Hessengau
The Hessengau (pagus Hassorum) was the largest Franconian county on the right bank of the Rhine in the Middle Ages . Around 900 it corresponds roughly to Northern Hesse (according to the proposal of the Geographentag of 1973) together with the Wittgensteiner Land and the eastern half of today's Warburg and Staufenberg , but without the area between Edersee and Diemelsee ( Ittergau ) and without the areas east of the Werra ( belonging to the Leinegau and the Germara Mark ) or east of the Hohe Meißner ( Netra and Ringgau ).
history
The Gau was divided into
- the Saxon Hessengau ( Pagus Hessi Saxonicus ; between the Ittergau and the Weser ) and
- the Franconian Hessengau.
The division came about when the Saxons pushed the Chatti south in the 7th century and settled the conquered land themselves without changing the name. The border between the two parts is roughly on the line Waldeck - Hann. Münden ( Benrath Line ) and ran just a short distance north of Kassel .
The Hessengau was one of the ancestral lands of the Conradines in the 9th century , but after the rebellion of Duke Eberhard von Franken and his death in 939 in the Battle of Andernach, it was drafted by King Otto I and given to loyalists as a fief . The Saxon part finally came to the Bishop of Paderborn in 1020/1021 after the death of Count Dodiko . The Franconian part was administered successively from 1027 by the Counts Werner and Giso as an imperial fief and finally came by inheritance in the 12th century to the Ludowingers and thus to Thuringia . After the Ludowingers died out in 1247 and the subsequent War of the Thuringian-Hessian Succession , the Gau became the heartland of the Landgraviate of Hesse and thus the nucleus of today's State of Hesse .
Counts in Hessengau
Counts in Hessengau were:
From the family of Esikonen :
- Hiddi (Hildebold), attested in 813, count of the Saxon Hessengau
- Asig (Esiko) , attested in 839 and 842, count of the Saxon Hessengau
- Cobbo the Younger , attested around 890, Count of the Saxon Hessengau
In the middle of the last decade of the 9th century the dignity of count in the Saxon Hessengau fell temporarily to the Conradines for unknown reasons :
- Berengar , attested in 860, † after 879, 876 count in the Saxon Hessengau
- Konrad the Elder , † February 27, 906 near Fritzlar , his nephew, 886 Count in Oberlahngau , 897 Count in Franconian and Saxon Hessengau, 903 Count in Gotzfeldgau , 905 Count in Wetterau , Count in Wormsgau , 892 to 903 Margrave in Thuringia , Nepos of King Arnulf of Carinthia , buried in the Martinskirche in Weilburg
- Konrad the Younger , † December 23, 918, his son, 908 Count in the Franconian and Saxon Hessengau, 910 Count in Keldachgau and Dux ( Duke of Franconia ), 7./10. November 911 as Konrad I, King of East Franconia , founded in 912 Sankt Walpurgis in Weilburg , buried in Fulda ; ⚭ 913 Kunigunde, sister of Counts Erchanger and Berthold ( Ahalolfinger ), widow of Margrave Luitpold of Bavaria ( Luitpoldinger ), buried in Lorsch Abbey
- Eberhard , † October 23, 939 near Andernach , his brother, "Duke of Franconia", 909 lay abbot of Sankt Maximin in Trier , 913 count in the Franconian and Saxon Hessengau and Perfgau , 913 and 928 count in Oberlahngau , 914 margrave , 936 Truchsess , 938 Count Palatine
After Eberhard's death and the collection of his goods and fiefs by King Otto I. initially received
- Liudolf , Otto's son, the Hessengau ( comitatus Hassonum )
From the family of Esikonen :
From other families:
- Athelbero (Berno) († 982 ), 965–966 Count Palatine in Saxony, Count in the Saxon Hessengau and in Liesgau
- Dodiko , count in 1011 in the Saxon Hessengau, in Ittergau and in Nethegau
- Tammo / Thankmar († 1037), Truchsess Emperor Otto III. , Grandson of Count Palatine Athelbero, Count in Astfala and from 994 in the Saxon Hessengau
After Dodikos death, King Heinrich II (1002-1024) gave part of his property to the Bishop of Paderborn , the rest to Tammo. King Konrad II (1024-1039) withdrew the Paderborn part and awarded it to the Archbishop of Mainz . After Konrad's death, this area fell back to Paderborn. Konrad gave another part in 1027 to his follower and standard bearer Werner von Winterthur , who from then on administered the heart of the Franconian Hessengau as Count von Maden .
Counts from the Werner family , which also owned the County of Ruchesloh in the Lahngau near Marburg , were:
- Werner I. , 1027-1040
- Werner II , 1040-1053
- Werner III. , 1053-1065
- Werner IV. , 1065-1121
After Werner IV died without an heir, the county that he had given the Archdiocese of Mainz as a fief shortly before his death and received back from Mainz as such went to Giso IV. Counts from the house of the Gisonen :
- Giso IV , 1121
- Giso V. , 1121–1137 (reign of his mother Kunigunde von Bilstein until he came of age)
After Giso V's death, Landgrave Ludwig I of Thuringia inherited the county due to his marriage to Giso's sister Hedwig von Gudensberg .
In the northeastern part of the Hessengau Siegfried III. von Boyneburg (~ 1050–1107) from the house of Northeim from 1083 to 1107 Count von Boyneburg , Count in Hessengau, Ittergau and Nethegau.
literature
- Georg Landau: The territories in relation to their formation and their development. Perthes, Hamburg and Gotha, 1854 , pp. 257 f., 357.
- Karl Wenck: On the history of the Hessengau. In: Journal of the Association for Hessian History a. Regional studies. NF Vol. 26. In Comm .: A. Freyschmidt, Kassel 1903.
Web links
- Sound border of Central and Lower Germany (Benrath Line). Karl Bartsch: Investigations into the Jenaer Liederhandschrift (Palaestra 140), Leipzig 1923 (border between Saxon and Franconian Hessengau).
- Spruner-Menke: Hand atlas for the history of the Middle Ages and modern times. Germany's district. IV. Southern Thuringia. Francs.
- The "Gaue before 900". Historical atlas of Hessen. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
- The "Gaue after 900". Historical atlas of Hessen. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).