Duchy of Narbonne

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The Duchy of Narbonne was a titular duchy of the high Middle Ages in France . The Counts of Toulouse carried the title of Duke of Narbonne to document their claim to suzerainty over the historical landscape of Septimania , which made up the part of ancient Gothia north of the Pyrenees . The area in question corresponded in its extent to the former French region Languedoc-Roussillon . The title of Duke of Narbonne was not associated with real territorial rule.

The area that should make up the Duchy of Narbonne was already combined in the 9th century in the Gothic Mark of the Frankish Empire formed under Charlemagne , but which quickly disintegrated. The last holder of the margravial title was Duke Wilhelm I the Pious of Aquitaine († 918). After his death, the count family of Toulouse developed their dominance over what is now south-east France.

The duchy

The county of Toulouse was originally part of the feudal structure of the kingdom , or the duchy of Aquitaine , in the early 10th century its counts even fought for supremacy over Aquitaine, which in the recognition of Count Raimund III. Pons flowed as Duke of Aquitaine through King Rudolf in 932. Ultimately, however, they could not establish themselves permanently at the head of Aquitaine and ceded it to the Counts of Poitou . The Counts of Toulouse subsequently separated from Aquitaine and set about establishing their own sovereignty in the form of a duchy over the feudal lords of the region of Septimania bordering on them to the east, which however never fully succeeded.

The greatest competitors of the Tolosan counts for supremacy in Septimania were the counts of Barcelona , or later the kings of Aragon , who tried to establish a land connection from their Catalan homeland via Septimania to Provence, which they also held . As a result, the interests of both powers collided in this area, which was often carried out militarily. The Counts of Toulouse were able to assert sovereignty over fiefs such as Narbonne , Béziers , Albi and Nîmes , while Carcassonne , Razès and Montpellier were obliged to vassal to the House of Barcelona. In the 11th century, the Trencavel family was able to establish a strong position of power in ancient Septimania. This situation made the creation of a spatially closed feudal territory impossible, which is why the claims of the Counts of Toulouse actually ignored reality. The Tolosan counts' self-claim to a duchy was not recognized by any side, especially not by the French kings, by whom they were always and exclusively referred to as Counts of Toulouse in royal documents. In addition to the question of power, the knowledge of the non-existence of a Duchy of Narbonne may also have been decisive.

Only the leader of the Albigensian Crusade in the early 13th century , Simon de Montfort , was able to summarize a territory for a short period between 1213 and 1218 that came close to the ideas of the Counts of Toulouse for a Duchy of Narbonne by including Nîmes, Narbonne himself, Béziers, Albi, Carcassonne and finally Toulouse had taken power. He was then also the only one who was officially recognized as Duke by King Philip II of August , by paying homage to Montfort in April 1216 in Melun as "Duke of Narbonne, Count of Toulouse, Vice-Count of Béziers and Carcassonne". His son Amaury de Montfort transferred the rights he had taken over from his father to the French crown in 1225, whereupon King Louis VIII the Lion set about subjugating the areas concerned, which, with the exception of Toulouse, was successfully completed. Ancient Septimania was attached to the Crown Domain and divided into Seneschallates. The county of Toulouse followed as a settled fief in 1270. Soon the historical landscape was only known by the name Languedoc .

The ducal title

The Counts of Toulouse have always been among the outstanding feudal lords of the French south and in this region they held a position comparable to a primus inter pares , accordingly their early representatives were often given the margravial title (marchio) in the documents of the West Franconian kings . The counts Raimund III. Pons and his uncle Armengol von Rouergue were referred to by the historian Flodoard as "Prince of Gothien" (principes Gotiæ) or "Prince of Goths" (Gothorum principe) and Richer called Raimund III. Pons even "Duke of the Goths" (Gothorum ducem) , which illustrates his dominant position of power in Goths / Septimania.

But only Count Raimund IV of Toulouse actually accepted the title of duke by calling himself “Duke of Narbonne” (dux Narbonæ) in a deed of donation issued to the Abbey of Saint-André near Avignon in 1088 . This title was retained by all his successors, with the exception of Bertrand , on an equal footing with that of the count's. What is striking about this title is the avoidance of an ethnographically defined room name, ie the nearby “Duke of Gothien”, based on the example of the other West Franconian-French “tribal duchies” of Francia , Burgundy , Aquitaine , Gascony , Brittany and Normandy . This is likely to be based on a demarcation to the Counts of Barcelona, ​​because the Gothic name described not only the landscape of Septimania north of the Pyrenees, but also the areas south of them of the Counts of Barcelona, ​​today's Catalonia . Some of the early Catalan counts such as Borrell II had already carried the Gothic title of duke (dux Goticae) , although they soon gave it up. Since Narbonne was the old main and metropolitan seat of Septimania and the Counts of Toulouse held the count's rights associated with it, Raymond IV was able to name the duchy he claimed after his capital without encountering the sensitivities of the Counts of Barcelona.

As Duke of Narbonne called themselves:

cards

The Gothic marrow from the Carolingian era extended both north (Septimania) and south (Catalonia) of the Pyrenees.
The Duchy of Narbonne should correspond to the old province of Septimania.
The actual political landscape of southeast France in the 12th century. Green / light green the county of Toulouse and vassals, Aragón and vassals in yellow / orange.

Remarks

  • The vice-county of Narbonne , which existed beyond the Middle Ages, cannot be equated with the duchy. The vice counts represented the owners of the county of Narbonne, which was limited to the city and the surrounding area. The count's rights were in turn owned by the Counts of Toulouse.
  • The medieval Duchy of Narbonne should not be confused with that of the later Duchy of Narbonne-Lara , from which Françoise de Châlus , Duchess of Narbonne-Lara (1734–1821), the mistress of King Louis XV. , is best known.

literature

  • Walther Kienast : The title of duke in France and Germany (9th to 12th centuries) , in: Historische Zeitschrift Vol. 203 (1966), pp. 559-563

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Catalog des actes de Philippe Auguste , ed. by Léopold Delisle (1856), no.1659, p. 371
  2. ↑ Flodoard , Annales . In: Georg Heinrich Pertz u. a. (Ed.): Scriptores (in Folio) 3: Annales, chronica et historiae aevi Saxonici. Hannover 1839, pp. 363-408 ( Monumenta Germaniae Historica , digitized version ), pp. 381, 390
  3. ^ Richer , Historiarum Lib. II, Cap. XXXIX. In: Georg Heinrich Pertz u. a. (Ed.): Scriptores (in Folio) 3: Annales, chronica et historiae aevi Saxonici. Hannover 1839, p. 596 ( Monumenta Germaniae Historica , digitized version )