Spremberg reign

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Spremberg Castle (2007), the center of the rule Spremberg

The Spremberg rule was a small aristocratic rule in the margraviate of Niederlausitz . Its territory mainly comprised the present-day town of Spremberg and, to a lesser extent, the communities of Felixsee and Neuhausen / Spree ( Spree-Neisse district , Brandenburg state ). The Spremberg dominion is first mentioned in documents at the end of the 13th century. In 1367 it came under Bohemian fiefdom with Lower Lusatia . In 1635 the Wettin Johann Georg I , who was also Elector of Saxony, was enfeoffed with the margravates of Lower and Upper Lusatia . In 1656/57 Lower Lusatia and with it the Spremberg rule fell to the secondary school principality of Saxony-Merseburg . Duke Christian I of Saxe-Merseburg first acquired the castle and town of Spremberg in 1665, and the rest of the rule in 1680. Duke Heinrich , the youngest son of Christian I, made Spremberg his residence in 1731. In 1738 the line between Saxony-Merseburg expired and the rule fell back to the Electorate of Saxony and in 1755 it was converted into an Electoral Saxon Office, the Office Spremberg . Since 1815 the office belonged to the Spremberg district in the Kingdom of Prussia and was now called Spremberg Rent Office . It was dissolved in 1874.

location

The Office Spremberg was in the south of today's state of Brandenburg around the city of Spremberg. In 1790 it bordered in the north and east on knightly territories and the Kingdom of Prussia, in the south on the dominions of Muskau and Hoyerswerda and in the west on knightly territories and Prussia.

history

In the valley of the Spree through the ridge of the Niederlausitzer Grenzwall , at the only Spree crossing in the vicinity for the Leipzig - Silesia road , which is also crossed here by the Dresden - Frankfurt / Oder road, a water was created in the lowland probably in the 12th century - or swamp castle, which covered this important Spree crossing. When the city was founded on a river island is not known, but the city was founded in the 13th century. 1301 appears the "castrum et oppidum" Spremberg in the documents. The castle developed into the center of a small dominion.

Late 13th and early 14th centuries

In 1282, Johannes de Spremberc, a Wettin family of ministers who named themselves after the Spremberg castle, lived in Spremberg Castle . You can be considered as the founder of the city. In 1318 a Conradus dictus de Spremberg appears in the documents. It is possible that the castle had come into the possession of the Lords of Kittlitz as early as 1300 , because Heinrich von Kittlitz made a donation to the city of Spremberg that year. The rule must soon have come to the Counts of Schwarzburg-Wachsenburg . From 1348 to 1352, Günther the Younger Count of Schwarzburg-Wachsenburg, probably the son of the German (counter) king Günther XXII. at the castle in Spremberg. Günther von Schwarzburg hosted a meeting of princes in 1350, which advised on how to proceed against the " false Waldemar ". On January 7, 1360, Emperor Charles IV bought the Spremberg rule for 5050 shock Prague groschen from Günther von Schwarzburg. Lower Lusatia had been in Wettin lien since 1353 ( Friedrich III, the Strenge ), except for the castle and town of Spremberg. Emperor Karl IV stayed at Spremberg Castle at least 1363. In 1367, the Brandenburg margrave and elector Otto V, "the lazy", sold Niederlausitz to the Bohemian crown. The rule of Spremberg went in 1377 to the son of Emperor Karl IV, Duke Johann von Görlitz , who pledged the castle and town of Spremberg in 1395 to his marshal and councilor Otto von Kittlitz, ruler of the Baruth in Upper Lusatia. Otto von Kittlitz was Governor of Lower Lusatia from 1389 to 1394 , and from 1406 to 1410 he was Governor of Upper Lusatia . Johann von Görlitz was in debt to Otto von Kittlitz with shock of Bohemian groschen in 2086.

