Friedrich V (Hessen-Homburg)

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Landgrave Friedrich V of Hesse-Homburg

Friedrich V. Ludwig Wilhelm Christian (born January 30, 1748 in Homburg before the height ; † January 20, 1820 ibid) was Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg from 1751 until his death .

His parents were Friedrich IV of Hessen-Homburg and Ulrike Luise zu Solms-Braunfels (1731–1792), daughter of Prince Friedrich Wilhelm zu Solms-Braunfels.

Life

In contrast to his ancestors and descendants, Friedrich V was a non-warlike man. For this he was one of the patrons of German intellectual history . His life spanned an exciting epoch in modern European history . Born during the “ Ancien Régime ”, he experienced the revaluation of values: the Enlightenment , French Revolution , the end of the 880-year-old Holy Roman Empire , the rise and fall of Napoleon and the reorganization of Germany and Europe through the Congress of Vienna Waypoints.

His correspondence with Lavater and Klopstock is well known ; visits to the Enlightenment officers Voltaire , D'Alembert and Albrecht von Haller are also documented . He also favored the Masonic Lodge "Friedrich zum Nordstern", founded in 1817 , which stopped its work in 1821 after his death.

The struggle for inheritance

Born in 1748 as the only son of Landgrave Friedrich IV , and half-orphaned at the age of three, he was challenged early on for his small inheritance. Under the little committed regency, which his mother exercised - with imperial permission and against Darmstadt's objection - Ludwig VIII of Hessen-Darmstadt believed that he could move in Hessen-Homburg in favor of Hessen-Darmstadt and had it occupied in 1747. But Hofrat Friedrich Karl Kasimir von Creutz fought (Creutz was even imprisoned for a year and a half). There followed lawsuits and complaints with the Reichshofrat and the Kaiser and in 1756 the Darmstadt cousin had to give in.

education

In the meantime the court master of the small Homburg prince's court had taken over the education of the young hereditary prince. This, Alexander von Sinclair (father of the later Hesse-Homburg diplomat Isaac von Sinclair ), was a humanist , a pious, clever and highly educated man. In response to allegations that he was raising the little prince too strictly, he replied with the remarkable sentence: “Is he called to become a hunter or one of the high-born idlers that are teeming with Germany? Should he one day divide his time into games, hunting and walking or will it be his duties to read the reports and reports of his councilors and make decisions about them? ” Of course, the heir had to be denied a military career for dynastic reasons. Sinclair's rigid upbringing is almost completely documented in files, reports, and reports to the mother who was not interested in raising her son. This is where his beliefs that determined piety and determined self-inquiry are the best path to eternal life are rooted. Due to a speech impediment (he stuttered), Friedrich devoted himself to philosophy, mathematics, architecture and other humanities under Sinclair's guidance; he is also said to have been a passionate chess and piano player. Sinclair's Calvinist - Pietist upbringing was fruitful and Friedrich V administered his country as honestly as he could, even if he often had to go to Frankfurt or Amsterdam bankers for loans. The mismanagement that he had inherited and was to pass on he could not get a grip on, he and the specialists commissioned for this purpose, including Friedrich Karl von Moser, did not want to restore the Homburg finances . In 1780 the administration was not able to draw up a list of all debts, income and expenditure, and the plan to put all dispositions in writing seemed almost impossible.

Marriage and sovereignty

With the early coming of age, which was still fought by Creutz, Friedrich V took over the government of the Landgraviate on March 22, 1766. In order to put an end to the quarrels with the Darmstadt cousins, the so-called comparison point - a waiver by Hessen-Darmstadt on sovereign rights over Hessen-Homburg - had previously been signed. In this treaty, the little country received extensive internal sovereignty, “Hessen-Darmstadt only reserved the relationship with the emperor and the empire; it represented Hessen-Homburg at imperial and district assemblies and raised imperial and district taxes for Homburg as well. Hesse-Homburg was therefore never directly imperial ... Therefore, Homburg's incorporation into ... Hessen-Darmstadt ..., which lasted from 1806–1816, cannot be called 'mediatization' ”. Friedrich married in a dynastic and diplomatic marriage on September 27, 1768 with Karoline von Hessen-Darmstadt (1746–1821), daughter of Landgrave Ludwig IX. von Hessen-Darmstadt and Henriette Karoline von Pfalz-Zweibrücken , the great countess . The connection with Karoline, an energetic, Francophile woman, was not a love affair, even if she had 15 children. Even as an old man, he notes in his memories that he did not get to know love. Also that the Landgrave was often absent for years and numerous remarks in letters from the Landgrave's family clearly show that this was the case.

