Sabina of Bavaria
Sabina von Bayern , also often called Sabine von Württemberg in literature (* April 24, 1492 in Munich ; † August 30, 1564 in Nürtingen ), was born Duchess of Bavaria and from 1511 the wife of Duke Ulrich von Württemberg . The marriage broke up after only four years, and the subsequent and long-lasting disputes had a major impact on the history of Württemberg in the first half of the 16th century.
Life
Sabina was the daughter of the Bavarian Duke Albrecht IV and his wife Kunigunde of Austria , the daughter of Emperor Friedrich III.
At the age of six, Sabina was engaged to the then 11-year-old Duke Ulrich von Württemberg in 1498 for strategic reasons . Her father and also her uncle, who later became Emperor Maximilian I , promised themselves allies against France and Switzerland through the alliance with Württemberg. The alliance was to prove itself in the Swiss War of 1499 and in the Landshut War of Succession in 1503. After a victorious course, the latter brought land gains for both Württemberg and Bavaria.
When Sabina reached the age of 16 for marriage in 1508, her 21-year-old fiancé was more interested in Elisabeth, the daughter of Margrave Friedrich II of Brandenburg-Ansbach , who lived in Nürtingen. On the occasion of the funeral for Sabina's father in January 1509, Ulrich was in Munich, the marriage agreement was confirmed again, but chroniclers report more than just a clearly negative attitude of the Duke of Württemberg towards his Bavarian fiancée. Ulrich's lover Elisabeth was betrothed to Margrave Ernst von Baden and finally married in 1510. But also losing his lover, Ulrich delayed the date of marriage with Sabina and finally complied only with a decree of his uncle Maximilian, who had meanwhile been crowned emperor, to celebrate the wedding before Lent in 1511.
The wedding on March 2, 1511 was celebrated with great pomp; the festival lasts 14 days and more than 7000 guests were invited. Around the Stuttgart Palace, the citizens were fed free of charge. With the wedding Sabina renounced all inheritance in Bavaria on the father's and mother's side.
The marriage was unhappy as both spouses could get quick-tempered and rude. Chroniclers report of physical disputes. In this context, especially in the history of Württemberg, reference is made to a hereditary predisposition that goes back to Henriette von Mömpelgard . In the case of Ulrich's father Heinrich , a possible mental confusion was not hereditary, but traumatic. It is also controversial whether Heinrich's possible mental illness was pathological or even politically constructed. Daughter Anna was born on January 13, 1513. Ulrich meanwhile had a relationship with the daughter of his hereditary marshal, Ursula Thumb von Neuburg . She was married to the stable master Hans von Hutten , whom Ulrich murdered in Hinterhald on May 7, 1515.
On May 12, 1515 Sabina gave birth to her son Christoph in Urach Castle . At the state parliament in Stuttgart , where a replacement of Duke Ulrichs was discussed for other reasons, Sabina brought various concerns about knight Hieronymus von Seiboldsdorf and Chancellor Augustin Lösch in the absence of her husband from July 1, 1515 . So she feared an expulsion if the murder of Hutten should lead to war in the country, complained about the lack of homage by the subjects and criticized the fact that Ulrich had not paid off debts for her and the children's clothes. The matter was not negotiated, but probably flowed into the further negotiations of the state parliament. In the event of Ulrich's dismissal, Sabine and her son would be assigned to administer the country.
Ulrich, who was with Emperor Maximilian at the time, returned angrily to Stuttgart. In order to gain more control over Sabina, who was in open opposition to him, he ordered the union of her court in Urach with his in Stuttgart. However, Sabina wanted to escape the irascible husband and forged escape plans, which she also discussed with Emperor Maximilian. Among other things, she reported about a locked chamber that Ulrich had built for his mentally ill father, and feared that she would be locked there in the future. Maximilian supported his niece and also confronted Ulrich about the bad treatment of his wife, but kept the escape plans from him.
In the fall of 1515 Sabine set out from Urach for Stuttgart with her two children. In Nürtingen she interrupted her trip to see Elisabeth , the widow of Eberhard the Younger , where Ulrich visited her, with whom she arranged her arrival in Stuttgart on November 24, 1515. Meanwhile, the Bavarian councilor Dietrich Spät prepared the escape at the behest of Emperor Maximilian. On the day of the agreed arrival in Stuttgart, she sneaked out of the castle in Nürtingen with her court master and another person, but without the children, and was given accommodation by Dietrich Spät and other knights at Spät's brother-in-law, the imperial councilor Renner in Ehingen , directed. She later came to live with relatives in Munich.
On the very next day, Duke Ulrich found out about his wife's flight and had Knechte look out for the escaped, but only a messenger could be picked up with a letter from Sabine to Eberhard's widow, in which she apologized for the hasty escape from their house and asked for care for the children and their sister Susanne. Since speculation about the causes of the flight began immediately, Ulrich sent letters to the allied counts and bishops with the request not to believe the rumors. He ordered the Count Palatine and Margrave to Stuttgart, other princes to Heilbronn . In a subsequent discussion with Emperor Maximilian, the latter denied his assistance in fleeing and even promised Ulrich that he would bring about an early reconciliation between the spouses.