15th century

After Otto, the Spremberg rule went to his sons Hans and Otto, who in 1408 sold the Baruth rule to Nicol von Gersdorf, known as Bock. Presumably Hans died soon after, because in a document dated February 22, 1411 Otto von Kittlitz is named as the sole lord of Spremberg. In 1428 Otto von Kittlitz and probably already his grandson Otto the Youngest von Kittlitz enfeoffed Otto von Berge with the courts in Spremberg.

Presumably in the second half of the 1480s, Georg and Sigismund von Kittlitz, who were enfeoffed together with the Spremberg rulership, perished in Austria in an unknown manner. There was now a dispute about who should inherit the rule, the sister of the two brothers or the half-brother Johann (Hans) von Kittlitz. The latter obviously prevailed in his claims and offered the governor of Lower Lusatia Heinrich III at the latest in 1497 . von Plauen put the Spremberg rulership up for sale. Hans von Kittlitz was of the opinion that Heinrich von Plauen had to redeem three Pfandbriefe at 500, 2086 and 1000 shock Bohemian groschen. The Prague Supreme Court saw it differently and ruled in 1498 that Heinrich von Plauen only had to redeem the first two Pfandbriefe. Since he was unable to raise the purchase price immediately and owed him 1,200 guilders, Johann von Kittlitz reserved the villages of Hornow, Bohsdorf, Bagenz and Sellessen as a pledge for five years.

16th Century

In 1502 Heinrich von Plauen acquired the Spremberg rule from Otto von Kittlitz with a contract. In 1504 he was deposed as governor of Niederlausitz, but refused to give up the Spremberg rule. Now the disputes escalated. His castle became the base of feudal knights and "land damage" who made their forays into Lower Lusatia, especially into the Brandenburg rule of Cottbus . Thereupon Heinrich von Plauen was summoned to court for breach of the peace. Since he did not appear, the new bailiff of Lower Lusatia, Georg von Schellenberg, took Spremberg Castle with the help of the Brandenburg Elector Joachim I by force. Through an arbitration award from King Vladislav, Heinrich was compensated for the loss of rule with 2000 guilders, the rule was transferred to the Lower Lusatian estates. Since they could not immediately raise the compensation in full, the king kept half of the rule as a pledge.

The history of the rule is poorly documented in the following years. During this time Lacek von Sternberg was presumably temporarily in possession of the rule. In 1562, the bailiff of Lower Lusatia, Bohuslav Felix von Lobkowitz and Hassenstein, acquired half of the Spremberg rule from the Lower Lusatian estates for 2000 guilders, and only a little later in 1564 the other half for 3000 guilders and 1200 thalers from Ferdinand I. In 1566 he received from Emperor Maximilian II. The rule of Spremberg as a hereditary fiefdom. However, the Spremberg knighthood refused to recognize him as master. Presumably because of these difficulties, he sold the estate only two years later for 30,000 guilders to the district judge Kaspar von Minckwitz auf Drehna . But even he could not really assert himself against the Spremberg nobility, so that Emperor Maximilian ordered his Lower Lusatian bailiff Jaroslav von Kolowrat in a letter from 1571 to enforce the rights of Minckwitz. At that time, in addition to the castle and town of Spremberg, the rule included the villages of Großbuckow, Slamen, Kantdorf, Gosda, Proschim and Welzow as well as two farmers in Graustein. In 1577 he was able to acquire half of the village of Trattendorf from Hans von Schütz, the other half he received as a gift from Emperor Maximilian. In 1584 Kaspar von Minckwitz sold the Spremberg estate to Karl von Kittlitz. The villages of Gosda, Proschim and Welzow were excluded from the sale. On November 13, 1584, Karl von Kittlitz received a feudal letter over the rule of Spremberg. His brothers Kaspar, Leonhard and Dietrich auf Mallmitz / Małomice (formerly Sagan district , today Powiat Żagański ), Eisenberg / Rudawica (formerly Sprottau district , now Powiat Żagański) and Fürstenau / Milin (formerly Neumarkt district , today Powiat Wrocławski ) were his father brother sons Adam and Friedrich von Kittlitz on Ottendorf / Ocice (formerly County Bolesławiec , today bolesławiec county ), the cousins Georg von Kittlitz to Eichberg / Dąbrowa Bolesławiecka (district Bolesławiec, today bolesławiec county) and Lassel of Kittlitz, princely advice and his brothers in Zauche / Sucha Górna (?) ( District of Glogau , today Powiat Polkowicki ), Zeisdorf / Cieciszów (earlier district of Sprottau, today Powiat Żagański) and Bußda (Buchwald?) (District of Glogau) as well as Wolf and Abraham von Kittlitz zu Schweidnitz / Świdnica ( district of Schweidnitz , today Powiat Świdnicki ) and Burglehn Steinau / Ścinawa (formerly Steinau district , today Powiat Lubiński ) and Alexander von Kittlitz Zeisdorf.

