Ruprecht (HRR)

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Ruprecht with his wife von Hohenzollern-Nürnberg in a miniature copy of a now-lost mural in Heidelberg Castle , 1772/73. (Bavarian National Museum Munich, Inv. No. NN 3610). One of the most famous lines of ancestors from the Gothic era was once located in the hall of Heidelberg Castle . A wall copy of this row of princes was made for the new construction of Amberg Castle in the early 17th century. However, both series are no longer preserved, only a colored miniature copy on parchment.

Ruprecht (* May 5, 1352 in Amberg ; † May 18, 1410 at Landskron Castle in Oppenheim ) from the Wittelsbach dynasty was from 1398 to 1410 as Ruprecht III. Count Palatine near the Rhine and Roman-German King from 1400 to 1410 .

At the beginning of the 15th century, the Roman-German monarchy got into a serious crisis. Together with the other three Rhenish electors , Ruprecht deposed the increasingly unpopular King Wenzel in 1400, whereupon he was elected king himself, although Wenzel did not give up his claim. Ruprecht's ten-year kingship was marked by the decline in the royal court's power to integrate and permanent financial difficulties. A planned Italian train ended in fiasco. Ruprecht remained without an imperial crown and could not win back the Duchy of Milan for the empire. Financially stricken, he returned to the Rhine. He tried to compensate for the legitimization deficit of his kingship with representative symbolism such as burial place, royal seal or his own coinage.

He was the only medieval king from Heidelberg. He managed to expand the territory of the Electoral Palatinate. Under him, Heidelberg received the character of the capital of the empire for a short time. With the Heiliggeistkirche in Heidelberg , Ruprecht created a place of burial and remembrance befitting his status, which served the Wittelsbachers on the Rhine as a burial place until the 17th century. Ruprecht's division of rule and territory among the four sons, contrary to existing house contracts, ensured the dynastic survival of the Palatine line of the Wittelsbach family. To this day, historians often consider him the Roman-German king with the smallest political radius of action and freedom of action. The more recent research questions the judgment of a failed king in view of wide-ranging marriage and alliance projects as well as the further development in the administrative and political area.

Life

origin

Territorial inventory of the Palatinate in 1329 according to the Wittelsbach house contract of Pavia (excluding the Upper Palatinate)
The family tree of the Wittelsbach Count Palatine near Rhine, decorated with tendrils and flowers, from around 1530 shows 23 half-figures, each with a coat of arms and a banderole. In the upper left corner are shown: "Ruprecht Roman King and Count Palatine of the Rhine and Frau Katharina, born Countess of Nuremberg". (Art collections of the Veste Coburg, VI, 429,102)

Ruprecht came from the Wittelsbach family , who first appeared in the sources in the middle of the 11th century. Whether they were related to the Liutpolders , as was suspected, cannot be proven. Shortly before 1050 a "Count Otto von Scheyern" is mentioned in the documents of the Diocese of Freising . His county was between Augsburg and Ingolstadt with the Count Castle Scheyern . His son Otto II expanded the territory by collecting church and monastery bailiffs (Freisinger Domstift, Weihenstephan, Ilmmünster, Eisenhofen). With the instrument of the bailiwick, larger areas could be controlled without the need for property rights. Under Friedrich Barbarossa , who was elected king in 1152, the Wittelsbachers were among the loyal followers and distinguished themselves through special services in the royal service. In 1180 Otto von Wittelsbach was raised by Friedrich Barbarossa for his loyalty to Duke of Bavaria.

In 1214 the family was further raised in rank when the young Hohenstaufen ruler Friedrich II raised Duke Ludwig I of Bavaria to the rank of Count Palatine of the Rhine . As a result, the Wittelsbachers, as loyal supporters of the Staufer, received another important imperial principality after the Duchy of Bavaria after 1180 . In the Treaty of Pavia in 1329 , Emperor Ludwig IV (“the Bavarian”) and his nephews from the Palatinate agreed to separate the Wittelsbach rule into the Palatinate on the one hand and Bavaria on the other. They also agreed that when a branch expired, mutual inheritance law should apply. This created two branches of the family that act independently of one another and each have their own domains. With the Golden Bull of Emperor Charles IV from 1356, the Count Palatine was awarded a prominent position among the secular electors. As an archdean he exercised the imperial vicariate and was thus representative in the absence or death of the king. Through ceremonial powers, such as a special seat in the coexistence of the king and elector, the priority in the political and social order structure of the empire was visually staged for everyone. Around 1400, the Palatinate near Rhine was one of the most powerful principalities in the empire. It owed its priority to its location on the Rhine, which brought numerous economic and political advantages to the Electoral Palatinate. The Rhine tolls made the count palatine the wealthiest imperial princes. The Wittelsbachers became the third dynasty alongside the Luxemburgers and Habsburgs , which decisively determined the fate of the empire in the late Middle Ages .

Family and early years

Ruprecht was born as the only son of Ruprecht II and his wife Beatrix of Sicily on May 5, 1352 in Amberg. Nothing is known of his youth, except that he lost his mother at the age of 13. But he took part in important events early on. From 1378 he appears next to his great uncle Ruprecht I and his father Ruprecht II in many important documents. As a result, he was highlighted early on as a future successor in the Electoral Palatinate. Ruprecht married on June 27, 1374 in Amberg Elisabeth von Hohenzollern , the daughter of Burgrave Friedrich V and his wife Margravine Elisabeth of Meissen and Thuringia . The marriage resulted in a total of six sons and three daughters. His eldest son Ruprecht IV, called Ruprecht Pipan , was born in 1375, Friedrich in 1377, later Elector Ludwig III. Born in 1378, Johann in 1383, Stephan in 1385 and Otto in 1390, his daughters Margarete von der Pfalz in 1376, Agnes in 1379 and Elisabeth in 1381. The rule was thus dynastically secured to a far greater extent than before. At the same time, however, the unity of the Palatinate was in danger. Ruprecht II agreed with his son Ruprecht III in 1392 that in future only the eldest son should succeed in the rule. Only apanages or a spiritual career were planned for the later sons . They stipulated this in the Rupertine Constitution of July 13, 1395. The Rupertine Constitution was not implemented. The certificate remained incompletely sealed and did not become legally binding. The set of rules remained ineffective mainly because Ruprecht's sons, who were considered there, died. After the death of his father, Ruprecht was enfeoffed on January 6, 1398, at the age of almost 46, in the electoral dignity and with the palatinate .

Deposition of Wenceslas

No Roman-German ruler since the Staufers had succeeded in having a son chosen as his successor during his lifetime. This was achieved again for the first time in 1376 by Charles IV, whose son Wenceslaus was elected king. However, Wenceslaus, who had ruled since his father's death in 1378, increasingly focused on his Kingdom of Bohemia over the following years . This meant that he did not show any presence in the other areas of the empire or on the court days. The permanent physical distance led to the political distance to the Rhenish electors (the archbishops of Mainz , Cologne and Trier as well as the Count Palatine near the Rhine). In Bohemia, too, Wenceslas royal rule fell into a crisis. Wenceslaus was captured on May 8, 1394 by the Bohemian aristocratic opposition and then imprisoned. The electors behaved loyally and used their strength to secure his release. Ruprecht moved at the head of an army from the Upper Palatinate to Bohemia and was able to obtain his release there. Instead of taking the electors into the service of the king and empire himself, in 1396 Wenzel appointed his half-brother Sigismund as imperial vicar for an indefinite period of time with royal powers. This fundamentally affected the self-image of the electors and their role in the election of the king. A compensation with Wenzel could not be achieved. Since the middle of the 1390s, the electors therefore increasingly pursued their own interests. The Rhenish electors tried to win over the other imperial princes with written contracts and military aid promises. On October 24, 1396, Count Palatine Ruprecht II concluded the so-called Oppenheimer Treaty with the then Mainz canon Johann II of Nassau , who came from a count house close to the king, who had once established a king in the empire with Adolf von Nassau . Johann was helped to the office of Archbishop of Mainz, but he secured the Wittelsbacher Ruprecht II. Or his son Ruprecht III. to help them to gain and become dignified (dignities), after which they want to make (strive) , as the spirits may ( whatever kind they may be) spiritually or worldly . So-called “kingless” court days, which were held several times, were intended to increase the contradiction to Wenzel and to confront the Luxembourger with the demand to fulfill his duties in church and kingdom. In May 1397, various imperial princes met in Frankfurt for a meeting that had been convened on the initiative of the archbishops of Cologne, Trier and the Count Palatine.

