Hessen-Rotenburg

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Coat of arms of the House of Hessen-Rotenburg (1834)

The Landgraviate of Hessen-Rotenburg ( Rotenburger Quart ) was a partially sovereign principality ( Paragium ) under the imperial sovereignty of Hessen-Kassel , on the territory of today's state of Hessen, ruled by a branch line of the House of Hessen (Hessen-Rotenburg), which was temporarily in divided further branch lines and land counties.

Emergence

Landgrave Moritz the Scholar of Hesse-Kassel established a partially independent principality under the suzerainty of Hesse-Kassel to furnish his sons from his second marriage with Juliane von Nassau-Dillenburg through house contracts of February 12, 1627 and September 1, 1628 . The ruling branch lines of the House of Hessen-Kassel are summarized under the heading Hessen-Rotenburg .

In order to ensure the proper care of her children, Juliane operated the transfer of income and property rights to her children and finally managed from Moritz that her sons received the so-called Rotenburger Quart . The quart (lat. Quarter) comprised about a quarter of the total area of ​​Hessen-Kassel, and this size ratio was ultimately eponymous. However, it was determined that the Quart remained under Kassel suzerainty, and that above all the decision-making powers with regard to defense and foreign policy, i.e. representation under imperial law, rested exclusively with the ruling Landgraves of Hesse-Kassel. Nevertheless, this regulation led to a dispute in the period that followed.

Rotenburg Castle on the Fulda

The Rotenburger Quart formed from 1627 to 1834 one or more, only partially independent principalities within the Landgraviate of Hessen-Kassel. In addition to the town and office of Rotenburg , it included the Niedergrafschaft Katzenelnbogen with St. Goar and the fortress Rheinfels , the towns and offices of Eschwege , Wanfried , Sontra , the town of Witzenhausen , the courts of Bilstein and Germerode , the Hessian third of the rule of Treffurt , and Ludwigstein Castle the office of the same name Ludwigstein and the rule Plesse (north of Göttingen ) with the office Gleichen . Added to this was a quarter of the land tariff. The described territory was jointly owned by the descendants of Landgrave Moritz and Juliane and was repeatedly divided among the male descendants until the introduction of the Primogeniture in Hessen-Rotenburg.

The main residence was Rotenburg Castle in Rotenburg an der Fulda . As far as further branch lines existed, these resided u. a. in Eschwege, Wanfried or on Rheinfels under a different name than Hessen-Rotenburg.

development

After the resignation of Landgrave Moritz in 1627 and the assumption of government by his son from his first marriage, Wilhelm V , Julian's sons Hermann and Friedrich received the regions of Hessen-Rotenburg and Hessen-Eschwege . Juliane herself moved to her new residence in Rotenburg with her other children in 1629. In the period that followed, further secondary lines formed:

but which in addition to the main line only ever existed for a maximum of two generations.

After the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, the Rheinfels Castle and Office with St. Goar , St. Goarshausen , Neukatzenelnbogen Castle and the Hohenstein Office with Bad Schwalbach fell to Hesse-Rotenburg from the areas returned to Hessen-Kassel . These were transferred to Julian's youngest son, Ernst I von Hessen-Rheinfels, who had now come of age and set up his residence at Rheinfels Castle near St. Goar. He founded the so-called younger line Hessen-Rheinfels. After the death of his brother Hermann, who had previously inherited his middle brother, Friedrich von Hessen-Eschwege , Ernst also inherited Hessen-Rotenburg.

The parts of the country acquired in 1648 were ceded to Hessen-Kassel in 1754 as a prize for the recognition of primogeniture in the Hessen-Rotenburg family.

Landgrave Ernst von Hessen-Rheinfels became a Roman Catholic in 1652 . As the heir of his brothers, he acquired the entire "Rotenburger Quart" for the first time, which is why the lines of the House of Hessen-Rotenburg were also Roman Catholic in the following period.

After Ernst's death in 1693, his son Wilhelm the Elder of Hessen-Rotenburg became Landgrave of "Hessen-Rheinfels-Rotenburg", while his second son Karl Landgraf had already founded a new branch line "Hessen-Wanfried" in 1667. Karl was successively inherited in 1711 by his sons Wilhelm the Younger of Hessen-Wanfried - (Rheinfels) and Christian von Hessen-Wanfried . In 1711, Karl was also awarded Hessen-Rheinfels. He received Rheinfels Castle in 1718; however, the occupation rights were finally ceded to Hessen-Kassel by Christian in 1735. Christian was the last male representative of the Hessen-Wanfried sideline, and his territories reverted to Hessen-Rotenburg after his death due to the inheritance contracts.

Redistribution after the Congress of Vienna

In 1815, after the Congress of Vienna , Kur-Hessen ceded, among other things, the lower county of Katzenelnbogen with Rheinfels to Prussia to round off its own property ; Landgrave Victor Amadeus (Hessen-Rotenburg) used his necessary consent to obtain valuable territorial replacement from Prussia. He received the stately property of the Prussian principality of Corvey in Westphalia (about 300 km²) and extensive goods from Prussian domanial property in Upper Silesia (the Rauden monastery, which was withdrawn in 1810 and the rule of Ratibor) as the Mediat-Principality of Ratibor ; These goods complexes and other possessions in Prussia were summarized by His Highness as a Fideikommiß ; As it was a matter of free ownership (allod), this entails, in contrast to the property of the Rotenburger Quart, was not part of the joint property with Kurhessen. After the prince's death, it could therefore pass to his sister's son in accordance with his testamentary dispositions, while the property in Hesse fell back to Elector Hesse in accordance with the house contracts.

End of Hessen-Rotenburg

When this last Landgrave of Hesse-Rotenburg died in 1834, according to the house contract, his properties belonging to the Rotenburger Quart were to revert to the main line of Hesse-Kassel that ruled Kassel. Immediately after the death of Viktor Amadeus, his widow surprisingly announced that she was pregnant. In this situation, Elector Wilhelm I felt compelled to have his own troops control access to the residence of the widowed landgrave in the Residenzschloss in Rotenburg for the duration of the pregnancy in order to prevent infants from being smuggled in. After the biological period had expired, there was actually no birth in Rotenburg, so that Quart's reversion to Hessen-Kassel could be completed with a few months' delay.

The property located in Prussia - the Ratibor , which was promoted to the Media Duchy in 1821 , the Principality of Corvey and the lordship of Treffurt - fell to the latter due to an inheritance contract between Viktor Amadeus and the guardians of his nephew and godchild, Prince Viktor zu Hohenlohe-Waldenburg-Schillingsfürst . In 1840, when he came of age, he also received the title of Duke of Ratibor.

The ruling landgraves of Hessen- (Rheinfels-) Rotenburg

  • 1627–1658 Hermann , Landgrave of Hesse-Rotenburg

Hessen-Rotenburg falls on the Hessen-Rheinfels line in 1658

Tribe list

⚭ 2. Juliana Alexandrina von Leiningen -Dagsburg

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Treaties of October 16, 1815 between Prussia and Kur-Hessen as well as Prussia and Hessen-Rotenburg, see prussia. Collection of Laws 1818, Appendix pp. 59–64 and 65–66.