Conrad IX. (Weinberg)
Conrad IX. von Weinsberg (* around 1370; † January 18, 1448 ) was a German nobleman from the von Weinsberg family . As Reich Treasurer in the service of King (later Emperor) Sigismund and King Albrecht II , he organized the imperial finances and the imperial mints, traveled the entire empire on diplomatic missions with many neighboring countries and advised his employers, with whom he enjoyed a high reputation. He failed when trying to build his own sovereignty from his scattered possessions. Since his varied tasks were usually costly, but generated only little income, he left high debts despite his reputation.
Origin and first marriage
Konrad, the ninth bearer of this name in the Weinsberg family, was born as the second child and first son of Engelhard (VIII.) Von Weinsberg and his wife Anna von Leiningen († 1413). Through his mother, Konrad was related by marriage to the Luxemburgers , who provided several German kings and emperors. His father Engelhard was an imperial court judge and from 1393 to 1396 governor of the Austrian foreland . Konrad's uncle, also called Konrad and brother of his father Engelhard, was first canon and then as Konrad II von Weinsberg from 1390 to 1396 Archbishop of Mainz . He is considered to be the foster father of the young Konrad, who spent a few years in the vicinity of his uncle, accompanied him on trips and feuds and was familiarized with the rulers and political customs by him.
Between August 1396 and February 1397 Konrad married a relative, Anna von Hohenlohe -Brauneck, née von Hohenlohe-Weikersheim , who was about the same age but was already widowed . In 1400, Bishop Erhart von Worms issued the ecclesiastical dispensation necessary as a result of the family relationship . Anna was the heir to the Hohenlohe-Brauneck line, which had no male descendants. Through her, Konrad acquired the administration and usufruct of the Hohenlohe- Brauneck property around Creglingen and Weikersheim , including Brauneck Castle , and other properties as far as Rinderfeld and Königshofen . From the diocese of Würzburg in 1401 he received the Reichelsburg, which was located in the Creglingen area, including the associated villages as a fiefdom, which had previously been borrowed from Hohenlohe-Brauneck. Anna's brother Georg von Hohenlohe was bishop in Passau and later chancellor of Emperor Sigismund; until his death in 1423 he supported Konrad and his family as best they could. The marriage with Anna seems to have been a happy one; they had a daughter named Elisabeth, who later became the wife of Duke Erich von Sachsen-Lauenburg .
Konrad's relationship with his father must have been good. Engelhard handed over his property to his son in 1404 and received an annuity in return until his death in 1415 . His debts, which Konrad also had to take over, amounted to 19,055 guilders and, if one takes later sales and pledge documents as a yardstick, considerably exceeded the value of the goods. In addition to the ancestral castle, Weinsberg Castle , the goods also included Guttenberg Castle in the Neckar Valley and castles in the area between Kocher and Ohrn in Neuenstadt , Stein and Gochsen , each with associated locations. In the town of Weinsberg , located below his ancestral castle, Konrad also had significant rights, but with the Weinsberg citizens striving for imperial immediacy, he also had constant opponents.
In the Reich Service
Konrad had shown talent and inclination for financial and administrative matters. 1407 gained father and son the hereditary post of Reichserb (below) Chamberlain , who on behalf of the only nominally responsible Empire ore chamberlain (the Elector of Brandenburg ) for the finances of the empire was responsible. After the death of his father in 1415, Konrad continued the office alone. The fiefdoms of Falkenstein, Münzenberg and Königstein were connected to the office, but Engelhard and Konrad had to litigate for years with the heirs of the previous Falkenstein chamberlain.
As one of the highest officials of the imperial financial administration and close confidante in the wake of the king or emperor, Konrad organized the imperial tax system. In 1411 he was present at Sigismund's coronation in Frankfurt , and in 1414 he accompanied him on his homage journey through the empire. Konrad's tasks also included the appointment of the Court of Appeal (for which he received a share of its income), the long (1410–1433) mediation between the Teutonic Order and the King of Poland after the Battle of Tannenberg and the implementation of a legal dispute between the emperor and the Hanseatic cities of 1419. 1424 he invited on behalf of Sigismund mayors and councilors of the city of Antwerp to Vienna before, 1425/26 he negotiated simultaneously with King Erik of Denmark and prepared the war against the Hussites before. Many more orders followed.
