Joachim I of Alvensleben

Joachim I of Alvensleben, 1564

Joachim I. von Alvensleben (born April 7, 1514 in Hundisburg ; † February 12, 1588 in Alvensleben ) was lord of the castle in Erxleben , a scholar and reformer.

Life

He came from the Low German noble family von Alvensleben and was the second son of Governor Gebhard XVII. von Alvensleben († 1541) and Fredeke von Wenden († 1551) and younger brother of Ludolf X. von Alvensleben . As early as 1526, d. H. At the age of twelve he moved to the university in Leipzig , moved to the University of Wittenberg in 1534 , where he also heard Martin Luther , and continued his studies in Padua and Paris in 1538 until the death of his father in 1541 called him back home. The aim of this comprehensive scientific training was to create the conditions for a successor to his uncle Busso X. von Alvensleben as Bishop of Havelberg.

In 1544 he first entered the service of Cardinal Albrecht von Brandenburg as the Archbishop of Magdeburg . As early as 1546, however, he resigned this office and confessed to the Augsburg Confession , but remained Brandenburg Privy Councilor. After the Lutherans were defeated in the Schmalkaldic War in 1547 against Emperor Charles V , Joachim negotiated with the Emperor and Duke Alba in Augsburg on behalf of the Magdeburg estates . When the " Augsburger Interim " was to be introduced in 1548 at the behest of the emperor , he rejected this imperial religious formula together with some like-minded friends and the members of the city of Halle at the state parliaments in Staßfurt and Aschersleben .

In addition to managing his property, he devoted himself to science, collected the core holdings of the Alvensleben Lehnsbibliothek , which still exists today as an important collection of early humanist works, and he was in correspondence with leading Protestant theologians and legal scholars. Because of his high education he was nicknamed "Miraculum Saxoniae". From Cyriacus Edinus and Marcus Wagner (historian) (around 1527–1597) he commissioned historical works. His motto, based on Seneca, was: Vita sine literis mors est et viri homines sepultura (A life without science means death and being buried alive) , which he had installed above the door of his bedroom. In Erxleben he had a Latin school and a hospital built. His contemporary Heinrich Rantzau and Ludolf von Münchhausen, who worked two generations later , were country nobles and collectors of large libraries with a similar humanist education .

Tomb of Joachim I von Alvensleben and his three wives in the castle chapel in Erxleben

His funeral sermon, published in print, was given in 1588 by Pastor Andreas Schoppius in Erxleben.

Creed

Since the Lutheran Church was split into different directions after Luther's death (1546), which at times fought bitterly, Joachim von Alvensleben and his brother-in-law Andreas von Meyendorf had an extensive creed for their own sphere of influence and responsibility written and by the leading theologians of Confirm time. They included Johannes Aurifaber , Martin Chemnitz , Tilemann Heßhusen , Christoph Irenäus , Timotheus Kirchner , Joachim Mörlin , Simon Musäus , Bartholomäus Rosinus , Cyriacus Spangenberg and Johann Wigand . The latter was also the author of the script. It initially came into circulation (1563/66) without mentioning his name. In 1582 Wigand had it printed in Jena under his own name. When the Protestant parties finally agreed on the so-called concord formula in 1577 , this was emphatically supported by him.

Tomb

Joachim was married three times, (1) to Anna von Bartensleben , (2) to Kunigunde von Münchhausen and (3) to Margaretha von der Asseburg , and had nineteen children, of which only eleven survived. His grave monument, created by the Braunschweig sculptor Jürgen Röttger , is in the castle chapel in Erxleben . It shows him in life size kneeling across from his three wives.

Grave monument of Joachim I von Alvensleben, Erxleben Palace Chapel

literature

• Berthold Heinecke and Reimar von Alvensleben (eds.): Reading. Collect. Preserve - the library of Joachim von Alvensleben (1514-1588) and the research of early modern book collections , conference at Schloss Hundisburg from September 11 to 13, 2014, Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 2016 ( Journal of Libraries and Bibliography: Special Volumes  ; 119) ISBN 978-3-465-04266-2 .
• Joachim von Alvensleben's Christian creed and approbation of the most distinguished theologians of his time in 1566 . Printed in Stendal in 1854, reprint supplemented by a biography of the author by Udo v. Alvensleben-Falkenberg as well as explanations and biographies of the speakers by Wulf Piper, Freiburg 1986.
• Siegmund Wilhelm Wohlbrück: Historical news of the Alvensleben family and their goods . Volume II, Berlin 1819, pp. 415-463.
• Fritz Schwerin: Five nobles from the previous days . Halle 1859, pp. 126–131
• JP Meier: The masters of the Alvensleben epitaph in Erxleben from 1589 . In Mondaysblatt 1935, vol. 77, no.9
• New German Biography, Volume I. (1952), p. 233
• Marie-Luise Harksen: The art monuments of the Haldensleben district . Leipzig 1961, p. 268
• Werner Arnold: Nobility education in Central Germany: Joachim von Alvensleben and his library . In: Libraries and Books in the Age of the Renaissance. Wolfenbütteler Abhandlungen zur Renaissanceforschung Vol. 16, 1997, special edition pp. 167–194
• Martin Wiehle : Altmark personalities. Biographical lexicon of the Altmark, the Elbe-Havel-Land and the Jerichower Land (= contributions to the cultural history of the Altmark and its peripheral areas. Vol. 5). Dr. ziethen verlag, Oschersleben 1999, ISBN 3-932090-61-6 , pp. 10-11.
• Udo von Alvensleben:  Alvensleben, Joachim von. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 1, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1953, ISBN 3-428-00182-6 , p. 233 ( digitized version ).
• Udo von Alvensleben-Wittenmoor : The Alvensleben in Kalbe 1324-1945 , edited by Reimar von Alvensleben , Falkenberg August 2010 (180 S).
• Christoph Volkmar: The reform of the Junkers. Country nobility and Lutheran confession formation in the Middle Elbe region . In: Sources and research on the history of the Reformation Volume 92, 359 S. Göttingen 2019.

Web links

• familie-von-alvensleben.de