Margarethe von Pfalz-Mosbach

Margarethe von Pfalz-Mosbach on the reredos of the Wörther Altar

Margarethe von Pfalz-Mosbach (* March 2, 1432 , † September 14, 1457 ) was the daughter of Count Palatine Otto I of Pfalz-Mosbach . She married Count Reinhard III on July 11, 1446 . von Hanau , who succeeded his father in the government of the county of Hanau in 1451 .

family

From the marriage emerged:

1. Philipp (born September 20, 1449 in Windecken , † August 26, 1500)
2. Margarethe (* 1452, † March 14, 1467), engaged to Philipp von Eppstein , died before the marriage

Position in the division of the country

initial situation

The fact that the four-year-old Philip I (the younger) inherited the county with the death of her husband brought the family into a conflict:

• Either the primogeniture , which had to be observed in the Hanau house since 1375, was followed and it was waited to see whether Count Philipp I (the younger) reached adulthood, had offspring and continued the dynasty. This variant had the advantage that property, importance and power of the family were preserved in one hand, but had the disadvantage that should Count Philip I (the Younger) die without producing any offspring, the dynasty would become extinct.
• Or the family disregarded the primogeniture law, allowing the next agnate , Philip I of Hanau-Lichtenberg (the elder), Katharina's brother-in-law, to marry. This was already 40 years old at the time of the negotiations about the division of the county. Such an approach had the advantage of considerably increasing the chances of the dynasty's survival, but the disadvantage that the county had to be divided for this purpose, because in contemporary ideas there was a pure apanage of a descendant, i.e. a financial endowment without territory at the same time was assigned, not yet imaginable.

Fight for division

In this conflict, Margarethe, supported by her father, pursued the primogeniture solution, which would concentrate the entire inheritance on him for the benefit of her son. The opposing party was formed around her mother-in-law Katharina von Nassau-Beilstein . It could be indifferent to him whether her second-born son, Philip I (the elder) or her grandson, Philip I (the younger) continued the line. She estimated the danger to the existence of the Hanau family to be lower if the childbearing (at that time he already had at least one illegitimate son) Philip I the elder were allowed to marry as quickly as possible, instead of relying solely on the grandson. She managed to get the relatives, the most important collaborations of her subjects - above all the four cities of the County of Hanau , Windecken , Babenhausen and Steinau , and the associations of the Burgmanns in Babenhausen and Gelnhausen - and vassals of the Counts of Hanau behind her.

At first, however, Margarethe prevailed. It was only when she died in 1457 that Katharina was able to implement her plan and the division of the county. As early as January 1458, a family contract was sealed, which granted all parts of the county south of the Main , especially the offices of Babenhausen , Schaafheim and the Hanau part of Umstadt , Philip I the Elder, the right to marry. He made use of this in the same year.

death

Katharina was buried in the Marienkirche in Hanau.

useful information

Margarethe is shown praying together with her husband on the altarpiece of the late Gothic Wörther Altarpiece . The winged altar dates from 1485/90 and was donated by her son, Count Philip I, for the salvation of his parents' souls. Since the altar was only created more than 30 years after Margarethe's death, it can be assumed that the illustration is not a lifelike portrait .

literature

• Reinhard Dietrich : The state constitution in the Hanauischen = Hanauer Geschichtsblätter 34. Hanau 1996. ISBN 3-9801933-6-5
• Reinhard Dietrich: The abdication of Ulrich V. von Hanau - causes and consequences . In: Hanauer Geschichtsblätter 31. Hanau 1993.
• Fried Lübecke: Hanau. City and county . Cologne 1951. pp. 95f.
• Reinhard Suchier : Genealogy of the Hanauer count house . In: Festschrift of the Hanau History Association for its 50th anniversary celebration on August 27, 1894, Hanau 1894.
• Günther Wüst: Pfalz-Mosbach (1410-1499). History of a Palatine sideline in the 15th century with special consideration of territorial politics. Dissertation Heidelberg 1976.
• Ernst Julius Zimmermann : Hanau city and country . 3rd edition, Hanau 1919. ND 1978.