Karl von Kittlitz had already been wealthy in the Spremberg area before he acquired the rule and was thus able to build up a comparatively large rule. He owned Reuthen including the castle, Schönheide , a mill in front of Spremberg, six Hufen in Terpe , six Hufen in Slamen , a mill and a Hufe in Hornow , the "team at Klein Düben ", a Freihof in the town of Spremberg and an altar arm in the parish church in Spremberg. This property belongs to Jakob von Kittlitz as early as 1527 and before that his father Hans von Kittlitz. Some of the vineyards in front of the city had been sold around 1530 to the bailiff Heinrich Tunkel von Bernitzko, who passed them on to the city council. In 1590, Karl von Kittlitz managed to acquire a third of Klein Loitz ( Wendisch Loja , today the municipality of Felixsee ) with the Vorwerk and further grain interest from the mill in Bühlow. In 1589 he received the privilege from the bailiff that he had the sole right to collect rags in Niederlausitz. Karl von Kittlitz had a paper mill built around this time. In 1593 the "New Vorwerck" in Spremberg and the Vorwerk "Im Winkel" came into his possession. Shortly after 1593 he had a copper hammer built. In 1595 he was still governor of Lower Lusatia and died in 1598. In 1607 Karl's sons, Karl, Siegmund and Seyfried also acquired the village of Weskow .

17th century

According to the feudal letter issued on October 16, 1607 for Siegmund and Seyfried von Kittlitz, the Spremberg lordship included:

  • Spremberg castle and town with all buildings
  • a water and paper mill
  • a hammer and a granary
  • a brick barn
  • a Vorwerk, a vineyard and the duties and customs justice in the city of Spremberg
  • Customs duties and customs justice in the little town of Drebkau and in the village of Graustein
  • Bühlow (today part of the municipality in the Sellessen district of the city of Spremberg)
  • Trattendorf (today part of the city of Spremberg)
  • Groß Buckow (devastated, incorporated into Spremberg in 1984)
  • Slamen (residential area of ​​the city of Spremberg)
  • Sellessen (district of the city of Spremberg)
  • Cantdorf (residential area of ​​the city of Spremberg)
  • the angle before Spremberg
  • Graustein (partial ownership: 3 hereditary farmers) (district of the city of Spremberg)
  • the Reuthensche Heide ( Reuthen is now part of the Felixsee municipality)
  • the Bagenzer Heide, in which the von Löben have timber justice for their house, called the Gulisch, with accessories ( Bagenz is a district of the Neuhausen / Spree community )
  • the spiritual and worldly fief (?)
  • 1/3 to Gut Klein Loitz (now part of the Felixsee community)
  • 1/3 bushel interest grain on the mill at Bühlow

In 1623 Seyfried received sole ownership, his brother had received Mallmitz, Eisenberg and Kunzendorf near Sprottau / Chichy . The son of Karl, who had already died in 1623, a Georg von Kittlitz had received Ottendorf. In 1630 Seyfried succeeded in acquiring Kochsdorf and a further share in Graustein. The Thirty Years War brought great financial difficulties and a change of ruler for Seyfried von Kittlitz. In 1635 the Saxon elector Johann Georg I was enfeoffed with the margravates of Lower and Upper Lusatia. Seyfried von Kittlitz had to sell the share in Klein Loitz to Adam Leupold in 1648. In 1649 he even had to transfer the entire Spremberg rule to Dr. Philipp Lochmann pledge on Schönaich and Klein Bösitz. In 1658 the rulership was in debt with 27,000 guilders, with an estimated value of only 21,594 guilders.