In the months before Wenceslas was deposed and the new election that followed, the consensus between the Rhenish electors was fixed in detail in writing through extensive alliance agreements, aid pledges and promises and no longer visualized using symbolic forms of expression. The Electoral Palatinate as well as Mainz and Cologne concluded a formal agreement with the Kurverein von Boppard on April 11, 1399 . The electors committed themselves to a common alliance for life. In church and imperial matters they wanted to act together and they declared emphatically that they would put up resistance together. In June, Duke Rudolf III. von Sachsen-Wittenberg and on September 15 also the Archbishop Werner of Trier joined the alliance. However, the attempt to find regionally influential cities or Pope Boniface IX remained in vain. to win for the deposition of Wenceslas. At the end of May 1400, the Rhenish electors and other princes met in Frankfurt. This gathering was a highlight for the electoral activities “according to political demands, the size of the group of participants and the degree of institutionalization”. Not only were their own followers present, but also representatives of the imperial cities and envoys from England, France and Castile. Wenzel was asked to come to the Mainz official residence in Oberlahnstein on August 11th . In the context of the Frankfurt talks, however, a possible new king was already being disputed. The elector Rudolf of Saxony proposed his brother-in-law Friedrich I, Duke of Braunschweig and Lüneburg . But Archbishop Johann II of Mainz favored Ruprecht. There was an argument. Friedrich left and was murdered on June 5, 1400 near the village of Kleinenglis (south of Fritzlar ) by Count Heinrich VII von Waldeck and his followers Friedrich von Hertingshausen and Konrad Kunzmann von Falkenberg . The reasons are to be found in local conflicts between the Counts of Waldeck and the Guelphs around Lüneburg. The suspicion arose, however, “as if the Rhenish opposition wanted to use brutal force to remove princes who did not agree to their plans for the empire.” Ruprecht later became personally involved in the matter as king. As an atonement, he committed the murderers to the foundation of an altar with eternal mass for the soul in the collegiate church of St. Peter in Fritzlar. In his role as a peacemaker, however, Ruprecht was unsuccessful. In the summer of 1402, the armed clashes between the conflicting parties continued.

In the weeks after the attack, the Rhenish opposition to Wenzel increasingly lost supporters. At the beginning of August 1400, the Rhenish electors met in Oberlahnstein for dismissal and re-election. Their support was reduced to a minimum. In addition to some counts and gentlemen appeared with Friedrich VI. von Nürnberg and Ruprecht's son Stephan were only two representatives of the imperial princes . The Duke of Saxony and Jobst of Moravia as the holders of the Brandenburg voting vote were not present . The four electors from Mainz, Cologne, Trier and the Palatinate waited demonstratively for any delayed electors or Wenzel, who was also invited. On August 20, 1400, they declared Wenceslaus to be deposed of his royal office as “useless, lazy, careless dismemberer and unworthy owner of the empire” and justified this measure with their responsibility for the empire. Wenceslaus did not recognize his deposition and continued to use the title of Roman king. As king, he continued to seal until his death.

Royalty

Coronation

Ruprecht III. and his wife Elisabeth von Hohenzollern-Nürnberg. They are depicted with the insignia of royalty, the royal cloak, the crown, the scepter and the orb. The verse emphasizes the Wittelsbacher's ascent to king: "Ruprecht the king of the Roman Empire / An would be high wass hard the same / Vonn Nüremberg a Burgkgrevin / Waß be marred queen". Portrait around 1600, based on a 15th century model. Oil on canvas. Munich, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen , 4478.
On August 21, 1400, the prince-electors elected the Wittelsbach Count Palatine as king. The octagonal square building was destroyed in 1795 and rebuilt in 1842 a little offset.

One day after Wenceslas was deposed by the electors, 48-year-old Ruprecht was elected king. He had given the man from Mainz his election vote. The Rhenish electors had promised all adopted by Wenzel Ruprecht Rhein duties repealed and raise without their consent no. In addition, there were obligations to take care of the political problems in the Italian part of the empire and to maintain the peace, with which the Rhenish electors emphasized an independent policy.

Ruprecht's uprising took place in the royal chair of Rhens , where preparations for royal elections had already taken place several times in the past. The usual coronation site Aachen refused Ruprecht access. The traditional choice of Frankfurt was also closed to him. The Frankfurters did not want to jeopardize their trading interests with Bohemia and had a very good relationship with Wenzel. After a “royal camp” in front of the walls, Frankfurt did not allow Ruprecht to move into the city until October 26th after more than six weeks. From then on the city became one of the most important bases of the new king. Aachen, which was connected to France, which was friendly to Luxembourg via the Duke of Geldern , kept its distance from Ruprecht until 1407.

On January 6, 1401 Ruprecht was indeed in the traditional coronation place of Cologne by the authorized Archbishop Friedrich III. crowned, but without the imperial insignia. Wenzel was by no means ready to hand it over. Ruprecht had to be content with a specially made, fairly inexpensive crown. In the empire Ruprecht was widely recognized as king. In the summer of 1401 Wenceslas wanted to recognize Ruprecht as king in the empire in return for keeping the Bohemian royal crown. However, the project failed because of the other demands that Ruprecht and Wenzel had linked to their implementation. On October 1, 1403 Ruprecht received from Pope Boniface IX. the license granted. Ruprecht had previously promised him to follow the ideas of the Roman Pope in overcoming the schism . Overall, recognition was only achieved in parts of the empire. Wenceslaus continued to rule in Bohemia. The entire east with the electorates of Saxony and Brandenburg also remained remote from the king . Right at the beginning of his rule, Ruprecht at least managed to win back the northern Upper Palatinate . Ruprecht's son Ludwig took action against Wenzel, but after initial successes he was only able to conclude an armistice outside Prague on June 2, 1401.

Failed Italian move (1401/02)

In the spring of 1401 Ruprecht made preparations for a train to Italy . Imperial Italy , for which no central form of organization existed, had already withdrawn almost entirely from royal influence in the late 13th and early 14th centuries. Henry VII had tried to integrate the economically and financially extremely powerful part of the empire more strongly, but this was prevented by his early death in 1313; Ludwig IV and Charles IV were already pursuing much more modest goals. Interfering in the complex situation in Imperial Italy with its various political actors was associated with the risk of the late medieval Roman-German kings of being crushed between the factions there. At the same time, however, the mobilization of the financially strong municipalities for imperial policy was in the interests of the Roman-German monarchy. If successful, Ruprecht could also acquire honor, reputation and prestige.

On August 1, 1401, some documents were issued that made arrangements for the event that Ruprecht should not return alive from Italy. His sons had to recognize the primogeniture . On September 9th he appointed his son Ludwig as deputy in the Palatinate County. Four days later he appointed him imperial vicar for the time of his journey to Rome, because in such a case Rome was the destination, more precisely the coronation of the emperor. According to traditional ideas, Ruprecht understood the imperial vicariate ( vacante imperio ) as a temporary office with restricted, by no means equal, powers. This was supposed to represent Ruprecht as king during his absence in the empire. However, Ruprecht did not have enough of his own financial means for the Italian move, so that he was dependent on credit from the Upper German and Florentine big capital. Because of this, contemporaries gave him the unflattering nickname “Condottiere of Florence”. However, the hoped-for payments did not materialize or were delayed. Part of the Imperial Army therefore had to be released again in Augsburg in September 1401. Ruprecht crossed the Alps with the rest of the army, accompanied by his wife, and came to Trento on October 14, 1401 .

The Florentines explained to him that they would not pay the 65,000 ducats until the king had fulfilled his contractual obligations with the war against Milan. Milan was a common enemy of Ruprecht and the Florentines. In 1395, Wenceslaus had converted the former imperial vicariate of Milan into a duchy for the enormous sum of 100,000 florins and transferred it to Gian Galeazzo Visconti , an opponent of Florence. This act also represented an alienation from imperial property , which was one of the reasons for the deposition of Wenceslas by the Rhenish electors. When he was elected king, Ruprecht had promised to take action against the Visconti . However, a defeat by the Milanese army near Brescia (November 22, 1401) quickly made the difference between the financially strong Visconti and Ruprecht clear. Important allies such as the Archbishop of Cologne Friedrich or Leopold of Austria also left Ruprecht's army. Weaker, Ruprecht had to withdraw to Padua via Bozen and the Puster Valley . There he was stuck and moved into winter quarters in 1401/02.