His arithmetic, his organizational skills, his intelligence and his negotiating skills were useful in all of these tasks. The constant close contact with the ruler, the imperial princes and the pope, which the office brought with it on trips, at diets and other occasions, made Konrad known throughout the empire and brought him many useful acquaintances and liaisons; he is considered to be one of the best informed men in the empire of his time. The difficult financial situation of the empire and the additional diplomatic tasks required the use of all Konrad's strength and made constant trips necessary, which each year added up to thousands of kilometers that he covered on horseback, by carriage and by ship. Konrad was in the Netherlands , Denmark , Switzerland , Burgundy , Bohemia , Poland , Hungary , in the Teutonic Order , with the Hanseatic cities and probably in every major city in between. He went on strenuous journeys well into old age. The high esteem of his employer was expressed in the admission of Konrad to the exclusive knightly Society for the Dragon (or Society for the Lindwurm ), which was founded in 1408 by King Sigismund and his wife and to which only 24 full members belonged during Sigismund's lifetime (including Oswald from Wolkenstein ).
From the Council of Constance in 1415 onwards, Konrad's first important task as treasurer was the organization of the Jewish tax , a special property tax for Jews , which was of extraordinary importance for the king, as it was the only income he could freely dispose of. If the ruler's expenses and obligations exceeded the budget, his followers, above all the chamberlain, had to stand up for him. Konrad therefore tried to collect the Jewish tax as conscientiously as possible just to save his own finances, and for this task also called on confidants: first the pastor Meinwart from Baldersheim and the ministerial Seifried Greck from Kochendorf , who were given royal powers. In 1418 more confidants followed, each of whom was also assigned a Jew who had an insight into the financial circumstances of his fellow believers. Despite difficulties with the territorial rulers, who partially hindered his organizational measures in their areas, Konrad was able to increase the income from the Jewish tax from initially 15,000 to 20,000 guilders to 33,000 guilders in 1433/34. The Jewish tax soon formed a secure source of income for the king (later emperor), but the execution of the councils in particular put a strain on his budget, so that Conrad was often made responsible, which severely weakened his own finances.
The idea is to fall from imperial mints that the the Konrad electors assigned coinage should bring back the king. He promised himself that imperial coins would be preferred by the population because of their high gold content. In addition to the strengthening of the imperial concept , it played a role in the fact that it was another source of income for the king. From 1423 to 1428 and again from 1432, Konrad was entrusted with the administration of the imperial mints in Frankfurt , Nördlingen and Basel . The selected by him Master of the Mint were efficient, perhaps too hard, as the accusation that the embossed of them Gulden had brought the reputation of a counterfeiter too low gold content, Konrad 1427 and 1432nd Konrad justified himself, he was doing his duty of supervision to the best of his ability. Since the king's debts with Konrad rose steadily (to 5450 guilders by 1431), Konrad was entitled to the strike rate (profit through coinage) in Frankfurt in 1425 . From around 1426, Konrad temporarily fell out of favor with the king because of a questionable forgery of documents. In 1431 there was a reconciliation, and Konrad received the strike sentence from Basel, but also other bonds from the king. Konrad did not use the administration of coins entrusted to him for his own benefit, but only promoted the idea of imperial coinage, which, however, was rejected by the electors and bishops at the 1432 Elector's Day in Mergentheim .
In 1434 Konrad's powers over the Jewish tax to collect the golden sacrificial penny from the Jews in Alsace were extended again. However, this authority was transferred to the emperor's wife Barbara as early as 1436, so that Konrad was only given the appropriate powers by his successor Albrecht II in 1438 after Sigismund's death . Konrad's files on the Jewish tax are still preserved today and, as usual with him, are kept in detail, so that they contain many references to the history of Jews in Germany and also individual Jewish communities.
