Hadwig von Wied

In the ceiling painting of the collegiate church of Schwarzrheindorf, Hadwig is depicted as the benefactor in Proskynesis next to her brother before the world judge.

Hadwig of Wied (* possibly before 1120 ; † possibly before 1172 ) Abbess had pins Gerresheim and food as well as co-founder of the women's community of Schwarzrheindorf .

The Gerresheimer and Essen Abbess Hadwig from the Middle Rhine noble family of the Counts von Wied was a supervised woman, integrated into a network of patriarchal rule and patronage, also integrated into the aristocratic church of her time, within which the sanctuary received its ecclesiastical training and as a sister of the Cologne Archbishop Arnold II von Wied (1151–1156) became the head of two religious women's communities on the Lower Rhine, the abbess of Gerresheim and Essen.

Hadwig was an independent personality due to her noble socialization and the church position she had achieved. Not only the day of the consecration of the church in Schwarzrheindorf (April 24, 1151) saw her in close acquaintance with the Hohenstaufen kings Konrad III. (1138–1152) and Friedrich I. Barbarossa (1152–1190), to bishops and abbots, a. a. to Abbot Wibald von Stablo - Malmedy and Corvey (1130–1158 and 1146–1158) and to the historian Bishop Otto von Freising (1138–1158). The documents that she issued as the abbess of Essen reveal the image of a woman who wielded secular power and rule. After the death of her brother Arnold, Hadwig took over the development of the women's community in Schwarzrheindorf, where she appointed her younger sisters Sophia and Siburgis as abbess and dean (after 1167). Even today, the wall paintings of the local collegiate church of St. Clemens (around 1170) show the founders Arnold and Hadwig humbly before the world judge Jesus Christ . And a document from Cologne Archbishop Philipp I von Heinsberg (1167–1191) speaks of Hadwig as a "strong woman" who "successfully mastered many significant and greater efforts that are usually not work of the female sex".

literature

• Michael Buhlmann: The Essen Abbess Hadwig von Wied . In: Das Münster am Hellweg 56 (2003), pp. 41–78
• Ute Küppers-Braun: Power in women's hands. 1000 years of rule of noble women in Essen , Essen 2002
• Hugo Weidenhaupt: The cannon convent Gerresheim 870-1400 . In: Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch 46 (1954), pp. 1–120
• Ludwig Wirtz: The Essen abbesses Irmentrud and Hadwig II of Wied . In: Contributions to the history of the city and monastery Essen 18 (1898), pp. 19–41