Konrad von Urach

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Konrad von Urach (also Kuno ; * around 1180 ; † September 30, 1227 in Bari ) came from the family of the Counts of Urach and was a Cistercian abbot , cardinal bishop and cardinal legate in France and Germany .

Life

Cardinal Konrad von Urach (depiction from 1798 in a nobility chronicle)

Origin and career

Nothing is known about the year Konrad von Urach was born; his parents, Count Egino IV. and Agnes , a Zähringer woman, had married before 1181. A spiritual career was planned for Konrad, who had a Zähringer name, and he was probably accepted as a cathedral canon at the Liège cathedral church before 1189 , where Konrad's great-uncle Rudolf, brother of the Zähringer duke Berthold IV († 1186), was bishop (1167 -1191). The cathedral school gave the boy a solid education. The assumption that Konrad had already become dean of the cathedral monastery in 1195 is, however, questioned today and could be confused. In 1198, together with his brother Berthold , he spent several months hostage in Cologne as a surety for his uncle Berthold V. von Zähringen, from which the nephews of Burchard von Ursberg's chronicle had to buy themselves out after Berthold V had his from Cologne supported throne candidacy against Philipp von Schwaben had withdrawn. Both brothers subsequently became Cistercian monks; Konrad entered the Villers Abbey in 1199 .

Church career

From 1208 or 1209 he can be traced as abbot in this daughter monastery of Clairvaux . In 1213 or 1214 Konrad moved to Clairvaux , where he was elected monastery director. As abbot of the primary abbey with most of the daughter monasteries and successor to the famous Bernhard von Clairvaux (1090–1153), even more so from 1217 as abbot of Cîteaux and supreme representative of the Cistercian order, he essentially determined the organization and politics of this widely ramified European monastic community. He headed the general chapters of 1217 and 1218, which included the monks' participation in the fight against heretics in southern France ( Albigensians ). On his initiative, the daily chant of the Salve Regina is said to have been prescribed in all the monasteries of the order. At the beginning of 1219, after successful negotiations between the Cistercian order and the papacy, he was appointed by Pope Honorius III. (1216–1227) created and consecrated Cardinal Bishop of Porto and Santa Rufina . As a cardinal, Konrad remained connected to his order, but also promoted the Dominicans , pastoral care for women and the establishment of the Magdalen Order . In the years 1219, 1223/1224 and 1226/1227 Konrad stayed at the Curia , in between official business as a papal legate led him to France (1220-1223), Spain and Germany (1224-1226), where he was on behalf of the Pope in the crusade campaign, conducted negotiations, resolved church legal questions and mediated conflicts.

Legacy in France

The three and a half years of Conrad's legacy in southern France fell into a politically difficult phase of the Albigensian Crusade , in which the Raimundin Counts of Toulouse regained large parts of their former sphere of influence after the death of the crusade leader Simon de Montfort († June 25, 1218 outside Toulouse ) and the Crusader barons largely lost the Languedoc. Already on his arrival in the spring of 1220, Konrad in Bézier was driven by an angry crowd, threatened and beaten, from the city whose population had been murdered eleven years earlier by the crusader army under the orders of the Cistercian abbot Arnold Amalrich . Konrad stayed temporarily in Carcassonne with Vice Count Amauri de Montfort , Simon's eldest son and heir, and tried to coordinate the activities of the partisans who were loyal to the Church. Without success he tried to get the support of the French king Philip II. August († 1223) for a resumption of the crusade against the excommunicated Count Raimund VI. († 1222) and his son Raimund VII. To win. The last major military operation of the Crusaders, the siege of Castelnaudary , broke off Amauri in February 1221 amid the death of his younger brother Guy , who had fallen outside the city walls in late autumn 1220. Conrad's plans to build an order of crusaders based on the Cistercian ideal of monks (" Militia Jesus Christ ") based on the model of the Templars , which could continue the fighting in the name of the church, were also unsuccessful . Overall, the source base for this phase of the Albigensian Crusade is incomplete, which makes the reconstruction of Konrad's activities difficult. Konrad almost always seems to have been on good terms with the diocesan bishops of the legation area. Occasionally he also took part in military actions and, according to the report of Caesarius von Heisterbach, is responsible for the lynching of a heretic leader. When Count Raimund VII. After the death of his father in the autumn of 1222 showed his willingness to submit to the Church and the French crown in return for the return of his lands, Pope Honorius III changed. the up to then confrontational ecclesiastical course and now favored a peace treaty between the houses of Montfort and Toulouse. According to a rescript that has been received, the Pope expressly gave his legate a free hand for very far-reaching decisions at this time. In this situation, Konrad von Urach, who had hardly been in the actual crisis area since the summer of 1222, succeeded in arranging a brief armistice in the summer of 1223, after which he returned to Rome and in April 1224 traveled to Paris to meet the To pursue reconciliation between the Pope and the new French King Louis VIII . However, this initially failed and the alliance only came about under Conrad's successor, the Italian Cardinal Romano di Sant'Angelo , who was appointed legate of France in February 1225 .