The Heilbronn Jews had been under the special protection of Sigismund. His death on December 9, 1437 and the anti-Jewish norms of the Basel Council led to the expulsion of the Jews in some cities, including Heilbronn . In a letter from the Heilbronn council to Konrad von Weinsberg, it said that "it has been punished and warned how much one sins against God and one's neighbor if one keeps Jews and knowingly allows them to proliferate" . As Reich Chamberlain, Konrad von Weinsberg invited the Council of Heilbronn and the Jewish citizenship to the Reichstag in Nuremberg on July 27, 1438 before the new King Albrecht II and his Chancellor Kaspar Schlick . There, Albrecht II condemned the city "for devastating the royal chamber" (tax losses due to the lack of Jewish tax) to "abandon the Jewish citizenship as before" and threatened a lawsuit for damages. The city's Jews were allowed to return on October 8, 1439 and paid 200 gulden to Konrad von Weinsberg.
Under King Albrecht, whom he advised and represented in all secular affairs, Konrad reached the height of his influence and received general powers to an extent that he had never received from Sigismund. All princes and subjects in the empire were ordered to obey Conrad in all things. In 1438 he was entrusted with the regulation of imperial fiefs, pensions, usages and inclines, taxes and tithe and, as the king's representative, performed the imperial homage in cities on the Rhine and in Alsace. From January 1439 to 1440 he was on behalf of Albrecht, who died on October 27, 1439, protector of the Basel Council , which had been in session since 1431 and which did not want to come to an end. Konrad was supposed to settle the disputes at the council and ensure the funding. For Konrad this again meant high expenses; In return, he received the wages he was entitled to in the form of a bond on indulgences in various dioceses, including in the Teutonic Order, which he failed to redeem in the following years.
After Albrecht's death, Konrad's good contacts with him and his widow Elisabeth were detrimental. Albrecht's successor and political opponent Friedrich , who was also in a difficult position due to the birth of a posthumous son Albrecht ( Ladislaus Postumus ), did not extend Konrad's protectorate over the council. Even Konrad's monetary demands on the Reich, about 13,000 guilders had accumulated over the course of decades, were only partially paid by Friedrich until Konrad's death. Konrad formally retained his title of Chamberlain, but his services were waived.
Private life
Unlike his father, who still lived mainly at Weinsberg Castle, Konrad, when he was not on one of his numerous trips anyway, was constantly on other of his various possessions, such as his documents and his meticulously managed income and Can be found in edition books. His immediate service staff included about three dozen people from the chaplain to clerks, waiters, various craftsmen, the kitchen staff to maids and a court dwarf named Hans half-grown. In order to be able to accommodate his staff of scribes, Konrad had a special office building built outside the castle walls in the cramped Guttenberg Castle, what is now known as the fountain house. A lute player who accompanied him on his travels provided musical entertainment . In the last years of his life, from 1439 onwards, Konrad employed the later master singer Michael Beheim at his court. Instead of having the goods required to supply this large household delivered from the various possessions, it was obviously cheaper to constantly relocate the place of residence and to consume the goods accumulated in the castles on site.
Despite his ongoing money problems, Konrad did not live badly. Good cloth was procured for the clothing of the family and servants. The kitchen and wine cellar were well stocked and varied; when traveling, tips and alms for musicians were not spared. In the cities he visited, he regularly bought jewelry from goldsmiths. He commissioned glass pictures and paintings for his castles and had an artist create a (not preserved) genealogical and coat of arms book for his family. In order to improve his coffers a bit, Konrad was also active in the business, traded in wine and in 1422 participated in the then flourishing ox trade by importing oxen from Hungary .
Konrad was almost constantly at odds with any of his numerous neighbors. Often it was about horse or cattle theft, unpaid bills, injury, death or imprisonment of subjects, robbery, disagreements in inheritance or feudal matters , which in this time before the Eternal Peace of 1495 gave rise to a feud before they finally did were settled by atonement or payment of damages . Such feuds often resulted in economic losses for both sides.
