Friedrich II. (Liegnitz)

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Friedrich II., Duke of Liegnitz and Brieg. Engraving, 1733

. Frederick II (Czech Fridrich II Břežsko-Lehnický. ; Polish Fryderyk II Legnicki * 12. February 1480 in Legnica ; † 17th September 1547 ibid) was Duke of Legnica and Brzeg and 1516-1526 Upper governor of the duchies in Lower Silesia .

Origin and family

Friedrich came from the Silesian Piast family . His parents were the Liegnitz Duke Friedrich I († 1488) and Ludmilla († 1503), daughter of the Bohemian King George of Podebrady . Friedrich's brother was Georg I von Brieg .

On November 26, 1515, Frederick married Elisabeth , a daughter of the Polish King Casimir IV , who gave birth to a daughter (Hedwig, * / † 1517). After Elisabeth's death in 1517, Friedrich married Sophie († 1537) on November 24, 1518 , daughter of Margrave Friedrich II of Brandenburg-Ansbach and sister of Margrave George the Pious . From this marriage came the children:

Life

After the early death of his father, Friedrich grew up under the tutelage of his mother and spent some time at the Prague court of King Vladislav . Together with his younger brother George I, he took over the government of his duchy in 1499. After Georg came of age, he ruled the Brieger share independently from 1505. In 1507 Frederick went on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and was knighted there by the Holy Sepulcher . From 1516 to 1526 he was governor of the duchies in Lower Silesia .

After George's death in 1521, the Duchy of Brieg fell back to Liegnitz, which Friedrich expanded in 1523 by purchasing the Principality of Wohlau . In the same year he brokered the Thorner armistice between Grand Master Albrecht von Brandenburg and the Polish King Sigismund I , with whom he was related by marriage, and the Krakow Treaty in 1525, with which the Order of Prussia became a secular duchy under Polish sovereignty. After the death of the Bohemian-Hungarian King Ludwig , who fell in the Battle of Mohács in 1526 , Friedrich was proposed by the non-Catholic Bohemian nobility as his possible successor. The candidacy, which was supported by the Bohemian estates, was justified by the fact that Friedrich, through his mother, was a grandson of King George of Podebrady, who died in 1471.

Friedrich had been a supporter of the Reformation since 1523 and founded the first Protestant university in Liegnitz in 1526, which, however, only existed until 1530 because of the religious turmoil caused by Kaspar Schwenckfeld . In 1535 he enacted an ordinance of the sacraments and in 1542 a church ordinance based on the Wittenberg guidelines. The hereditary brotherhood concluded on October 19, 1537 with his Berlin cousins, which was founded with a privilege of King Vladislav from 1511, did not last. It was rejected by the Bohemian Estates and by King Ferdinand of Bohemia and canceled in 1546 at the Wroclaw Princes' Day.

From 1540 to 1544 Friedrich owned the Principality of Glogau as a pledge. Due to excessive indebtedness, the sons of Friedrich's cousin Karl I von Podiebrad transferred the Duchy of Münsterberg to him , which remained with his descendants until 1550.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jan Harasimowicz: Adel in Schlesien 01: Herrschaft- Kultur- Selbstbildung , Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag 2009, ISBN 348658877X , p. 177
  2. ^ Rudolf Žáček: Dějiny Slezska v datech . Praha 2004, ISBN 80-7277-172-8 , p. 131.
personal data
SURNAME Friedrich II.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Fridrich II. Břežsko-Lehnický (Czech); Fryderyk II Legnicki (Polish)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Duke of Liegnitz and Brieg
DATE OF BIRTH February 12, 1480
PLACE OF BIRTH Liegnitz
DATE OF DEATH September 17, 1547
Place of death Liegnitz