Legacy in Germany

In the summer of 1224 Konrad traveled from Paris via Liège to Cologne , where he met Archbishop Engelbert (1216-1225), the imperial administrator and unofficial guardian of the underage Staufer King Heinrich (1220-1235). In November 1224, Konrad accompanied the king and the archbishops Engelbert of Cologne and Siegfried II of Mainz to negotiations with the French king in Toul , where, according to envoy reports, he succeeded, in agreement with Engelbert, in a marriage between King Henry and a Prevent French Princess. It is precisely his legation activity in Germany, the official purpose of which was to prepare for the imperial crusade to the Holy Land, which makes the network of family, political and church relationships clear in which Konrad moved. The geographic area of ​​his influence stretched from the Lower Rhine and Lorraine to southwest Germany, from Bavaria to Saxony. In the summer of 1224, concerning the family policy of the Counts of Urach, a contract was concluded between Emperor Friedrich II and the Strasbourg Church a . a. because of a former church loan from Zähring in Offenburg ; the contract had been brokered by Konrad. A little later, probably also through the mediation of Konrad, King Heinrich and Count Egino V († 1236/37) reached an agreement in Speyer regarding the Zähringer inheritance; the contract was finally confirmed by Emperor Frederick II on July 8, 1226 “out of adoration for Cardinal Bishop Konrad” and Egino, who was in opposition because of the inheritance disputes, was accepted. Konrad was also involved in the negotiations in 1224 and 1225 about the release of King Waldemar II of Denmark , with whom he was related by marriage through a relative of his mother's. On January 8, 1225 Cardinal Legate uncertificated in Schaffhausen for the monastery of St. Georgen in the Black Forest , which had burned the year before. In the fall of 1225, Konrad met his father Egino in Saxony to discuss family matters. The remaining time of his legate mission was overshadowed by the unexpected death of Engelbert of Cologne, who was murdered on November 7, 1225 near Gevelsberg by knights competing with the Berg family . Konrad took the alleged main perpetrators Frederick of Isenberg at a synod in Mainz with the excommunication , the funeral of the murdered man with great public participation initiated in Cologne Cathedral and sat chosen a strict pursuit of the murderers of Reichsgubernators one, he repeated as martyrs characterized. It finally led to the execution of Frederick a year later in November 1226 in Cologne, although he had previously been in Rome and obtained a solution from the ecclesiastical condemnation from the Pope. At this point Konrad was already back in Italy.

In the various negotiations, not only in Germany, the extensive family relationships between the Counts of Urach and the Zähringer Agnes helped Konrad: with the Zähringen side lines of the Margraves of Baden , the Margraves of Hachberg and the Dukes of Teck , who also belonged to Bishop Berthold of Strasbourg , with the Dukes of Namur , the Wittelsbachers , the Counts of Holland , Dagsburg and Geldern , the Archbishop Engelbert of Cologne, with the Hohenstaufen and the French kings from the line of the Capetians , in France also with the noble families of Châtillon and Montfort. "In the majority of the cases in which Konrad settled political disputes, he was related to one or both parties."

