Ruthard (Count)

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Ruthard († before August 31, 790 ) was a Franconian nobleman who, following Josef Fleckenstein, is generally counted among the ancestors of the Guelphs .

After the Alemannic duchy was smashed by the Carolingians and by the blood court of Cannstatt (746), he was, alongside Warin, one of those Franks who enforced Franconian rule in Alemannia as administratores Alamanniae , who organized the Franconian county constitution and the fiscal estate . He was mainly active north of Lake Constance, while Warin worked more south of the lake.

In 748/749 he founded the Arnulfsau monastery , which was later relocated to Schwarzach (both in what is now the Rheinmünster community ).

In 752 he is attested in royal service alongside Fulrad , Abbot of Saint-Denis . In the winter of 753/754 he is - again with Fulrad - the companion of Pope Stephen II , who is looking for help, on the way to Pippin the Younger .

In 759 it was Ruthard and Warin who persecuted the founder of the monastery, Otmar von St. Gallen , took prisoner, accused him and had him tried. This action was triggered by tensions between the monastery and the Bishop of Konstanz, who wanted to make St. Gallen subordinate to his diocese. Ruthard and Warin received goods from St. Gallen's property as gifts for their support, which Ruthard only partially incorporated into the treasury.

A certificate from Charlemagne dated August 31, 790 states "that in the time of our blessed memory of our father, the late King Pippin, and our uncle Carlmann [between 742 and 768] some things in the ducat of Alemannia were incorporated into the treasury, who then possessed different people, as it were, for their own right, but actually illegally, and who then scattered them through sales, donations or some other way "; Ruthard, who died at this time, is mentioned as well as the Abbey of Saint-Denis , and thus again Abbot Fulrad, who received property from the royal treasury. Charlemagne reprimanded this procedure, but then left the goods in the monastery property.

As early as December 911, King Konrad I, elected only a month earlier, visited the St. Gallen monastery and promised an annual donation to Otmar's grave because he was the "son of those executioners" (meaning Ruthard and Warin) and thus atonement is obliged. In this context, a Rudolf and his son Count Welfhard are mentioned, who would also have donated an annual fee to Otmar. With the help of this information and the inheritance of the goods taken away from St. Gallen, Josef Fleckenstein deduced that Ruthard was on the one hand an ancestor of Konrad and on the other hand belonged to the Guelph family.

The death of Pippin in 768 and the accession of Charlemagne seem to usher in the end of Ruthard's career: in 769 he appears again as Count in the Argengau , after which he is no longer mentioned in any royal document, although he was probably still alive in 777.

In 771, Ruthard donated his property in Mandres in pago Scarponinse ( Scarponnois , also called “Charpeigne” in literature) to Gorze Abbey in his will . The accompanying document shows that his father's name was Hardrad ("filius Hadradi quondam"), that he was married to Haildis in his first marriage (her salvation was the reason for the donation) and in his second and still current marriage to Ermena.

Other monasteries such as Gengenbach and Schuttern also refer to Ruthard when they were founded, with St. Pirmin acting on behalf of Ruthard, according to Josef Fleckenstein. In the Gengenbach case, which was founded around 727, it was then proposed to see two people of the same name in Ruthard, an older and a younger: Ruthard the Elder († 756 according to a Gengenbacher necrology ) is the founder of Gengenbach, his son Ruthard the Younger, the founder of Arnulfsau, but also the one who had a monastery (e.g. Gengenbach or Schwarzach) renovated in 761 by monks from Gorze. This proposal is controversial in research, whereby neither the founding year of the Gengenbach monastery nor the year of death 756 of Josef Fleckenstein and Michael Borgolte are accepted as real.

swell

  • Ekkehard IV. , St. Gall Monastery Stories . Selected Sources on German History of the Middle Ages Volume X

literature

  • Josef Fleckenstein : About the origin of the Guelphs and their beginnings in southern Germany. In: Studies and preliminary work on the history of the Greater Franconian and early German nobility , 1957, pp. 71–136.
  • Michael Borgolte : The Counts of Alemannia in Merovingian and Carolingian times. A prosopography. 1986.
  • Rudolf Schieffer : The Carolingians. Stuttgart 1992.
  • Karl-Ludwig Ay , Lorenz Maier , Joachim Jahn (eds.): The Welfs. Regional historical aspects of their rule (= Forum Suevicum. Contributions to the history of East Swabia and the neighboring regions. Vol. 2). UVK, Konstanz 1998, ISBN 3-87940-598-0 . In this:
    • Alois Niederstätter: Welfish traces south of Lake Constance and in Raetia. Pp. 97-115.
    • Wolfgang Hartung : The origin of the Guelphs from Alemannia. Pp. 23–55 ( digitized version , PDF ).
  • Hans Jänichen , Warin, Rudhart and Scrot. Property historical considerations on the early history of Buchau Abbey. In: Journal for Württemberg State History . Vol. 14, 1955, pp. 372-384.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Lexicon of the Middle Ages
  2. ↑ See the essay in the #Literature section . This was contradicted by Wolfgang Hartung : The origin of the Guelphs from Alamannia. In: Karl-Ludwig Ay, Lorenz Maier, Joachim Jahn (eds.): Die Welfen. Regional historical aspects of their rule (= Forum Suevicum. Vol. 2). UVK, Konstanz 1998, pp. 23-55 ( digital copy , PDF ).
  3. ^ Name of Walahfrid Strabo , s. Michael Borgolte
  4. ↑ Lexicon of the Middle Ages, Fleckenstein
  5. ↑ Hans Jänichen
  6. ↑ Lexicon of the Middle Ages; Michael Borgolte: in the document as "Crothardus"
  7. ↑ Rochardus dux - Liber Pontificalis 447
  8. ↑ Ekkehard IV. 12, 16 and 21
  9. ↑ Michael Borgolte
  10. ↑ Alois Niederstätter, p. 97; Michael Borgolte
  11. ↑ Hrodardus
  12. ^ D Karl 166, quoted from Michael Borgolte
  13. ↑ Michael Borgolte, see also Udo im Lahngau on the connection between the Guelphs and the Conradins
  14. ↑ sub Roadharti comite , St. Gallen 15.3.769
  15. ^ Josef Fleckenstein; The source is Fulrad's will, in which Ruthard ( Chrodhard ) is mentioned and not referred to as deceased
  16. ↑ Ratardus
  17. ↑ Josef Fleckenstein pp. 99, 102 and 111-114; Michael Borgolte only follows “with reservations”.
  18. ↑ Lexicon of the Middle Ages
  19. ↑ Hans Jänichen; Bishop Chrodegang of Metz sent suos monachos de Gorcia ad monasterio Hrodbardi (Annales Laureshamenses)
personal data
SURNAME Ruthard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Count in Alemannia
DATE OF BIRTH 8th century
DATE OF DEATH before August 31, 790