Mental life

Scholars, poets and musicians were always welcome at the small Homburg court. Even Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was a brief guest, fell in love and the White Tower found its way into German poetry in “Pilgrims Morgenlied”. The school system and his library were of great concern to Friedrich. For this purpose, purchases were made even if one was behind with the salary payments at the farm. Fiction was not his thing - unlike his wife Karoline, who loved reading French works. He was more drawn to historical, philosophical, military and theological literature. A passionate traveler (which he wrote descriptions of) he devoured travelogues. He “liked to write at all, mostly philosophical-political-religious treatises. It seemed to him to be the best enlightenment to have Christianity taught as a revealed divine will in schools and life in the hereafter as the goal and purpose of the earthly, but otherwise the number of educated people, of the book and newspaper readers, of secondary schools and universities to restrict ". Despite his piety, he surprisingly supported an enlightenment idea, the Société Patriotique de Hesse-Hombourg, a short-lived coordination center for scientific projects scattered all over Europe. A concept with which he once again misled himself financially.

Freemasonry

On August 27, 1782, at the age of 34, Friedrich V. Ludwig von Hessen-Homburg was accepted into the Freemasons ' league by Carl von Hessen at the edge of the Wilhelmsbad convent . Landgraves Friedrich von Hessen-Kassel and Christian von Hessen-Darmstadt were also present. Although he is said to have given an indeterminate promise not to visit a lodge, he reached the V degree (Ecuyer) in the Rectified Scottish System . His numerous contacts with great minds of the time, many of whom were Freemasons themselves (such as Goethe and Klopstock), appear in a new light against this background. The “Friedrich zum Nordstern” Freemason Lodge, founded in 1817, would have been inconceivable without its protectorium, which included moral and material support. Since his son and government successor Friedrich VI. However, detested Freemasonry, the lodge suspended its work on December 28, 1821, just under two years after the death of its sponsor.

French occupation

The life of "Frederick the Hermit" (as he once called himself self-deprecatingly) continued to develop turbulent - without any action on his part. In 1795 the French revolutionary army under Jourdan broke into the Rhine-Main area. From then on, Homburg was almost constantly occupied by French troops and contributions had to be paid. In 1798, the generals Saint Cyr and Ney even relocated their headquarters to the vacant Homburg Castle at short notice; the landgrave family was on the private property in neutral Prussia , the adult sons were in military service.

Friedrich V. and Hölderlin

In 1802 Sinclair approached the Landgrave that his old friend Friedrich Hölderlin was in a melancholy condition after the failure of his professional plans (and the death of his lover), whether he could not be helped by giving him a job befitting his status, for example as a court librarian. Hölderlin and the Landgrave had known each other since 1798 and Friedrich V agreed, but Sinclair had to raise the salary out of his own pocket. Holderlin took up his position in June 1804, but since the landgrave looked after the library himself, he would only have used it. The song Patmos is dedicated to Frederick V ; part of the large-scale cycle of Hesperian chants , to which the famous Homburger Folioheft testifies, also the popular half of life was created at the Homburger Schlossparkweiher . Patmos is possibly a commissioned work by Hölderlin, which his friend Sinclair arranged for him. Friedrich had originally hoped that his correspondent Klopstock would write such a hymn, but he put forward reasons for age. The Landgrave's words of thanks, transmitted by Sinclair, sound so stiff and conventional that one can assume that the devout Christian was dissatisfied with the so little conventional Christian poetry.