The mood among the people was in favor of Ulrich. This demanded assistance against the kidnappers in the state parliament. The Landtag regretted Sabina's flight, declared its solidarity with the Duke, who was no longer in doubt, and offered assistance in the event of armed conflicts over marriage trafficking. On December 21, 1515, Sabina wrote from Munich to the Württemberg state parliament, to which she tried to explain her difficult situation in the marriage and the fear for her life as reasons for fleeing. However, Ulrich knew how to prevent the spread of the letter. He described Sabina's allegations as "fictitious", so that the Württemberg state parliament only continued to believe his descriptions. The Bavarian state parliament, on the other hand, sided with Sabina and sent inquiries to the cities of Stuttgart, Urach, Kirchheim and Tübingen as to whether they knew anything about the mistreatment of the Duchess by Ulrich.
The dispute escalated for almost a year and culminated on October 11, 1516, when Emperor Maximilian pronounced an imperial ban on Duke Ulrich for breach of the peace (through the murder of Hutten) and disobedience to his wife. In order to avert the eight, Ulrich was forced to sign the Blaubeurer contract a week later , with which the Huttensche affair and the marital dispute were formally settled and in which maintenance payments to Sabina were agreed. Since there had been a falling out among Sabina's family in Munich for unexplained reasons, Ulrich and Sabina's mother Kunigunde also had an advocate in Bavaria at the time.
Ulrich immediately disregarded the Blaubeurer contract and took to the field against Sabina's escape helper Dietrich Spät; some of its castles and villages were burned down by Ulrich's troops. On July 17, 1518, a new eight was imposed on Ulrich, who declared himself in Lauingen on September 22, 1518 and refused the required maintenance payments to Sabina. On January 8, 1519, after further negotiations, Ulrich had a pamphlet distributed in which he rejected all guilt for the failure of the marriage. On January 12, 1519, Emperor Maximilian died and on January 21, 1519 Ulrich took the murder of one of his castle bailiffs by a citizen of Reutlingen as an opportunity to conquer Reutlingen . Without Maximilian's constant striving for peace, this ultimately led to the war against the Swabian Confederation , which, under the leadership of Duke Wilhelm of Bavaria, took to the field against Ulrich, not without the marriage dispute being discussed again in previous dispatches. Ulrich was subject to the Swabian Federation and was banished .
On April 26th, the federal government captured Hohentübingen Castle and brought the children Anna and Christoph who were there to Sabina in Munich. When Hohentübingen and Hohenneuffen surrendered , it was initially negotiated that the castle, town and office of Tübingen as well as Neuffen castle and bailiwick should remain with Anna and Christoph.
Sabina was back in Württemberg several times during the campaign in the spring of 1519 and finally settled down again with the children in Urach after Ulrich's expulsion, where she had a relationship with her former escape helper Dietrich Spät and from where she made great efforts that Württemberg as a whole remained with the children. She also presented this to the Swabian Bund at its Bundestag in Esslingen am Neckar on May 24, 1519 and at another Bundestag in Nördlingen on July 12, 1519. However, as the payment of the war costs by the Sabinas brothers was questioned by the Bundestag and Austria appeared more liquid, Württemberg was delivered to the new Emperor Charles V as Archduke of Austria on February 6, 1520 . Tübingen and Neuffen were also handed over to the emperor, for which Sabina received a compensation payment and a Wittum in Waiblingen and Winnenden, as well as the assurance of maintenance for the children from the emperor. Christoph was sent to the imperial court in Innsbruck , only daughter Anna stayed with her mother in Urach, where people thought they were safer than in Waiblingen or Winnenden from possible campaigns of revenge by the exiled Ulrich. In 1521 Sabina founded chaplains in the monasteries in Zwiefalten and Marchtal .
In the following years the Peasants' War raged in Württemberg and the nationwide unrest ensured that the payments promised to Sabina, both by the emperor and by the Württemberg regent, Archduke Friedrich, often failed to materialize in whole or in part. Her castle in Waiblingen was looted by farmers in 1525. Only a contract of 1529, which was drawn up with the help of Dietrich Spät, ensured her a regular livelihood again, with which she also supported her son Christoph, who was completely penniless after the campaigns against the Turks in Vienna, Italy and Spain and finally for fear of being liked kill him as an unpleasant heir or put him in the cold, went into hiding for a few years. Christoph's sister Anna died on June 28, 1530 in Urach of the plague .
When Duke Ulrich regained control of Württemberg after the battle of Lauffen in 1534, Sabine and Dietrich Spät, who was the commander in chief of the defeated Austrians in the battle, fled to Bregenz via Weingarten (Württemberg) . Ulrich complained to King Ferdinand about the tolerance of the fugitives, but this remained, even though Ferdinand did not exactly support his distant relatives, so that Sabina found herself in financial difficulties again. In 1538 she moved to Munich, where she was initially boarder of her siblings in the new festival, but in the same year she was able to acquire the Schwarzenberg house and remodel it with the financial help of her brothers.
