Denmark until 1537. After the political unrest there ended and Christian III was recognized. as king, he returned to Germany.

A passport dated August 1, 1537 identifies him as an imperial lieutenant. As a colonel and imperial war council , he served Charles V in the Schmalkaldic War . During the so-called prince uprising in 1552, the Protestant officer Conrad von Hanstein, on behalf of the Catholic emperor, successfully defended the Protestant but loyal imperial city of Frankfurt am Main against Protestant troops from Saxony and Hesse for four weeks . Hanstein had the Frankfurt city fortifications brought up to date in a very short time , temporary bastions filled up and the Gothic spiers of the Bockenheimer and Friedberger Tor thrown off so as not to obstruct their own artillery. The siege ended with the conclusion of the Passau Treaty on August 2, 1552 .

Conrad von Hanstein fell ill in Mainz and died the following spring, probably also in Mainz. He was in the St. Catherine of Oppenheim buried and there was a great grave monument with its full figure. It shows him as an imperial officer in armor and with a flowing beard; the Mainz sculptor Dietrich Schro is said to have made it. Since he prevented the city from being plundered by successfully defending it, Hansteinstrasse in Frankfurt's north end was named after him in the 19th century .

Hanstein was born with Margarete. von Hardenberg married. As early as 1543 he had acquired the former monastery estate Oberellen in Thuringia , which passed to his descendants and heirs, who built a castle there as a family seat. In 1547 he also owned the fiefdom of Ort and Burg Volkerode , where a coat of arms stone is still preserved.

literature

• Hans-Dieter von Hanstein: Hanstein Castle: on the 700-year history of a border fortress in Eichsfeld , Mecke Druck und Verlag, 2008, p. 30, ISBN 3-936617-48-1 ; (Digital scan)
• Carl Philipp Emil von Hanstein: Documented history of the von Hanstein family in the Eichsfeld in Prussia (Province of Saxony): together with document book and gender tables , Mecke Druck und Verlag, 2007, pp. 446–454 and 810–869, ISBN 3- 936617-39-2 ; (Digital scan)

Web links

Commons : Conrad von Hanstein  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Heraldry website for Conrad von Hanstein
• Website on grave monuments in the Katharinenkirche in Oppenheim with a section on Conrad von Hanstein

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Genealogical page about the couple  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
2. ↑ Philipp Knieb: History of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation on the Eichsfelde , p. 41
3. ↑ Website on Burg Volkerode ( Memento of the original from March 23, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.