Venice received Ruprecht with honor, but offered him no support and declared its "neutrality". In mid-April 1402 Ruprecht decided to retreat to the empire north of the Alps. After all, Venice gave him 4,000 ducats for the return trip. The failed Italian move was a heavy burden for Ruprecht's further kingship. Instead of being the “Condottiere of Florence” he was now mocked by contemporaries as the “Goggelmann with the empty pocket”. According to the chronicle of Burkhard Zink , Ruprecht's army came back from Italy "with mockery and shame". The idea of ​​a Rome train was pursued by Ruprecht until 1406, but could no longer be implemented. Even the early death of Gian Galeazzo Visconti on September 3, 1402 did not bring Ruprecht any advantage. The regulatory function of the Roman-German kings in imperial Italy , which was still exercised during the Staufer period , could no longer be exercised by Ruprecht either.

Power structure and power practice

Finances

In the early 14th century, the Roman-German king could still dispose of a regular income from the empire of 100,000 guilders annually. As elector, Ruprecht was one of the richest princes. As a king, however, he was always faced with financial challenges. He could expect 50 to 60,000 guilders from his property and probably only 25,000 guilders from the shrunken imperial estate. Loans were the only way out. So he probably took out a total of half a million guilders in loans. Ruprecht had to tax his hereditary lands until 1402/05 in order to pay off the debts from the Italian move. In accordance with his promise to the Rhenish electors, he removed the tariffs in 1401. But his plan to reorganize the tariffs was unsuccessful, also because he had promised the elector not to introduce any new tariffs without their consent. The plans developed by Ruprecht in 1404 for a royal mint in Frankfurt, which was to mint a new unified coin in the empire, could not be implemented either. As head of the empire, his efforts to protect the royal Jews were more successful than his plans for customs and coins. This protection was usually paid for. As Count Palatinate, Ruprecht had the Jews expelled from the Electoral Palatinate and thus continued his father's anti-Jewish policy. As a king, however, the Jewish shelf was an important source of income. He reorganized the delivery of the “golden sacrificial penny” that had been collected since Ludwig the Bavarian . All Jews had to pay poll tax for over twelve years. In 1407 Ruprecht appointed Israel von Rothenburg Grand Master for all Jews in the empire. In this way he wanted to get a better overview of the widely dispersed Jewish communities in the empire.

Marriage projects

Marriage policy was an essential element of the enforcement and legitimation of power. In the period before 1400 and after 1410 this moved exclusively in a regional context. Ruprecht's own marriage to the Nuremberg Countess Elisabeth von Hohenzollern was concluded because of the probable rule in the Upper Palatinate. The marriage of Ruprecht's first-born son Ruprecht Pipan to Countess Elisabeth von Sponheim in 1392 was concluded with the prospect of the Sponheim inheritance. However, the marriage remained childless and Pipan died in 1397.

Through Ruprecht's kingship, the room for maneuver in the search for suitable spouses was vastly expanded. Through them, European rulers in particular were involved. Just three days after his coronation, Ruprecht successfully campaigned for a bride at the English royal court for his son Ludwig. The marriage project with King Ruprecht was also of considerable importance for the House of Lancaster . Henry IV had deposed the controversial Richard II in 1399 . His rule, however, had not completely lost the taint of illegitimacy. On March 7, 1401, the marriage contracts were signed in London. Both sides hoped for a gain in reputation and the consolidation of their royal position at European level. However, no agreement could initially be reached on the modalities of the dowry payments for the bride. At another meeting on August 16, 1401 in Dordrecht , three payment dates for 40,000 Nobles were agreed by 1404 at the latest. On July 6, 1402, the wedding between Ruprecht's eldest son Ludwig and Blanca von Lancaster , the eldest daughter of Henry IV of England, took place in Cologne . Because of the early death of the 17-year-old Blanca in 1409, the wedding had no recognizable long-term consequences.

A marriage project between Ruprecht's daughter Elisabeth and Duke Friedrich von Tirol could only be successfully concluded in autumn 1406. With the Habsburgs, Ruprecht won an important ally in the south and south-east of the empire. Another marriage project was realized in 1407 with Katharina , the sister of the Nordic Union King Erich von Pomerania , and Ruprecht's son Johann . Ruprecht probably wanted to continue the policy of Emperor Charles IV, which was very active in the Baltic Sea region, while emphasizing his royal priority. It was the last marriage project realized during Ruprecht's reign. Further marriage projects with the houses of Aragón and Savoy , the Visconti and the Luxemburgers could not be realized.

Itinerary and royal central places

Medieval royal rule was exercised in the empire without a permanent residence through "outpatient rule practice". Ruprecht had to go through the empire and give his rule validity and authority through personal presence. His itinerary (travel routes in the empire) concentrated on the area between the Moselle, Middle Rhine and Neckar with the territorial-Palatinate-Count's residence in Heidelberg and the Upper Palatinate with the imperial city of Nuremberg. It is the most spatially restricted itinerary of the medieval kings.

One of the most important centers of the Wittelsbacher on the Rhine was Heidelberg. The place, first mentioned in 1196, belonged to the Wittelsbach rule from 1225. Under Ruprecht I the city became the center of the Palatine rule. With the takeover of the Palatinate in 1398, Ruprecht also resided in Heidelberg like his father and great-uncle. In addition to Heidelberg, Amberg was also of particular importance to Ruprecht. On September 14, 1400, around four weeks after his king's election, Ruprecht confirmed the rights and freedom of the city of Amberg in a field in Frankfurt. Ruprecht also made one of his first foundations for Amberg. Ruprecht often had personal relationships with this city. He was not only born there in 1352, but also married there in 1374. His son Ruprecht Pipan also found his final resting place in St. Martin in Amberg in 1397 .

court
Portrait of a scholar Job Veners in a legal opinion. Miniature in the illuminated manuscript of Winand von Steeg (Munich, Bavarian Main State Archives, Secret House Archives, HS 12, fol. 8)

At the royal court, the politically negotiated and lived relationships between the king and the great were visualized. The royal court played an important role as a “stage for the princes to present themselves and demonstrate their rank”. The Metz court day of Charles IV of 1356 was considered a high point of late medieval rulership representation due to the performance of court services by the seven electors . From around 1375 to around 1470, however, a “destruction of the ruler's court” emerged. The royal successors of Charles IV no longer succeeded in integrating the political and social elite into the royal court. The greats of the empire had lost interest in council and court service since the last third of the 14th century. The greats of the empire gathered for deliberations on the court days. The number of Reichstag and the area of ​​origin were significantly more limited under Ruprecht than under Charles IV. The court days were only attended by a small number of imperial princes. The Frankfurt Court Conference of 1409 on questions about the Council of Pisa was the only Court Conference attended by a considerable number of great people. Ruprechts Hof was lacking in attraction. Only three imperial princes, with whom Ruprecht was related or related by marriage, acquired the title of royal council. These were the dukes of Bavaria-Ingolstadt and the elector Friedrich I of Brandenburg (formerly burgrave of Nuremberg) . Friedrich I in particular was a close political ally of Ruprecht. Both were related by marriage through Friedrich's sister. Friedrich not only made it possible for Ruprecht to be elected king, he also accompanied him on his Italian campaign. In 1401 Ruprecht laid down the conditions in a marriage agreement between Burgrave Friedrich and Elisabeth of Bavaria .

The most important part of the court was the chancellery . According to Ellen Widder , the late medieval law firm was not a fixed institution, but a flexible personal association. The Bishop of Speyer Raban von Helmstatt played an important role in the office. Ruprecht appointed him his chancellor in autumn 1400. According to Peter Moraw , who examined the office staff, the court council consisted of at least 107 people, namely 76 lay people and 31 clergy. The composition of this council was comparable to that of a territorial prince. Of 107 councilors, about half came from the power of the household and a quarter each from the non-territorial nobility and the clergy. Ruprecht's chancellery, on the other hand, was more focused on royalty and less territorial. Numerous protonotaries had not worked in the Palatinate-territorial administration before they entered the royal chancellery. Two of the most important advisors at court were Matthäus von Krakau and the German master Konrad von Egloffstein .

Bellifortis, Göttingen, Lower Saxony State and University Library, 2 ° Cod, ms. philos, 63 cim., fol. 85r

Court judicial activity developed a particular intensity. From October 1400 to December 1403 436 documents prove the judicial activity of the king and his court judge. For the last third of Ruprecht's time and thus for less than three and a half years, 464 regesta were found . Compared to its predecessors, there was a "significant increase" in business. The 1686 regests in the 24 years of Wenceslas' reign are compared to 1388 in just ten years under Ruprecht. According to Ute Rödel, Ruprecht was "astonishingly successful" as the chief judge. On the other hand, for Ellen Widder, the increase in judicial writing production expresses a “legitimation problem” compared to his deposed Luxembourg predecessor, Wenzel, who was still living. According to their opinion, the production of documents, including administrative activities, can only be explained out of the compulsion to legitimize Ruprecht's kingship.