In 1656/57 Lower Lusatia and with it the rule of Spremberg fell to the Secondary School Principality of Saxony-Merseburg under Duke Christian I. Seyfried von Kittlitz became the first Upper Lusatian government president in 1666, as the previous bailiff was now called under the government of Christian I.

According to the Landtag ordinance of 1669, the Spremberg rulership together with the Abbot von Neuzelle, the Dobrilugk, Friedland and Schenkendorf rulers, the Forst and Pförten, Sorau, Leuthen , Sonnenwalde , Drehna , Straupitz , Lieberose , Lübbenau and Amtitz rulers belonged to the Herrenkuria. The other two estates were the Knight's Curia and the City Curia.

Duke Christian I of Saxe-Merseburg first acquired the castle and town of Spremberg in 1665, and the rest of the rule in 1680. In 1689 a new land register and inheritance register was created for the Spremberg lordship. After that, the rule included the villages (or shares):

18th century

From 1731 Christian's youngest son, Duke Heinrich, resided in Spremberg, who also had the castle expanded. As early as 1696 he occasionally stayed in Spremberg. After Heinrich's death in 1738, the Duchy of Saxony-Merseburg reverted to the Electors of Saxony. In 1755 the Spremberg rulership was transformed into an Electoral Saxon Office , the Spremberg Office . The Heinrichsfeld establishment (now a residential area of ​​the city of Spremberg) was added before 1738.

19th century

At the turn of the 19th century, the Spremberg office included:

  • Spremberg town and castle
  • Upper and lower slamen
  • Cantdorf
  • Kochsdorf
  • Great Buckow
  • Bühlow
  • Sellessen
  • Big Luja
  • Weskov
  • Gray stone
  • Trattendorf

In 1815, the Kingdom of Saxony had to cede Niederlausitz and thus also the Spremberg district and the Spremberg office to the Kingdom of Prussia. In the course of this district reform, some exclaves of neighboring districts were assigned to the Spremberg district. Conversely, some exclaves in the Spremberg district were assigned to other districts. He was also united with the Office of Hoyerswerda to form the Spremberg-Hoyerswerda district. Only a few years later in 1824 this merger was reversed. In the district reform of 1952, the district was re-cut and in 1993 merged with the districts of Cottbus-Land , Guben and Forst to form the Spree-Neisse district.

The Spremberg Office lost most of its previous powers in 1815 and was now called the Spremberg Rent Office, i. H. it only collected the taxes from the villages belonging to the office. In 1824 the villages of Klein Buckow (residential area of ​​Spremberg), Proschim (town of Welzow ), Schönheide and Terpe (the latter are districts of the town of Spremberg) came from the (rent) office of Hoyerswerda to the rent office of Spremberg. The Spremberg Rent Office (and with it the last remainder of the Spremberg rule) was dissolved in 1874.

The noble houses in the town of Spremberg

Von Kittlitzsche's Freihaus Lange Straße 31. It is not the original building of the von Kittlitz building, but a new one built in 1706 after the great fire of the city

In the city of Spremberg there were probably eight noble houses, d. H. Aristocratic residences in and in front of the city, which were freed from all burdens on the city's magistrate and also had other special rights and privileges. In the land registry and inheritance register of the Spremberg rule of 1689/91, six free houses are named, one of which was burned down and lay desolate. In the 18th century there were therefore only five Freihaus houses left.

