Magister Wigbold

Bertram Wigbold (* 1365 ; † 1401 in Hamburg ; also Wygbold , Wycholt ), commonly known as Magister Wigbold or also " Magister of the Seven Arts ", was a pirate and one of the leaders of the Vitalienbrüder . Together with Klaus Störtebeker , Hennig Wichmann , Klaus Scheld and Gödeke Michels , also leaders of the Vitalienbrüder, he made the North and Baltic Seas unsafe at the end of the 14th century .

The name Wigbold comes from wig (= dispute) and bold (= brave).

Life

Little is known about the life of Bertram Wigbold and there are no contemporary sources from his lifetime. There are numerous legends about his person , most of which are not historically documented.

He is said to have been admitted to the monastery at an early age and taught there in a wide variety of areas of knowledge. Then he is said to have attended the Rostock University of Applied Sciences , where he is said to have worked later as a master of world wisdom . Ludwig Bühnau, on the other hand, writes that Wigbold studied (with John Wyclif ) in Oxford .

He should not have been a particularly imposing figure and was described as "the cunning dwarf" or "the diabolical brain". He is said to have looked like a bourgeois scholar; he was long and gaunt and wore a dark velvet doublet.

According to the description in the Lübische Chronik by Johannes Rufus (1406/30), Wigbold was a learned, spiritual and secular master ("mester an den seven kunsten", Magister of the seven [free] arts, that is, the seven book scholarships). He is said to have been connected to the English radical reformer John Wyclif.

He was allegedly not, like Gödeke Michels or Klaus Störtebeker, actively involved in the fighting and preferred to conduct negotiations in order to suffer few losses. Leonhard Wächter calls Wigbold "Captain Wigbold, a Rostock master of philosophy ... who had swapped his position on the cathedral for that on the ship's fort".

In the literature, Wigbold is assigned to the captains of the Likedeeler ( Vitalienbrüder ) (Unterfeldherr under Michels) and is sometimes referred to as a "friend" of Störtebekers. Gödeke Michels and Wigbold and next to them Wichmann and Störtebeker are named in the Lübische Chronik from 1395 as the chiefs of those pirates who, after the liberation of King Albrecht of Sweden, no longer felt safe in the cities of Rostock and Wismar and therefore sought refuge elsewhere.

The Norder author Gudrun Anne Dekker states: Possibly it was the Schieringer and Vitalienbrüder Junker Johann Sissingh (a) van Groningae and Wigbold (probably the family of Ewsum from Oert?). The latter was most likely responsible as a “Magister artium” for drawing up the laws of the Groningen “Liekedeelers” after those of the Fratres Devoti.

The Vitalienbrüder or (since 1398) Likedeeler ("equal shareers"; because they distributed their booty fairly) made the North Sea unsafe for a long time, until the Hanseatic League struck back and smashed the group around Störtebeker. Michels and Wigbold initially escaped to Norway . But shortly after Störtebeker's death on October 21, 1401, Michels and Wigbold, along with around 200 followers, were captured on the Weser (and Jade ) and in the same year were executed in a second wave of executions (a total of 80 pirates) on the Grasbrook near Hamburg.

Störtebeker's execution and that of his journeymen Hennig Wichmann, Magister Wigbold and Gödeke Michels in 1401 are only documented by two lines in an old chronicle. The short Hamburg Chronicle of 1457 reports: “In 1402 Wichmann and Störtebeker became afgehouwen altohand na Feliciani. In 1403 Wikbolt and Goedeke Michael became afgehouwen. "

Flyer from 1701 on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of the execution of Magister Wigbolds and Klaus Störtebeker

On a leaflet for the 300th anniversary of the capture, printed by Nicolaus Sauer, Hamburg 1701, it says (on 1401): “In the same year, 80th sea robbers were upset / their captains were Gödecke Micheel and Gottfried Wichold / doctorate degree Artium, they were also beheaded on the Brocke / and their heads were placed on stakes / next to the previous ones. "

In the historical paperback by Friedrich von Raumer (1840) it adds: “Magister Wigbold had the fate of seeing all of his fellow journeymen beheaded before him; he was the last one to hit the sword. "

literature

• Matthias Blazek: Piracy, Murder and Atonement - A 700-year history of the death penalty in Hamburg 1292-1949. ibidem, Stuttgart 2012, ISBN 978-3-8382-0457-4 .
• Thomas Einfeldt: Störtebeker's children . Ravensburger Buchverlag, Ravensburg 2002, ISBN 3-473-58200-X .
• Gustav Schalk: Klaus Störtebeker . Ueberreuter, Vienna 2002, ISBN 3-8000-2876-X .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Jensen, Wilhelm: Osmund Werneking (From the days of the Hansa, Vol. 2), Berlin / Hamburg 2012, p. 19.
2. ↑ Bühnau, Ludwig: Piraten und Korsaren der Weltgeschichte, Würzburg 1963, p. 93. In this context, it is claimed in secondary literature that Wigbold later moved to Oxford, where he turned to astronomy , the research of algebraic laws. (Hansen, Konrad: Simonsbericht, Historischer Roman, 2010). He had spread the teachings of Wyclif and John Balls , who played a decisive role in the great peasant uprising that shook England in 1381 . (Bernhard, Hans Joachim: Klaus Störtebeker in Ralswiek: Legend, Dream and Reality, Rostock 1984, p. 59.)
3. ↑ "Desser hovetmanne weren gone Godeke Micheles vnde Wygbold, a mester at the seven arts." Cf. Hansische Geschichtsblätter, ed. von Hansischen Geschichtsverein, vol. 3, Leipzig 1881, p. 41. Chronicle of the Franciscan reading master Detmar, based on the original, 2nd vol., Hamburg 1830, p. 463.
4. ↑ Gaebel, Lotte: Rulers, Heroes, Saints, Medieval Myths, Vol. 1, UVK, Fachverl. for science u. Studium, 1996, p. 462. In Carsten Misegaes, Chronik der Freyen Hansestadt Bremen, vol. 3, Bremen 1833, p. 81, the title Magister is granted to Michels: “Gödeke Michael, a nobleman and a PhD Master of the Freyen Künste, which had its seat in the area of ​​Verden ... "
5. ^ Wurm, Christian Friedrich (ed.): Leonhard Wächter's Historischer Nachlass, 1st volume, Hamburg 1838, p. 154.
6. ↑ The so-called Rufus Chronicle, second part from 1395-1430, ed. v. Karl Koppmann, in: The Chronicles of the Lower Saxony Cities, Lübeck, 3rd vol., Leipzig 1902 (The Chronicles of the German Cities, 28), pp. 25-26.
7. ↑ Dekker, Gudrun Anne: Ubbo Emmius: Leben, Umwelt, Nachlass und Gegenwart, Norderstedt 2010, p. 18. Dekker identifies Klaus Störtebeker in Ostfrieslandmagazin , 8 / 1991-1 / 1992 and 9 / 1993-1 / 1994, as “Junker Johann Sissingh (a) “from the city of Groningen . Cf. Dekker, Gudrun Anne: Junker Johann Sissingh from Groningerland = Klaus Störtebeker (Klaus Stürz-Den-Becher), Eilts print shop, Norden 1996.
8. ↑ On the arrest on the Weser, cf. Wanke, Josef: Die Vitalienbrüder in Oldenburg (1395–1433), Royal University of Greifswald, 1910, p. 35.
9. ↑ The complete text can be found in Blazek (2012), p. 46.
10. ↑ Raumer, Friedrich von (Ed.): Historisches Taschenbuch, New Series, 1st year, Leipzig 1840, p. 103.