A number of factors, in their complex interaction, led to an almost leap in the use of fonts. This was made easier by the significantly cheaper paper compared to parchment , the changed and more complex legal relationships forced more correspondence and legislative acts at all levels. In addition, literacy and reading skills, which have been growing and widespread for a long time, increased in the 15th century. Accordingly, far more written sources are available from this period, including a large number of documents, than from the previous decades. About 4800 documents and letters have been received from Ruprecht. The beginnings of modernization and rationalization can be seen under him. With Ruprecht, the continuous series of Reich registry books begins, which documents essential aspects of government activity. The certificates issued were recorded in it. The oldest feudal book of the Electoral Palatinate and the first, albeit incomplete, Reichslehnsbuch (1401) were written on his initiative. The court court order laid down in 1409 is also the first of its kind to have survived. Ernst Schubert spoke of the “objectification of royal rule” for the peculiarity of Ruprecht's rule.

Ruprecht was interested in writings on war technology. Konrad Kyeser provided an edition of his Bellifortis (the strong man), a technical war compendium, with a dedication to King Ruprecht. It is also the earliest date of a Bellifortis manuscript. However, Ruprecht probably never received the dedication copy.

The tendency towards academization of the members of the council and the chancellery, which began under Charles IV, continued under Ruprecht's kingship. The legal scholar Job Vener , who came from the Schwäbisch Gmünder patriciate, worked as protonotary and counselor. About three weeks after Ruprecht's election as king, Job was first mentioned in royal service; the earliest designation as protonotary (de facto head of the office) can be documented for March 11, 1401. He played a major role in the fact that under Ruprecht's rule more royal documents were produced every year than under the previous rulers. University professors were brought in by Ruprecht to an extent previously unknown. Ernst Schubert emphasized the high number of theologians under Wenzel and Ruprecht. Furthermore, under Ruprecht an institutionalization of court authorities began. The court court was expanded to include procurators. Ruprecht deliberately decided not to involve the greats at the court. In 1401, for example, he issued the privileges of many participants in the Rome parade out of royal authority, despite the presence of large numbers in the Augsburg field camp. Also the big ones were waived as assessors in the court court. However, this also meant that an essential element of political integration in the empire was lost. The institutional consolidation of the court under Ruprecht was only under Friedrich III. concluded with the higher court .

Heiliggeistkirche Heidelberg and sponsorship of the university

Ruprecht sponsored the University of Heidelberg , founded in 1386 . After Prague and Vienna it was the third university foundation in the empire. He founded the Heidelberg Heiliggeiststift to provide material support to the university's teaching staff. The plan to raise the Heiliggeistkirche to a collegiate monastery was first mentioned in a bull by Pope Boniface IX in 1403 . clear. The Heiliggeistkirche was replaced by the parish of the Heidelberg Peterskirche , elevated to a collegiate church and given four benefices from the Marienkirche in Neustadt . Ruprecht's motives were the concern for the salvation of the soul as well as the "increase of worship and consolidation of the university". The establishment of the collegiate foundation was not fully completed until 1418 because of the limited donation funds and Ruprecht's death.

With the Heiliggeiststift he founded a new dynastic hereditary burial place and a capella regia (royal chapel) appropriate to the rank . He also chose the collegiate church he founded as his final resting place. With this he gave up the previous Palatinate burial tradition in the Schönau monastery or in the Neustadt collegiate church . Almost all successors up to 1686 found their final resting place in the vicinity of the king and queen.

Representation of power

As king, Ruprecht tried to emphasize his monarchical rank. To this end, he used the royal seal, his own coinage and the heraldic repertoire , in addition to the construction of a royal burial place and the initiation of a marriage for his son Ludwig with an English king's daughter . The Stuttgart coat of arms , which was created in the first half of the 15th century, consists of various manuscript parts that were created by various artists every few years. Ruprecht is represented with a full royal coat of arms.

Before he was elected a king, Ruprecht used the three combination of lion, diamond and cure shield in the seal. The royal seal shows Ruprecht sitting on a throne with a crown, orb and scepter. There are two lions at his feet. To the right and left, the enthroned ruler is flanked by two heraldic shields. After his royal coronation, the guilders minted in the Frankfurt mint from 1400 to 1402 show the imperial eagle sitting or holding onto the diamond shield.

Last years

Marbacher Bund

On September 14, 1405, Kurmainz, Baden, Württemberg and 17 Swabian cities united to form the Marbacher Bund against Ruprecht. The alliance concluded in the Swabian town of Marbach was led by Archbishop Johann of Mainz. The motives were different. The cities feared renewed aid payments. There was a rivalry between the Archbishopric of Mainz and the Electoral Palatinate, based on territorial disputes. However, Ruprecht avoided open confrontation with the federal government and relied on propaganda. The preservation of peace is due only to the king.

The climax of the dispute with the Marbacher Bund also reflects the crisis of royalty. Almost no first petitions and completed panic letters have survived. The Archbishop of Cologne Friedrich III. von Saar Werden acted as a mediator in the conflict. In 1407 a balance could be found. On February 27, 1407, Ruprecht and Johan II assured themselves in Hemsbach that they would no longer conclude an alliance without the prior knowledge and consent of the other. In return, the Archbishop of Mainz did not want to extend the Marbacher Bund beyond 1411, especially since Ruprecht was able to forge an alliance with Strasbourg and other Alsatian imperial cities on April 5, 1408. The Landgrave of Hesse Hermann joined later.

The Occidental Schism
Council policy
Heraldic plaque with King Ruprecht's eagle on the Ruprechtsbau of Heidelberg Castle . The eagle holds in its claws the Palatinate lion coat of arms on the right, the heraldic coat of arms on the left, the diamond or alarm coat of arms.

The Great Schism had existed since 1378 . The Latin Church was divided into two obediences with Popes in Rome and Avignon . France tended towards the Avignon and England towards the Roman Pope. Ruprecht held on to Roman obedience until his death. He advocated a council that he wanted to convene himself. However, its political opportunities at European level remained limited. All of his advances in the church question were unsuccessful. In the so-called Heidelberg Postilles 1409 he spoke out against the decision-making authority of the council convened in Pisa by cardinals of the Roman and Avignon popes in June 1408 and justified the legitimacy of the Roman pope. Ruprecht feared that the assembly was completely under French influence. The Council of Pisa met on March 25, 1409 with around 500 participants. Ruprecht's ambassadors read the Heidelberg appellation from March 23, 1409, in which all resolutions were declared invalid. The calling of a council by cardinals is illegal. It is possible that the idea of ​​a royal convocation right was behind Ruprecht's critical stance. But nothing changed about the holding of the council. In the empire Ruprecht isolated himself with his attitude, since the forces opposed to Ruprecht, especially the Archbishop of Mainz, Johann II, stood up for the council. Wenceslaus hoped that the Pisan Council would revise his deposition. He recognized the Pisan Council and withdrew obedience from Pope Gregory XII, whose party he had previously been a party to. He was then confirmed as the rightful king by the Pisan Assembly.

The Avignon Pope Benedict XIII. and also the Roman Pope Gregory XII. were declared deposed at the council and Cardinal Peter Philargi was elected as Alexander V as the new Pope. The Archbishop of Mainz, Johann II, supported the council and the Pope Alexander V, who was elected there, but the two deposed did not recognize the act. Benedict XIII. was mainly supported by the Crown of Aragon and the Kingdom of Castile with León , Gregory XII. by King Ladislaus of Sicily-Naples , King Ruprecht and part of the German princes. The Council of Pisa thus did not achieve an unification of the Latin Church under a universally recognized head, but produced a third pretender.

Death and succession

Grave monument of King Ruprecht and his wife Elisabeth von Hohenzollern in the Heiliggeistkirche Heidelberg .

In the months before Ruprecht's death, Archbishop Johann of Mainz intensified his efforts to depose Ruprecht. Ruprecht was desperately looking for support. It can be traced back to Marburg in March 1410, from March to April in Heidelberg, in April in Nuremberg, then again in Heidelberg and in May in Oppenheim.