Because of his constant financial misery, Konrad had to constantly take out even the smallest loans to finance his life, but also gave loans himself when there was some money available again. In addition to the pre-financing of imperial tasks (with little prospect of repayment), which he had to do in his function as chamberlain, he also advanced money or grain to his immediate subjects so that they could bridge the time until the harvest. Konrad was then able to sell the repayment in kind.
In September 1424 Konrad and his wife donated 160 guilders to the Schöntal Monastery in order to have a vigil and a soul mass held there on every quarter day . Her grave should also be in the monastery according to her will. The statues of Konrad and Anna made of cast brass, which were made for 120 guilders by a Nuremberg artist between 1426 and 1428 and were intended for this grave, then found their place in front of the high altar of the Schöntal monastery church, before they were moved to their present places during the reconstruction of the church at the beginning of the 18th century left and right of the entrance.
In addition to Schöntal, Konrad was also a benefactor of other monasteries. He also wrote religious poems such as the verse shown opposite in his manuscript, a variation of the Ave Maria :
Diner I help / Marya muter dez me if I stand
up in front of the courts / and no more to offer han
wan to min poor sel alone / Marya muter everything bad in,
So help me to the reigned hand / And guard me from hell bant
Thanks to your dear child, Dot / So, all mine need is ended.
Konrad's failure to establish his own sovereignty
Following the example of earlier princes, Konrad tried to build up a closed territory and thus to become a sovereign, which would have put his desolate finances in order and financially secure his family. The area around its headquarters in Weinsberg offered itself as a focus. To do this, it was essential to get the city of Weinsberg completely under control, but this was where Konrad's ancestors had failed. Most recently, his father Engelhard had to make many concessions to the Weinsberg citizens in a contract in 1379.
The citizens of the city strove for the status of complete imperial immediacy. Even before 1407, the city had included the imperial eagle in its coat of arms as a sign of this and abandoned the earlier coat of arms with the vine, awarded by the Lords of Weinsberg. In 1412, she formed an alliance with 32 other cities to support her efforts towards independence against Konrad. Konrad, who knew that the electors and the major rulers in the empire were on his side, took action against it. When it had become indispensable in the imperial service, on May 22nd, 1417 King Sigismund gave it complete enfeoffment with the city of Weinsberg, which would have been devalued from the status of an imperial city to a country town subordinate to the Weinsberg lords. The city sought protection in another league of cities, the Weinsberger Bund of November 27, 1420, in which 33 imperial cities came together to protect the city of Weinsberg.
Because the city refused to recognize his rule and no longer paid the taxes due to him, Konrad brought about eight over the adult citizens in 1422 . Because this had nothing to do with it, the aberration followed in 1425. In addition, the Pope - presumably Martin V - banished them from church in 1424 . None of this was of any use, however, and Konrad took more drastic measures. He wanted to damage the Swabian cities allied with Weinsberg and for this purpose acquired (by exchanging for Weikersheim with Count Palatine Otto I of Pfalz-Mosbach ) the city of Sinsheim , through which one of the main routes led to the Frankfurt trade fair , on which he acquired rights. In August 1428 he attacked merchants who were going to the fair in Sinsheim with 421 heavily armed noblemen and mercenaries whom he had recruited as mercenaries for 5,990 guilders and arrested 149 merchants from 20 towns allied with Weinsberg. The Frankfurt fair had to be canceled. The cities did not dare to take action against the electors behind Konrad. You came to a quick agreement with Konrad in Heidelberg in November 1428 . This agreement provided that the cities pay a ransom of 30,000 guilders to Konrad, who in return released all prisoners and their belongings, renounced all official rights to the city of Weinsberg (but not the income) and recognized its position as an imperial city. After King Sigismund and Konrad had forbidden the agreement in 1429 because of the earlier forgery of documents and the disruption of the Frankfurt trade fair, a new comparison of the parties took place at the Reichstag in Nuremberg in 1430 on the basis of the agreement reached two years earlier in Heidelberg . The king now agreed. In this contract, Konrad had to recognize the city of Weinsberg as an (undivided) imperial city. However, only a fraction of the agreed ransom of 30,000 guilders came into Konrad's hands, and in 1430 he had to cede most of the claim to Count Palatine Otto. Konrad had not only failed in his attempt to achieve sovereignty, but had also worsened his financial situation. Further attempts by Konrad to expand the areas around his other possessions such as Guttenberg Castle, Reichelsburg or the County of Königstein im Taunus failed because of his enormous debt.
