Höchstetter (patrician)

Höchstetter is the name of a patrician family from Augsburg . The family was raised to imperial nobility in 1518 .

Coat of arms of the Höchstetter in the Siebmacher

history

The Höchstetters were descendants of Staufer ministerials from Höchstädt an der Donau , the first documentary mentions come from the end of the 13th century. Under Ulrich V, the family rose to the wholesale and long-distance trade in textiles and spices. After Ambrosius the Elder founded a trading post in Antwerp in 1486 , the Höchstetters, along with the Fugger and Welser families, were among the most powerful German merchant families. At the beginning of the 16th century they owned a large trading and banking house in Augsburg with branches in Antwerp, Bruges , Venice ( Fondaco dei Tedeschi ), Lisbon and Lyon and were among other things owners of the Steineberg ironworks in Tyrol. In 1512, Ambrosius the Elder bought the village of Ettenhofen and built a moated castle there. In 1518 the family was raised to the status of imperial nobility and called themselves Höchstetter von Burgwalden . In 1529 the financial bankruptcy put an end to the trading house. Daniel Höchstetter went to England at the end of the 16th century , where he worked in mining in Keswick .

Höchstetter house

Höchstetter bay window on the senior building of the Fuggerei in Augsburg

The upper-class trading house was located at Kesselmarkt 1 (today Ludwigspassage) in Augsburg next to the St. Martin monastery (today Hotel Augusta). Built in 1504/07 on behalf of Ambrosius the Elder by Jakob Zwitel on a corner plot and decorated with elaborate facade painting. Completely destroyed in the air raids on Augsburg in February 1944. Only the polygonal bay window remained, which was integrated into the newly built senior building of the Fuggerei (Jakoberstraße 24) after the restoration in 1962.

Significant family members

Ulrich V. Höchstetter (1422–1497), guild master of the garment tailors in Augsburg, merchant
Georg Höchstetter (1453–1552), businessman in Augsburg
Ambrosius Höchstetter the Elder (1463–1534), textile merchant, banker in Augsburg
Joachim I. Höchstetter (1505–1535), businessman in Augsburg, mine administrator
Joachim II. Höchstetter (1523–1597), merchant in Augsburg
Daniel Höchstetter (1525–1581), mine operator in Keswick

With a few exceptions, the Höchstetter family name is found almost exclusively in southern Germany today, but above all in eastern Bavaria .

literature

Wilhelm and Walter Hoechstetter: family table of the Hoechstetter. Hoechstetter to Burgwalden. Hoechstetter von und zu Scheibenegg, Munich 1976 (= publications of the Bavarian State Association for Family Studies Munich, 1st new edition, issue 21)

Web links

Individual evidence

↑ The story of Burgwalden
↑ Gernot Michael Müller: Humanism and Renaissance in Augsburg: Cultural History of a City between the Late Middle Ages and the Thirty Years' War . Walter de Gruyter, 2010, ISBN 978-3-11-023124-3 ( google.de [accessed on January 6, 2020]).

[1] The story of Burgwalden

[2] Gernot Michael Müller: Humanism and Renaissance in Augsburg: Cultural History of a City between the Late Middle Ages and the Thirty Years' War . Walter de Gruyter, 2010, ISBN 978-3-11-023124-3 ( google.de [accessed on January 6, 2020]).