Rapoto IV. (Ortenburg)

Rapoto IV. († 1296 ) was the third son of Count Heinrich I von Ortenburg . Rapoto IV was a member of the Ortenburg dynasty . Rapoto IV usually performed together with his two brothers Diepold and Gebhard , whom he later inherited. After the death of the two brothers he was the rightful Count of Ortenburg .

Live and act

From birth Rapoto IV had to fear his older stepbrother Heinrich II . This tried to bring him and his two brothers into his power. The trigger for this situation was the marriage of his mother Richgard von Hohenburg to Heinrich I, since Heinrich II feared for his inheritance, and a falling out with his father broke out.

In 1238 he and his two brothers Gebhard and Diepold received the county of Murach for administration. After the death of his stepbrother Heinrich in 1257, his brother Gebhard officially inherited the county of Ortenburg as the elder , but he shared the administration with his brothers. Thus the county was ruled indirectly by three counts.

In the course of time, the three brothers sold their properties in what is now Upper Palatinate . The reason for this was the great financial burden that the escape from childhood brought with it, as well as the large donations from his stepbrother to the church, as well as generous donations to the church and other nobles. In 1272 they even sold the County of Murach to the Bavarian Duke Ludwig II. Thus, the Ortenburg territory only extended over the small but imperial-free Lower Bavarian County of Ortenburg, which was roughly the size of the Ortenburg market before the municipal reform of 1972.

After the death of his brother Gebhard, who died childless, and the apparent resignation of his brother Diepold, Rapoto IV became the ruling count of Ortenburg in 1275 . In 1285 his brother Diepold also died childless. So Rapoto also got his property. Rapoto IV. Was thus again the first Ortenburg count, after the ancestor Rapoto I , who alone held all of Ortenburg's possessions, even if these were significantly smaller than those of his grandfather.

Interior of the Ortenburg chapel at Passau Cathedral

In 1288 Rapoto designated the Ortenburg chapel next to St. Stephen's Cathedral in Passau as the permanent and only burial place of his family. From then until 1684 all Catholic family members were buried there.

In 1291 Count Albrecht von Hals renounced Kamm Castle and its accessories and the possessions around Kamm, St. Philipp (today's Söldenau ), Holzkirchen and Isarhofen in favor of his granddaughter Kunigunde, the wife of Rapotos IV .

As the last male count from the Ortenburg family still alive, he became thanks to his marriage to Kunigunde and his son Heinrich III. the ancestor of the family. Rapoto IV initiated a quieter phase in the county of Ortenburg, which had been characterized for decades by feuds with neighbors and family quarrels.

Today the street Rapotohöhe in Oberviechtach is named after him.

progeny

Rapoto IV was married to Kunigunde von Bruckberg. The following children were born from this marriage:

• Henry III. († 1345), ∞ Adelheid († 1335), Countess von Schaunberg , ∞ Sophia, Countess von Henneberg-Aschach
• Liutgard, ∞ Hartmann II., Count von Wartstein

literature

• Friedrich Hausmann : The Counts of Ortenburg and their male ancestors, the Spanheimers in Carinthia, Saxony and Bavaria, as well as their subsidiary lines , published in: Ostbairische Grenzmarken - Passauer Jahrbuch für Geschichte, Kunst und Volkskunde, No. 36, Passau 1994 (p. 9 -62).
• Ders .: Archives of the Counts of Ortenburg. Documents of the family and county of Ortenburg (in Tambach and Munich) Volume 1: 1142–1400 (= Bavarian archive inventories 42), Neustadt an der Aisch 1984.
• Eberhard Graf zu Ortenburg-Tambach: History of the imperial, ducal and counts 'entire house of Ortenburg - Part 2: The counts' house in Bavaria. , Vilshofen 1932.
• Carl Mehrmann: History of the Evangelical Lutheran community of Ortenburg in Lower Bavaria - memorandum for the anniversary celebration of the 300th anniversary of the introduction of the Reformation there on October 17 and 18, 1863 , Landshut 1863 ( digitized version ).
• Johann Ferdinand von Huschberg : History of the ducal and countial general house of Ortenburg: edited from the sources , Sulzbach 1828 ( digitized ).

Individual evidence

1. ↑ RB IV, 480

Web links

• genealogy

predecessor	Office	successor
Gebhard	Count of Ortenburg 1275–1296	Henry III.
Heinrich I.	Count of Murach 1238–1272	Ludwig II.