Second marriage and end of life
After Anna von Hohenlohe died in 1434, Konrad married Anna von Henneberg that same year . This wife was also extensively related to him and an ecclesiastical dispensation was again necessary for the marriage. This second marriage resulted in two sons: Philipp senior and Philipp junior. Anna von Henneberg was already very ill in 1436 and seems to have died early. The elder Philipp married Anna von Stoffelsheim, and his younger brother was given a spiritual career.
Despite his wealth of influence, Konrad's financial situation remained precarious as his tasks were costly to accomplish. He rarely received payments for his services; rather, he was granted further privileges that could only bring financial benefits through the use of additional funds. Konrad was ultimately completely in debt. He often had to pledge the inheritance of his first wife, who died in 1434, and their daughter, who died in 1435, which gave rise to legal disputes within the family, which ultimately resulted in Konrad forgoing all of the Hohenlohe property and even surrendering the property and jewelry of the deceased wife had to. Financially stricken, he was later unable to raise the purchase price demanded by Burgrave Michael von Magdeburg, the grandson of his wife (son of their daughter from his first marriage), for his share in Brauneck Castle, so that this rule was also lost. In 1440, Count Palatine Ludwig granted him a loan, to secure it, Konrad transferred the pledge to him over the mints in Frankfurt and Nördlingen, with which the imperial coin came into the possession of their opponents. In 1441 Konrad's headquarters in Weinsberg came to the Count Palatinate, who contractually granted Konrad rights there until the end of his life. In the last years of his life, even Konrad's jewelry and table silver were constantly pledged, he had to ask nobles from the area to vouch for him even for smaller sums, otherwise he would end up in the debtor's tower . His situation was so desperate that in the summer of 1446 he even tried to stand up as a servant and feudal man with the former enemy Philip of Burgundy . In 1447 he again offered his services to King Friedrich.
Konrad von Weinsberg died on January 18, 1448 at the age of about 77. According to his will, he was buried in the Schöntal monastery next to his first wife Anna von Hohenlohe. Konrad's various possessions were all pledged and could not be redeemed by the descendants. His nephew Kraft von Hohenlohe (1429–1472) took on some obligations. The rule of Weinsberg had to be sold by Konrad's cousin and guardian of his children, Bishop Gottfried von Würzburg , to Elector Friedrich von der Pfalz . Guttenberg Castle and the associated villages came to Hans von Gemmingen, known as the Rich . Konrad's son Philipp sen. was confirmed as treasurer and inherited the Würzburg fiefs with the Reichelsburg, where he lived, as well as the set of coins in Basel, Frankfurt and Nördlingen. Philipp jun. only inherited income from properties in Kochertal. Since Philipp sen. had only one daughter, who later became the wife of Count Eberhard von Königstein, the family of the Lords of Weinsberg went extinct with the sons of Konrad. The remaining possessions then went to the Hohenloher family due to a hereditary brotherhood that was closed in 1404 . The Weinsberg archive with numerous documents by Konrad, which has been preserved to this day, is located in the Hohenlohe Central Archive in Neuenstein .