On May 18, 1410, Ruprecht died at the age of 58 in Landskron Castle near Oppenheim am Rhein. His wife died a year later. Ruprecht was buried two days after his death in the Heiliggeistkirche. Neither the electors nor important imperial princes attended the funeral. With the sons of the king and the archbishop of Riga, only a few high dignitaries were present. Funeral ceremonies can be proven in the imperial cities of Nuremberg, Frankfurt and Nördlingen. The funeral ceremony took place in Heidelberg on June 9th. Great imperial princes did not take part. Ruprecht was buried in the still unfinished church of the Heidelberg Heiliggeiststift founded by him. His wife was buried by his side. Before 1419 a high grave was built over the royal crypt. The cover plate, which has been restored several times, survived the destruction of the city and the looting of almost all electoral graves in the Heidelberg Church of the Holy Spirit in the course of the War of the Palatinate Succession in 1693. On the cover plate made of light gray sandstone, the heads of the royal couple rest on cushions and are presented with royal splendor. Ruprecht carries the scepter in his right hand, the imperial orb in his left and a three-pass crown on his head. The grave slab, which is now in the north aisle, had its original location as a high grave in the center of the high choir .

Contrary to existing house contracts, Ruprecht had decreed to divide the rule and territory between his four sons. The division was to carry out a commission appointed for this purpose by seven councils closely related to it. Despite the division of the Palatinate into four parts, the territory was larger in 1410 than in 1395. Ruprecht assured Ludwig two days before his death that the right of inheritance to the inalienable core of the Electoral Palatinate, which was indivisible according to the Golden Bull. Ruprecht's younger sons Johann, Stephan and Otto each received an independent duchy, namely Pfalz-Neumarkt , Pfalz-Simmern-Zweibrücken and Pfalz-Mosbach . In the inheritance order of 1410, the claims of the younger brothers to rank were taken into account much more strongly than in the Rupertine Constitution.

From a contemporary point of view, the division was by no means as negative as later historiography understood it. With the division, internal dynastic disputes could be avoided. In the long term, the division of the estate guaranteed the survival of the Wittelsbach family. All Wittelsbachers still living today descend from King Ruprecht.

His son Ludwig III. apparently did not seek the succession in the kingdom of his father. Rather, he supported the kingship of Sigismund from Luxembourg . Neither he nor his brothers were considered as king candidates. In the political and social order, the Count Palatine continued to occupy a special place despite the loss of the royal dignity with an electorate and three new imperial principalities. The Duke of Saxony and Jobst of Moravia , who claimed the Brandenburg vote, did not want a king election. They continued to support a kingdom of Wenceslas. On the other hand, the Rhenish electors wanted to elect a new king. Wenceslas younger brother Sigismund from the House of Luxemburg was on September 20, 1410 by Archbishop Werner von Trier , Count Palatine Ludwig III. and Burgrave Friedrich VI. elected by Nuremberg .

Aftermath

Perception in the wider public

Ruprecht on the outer wall of Stolzenfels Castle. Painting by August Gustav Lasinsky
Ruprecht in the Frankfurt Römer (Karl Ballenberger)

Compared to the High Middle Ages , contemporary historiography has changed. Instead of Latin, the vernacular was increasingly used, which meant that the educated urban laypeople addressed a wider audience than before.

Ruprecht's nickname "Clem (m)" is already documented during his time as Count Palatine and has less to do with clemens ("mild"), but rather means "small" or "barren" and "stingy". In the Heidelberg painting cycle of 1559 with portraits of the Count Palatine and Electors from the House of Wittelsbach and their wives, Ruprecht's predecessor Ruprecht II is already referred to as "Clem".

After the failure of King Ruprecht's expedition to Italy, contemporary chronicles portray a beggar man. The so-called fourth Bavarian continuation of the Saxon World Chronicle judged that he had appeared as a wise and rich prince before his election as king, so that one believed him that no one else had such a large gold treasure as he did. As king, however, all his wealth had melted away.

King Ruprecht and his wife as well as their son Ludwig III are in the collegiate church of St. Giles . von der Pfalz with his wife Blanca of England was painted by a contemporary on the choir ceiling. The painting must have been created before 1417, the time of Ludwig's marriage to his second wife Mechthild of Savoy - Achaja . Ruprecht's father wanted to convert the collegiate church into a memorial center and was buried there.

The later Wittelsbachers cultivated the memory of their royal ancestors. The royal rank, above all of the Palatinate line, was derived from Ruprecht. Ruprecht's son Ludwig III. continued the construction work on the so-called Ruprechtsbau of the Heidelberg Castle. He installed a coat of arms with an imperial eagle on the upper floor. The Frankfurt cathedral builder and sculptor Madern Gerthener is considered to be the author . Ruprecht was given a special place on the “Great Genealogical Carpet” by Count Palatine Ottheinrich in direct relation to the client. The statue designed by Ludwig Schwanthaler was installed in the study of the Bavarian King Ludwig I in the Munich Residenz in 1840 .

King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia had a magnificent exterior painting by August Gustav Lasinsky on Stolzenfels Castle commemorating Ruprecht in 1843/44 , in which Ruprecht even appears as emperor. In the picture, Elector Werner von Trier receives the newly elected Emperor Ruprecht of the Palatinate together with the Count of Hohenzollern as guests on August 30, 1400. The encounter probably never took place. The Prussian king was with Elizabeth , the sister of the Bavarian King Ludwig I married. In Ruprecht, this connection was anticipated as an ancestor who was himself married to a Hohenzollern woman named Elisabeth. Another fantasy portrait of Ruprecht can be found in Max Barack's book The German Emperors , which is apparently based on the picture of Ruprecht created by Karl Ballenberger in the Frankfurt Römer . The painting by Ruprecht made by Johann Philipp von der Schlichten around 1729 for the Mannheim residence is also devoid of any authenticity .

One year before the 500th anniversary of Heidelberg University, two well-preserved skeletons were discovered in 1885 during excavations in the choir of the Heiliggeistkirche. Missing grave goods prevented a clear identification with Ruprecht and Elisabeth. The bones were buried in new wooden coffins. After construction work in the choir, they have been resting in the elector's collective grave since 1979.

On August 21, 1977 the Kaiser Ruprecht Brotherhood was founded on the King's Chair in Rhens . The founding day was also the anniversary on which Ruprecht was elected Roman-German king in 1400. The aim of the brotherhood is to foster the memory of the increasingly forgotten Königsstuhl in Rhens. In 2003 the association Freundeskreis König Ruprecht was founded.

Research history

In the Protestant-Little German historiography of the 19th century, the late Middle Ages were considered to be an era of disintegration, since with the end of the Hohenstaufen the expansion of territories and the power of the princes over the power of the king steadily increased. The late medieval rulers were considered weak and the princes selfish. On the other hand, Ruprecht enjoyed sympathy among historians as a sponsor of Heidelberg University. The Heidelberg professors repeatedly dealt with the beginnings of their institution under the three Count Palatine with the name Ruprecht. The Heidelberg high school director August Thorbecke published an article on Ruprecht for a long time in the Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie in 1889 . He came to a balanced judgment on the basis of an intensive study of the sources: “Anyone who looks only at the success of his government will only have a derogatory judgment on his lips for him; Anyone who asks about the goals and motives of his actions and weighs the times in which he was placed will not be able to deny him a certain recognition. "

The only detailed biography of Ruprecht to date was presented by Constantin Höfler in 1861 and shaped Ruprecht's image well into the middle of the 20th century. From the 1960s onwards, Ruprecht's monarchy received increased attention through Peter Moraw and Alois Gerlich . Moraw has researched the council and the law firm of King Ruprecht in extensive studies. His work was part of the paradigm shift that occurred in the last decades of the 20th century in late medieval research from traditional, legal and constitutional-historical approaches to a personal history of late medieval royal rule. The late medieval rulers from Rudolf von Habsburg to Henry VII were “little kings” for Moraw in a European comparison, because they “could change little or nothing at all in the existing political conditions on a large scale [...]”. Moraw's remarks on the "smallness" of late medieval German kings, especially in the case of Ruprecht of the Palatinate, influence research to this day. In 1987, Gerlich presented a biography of Ruprecht in the multi-volume work Palatinate Life Pictures .

Medieval studies have been concentrating more on the late Middle Ages since the 1970s . In fact, no century has recently been explored so intensely as the fifteenth. This century is now understood less as a time of crisis-ridden developments, but rather as an epoch of transitions, the "open" constitutional states and new beginnings. In research, a growing independence of the Rhenish electors was noted. Ruprecht's kingship was described as “a key epoch of constitutional history”.

At the beginning of the 21st century, research interest in Ruprecht intensified again. To mark the 600th return of his king's election on August 20, 1400, the exhibition The Reach for the Crown - The Palatinate near Rhine in the Middle Ages was shown in 2000 in Heidelberg Castle . The contributions of the accompanying volume to the exhibition are an important part of the current state of research. In the opening speech to the exhibition, printed as an essay in 2001, Moraw took stock: "Ruprecht was a failed king, and from the start the prospect that he would not fail was slim." It stands as a “symbol of the phase of indecision” for three generations of rulers without “long-term state-developing or even only state-stabilizing objectives and effects”.