After the death of her brother Ludwig X in 1545, there were disputes about his legacy, which Sabina and the deceased's partner, Ursula von Weichs , had taken over without any legal basis. Chroniclers describe an ugly appearance by the 53-year-old towards the family and a commission sent to preserve the heritage. In the course of the dispute, she declared her inheritance waiver associated with the wedding in 1511 null and void, whereupon she was imprisoned by her family for 16 weeks in the Neue Veste and thus forced to issue another inheritance waiver, which she sealed on September 16, 1545.
In the meantime Ulrich had lost control of Württemberg again in the course of the Schmalkaldic War and even had to flee the country briefly at the turn of the year 1546/47. He submitted to the emperor in the Heilbronner Bund and was able to return, but after his death on November 6, 1550, in addition to his son Christoph, King Ferdinand Württemberg also claimed for himself. Although the succession had not yet been clarified, Christoph brought his mother back to Nürtingen in late 1550 and took care of her financially in the future. The Passau Treaty of August 1552 consolidated Christoph's reign. Relieved of financial worries, Sabine set up a domicile for Württemberg widows in Nürtingen and gave away most of her money. Her Wittum in Waiblingen and Winnenden was administered from January 1551 by Marshal Wilhelm von Massenbach .
Sabina, who had already spoken out for and sometimes against the Reformation at the time of Martin Luther's theses , later on Reformation questions within her Wittum and finally on questions of the reign of Württemberg after Ulrich's death , officially converted to Protestant belief in 1552. In 1550 she had spoken out in favor of the re-Catholicization of Württemberg by Christoph; However, this was probably done out of political calculation, since chroniclers also report that she had secretly kept and read Protestant writings for many years before 1552. In Nürtingen, a center of Württemberg Protestantism was established under her care , which she zealously promoted in her later years. In 1555 she revoked the chaplain foundations in Zwiefalten and Marchtal and converted the Catholic houses she had sponsored to date into institutions for secular poor relief.
Her youngest and last brother, Ernst, died on December 7, 1560 . Again disputes over inheritance broke out, now between Sabine and her nephew Albrecht V. Although Christoph supported his mother, the legal disputes dragged on for years and ultimately also over Sabine's death in 1564.
After a serious illness in 1563, she had already written her will and she died on August 30, 1564, presumably of a stroke. Sabina von Bayern, Duchess of Württemberg, was buried at the side of her unloved husband Ulrich in the choir of the Tübingen collegiate church.
progeny
- Anna (born January 30, 1513 - † June 29, 1530 in Urach).
- Christoph (* May 12, 1515 in Urach; † December 28, 1568 in Stuttgart)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Werner Ulrich Deetjen: Dispute about Duke Ulrich and the Reformation in Württemberg . In: work and reflection . 1984, p. 607-619, especially 609 f . : “The person of Ulrich, like 150 years of Württemberg history, cannot be explained solely by referring to the maddener Henriette von Mömpelgard. [...] The historians from outside of Württemberg have, wisely limited to their specialist knowledge, not built up any monocausal theories. This should also be advisable in the case of Ulrich, because his father Heinrich's state of illness was very likely caused by his long imprisonment under constant threat of death. "
- ↑ Klaus Graf : Heinrich . In: Sönke Lorenz , Dieter Mertens , Volker Press (eds.): Das Haus Württemberg. A biographical lexicon . Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-17-013605-4 , pp. 123 f .
literature
- Monja Dotzauer: The library of the Duchess Sabine of Württemberg. A mirror of late medieval piety and Reformation curiosity . In: Journal for Württemberg State History, vol. 77, 2018, pp. 85-106.
- Katrin Nina Marth: "To the laudable Hawss Beirn to pesserung, Aufnemung and enlargement ...". The dynastic politics of the House of Bavaria at the turn of the late Middle Ages to the modern age . Dissertation, University of Regensburg 2009, p. 172-207 ( PDF ).
- Marita A. Panzer: Wittelsbach women. Princely daughters of a European dynasty . Pustet, Regensburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-7917-2419-5 , p. 67-82 .
- Gerhard Raff : Hie good Wirtemberg all the way. Volume 1: The House of Württemberg from Count Ulrich the Founder to Duke Ludwig. 6th edition. Landhege, Schwaigern 2014, ISBN 978-3-943066-34-0 , pp. 475-484.
- Frida Sauter: Duchess Sabine von Wirtemberg. In: Journal of Württemberg State History. VIIIth year, 1944-48.
Processed in fiction as The Girl and the Duchess by Astrid Fritz.
Web links
- Portrait of Sabina of Bavaria, Duchess of Württemberg. Painter: Barthel Beham . Dated: 1530. Oil on panel. In: History of Bavaria. Exhibition Bavaria Pictures. House of Bavarian History, accessed on March 12, 2013 .
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Sabina of Bavaria |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Duchess of Württemberg |
| DATE OF BIRTH | April 24, 1492 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Munich |
| DATE OF DEATH | August 30, 1564 |
| Place of death | Nürtingen |