literature
- Franz Irsigler: Konrad von Weinsberg (around 1370–1448). Nobleman - diplomat - businessman . In: Württembergisch Franken 66 . Historical Association for Württembergisch Franconia, Schwäbisch Hall 1982. pp. 59–80
- Karl Schumm: Weinsberg, disputes between rule and city . In: Heilbronn Historical Association. 21. Publication . Heilbronn 1954. pp. 205-224
- Karl Schumm: Konrad von Weinsberg, the kingdom treasurer . In: Heilbronn Historical Association. 23. Publication . Heilbronn 1960. pp. 100-115
- Karl Schumm: Konrad von Weinsberg and the Jewish tax under Emperor Sigismund . In: Württembergisch Franken 54 . Historical Association for Württembergisch Franconia, Schwäbisch Hall 1970. pp. 20–58
- Hartmut Welck: Konrad von Weinsberg as protector of the Basel Council . [Schwäbisch Hall] 1973 (research from Württembergisch Franken, 7)
- Bernd Fuhrmann : Konrad von Weinsberg. A noble oikos between territory and empire . Steiner, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-515-08456-8 (quarterly for social and economic history: supplements, 171) [not evaluated]
- Bernd Fuhrmann: Noble economy in the late Middle Ages. The example of Konrad von Weinsberg . Journal for Württembergische Landesgeschichte, 68th vol., W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2009, pp. 73–101 [not evaluated]
- Karl Weller: Weinsberg, Konrad von . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 41, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1896, pp. 517-520.
Web links
- Inventory of the archive of the Weinsberg rule (with the estate of Konrad von Weinsberg) in the Hohenlohe central archive in Neuenstein
- Portrait of Konrad (PDF) based on a lecture by Simon M. Haag (81 kB)
- Konrad's income and expenditure registers from 1437 and 1438 in the library of the Litterarian Society in Stuttgart (volume 18); linked there as a digitized version
- Five documents on the history of the Göppingen Oberhofenkirche (1439, 1447) from the Lehenkopialbuch Konrad von Weinsberg and the Weinsberg archive - transcription ( memento of September 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) by Klaus Graf , University of Freiburg
Individual evidence
- ↑ What is meant is the Hessian Neu-Falkenstein ; see. Imperial decision of December 1444; Hohenlohe central archive in Neuenstein (GA 15 drawer K No. 55 Ü55 / 79); there will u. a. Weisenau, Hechtsheim (Hexheim), Langen (Stedtenlangen), Hayn, Offenbach, Assenheim and Petterweil mentioned as neighboring places in the Dreieich rule . The Counts of Virneburg were enfeoffed with the castle and county of Falkenstein at the same time, and the Weinsbergers never took possession of them.
- ↑ Cf. Friedrich Battenberg: Reichserbkämmerer Konrad von Weinsberg and the Falkensteiner inheritance. The trials at the Imperial Court of Justice, the Court Court of Rottweil and the Royal Court of Appeal from 1420–1447 . In: Archive for Hessian History NF 35 (1977), pp. 99–176.
- ↑ It was about the claim of Duke Erich V of Saxony, Engern and Westphalia (Lauenburg), who was married to Konrad's daughter Elisabeth, to the electoral dignity after the death of Duke Albrecht III. of Saxony, Engern and Westphalia (Wittenberg) 1422. Since Konrad (yet) had no son, he placed his future hopes on possible grandchildren, whom he wanted to gain advantages - in retrospect, since the later actually born grandson, Duke Heinrich von Sachsen- Lauenburg died in 1437 while still a child.
- ↑ Eugen Knupfer (arrangement): Document book of the city of Heilbronn . Volume 1. Kohlhammer Verlag, Stuttgart 1904 ( Württembergische Geschichtsquellen . N. F. 5). No. 581, p. 291 (line 33 ff.): Dispute between the city of Heilbronn and the treasurer Konrad von Weinsberg over the expulsion of the Jews - January 14, 1438 to October 8, 1439
- ↑ Simon M. Haag: Römer - Salier - Staufer - Weinsberger. A brief history of the castle and town of Weinsberg . Verlag Nachrichtenblatt der Stadt Weinsberg, Weinsberg 1996, ISBN 3-9802689-9-3 . P. 15
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Conrad IX. |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Conrad IX. von Weinsberg; Konrad von Weinsberg |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German aristocrat, royal adviser, imperial chamberlain |
| DATE OF BIRTH | around 1370 |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 18, 1448 |