End of life

In the spring of 1226, Konrad's second legation was over, he returned to Italy, got involved in negotiations with the Lombard League of Cities (1226/27) and supported the emperor's preparations for the crusade. In 1227 he took part in the papal election, from which Gregory IX. (Ugolino Segni) emerged. According to the Vita, he is said to have been a promising candidate for the papal throne himself, but to have rejected the election out of modesty. In reality, he probably did not have any serious election chances, rather his biographer suspects that Konrad could have played a decisive role in organizing the papal election and was therefore mentioned in the chronicles. Konrad von Urach was supposed to accompany Emperor Friedrich II on his planned crusade as papal legate, but died on the journey on September 30, 1227, possibly already at the place where the crusaders gathered in Bari . Falko Neininger doubts this and considers embarkation in Brindisi to be possible. Michael Buhlmann also thinks it is conceivable that Konrad traveled ahead of the emperor and died in the Holy Land. In any case, his body was transferred to Clairvaux and buried there, as evidenced by a letter from Konrad's brother, Count Egino V. von Urach and Freiburg, from 1228. Konrad von Urach is venerated by the Cistercian order as a miracle worker ( sanctitate et miraculis clarus ) with the reputation of holiness , his internal memorial day is September 30th.

Individual evidence

Baroque statue of Konrad von Urach on a side altar of the parish church of St. Martin in Meßkirch
  1. ^ See Neininger p. 74
  2. ↑ a b c cf. Hans Jürgen Rieckenberg: Konrad (Kuno) von Urach. In: Neue Deutsche Biographie 12 (1979), p. 551.
  3. ↑ See Neininger p. 73f.
  4. ↑ According to Burchard, the decision of the two brothers to enter the monastery was based on a vow taken while they were held hostage to become monks if they were rescued (see Neininger p. 78).
  5. ↑ a b c d URACH, O. Cist., Konrad von. In: Salvador Miranda : The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church. ( Florida International University website ), accessed January 20, 2014.
  6. ^ Hans Martin Schaller: Review of Falko Neininger. In: German Archive for Research into the Middle Ages (1996), p. 288.
  7. ↑ a b c Jörg Oberste: The "crusade" against the Albigensians. Heresy and Power Politics in the Middle Ages. Darmstadt 2003, pp. 158-161.
  8. ^ See Neininger p. 184
  9. ^ See Neininger p. 169
  10. ↑ See. Neininger S. 191f.
  11. ^ See Neininger p. 228
  12. ↑ See Neininger p. 198
  13. ↑ See Neininger p. 179
  14. ^ See Neininger p. 231
  15. ^ See Neininger pp. 235f.
  16. ↑ a b Cf. Michael Ott: Conrad of Urach . In: Catholic Encyclopedia , Vol. 4 (1908).
  17. ↑ See Neininger pp. 244–247; Like. Ulrich Andermann: The conspiracy against Engelbert I of Cologne on November 7, 1225 and its consequences. Attempt to reconstruct and evaluate legal history. In: Knights, Castles and Intrigues. Revolt in 1225! The Middle Ages on the Rhine and Ruhr. Exhibition catalog, ed. from the LWL Museum for Archeology - Westfälisches Landesmuseum Herne, Verlag Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2010. P. 40f.
  18. ↑ So based on Wolfgang Kleist ( The death of Archbishop Engelbert von Köln. A critical study. In: Zeitschrift für vaterländische Geschichte und Altertumskunde 75 (1917), pp. 182–249) recently confirmed by Ulrich Andermann ( The conspiracy against Engelbert I . von Köln , p. 44 and note 56).
  19. ↑ Neininger p. 76
  20. ↑ See Neininger p. 276f.

literature

See also

Web links

Commons : Konrad von Urach  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
predecessor Office successor
Cencio Savelli Cardinal Bishop of Porto
1219–1227 		Romano Bonaventure
personal data
SURNAME Konrad von Urach
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Cistercian Abbot, Cardinal Bishop and Cardinal Legate in France and Germany
DATE OF BIRTH around 1180
DATE OF DEATH September 30, 1227
Place of death Bari