Letter of protection (diplomacy)
Protection letters were issued in different epochs and for different reasons in order to justify a special legal status of the owner or a certain group of people.
Umbrella letter
Umbrella letter is an outdated word in Standard German today. It stood for:
- Each certificate, which is someone who takes in his shelter and protection: for example, Emperor Frederick in 1447 gave the abbot to mount before the city of Magdeburg an umbrella letter and ordered the Lord to Berneburg and the Bishop of Halberstadt Schirmern (guarantors of protection or Integrity of his rights).
- As an expression of the old legal language, the umbrella letter was a petition to the court, in which the plaintiff seeks execution into the debtor's property.
Privileging immigrants
Many states recruited immigrants as colonists to settle their lands. The immigrants were promised certain privileges or privileges, such as trade monopolies for certain goods, (initial) tax exemption, freedom to practice religion, exemption from military service or the like.
In this context, the Jews expelled from Austria in 1671 and the Huguenots were admitted to Prussia by the Edict of Potsdam . The moor colonization, the development of the Teutonic Order and the reclamation of the North German marshes were only made possible by such privileges. The ethnic group of Russian Germans came into being through the invitation manifesto of 1763 by Catherine II , in which the immigrants were guaranteed extensive privileges.
colonization
As early as 1496, John Cabot was privileged by Henry VII , "to sail, to conquer, to own heathen land, and to exclude others from so doing".
From the 17th to the 19th century there were colonial efforts in Europe towards overseas territories. Individuals or organizations specially founded for this purpose asserted their territorial claims or mining rights against other interested parties or the local rulers in the form of "letters of protection". Examples of this are the East India Company , the British South Africa Company or the German New Guinea Company . The term “protected area” for German colonies is derived from there.
The colonial powers regulated their relations with the natives in so-called protection treaties .
Protection of Jews
In the Middle Ages, stately letters of protection were able to guarantee Jews living in the Reich territory a special legal status.
Martial law and humanitarian letters of defense
For certain people or places, warring parties issued letters of protection that were supposed to protect against attacks by enemy troops.
The Catherine's Monastery produced a - possibly forged - letter from the Prophet Mohammed , which was recognized by the Islamic rulers. Even Napoleon Bonaparte wrote to the monastery a letter of protection.
In times of crisis and war, letters of protection were also issued by neutral powers for their own nationals or for other people. The best-known example is probably the Swedish protective passports of Raoul Wallenberg . These documents identified the holders as Swedish citizens awaiting safe repatriation . Similar documents were also issued by Switzerland and the Vatican.
Special protection symbols put people and objects under the protection of international humanitarian law .
