Koenigsegg-Rothenfels county

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Map of the county of Königsegg-Rothenfels from the Atlas of the Swabian District by Jacques Michal (1715–1725)

The imperial county of Königsegg-Rothenfels was a tiny territory of the Holy Roman Empire that existed until 1804 and was directly imperial for 563 years in what is now the district of Oberallgäu . It was named after the Rothenfels Castle near Immenstadt in the Allgäu .

history

In 1243, Emperor Friedrich II bought parts of the Albgau County from Hartmann I von Grüningen . The purchase price, together with Eglofs , was 3200 marks (about 745 kg of silver), which was described as a very large sum. From this point on until 1804 the area was directly imperial , that is, it was directly subordinate to the king or emperor , enjoyed his protection and was only obliged to pay taxes and services to him.

Previously, the area was owned by the monastery of St. Gallen , since in 868 a certain Chadold ​​from Albegeue (Algäu) handed over his property in Staufen to the monastery of St. Gallen , as Aloys Adalbert Waibel confirms in 1854. This means that St. Gallen and the area that will later become the county would have been adjacent to the Kempten monastery since the 8th century (border between Niedersonthofen and Memhölz ).

Coat of arms of the Lords of Montfort-Tettnang
Coat of arms of the Lords of Königsegg

At the end of the 11th century, the area was under the control of the Counts of Buchhorn . After this it was claimed by the Guelphs , but came to the Counts of Kirchberg.

The Lords of Montfort-Tettnang acquired in 1332 together with the rule Burg Rothenfels. The village of Imendorf , located near the castle, became the secondary residence town of Immenstadt . This became the main residence of the Tettnang-Rothenfels branch established here from 1439 . Under the Montfort, the area was raised to a county in 1471, combined with the establishment of a separate regional court . In 1526 the main line of the Montforts (Tettnang-Tettnang) went out , and the Rothenfelser called themselves Tettnang-Rothenfels-Tettnang , and increasingly relocated their headquarters. This house went out in 1574 and was inherited by the Styrian line of Tettnang-Bregenz-Beckach (-Peggau) .

In 1565, Count Ulrich, the last count on the Tettnang-Rothenfels-Tettnang line, sold the county to his brother-in-law Johann Jakob von Königsegg . The Königsegg house split into the Königsegg-Rothenfels and Königsegg- Aulendorf lines in 1588 . The capital of the county and seat of government was Immenstadt. In 1785 the county was expanded to include the Werdenstein rule .

The county of Rothenfels came briefly to Austria in 1804 with around 13,000 inhabitants and around 450 square kilometers . Franz Fidel von Königsegg-Rothenfels , received goods in Austria and Hungary for it . On December 16, 1805, the area went to the Kingdom of Bavaria as a result of the Peace of Pressburg and with this came to the German Empire in 1871 .

See also

Individual evidence

  1. a b Gerhard Köbler : Historical Lexicon of the German States. The German territories from the Middle Ages to the present. Beck, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-406-54986-1 , p. 344 .
  2. Aloys Adalbert Waibel: The imperial county Königsegg-Rothenfels and the rule ... 1854 ( p. 34. )
  3. The Königfelser coat of arms can be found obliquely left (awakened) as well as obliquely right, see Commons: Category: Coats of arms of Königsegg family
  4. ^ Max Spindler, Andreas Kraus: History of Swabia up to the end of the 18th century. (= Handbook of Bavarian History. Volume 3: Franconia, Swabia, Upper Palatinate up to the end of the 18th century. ) Beck, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-406-39452-3 , pp. 384f.