More recent contributions by Bernd Schneidmüller and Oliver Auge put this negative judgment into perspective. Schneidmüller stated that Ruprecht's kingship was embedded “in a crisis phase of the European monarchy”. According to Schneidmüller, “constant financial shortages, military defeats, […] limited ability to integrate” faced “an administrative awakening and trust in learned policy-making”. According to eye, Ruprecht was not a fundamentally failed, but rather a hapless king. Eye emphasizes the scientification of the office work, Ruprecht's marriage and alliance policy and his foundation behavior. His old age and short reign should also be taken into account.

The large-scale cultural and historical exhibition The Wittelsbachers on the Rhine. The Electoral Palatinate and Europe (Mannheim 2013/2014) not only highlighted the historical events that shaped the epoch and region, but also placed a focus on King Ruprecht among the Palatinate Wittelsbachers. The three-volume regesta work edited by Ute Rödel during his reign forms a milestone in the development of sources of medieval German imperial and legal history. As a result, a more positive picture could be gained from the sources of Ruprecht's work as the highest judge of the empire, his handling of royal jurisdiction, his court system and the efficiency of his offices. A scientific biography that meets modern standards remains a research gap.

swell

  • Karl-Heinz Spieß (Ed.): The oldest feudal book of the Count Palatine near Rhine from 1401 (= publications of the Commission for Historical Regional Studies in Baden-Württemberg, Series A. Vol. 30). Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1981.
  • German Reichstag files. Vol. 4–6, edited by Julius Weizsäcker, Gotha / Göttingen 1882–1888.
  • Deeds of documents on the activities of the German royal and court courts until 1451. Vol. 15: The time of Ruprecht 1400–1403. Edited by Ute Rödel. Böhlau, Cologne et al. 2009, ISBN 978-3-412-20400-6 ( online ).
  • Deeds of documents on the activities of the German royal and court courts until 1451. Vol. 16: Ruprecht's time 1404–1406. Edited by Ute Rödel. Böhlau, Cologne et al. 2013, ISBN 978-3-412-22294-9 ( online ).
  • Deeds of documents on the activities of the German royal and court courts until 1451. Vol. 17: Ruprecht's time 1407–1410. Edited by Ute Rödel. Böhlau Vienna et al. 2019, ISBN 978-3-412-51417-4 .
  • Regest of the Count Palatine on the Rhine 1214–1508. 2nd volume, published by the Baden Historical Commission, edited by Ludwig Graf von Oberndorff, Innsbruck 1912.

literature

  • Oliver AugeRuprecht (III.) Of the Palatinate. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 22, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-428-11203-2 , pp. 283-285 ( digitized version ).
  • Oliver Auge, Karl-Heinz Spieß: Ruprecht (1400–1410). In: Bernd Schneidmüller and Stefan Weinfurter (Hrsg.): The German rulers of the Middle Ages. Historical portraits from Heinrich I to Maximilian I (919–1519). Beck, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-406-50958-4 , pp. 446-461 and 595-596.
  • Kerstin Dürschner: The shaky throne. Political opposition in the empire from 1378 to 1438 (= European university publications. Series 3. Vol. 959). Lang, Frankfurt am Main et al. 2003, ISBN 3-631-51144-2 (also: Erlangen-Nürnberg, Universität, Dissertation, 2002).
  • Alois Gerlich : Habsburg-Luxemburg-Wittelsbach in the fight for the German royal crown. Studies on the prehistory of the kingdom of Ruprecht of the Palatinate. Steiner, Wiesbaden 1960.
  • Alois Gerlich: King Ruprecht of the Palatinate. In: Hartmut Harthausen (Hrsg.): Pfälzer Lebensbilder. Vol. 4. Speyer 1987, pp. 9-60.
  • Christian Hesse : Synthesis and Awakening (1346-1410) (= Gebhardt: Handbuch der deutschen Geschichte. Vol. 7b). 10th, completely revised edition. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2017, ISBN 978-3-608-60072-8 .
  • Constantin Höfler : Ruprecht of the Palatinate, called Clem, Roman king. 1400-1410. Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau 1861.
  • Peter Moraw : Ruprecht von der Pfalz (1400-1410). In: Werner Paravicini (ed.): Courtyards and residences in the late medieval empire. A dynastic topographical handbook (= residence research. Vol. 15). Vol. 1,1, Thorbecke, Ostfildern 2003, ISBN 3-7995-4515-8 , pp. 319-324.
  • Bernd Schneidmüller : King Ruprecht 1410–2010. The king from Heidelberg. In: Heidelberg. Jahrbuch zur Geschichte der Stadt 15, 2011, pp. 51–65 ( online ).
  • Ernst Schubert : Ruprecht . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages (LexMA). Volume 7, LexMA-Verlag, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-7608-8907-7 , Sp. 1108-1110.