Mediatization

1806 put Franz II. Not only the German imperial crown down, but solved the kingdom as a whole, and after Frederick V had refused the Confederation of the Rhine to join, Hesse-Homburg was in 1806 in favor of Hesse-Darmstadt mediated . Even antichambering with the Emperor of the French did not help. The administration was relocated to Giessen , the short-term sovereignty was over. Friedrich V. withdrew to his garden landscape "Tempe" at the foot of the Taunus , took a cure in Schlangenbad or lived in several rooms in the inn "Stadt Ulm" in Frankfurt am Main .

restoration

Coffin of Landgrave Friedrich V in the crypt in Landgrave Castle Bad Homburg

After Napoleon's fall, Hessen-Homburg was the only one of the mediatized states to be restored (at the same time for the first time with complete sovereignty). This exception was due to Prussian use (via his youngest daughter Marianne ), the merits of his six heroic sons and the fact that his (albeit poor and insignificant) line belonged to the House of Hesse and thus to one of the most important dynasties of the German aristocracy . Landgrave Friedrich V received his land back in the Vienna Federal Act in 1815 . It was increased by the Oberamt Meisenheim on the left bank of the Rhine (176 km 2 / part of the former French department of Sarre ). Originally one had hoped for growth from the neighboring states (such as Oberursel and Rosbach ), and even if Friedrich V grumbled: "What am I supposed to do with this district in China?", Hessen-Homburg was a sovereign state - albeit the smallest in the country German Confederation , which the Landgraviate joined on July 7, 1817. The odd and conservative, but popular ruler died on January 20, 1820 and was buried in the crypt of Bad Homburg Castle .

Military Merit Cross

In 1819, Friedrich V donated the Hesse-Homburg Military Merit Cross, known as the Swords Cross, for all Homburg subjects who took part in the war. It was awarded sixteen times and is now a sought-after collector's item.

progeny

With Karoline von Hessen-Darmstadt , Friedrich V had 15 children, of which the following survived childhood:

literature

Web links

Commons : Friedrich V, Landgrave of Hessen-Homburg  - Collection of images

Fonts

My ride to Lake Constance , new edition, Constance: Rosgarten-Verlag; 1st edition (1970)

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Fried Lübbecke: Small fatherland Homburg before the height . Kramer, Frankfurt am Main 1981, p. 12.
  2. ↑ Ursula Brauer, Alexander Adam von Sinclaire, The educational files for Friedrich V. Ludwig von Hessen-Homburg. Expert opinions and reports on the upbringing of a prince - fragments of a prince mirror (1752–1766) , in: Mitteilungen des Verein für Geschichte und Landeskunde zu Bad Homburg vor der Höhe, Volume 42 (1993), 27–92.
  3. ^ Barbara Dölemeyer: From the Landgraviate of Hesse-Homburg to the secondary residence of the Hohenzollern. In: Bernd Heidenreich, Eckhard G. Franz (ed.), Kronen, Kriege, Künste. The House of Hesse in the 19th and 20th centuries. Frankfurt: Societaetsverlag, 2009, ISBN 978-3-7973-1142-9 , p. 57 f.
  4. ↑ Ursula Brauer, Landgrave Friedrich V. Ludwig von Hessen-Homburg and his republican friend Franz Wilhelm Jung , in: From the city archive, lectures on Bad Homburg history 1991/92, 7–35
  5. ↑ Death offering. To your Rev. Friar and dearly beloved Protector, The Most Serene Prince and Lord, Mr. Friederich Ludwig Wilhelm Christian, sovereign Landgrave of Hesse, who came to the Eternal East on January 20, 1820 [...] brought by the g ... u ... v ... Lodge Friederich zum Nordstern in the Aufgang zu Homburg vor der Höhe on February 2nd, 1820. P. 30/31
  6. ^ Günther F. Anthes, Hessen-Homburg and Meisenheim. In: Communications of the Association for History and Regional Studies in Bad Homburg vor der Höhe, Volume 35 (1982). Published on behalf of the city of Bad Homburg for the 1200th anniversary
predecessor Office successor
Friedrich IV. Landgrave of Hessen-Homburg
1751–1820 		Friedrich VI.
personal data
SURNAME Friedrich V.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Friedrich Ludwig Wilhelm Christian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg
DATE OF BIRTH January 30, 1748
PLACE OF BIRTH Bad Homburg vor der Höhe
DATE OF DEATH January 20, 1820
Place of death Bad Homburg vor der Höhe