Ferdinand von Degenfeld

Ferdinand Freiherr von Degenfeld (born December 31, 1629 - † April 25, 1710 in Venice ) was a Palatine privy councilor and governor.

The eldest of Christoph Martin von Degenfeld's ten children had the Archduke and later German Emperor Ferdinand III. to sponsor. Ferdinand went to war against the Turks with his father when he was sixteen. He lost both eyes on April 25, 1648 due to a gunshot wound during the siege of the Turkish fortress Vrana in Dalmatia ; from then on he was also referred to as Ferdinand the Blind . Ferdinand first went to Padua and later returned to the family's estates in Dürnau (Göppingen district) . In 1671 he triggered a church dispute there because he demanded that prayers be made in Gammelshausen for the von Degenfeld family, but not for the House of Württemberg. The dispute came to a head until the church was blocked. Within the family, he worked from 1677 as the guardian of the children of his sister Luise von Degenfeld .

In 1660 he became government and war councilor of the Palatinate Elector Karl Ludwig , who had married Luise two years earlier in a second, morganatic marriage, and five years later privy councilor and governor of the Palatinate . Elector Johann Wilhelm gave him a special position in the defense of the Palatinate. Ferdinand von Degenfeld was specially commissioned to secure the city and Heidelberg Castle .

Ferdinand von Degenfeld died in Venice and was buried on the bulwark of Ignatius.

literature

• Carl Friedrich Schilling from Canstatt. Gender description of their families von Schilling , p. 159, digitized family tree Degenfeld
• Johann Friedrich Gauhe, Des Heil. Rom. Reichs Genealogisch-Historisches Adels-Lexicon , p. 407, digitized
• Jakob Christoph Iselin , Newly increased historical and geographical general lexicon , Volume 3, p. 49, digitized

Individual evidence

1. ^ Johann Friedrich August Kazner, Louise, Raugräfin zu Pfalz, born Baroness von Degenfeld , p. 39.