Web links

Commons : Ruprecht von der Pfalz  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. Stefan Weinfurter : Welfen - Staufer - Wittelsbacher: A rising story. In: Alfried Wieczorek , Bernd Schneidmüller , Alexander Schubert (eds.): The Wittelsbachers on the Rhine. The Electoral Palatinate and Europe. Regensburg 2013, pp. 36–43, here: p. 39; Ludwig Holzfurtner: The Wittelsbacher. State and dynasty in eight centuries. Stuttgart 2005, p. 15 ff.
  2. ^ Ludwig Holzfurtner: The Wittelsbacher. State and dynasty in eight centuries. Stuttgart 2005, p. 72 f.
  3. ^ Ingo Runde: The Rhine as an economic and transport axis. In: Jörg Peltzer, Bernd Schneidmüller, Stefan Weinfurter, Alfried Wieczorek (eds.): The Wittelsbachers and the Electoral Palatinate in the Middle Ages. A success-story? Regensburg 2013, pp. 51–66.
  4. Jörg Peltzer : The rank of the Count Palatine near the Rhine. The shaping of the political and social order of the empire in the 13th and 14th centuries. Ostfildern 2013, p. 157.
  5. An edition of the document can be found at Meinrad Schaab , Rüdiger Lenz (ed.): Selected documents on the territorial history of the Electoral Palatinate 1156–1505. Stuttgart 1998, pp. 150-164. In detail: Heinz-Dieter Heimann : House rules and state formation. Inner-dynastic conflicts as factors in the consolidation of power among the Wittelsbach Counts of the Rhineland Palatinate and the Dukes of Bavaria. A contribution to the change in norms in the crisis of the late Middle Ages. Paderborn et al. 1993, pp. 248-268 ( online ).
  6. Oliver Auge : A Little King? On the 600th anniversary of the death of King Ruprecht of the Palatinate (1400–1410). In: Oppenheimer Hefte 39 (2011), pp. 2–29, here: p. 4.
  7. ^ Heinz-Dieter Heimann : From Pavia to Heidelberg. The house rules of the Wittelsbachers in the 14th and early 15th centuries: Dynasty formation in the continuity of the entire house. In: Jörg Peltzer, Bernd Schneidmüller, Stefan Weinfurter, Alfried Wieczorek (eds.): The Wittelsbachers and the Electoral Palatinate in the Middle Ages. A success-story? Regensburg 2013, pp. 109–125, here: p. 123.
  8. See also Ivan Hlaváček: King Wenceslaus (IV.) And his two captures (mirror of his struggle with the high nobility and with Wenceslas relatives for supremacy in Bohemia and the empire). In: Wojciech Fałkowski (ed.): Kings in captivity. Macroeconomy. Economic growth. Warsaw 2013, pp. 115–150; Alois Gerlich: Habsburg-Luxemburg-Wittelsbach in the fight for the German royal crown. Studies on the prehistory of the kingdom of Ruprecht of the Palatinate. Wiesbaden 1960, pp. 22-47.
  9. Jörg Peltzer: The rank of the Count Palatine near the Rhine. The shaping of the political and social order of the empire in the 13th and 14th centuries. Ostfildern 2013, p. 70; Ernst Schubert: Depositions of kings in the German Middle Ages, a study on the development of the imperial constitution Göttingen 2005, p. 381.
  10. Claudia Garnier : How do you trust your enemy? Building trust and consensus among the Rhenish electors around 1400. In: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 39, 2005, pp. 271–291, here: p. 277.
  11. ^ German Reichstag files under King Wenzel, 2nd section: 1388-1397, ed. by Julius Weizsäcker (German Reichstag files, older series 2) Munich 1874, No. 248, p. 437 f. Oliver Auge, Karl-Heinz Spieß: Ruprecht (1400–1410). In: Bernd Schneidmüller and Stefan Weinfurter (Hrsg.): The German rulers of the Middle Ages. Historical portraits from Heinrich I to Maximilian I (919–1519). Munich 2003, pp. 446-461, here: p. 449.
  12. For an overview of the “kingless” farm days cf. Thomas M. Martin: On the way to the Reichstag. Studies on the change in German central power 1314–1410. Munich 1993, p. 276
  13. Claudia Garnier: How do you trust your enemy? Building trust and reaching consensus among the Rhenish electors around 1400. In: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 39, 2005, pp. 271–291, here: pp. 276 f.
  14. Claudia Garnier: How do you trust your enemy? Building trust and reaching consensus among the Rhenish electors around 1400. In: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 39, 2005, pp. 271–291, here: p. 290.
  15. ^ German Reichstag files under King Wenzel. 3rd section: 1397–1400, ed. by Julius Weizsäcker (German Reichstag files, older series 3) Munich 1877, No. 41, p. 81 ff.
  16. ^ German Reichstag files under King Wenzel. 3rd section: 1397–1400, ed. by Julius Weizsäcker (German Reichstag files, older series 3) Munich 1877, no. 41, 51 and 56; Gabriele Annas: Court Day - Common Day - Reichstag. Studies on the structural development of German imperial assemblies in the late Middle Ages (1349–1471). Vol. 1, Göttingen 2004, p. 142 f.
  17. Thomas M. Martin: On the way to the Reichstag. Studies on the change in German central power 1314–1410. Munich 1993, p. 232.
  18. ^ The list of participants in: German Reichstag files under King Wenzel. 3rd section: 1397–1400, ed. by Julius Weizsäcker (German Reichstag files, older series 3) Munich 1877, No. 138, p. 184 ff.
  19. Claudia Garnier: How do you trust your enemy? Building trust and consensus among the Rhenish electors around 1400. In: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 39, 2005, pp. 271–291, here: p. 280.
  20. ^ Alois Gerlich: Habsburg - Luxembourg - Wittelsbach in the fight for the German royal crown. Studies on the prehistory of the kingdom of Ruprecht of the Palatinate. Wiesbaden 1960, p. 332.
  21. Claudia Garnier: How do you trust your enemy? Building trust and finding consensus among the Rhenish electors around 1400. In: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 39, 2005, pp. 271–291, here: p. 284.
  22. Claudia Garnier: How do you trust your enemy? Building trust and consensus among the Rhenish electors around 1400. In: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 39, 2005, pp. 271–291, here: p. 282.
  23. On the deposition of King Wenceslas Ernst Schubert: Deposition of kings in the German Middle Ages. A study on the development of the imperial constitution. Göttingen 2005; František Graus : The Failure of Kings. Karl IV., Richard II., Wenzel IV. In: Reinhard Schneider (Hrsg.): The late medieval monarchy in European comparison. Sigmaringen 1987, pp. 17-39 ( online ); Helmut G. Walther : The problem of the unsuitable ruler in the theory and practice of the European late Middle Ages. in: Journal for historical research 23, 1996, pp. 1–28; Frank Rexroth : tyrants and bad guys. Observations on the rituality of European deposition of kings in the late Middle Ages. In: Journal for historical research 278, 2004, pp. 27–53.
  24. ^ The deed of deposition in German Reichstag files under King Wenzel. 3rd section: 1397–1400, ed. by Julius Weizsäcker (German Reichstag files, older series 3) Munich 1877, no.204.
  25. Jörg Peltzer: The rank of the Count Palatine near the Rhine. The shaping of the political and social order of the empire in the 13th and 14th centuries. Ostfildern 2013, p. 70.
  26. Ernst Schubert: Depositions of kings in the German Middle Ages, A study on the development of the Imperial Constitution. Göttingen 2005, p. 416.
  27. ^ German Reichstag files under King Wenzel. 3rd section: 1397–1400, ed. by Julius Weizsäcker (German Reichstag files, older series 3) Munich 1877, no. 204, 205. In summary: Alois Gerlich: Habsburg-Luxemburg-Wittelsbach in the fight for the German royal crown. Studies on the prehistory of the kingdom of Ruprecht of the Palatinate. Wiesbaden 1960, pp. 340-347.
  28. Oliver Auge: A Little King? On the 600th anniversary of the death of King Ruprecht of the Palatinate (1400–1410). In: Oppenheimer Hefte 39 (2011), pp. 2–29, here: p. 6.
  29. Cf. Alois Gerlich: King Ruprecht of the Palatinate. In: Hartmut Harthausen (Hrsg.): Pfälzer Lebensbilder. Vol. 4. Speyer 1987, pp. 9-60, here p. 15 f.
  30. ^ Ernst Schubert: Depositions of kings in the German Middle Ages. A study on the development of the imperial constitution. Göttingen 2005, p. 410.
  31. ^ Ernst Schubert: Depositions of kings in the German Middle Ages. A study on the development of the imperial constitution. Göttingen 2005, p. 410.
  32. ^ Thomas R. Kraus: The attitude of the imperial city of Aachen and the dukes of Jülich-Geldern to the election of King Ruprecht (1400–1407). In: Journal of the Aachen History Association. 94/95 (1987/1988), pp. 5-29.
  33. ^ Alois Gerlich: King Ruprecht of the Palatinate. In: Hartmut Harthausen (Hrsg.): Pfälzer Lebensbilder. Vol. 4. Speyer 1987, pp. 9-60, here: p. 28; Christian Hesse: Synthesis and Awakening (1346–1410) . Stuttgart 2017, p. 94.
  34. Meinrad Schaab: History of the Electoral Palatinate. Vol. 1: Middle Ages. Stuttgart et al. 1988, pp. 34-41.
  35. Thorsten Huthwelker: Death and burial place of the Count Palatine near Rhine in the late Middle Ages (1327–1508). Heidelberg 2009, p. 90.
  36. A detailed, modern representation of the Italian train is missing so far. Hans F. Helmolt: King Ruprecht's move to Italy are still relevant due to the proximity of the sources, but the details are of course outdated . Jena 1892; Alfred Winkelmann: The Romzug Ruprechts von der Pfalz. In addition to sources. Innsbruck 1892.
  37. Cf. Fritz Trautz : The imperial power in Italy in the late Middle Ages. In: Heidelberger Jahrbücher 7 (1963), pp. 45–81.
  38. ^ Roland Pauler: The German kings and Italy in the 14th century. From Heinrich VII. To Karl IV. Darmstadt 1997.
