Nikolaus Poppel

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Nikolaus Poppel , also Popplau, Poppelau, Poppelaw etc. (* around 1435 probably in Breslau ; † around 1490) was a traveler, adventurer, diplomat and businessman who established and cultivated contacts between the Tsarist Empire and the Holy Roman Empire . His project of a close bond between the Tsar and the Emperor was unsuccessful. He has written extensive reports on his travels.

Life

Poppel was born as the son of Kaspar Poppelau on Nemke, the seat of an old knight family in Silesia. The name of Nikolaus Poppel appears for the first time in the accounts of the city of Wroclaw from 1468. In 1483 he received a letter of recommendation from King Friedrich V (later Emperor Friedrich III ), in whose service he was. His first three-year trip, about which he had written a report in German, took him to Western Europe. a. Innsbruck , Maastricht and England .

He arrived in Moscow in 1486 - little is known about the circumstances and purpose of his trip. According to his own information, however, he brought a letter of recommendation from King Frederick V with him to Moscow. His purpose of the trip “consists only in the desire to get to know the Grand Duke as a great ruler and his country”. He himself reported on his great successes with the tsar and subsequent great interest in his experiences and projects with the emperor.

The letter of credit is guaranteed for his second, this time diplomatic, trip to Russia (1486–1487) in 1488, a fragment of which has been preserved in Russian translation. From this it can be concluded that, as he himself reports in bright colors, he was actually in communication with the emperor or his court. It has been handed down from Russian sources that Poppel expressed the emperor's interest in a closer relationship with the tsar and made the tsar a proposal for the tsar's daughter (Helena or Feodosija) to marry Albrecht von Baden, the son of King Frederick V's sister Catherine. The reply was rather cool, but Moscow was ready to send envoys to the Emperor to “take note of our mutual health” and to further discuss the marriage project.

From a further conversation in the Moscow files it is noted that Poppel informed the tsarist court that the Pope could not offer the tsar the title of king, since his power only extends to the clergy. The tsar is said to have sought the title of king with the pope. To make kings, princes and knights, only the Roman emperor has the power. Poppel now offered to intervene with the emperor on behalf of the tsar. The Russian source contains a very clear answer to this: “By the grace of God we are rulers in Our kingdom from the beginning, from our first ancestors, and our position is from God ... and just as We used to desire Our elevation from no one, so We desire not even now. ”Indeed, Ivan III sent . the Greek Georg Grachaniotes to the court of Maximilian I. However, Poppel's attempts to stay in touch with the court of the tsars were unsuccessful. Nikolaus von Popplau undertook another diplomatic trip to Russia on behalf of the emperor from 1489 to 1490. The date of his death is unknown.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Dietrich Huschenbett: Nikolaus von Popplau. In: Author's Lexicon . Volume VI, Col. 1133 f.
  2. ↑ Pamjatniki diplomaticeskich snosenii, Saint Petersburg, 1851–1856 (4 volumes). Volume I, p. 1.
  3. ↑ Pamjatniki diplomaticeskich snosenii, Saint Petersburg, 1851–1856 (4 volumes). Volume I, p. 12.
personal data
SURNAME Poppel, Nikolaus
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Popplau, Nikolaus; Poppelau, Nikolaus; Poppelaw, Nicholas
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Traveler, adventurer, diplomat and businessman
DATE OF BIRTH around 1435
PLACE OF BIRTH unsure: Breslau
DATE OF DEATH around 1490