  • the Reichenbach-Zedlitz'sche Freihaus
  • that of Landskron-Zedlitzsche Freihaus
  • that of Haverlandsche Freihaus
  • that of Kittlitzsche Freihaus
  • that of Schütz'sche Freihaus
  • the Leopoldsche Freihaus
  • that of Waltersdorf-Knobloch'sche Freihaus
  • the Peter Henen-v. Köckritz'sche Freihaus

The latter two free houses had disappeared before 1689. In 1831 the remaining six free houses were incorporated into the city; but they still retained some privileges.

literature

  • Friedrich Beck , Lieselott Enders , Heinz Braun (with the assistance of Margot Beck, Barbara Merker): Authorities and institutions in the territories of Kurmark, Neumark, Niederlausitz until 1808/16. Brandenburg State Main Archive Corporation. (Overview of the holdings of the Brandenburg State Main Archive Potsdam, Part 1, Series of publications: Publications of the Brandenburg State Main Archive Volume 4). Böhlau, Weimar 1964, DNB 458201561 , p. 551.
  • Paul Rogalla von Bieberstein (Eds. Albert Hirtz, Julius Helbig): Documentary contributions to the history of the noble lords of Biberstein and their goods. VII, 498 p., Association for local history of the Jeschken-Isergau, Reichenberg in German Bohemia, 1911 Online University of Regensburg (hereinafter abbreviated to Hirtz & Helbig, documentary articles with the corresponding number of pages)
  • Karlheinz Blaschke , Uwe Ulrich Jäschke: Kursächsischer Ämteratlas 1790. Verlag Klaus Gumnior, Chemnitz 2009, p. 112. (The legend is confused here. The areas with a darker color represent the Spremberg office, the areas with a lighter color are knightly)
  • Luděk Březina: Who did the office belong to? In: Heinz-Dieter Heimann, Klaus Neitmann , Uwe Tresp (eds.): The Lower and Upper Lusatia - Contours of an integration landscape. Volume I: Middle Ages. (Studies on Brandenburg and Comparative State History, Volume 11). Lukas-Verlag, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-86732-160-0 , pp. 242-269.
  • Götz Freiherr von Houwald : The Niederlausitz manors and their owners. Volume I: District of Spremberg. Verlag Degener & Co., Neustadt an der Aisch 1978, ISBN 3-7686-4082-5 .
  • Leopold Freiherr von Ledebur : Adelslexicon of the Prussian monarchy . First volume A – K. Published by Ludwig Rauh, Berlin 1855, p. 434: Kittlitz. (online at Google Books)
  • Rudolf Lehmann : The gentlemen in Niederlausitz: Investigations into the origin and history. (Series of publications: Central German Research, Volume 40). Böhlau, Cologne et al. 1966, DNB 457383526 .
  • Rudolf Lehmann: Historical local lexicon for Niederlausitz. Volume 2: The districts of Cottbus, Spremberg, Guben and Sorau. Publishing house of the Hessian State Office for Historical Regional Studies, Marburg 1979, ISBN 3-921254-96-5 .
  • Klaus Neitmann: From the Brandenburg archival history: Festschrift for the 50th anniversary of the Brandenburg State Main Archives. Berliner Wissenschafts-Verlag, 2003, ISBN 3-8305-0161-7 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Hirtz & Helbig, documentary contributions, p. 58, no. 379.
  2. ↑ Michael Scholz: Landlord or Landstand? Lower Lusatian lordships in princely possession in the 15th and 16th centuries. In: Heinz-Dieter Heimann, Klaus Neitmann, Uwe Tresp (eds.): The Lower and Upper Lusatia - contours of an integration landscape. Volume 1: Middle Ages. Lukas Verlag, Berlin 2013, pp. 270–290, especially p. 294
  3. ↑ On the events of Luděk Březina: The governor of Lower Lusatia between royal power and estates (1490–1620). A servant of two masters? Berliner Wissenschafts-Verlag, 2017. P. 68f.
  4. ^ Johann Wilhelm Neumann : Attempt a history of the Niederlausitzische Land-Vögte . Volume 2. Lübben 1833, p. 165
  5. ↑ Winfried Töpler : The Neuzelle Monastery and the secular and spiritual powers 1268-1817. Lukas-Verlag, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-931836-53-3 (excerpts from Google Books)