  39. Viola Skiba: King Ruprecht appoints his son Ludwig as deputy in the Palatinate. In: Alfried Wieczorek, Bernd Schneidmüller, Alexander Schubert and Stefan Weinfurter (eds.): The Wittelsbacher on the Rhine. The Electoral Palatinate and Europe. Accompanying volume for the 2nd exhibition of the states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. Regensburg 2013, pp. 351–353.
  40. Jörg Peltzer: The rank of the Count Palatine near the Rhine. The shaping of the political and social order of the empire in the 13th and 14th centuries. Ostfildern 2013, pp. 227–229.
  41. Jörg Schwarz: King Ruprecht of the Palatinate (1400-1410) and Queen Elisabeth. In: Alfried Wieczorek, Bernd Schneidmüller, Alexander Schubert and Stefan Weinfurter (eds.): The Wittelsbacher on the Rhine. The Electoral Palatinate and Europe. Accompanying volume for the 2nd exhibition of the states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. Regensburg 2013, pp. 261–271, here: p. 265.
  42. ^ Fritz Trautz: The imperial power in Italy in the late Middle Ages. In: Heidelberger Jahrbücher 7 (1963), pp. 45–81, here pp. 71 f.
  43. Oliver Auge: Marriage Plans and Big Politics: An Electoral Palatinate-Milanese marriage project from 1404 in the context of imperial history. In: Peter Rückert, Sönke Lorenz (Ed.): The Visconti and the German Southwest. Cultural transfer in the late Middle Ages. Ostfildern 2008, pp. 185–206, here p. 188.
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  93. ^ Viola Skiba: King Ruprecht's coat of arms from the Stuttgart coat of arms book. In: Alfried Wieczorek, Bernd Schneidmüller, Alexander Schubert and Stefan Weinfurter (eds.): The Wittelsbacher on the Rhine. The Electoral Palatinate and Europe. Accompanying volume for the 2nd exhibition of the states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. Regensburg 2013, p. 355.
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  96. Ernst Schubert: Problems of the royal rule in the late medieval empire. In: Reinhard Schneider (Ed.): The late medieval monarchy in European comparison. Sigmaringen 1987, pp. 135-184, here: p. 146 ( online ).
  97. ^ Alois Gerlich: King Ruprecht of the Palatinate. In: Hartmut Harthausen (Hrsg.): Pfälzer Lebensbilder. Vol. 4. Speyer 1987, pp. 9-60, here: pp. 34-41.
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  99. Malte Prietzel: The Holy Roman Empire in the late Middle Ages. 2nd, revised and bibliographically supplemented edition. Darmstadt 2010, p. 101.
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  102. Dieter Girgensohn : From the conciliar theory of the later Middle Ages to practice: Pisa 1409. In: Heribert Müller , Johannes Helmrath (ed.): The Councils of Pisa (1409), Konstanz (1414-1418) and Basel (1431-1449) . Institution and people. Ostfildern 2007, pp. 61–94, here: p. 91 ( online ).
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  104. ^ Aloys Schmidt : Funeral sermon to King Ruprecht of the Palatinate, given in the Dome in Würzburg on June 9, 1410 by Winand von Steeg. In: Würzburg diocesan history sheets. 14-15, 1952-1953, pp. 337-342.
  105. Thorsten Huthwelker: Death and burial place of the Count Palatine near Rhine in the late Middle Ages (1327–1508). Heidelberg 2009, p. 99.
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  107. The will is printed in: Lorenz Weinrich (Hrsg.): Sources on the constitutional history of the Roman-German Empire in the late Middle Ages. Darmstadt 1983, pp. 448 f., No. 111.
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  109. Oliver Auge: Scope of action for princely politics in the Middle Ages. The southern Baltic region from the middle of the 12th century to the early Reformation period. Ostfildern 2009, p. 205 ( online )
  110. Without author: The death of the king and the consequences. In: Alfried Wieczorek, Bernd Schneidmüller, Alexander Schubert and Stefan Weinfurter (eds.): The Wittelsbacher on the Rhine. The Electoral Palatinate and Europe. Accompanying volume for the 2nd exhibition of the states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. Regensburg 2013, p. 358.
  111. Jörg Peltzer: The rank of the Count Palatine near the Rhine. The shaping of the political and social order of the empire in the 13th and 14th centuries. Ostfildern 2013, p. 436.
  112. Christian Hesse: Synthesis and Awakening (1346-1410). Stuttgart 2017, p. 20.
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  114. Oliver Auge: King Ruprecht - Attempt to take stock or: How successful does a medieval king have to be? In: Jörg Peltzer, Bernd Schneidmüller, Stefan Weinfurter, Alfried Wieczorek (eds.): The Wittelsbachers and the Electoral Palatinate in the Middle Ages. A success-story? Regensburg 2013, pp. 169–190, here: p. 183.
  115. ^ MGH Deutsche Chroniken and other history books of the Middle Ages. Vol. 2, edited by Ludwig Weiland, Hanover 1876, p. 360 f. Oliver Auge: A Little King? On the 600th anniversary of the death of King Ruprecht of the Palatinate (1400–1410). In: Oppenheimer Hefte 39 (2011), pp. 2–29, here: p. 3.
  116. Jörg Schwarz: King Ruprecht of the Palatinate (1400-1410) and Queen Elisabeth. In: Alfried Wieczorek, Bernd Schneidmüller, Alexander Schubert and Stefan Weinfurter (eds.): The Wittelsbacher on the Rhine. The Electoral Palatinate and Europe. Accompanying volume for the 2nd exhibition of the states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. Regensburg 2013, pp. 261–271, here: p. 271.
  117. Thorsten Huthwelker: Death and burial place of the Count Palatine near Rhine in the late Middle Ages (1327–1508). Heidelberg 2009, p. 89.
  118. Oliver Auge: A Little King? On the 600th anniversary of the death of King Ruprecht of the Palatinate (1400–1410). In: Oppenheimer Hefte 39 (2011), pp. 2–29, here: p. 19.
  119. Thorsten Huthwelker: Death and burial place of the Count Palatine near Rhine in the late Middle Ages (1327–1508). Heidelberg 2009, p. 104.
  120. ^ Kaiser Ruprecht Brotherhood
  121. Friends of King Ruprecht
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  123. ^ Peter Moraw: Ruprecht of the Palatinate. A king from Heidelberg. In: Journal for the history of the Upper Rhine. 149, 2001, pp. 97-110, here: p. 107.
  124. August Thorbecke:  Ruprecht von der Pfalz (Roman-German king) . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 29, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1889, pp. 716-726.
  125. Constantin Höfler: Ruprecht von der Pfalz, called Clem, Roman king. 1400-1410. Freiburg im Breisgau 1861. See also Alois Gerlich: Habsburg-Luxemburg-Wittelsbach in the fight for the German royal crown. Studies on the prehistory of the kingdom of Ruprecht of the Palatinate. Wiesbaden 1960, p. 114.
  126. Peter Moraw: Officials and advice of King Ruprecht. In: Zeitschrift für die Geschichte des Oberrheins 116 (1968), pp. 59–126; Peter Moraw: Law firm and law firm staff of King Ruprecht. In: Archiv für Diplomatik 15 (1969), 428-531; Peter Moraw: Ruprecht of the Palatinate. A king from Heidelberg. In: Zeitschrift für die Geschichte des Oberrheins 149 (2001), pp. 97–110.
  127. Peter Moraw: From an open constitution to a structured compression. The Empire in the Late Middle Ages 1250–1495. Frankfurt am Main 1985, p. 211.
  128. ^ Alois Gerlich: King Ruprecht of the Palatinate. In: Hartmut Harthausen (Hrsg.): Pfälzer Lebensbilder. Vol. 4. Speyer 1987, pp. 9-60.
  129. Hartmut Boockmann, Heinrich Dormeier: Councils, Church and Imperial Reform 1410–1495. Stuttgart 2005, pp. 21-23.
  130. Gabriele Annas: Court Day - Common Day - Reichstag. Studies on the structural development of German imperial assemblies in the late Middle Ages (1349–1471). Vol. 1, Göttingen 2004, p. 366 and p. 441.
  131. Bernd Schneidmüller: Ruprecht 1410-2010. The king from Heidelberg. In: Heidelberg. Jahrbuch zur Geschichte der Stadt 15 (2011), 51–65, here: p. 52 ( online ).
  132. ^ Peter Moraw: Ruprecht of the Palatinate. A king from Heidelberg. In: Journal for the history of the Upper Rhine. 149, 2001, pp. 97-110, here: pp. 99 f.
  133. ^ Peter Moraw: Ruprecht of the Palatinate. A king from Heidelberg. In: Journal for the history of the Upper Rhine. 149, 2001, pp. 97-110, here: p. 108.
  134. Bernd Schneidmüller: Ruprecht 1410-2010. The king from Heidelberg. In: Heidelberg. Jahrbuch zur Geschichte der Stadt 15 (2011), 51–65, here: p. 64 ( online ).
  135. Bernd Schneidmüller: Ruprecht 1410-2010. The king from Heidelberg. In: Heidelberg. Jahrbuch zur Geschichte der Stadt 15 (2011), 51–65, here: p. 64 ( online ). See also: Oliver Auge: King Ruprecht - Attempt to take stock or: How successful does a medieval king have to be? In: Jörg Peltzer, Bernd Schneidmüller, Stefan Weinfurter, Alfried Wieczorek (eds.): The Wittelsbachers and the Electoral Palatinate in the Middle Ages. A success-story? Regensburg 2013, pp. 169–190, here: p. 173.
  136. Oliver Auge: King Ruprecht - Attempt to take stock or: How successful does a medieval king have to be? In: Jörg Peltzer, Bernd Schneidmüller, Stefan Weinfurter, Alfried Wieczorek (eds.): The Wittelsbachers and the Electoral Palatinate in the Middle Ages. A success-story? Regensburg 2013, pp. 169–190.
  137. Ute Rödel (arrangement): The time of Ruprecht (1407–1410). Vienna et al. 2019, pp. XIII – LXIII, here: p. LVII.
  138. Jörg Peltzer: King Ruprecht of the Palatinate . In: Historical Lexicon of Bavaria , 2017.
predecessor Office successor
Wenceslaus Roman-German king
1400–1410
Jobst from Moravia
Ruprecht II Elector Palatinate
1398–1410
Ludwig III.
Ruprecht II Count of Zweibrücken
1398–1410
Stefan