Hans von Ponickau

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Hans Georg von Ponickau (* 1508 ; † February 15, 1573 in Pomßen ) landlord on Pomßen, was a Saxon politician in the service of the Ernestine Elector Johann Friedrich the Magnanimous , who moved to the Albertine camp after the Wittenberg surrender in 1547 and since then for the Electors Moritz and August of Saxony worked.

Life

He came from a noble family from Meissen (see: Ponickau (noble family) ) and was the son of Jakob von Ponickau (* around 1470; † before 1529) and Elisabeth von Carlowitz (* around 1485) from Elstra near Bautzen . Ponickau worked under Johann Friedrich the Magnanimous as a councilor and treasurer of the Electorate of Saxony. On his behalf, in 1536, he arbitrated a dispute between nobles who had become Protestant in Albertine Saxony and their Catholic sovereign Georg the Bearded . Ponickau was also able to, on the one hand in cooperation with the Albertine councilor Georg von Carlowitz , on the other hand with the active support of the Hessian landgravePhilip the Magnanimous , to end the hostilities that broke out at Easter 1542 between the two Wettin lines over the Wurzen office ( " Wurzener feud " ).

During the Schmalkaldic War , Ponickau was able to take Freiberg in the spring of 1547 . Since the Electoral Saxon General Field Marshal Wolf von Schönberg (1518–1584) failed to conduct another war due to a serious injury, Elector Johann Friedrich transferred his military inexperienced eunuch on April 24, 1547 to supreme command of the Ernestine army. Ponickau immediately recognized the desolate situation of the Saxon troops in front of Mühlberg and ordered them to withdraw immediately towards Lochauer Heide . However, the retreat took place precipitously and the foot troops, gunners and horsemen of the Schmalkaldic League hindered each other's rapid progress. Furthermore, Ponickau and his officers lacked leaders who knew the land, so that it was easy for the advancing imperial army to defeat the remaining Narrow Kaldic troops.

After the defeat of the Schmalkaldic League in the Battle of Mühlberg , Ponickau fled to Wittenberg . There he had to fend off violent accusations from the Ernestine Elector, who had meanwhile been disempowered, and who had placed sole responsibility for the debacle on his Commander-in-Chief.

Then Ponickau switched to the service of the new Elector Moritz. He served him as governor of Grimma and Leipzig , participated in the drafting of the Naumburg Treaty , which the Ernestines and Albertines finally signed in 1554 and in 1570 drafted the new Bergordnung von Freiberg in cooperation with other electoral councilors.

literature

personal data
SURNAME Ponickau, Hans von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ponickau, Hans Georg von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Electoral Council
DATE OF BIRTH 1508
PLACE OF BIRTH Gut Pomßen, today part of Parthenstein , Saxony
DATE OF DEATH February 15, 1573
Place of death Pomßen