Bourges county
The county Bourges with the capital Bourges consisted of 9 to the 11th century largely the historical province of Berry . Bordering Bourges were the counties of Blois and Gâtinais in the north, the county of Nevers in the east, the territory of the Lords of Bourbon in the south-east and the county of Poitou in the south-west .
The Counts of Bourges
A Cunibert († after 778, also Hunibert or Humbert) is documented as the first Count of Bourges in the 8th century , who joined the rebellion of Duke Waifar of Aquitaine against King Pippin the Younger and was forced to submit by him in 762 after the King Bourges had besieged for several weeks. In the next few years Count Cunibert acted as a mediator between Duke Waifar and King Pippin. The French genealogist Christian Settipani suspected that Count Cunibert is a son of the Arnulfinger Gottfried and is thus related to the Carolingian dynasty .
About 40 years later, Wicfred (Wicfried) was another count in Bourges, who was probably related to Count Rodulf / Raoul von Turenne. Count Wicfreds daughter Agane was married to Count Robert, who is often identified as Robert the Brave , but also to the son of Count Theodebert von Madrie and brother-in-law of King Pippin I of Aquitaine (see Arnulfinger )
At the beginning of the 9th century, Hugo I († after 835 or 853) was the first count who passed his office on to his son Stephan († ???), who in turn was followed by his son Hugo II († around 892 ) to. The family assignment of this count dynasty is unclear, but they were probably related to the sex of the Etichones . Count Hugo II was married to Rothilde, a daughter of King Charles the Bald . She was married a second time to Count Roger of Maine after the death of her husband . From the marriage of Hugo II to Rothilde, the daughter Richilde emerged, who married the Vice Count of Blois Theobald the Elder and thus became an ancestor of the Blois family .
Count Hugo II does not seem to have ruled Bourges until his death, because in the sixties of the 9th century, the former Count of Paris Gerhard II (called: Girart de Roussillon) competed for the county . He had built up a strong position of power in Burgundy under the kings Karl and Lothar II and was appointed Dux des Viennois and Lyonnais by the latter . He was also married to Bertha von Tours, a sister-in-law of King Charles the Bald and probably the count's sister Hugo I. After the death of King Lothar II. 869 raided Gerhard the Berry, where he gained control of Bourges, and denied 870 the recognition of the Treaty of Meersen in which the kingdom of Lothar II. the Bald and between Charles Louis the German divided has been. Charles the Bald, to whose empire Gerhard's territories were defeated, took up the fight against the rebellious count and drove him out of Vienne in the winter of 870 . Dux Gerhard finally died around the year 877.
King Charles the Bald gave Gerhard's possessions, including Bourges, to his brother-in-law, Count Boso , in 871 . After the king's death, Margrave Bernhard von Gothien rose against the new king Ludwig II the Stammler in 878 and conquered Bourges. But Bishop Frotaire von Bourges admonished the city's population to remain loyal to the king. He had the margrave condemned and excommunicated at the Troyes court in September of the same year and transferred all his possessions, including Bourges, to Bernhard Plantevelue († 886), who was inherited by his son Wilhelm I the Pious († 918). Wilhelm I rose to the rank of Duke of Aquitaine in 909 and sided with the former in the power struggle between the Carolingians and Robertines for the royal throne. As a result he drew the enmity of King Rudolf , who moved into the Berry between 916 and 918 and was able to take Bourges. During these battles, Duke Wilhelm is said to have personally killed a counter-count of Bourges appointed by King Rudolf. Duke Wilhelm's nephew Wilhelm II. The younger approached the king again after he had returned the berry to him, but Wilhelm's brother and successor Duke Acfred († 927) again opposed the king, who had the quick death of the Herzogs took advantage and brought the Berry back to himself.
The Vice Counts of Bourges
King Rudolf withdrew the count's rights on Bourges and instead appointed a vice-count as his deputy in Bourges, who could inherit the office in his family. Little is known about this vice-count's dynasty, which ruled in Bourges until the end of the 11th century, except that Geoffroi III. 1031 King Robert II received in Bourges.
- Geoffroi I. Papabas
- Geoffroi II. Bosebebas
- Geoffroi III. le Noble
- Geoffroi IV. Le Meschin
- Etienne
During the time of her reign there was a political dichotomy in the Berry. While the influence of the vice counts was limited to the northeast (Haut-Berry), the lords of Déols-Châteauroux and Issoudun dominated in the southwest (Bas-Berry) , who leaned closer to the dukes of Aquitaine. With Étienne, the vice-count dynasty died out in its male line. Instead, the eldest daughter followed his sister Eldeburge from her marriage to Mr. Gilles I von Sully. Mathilde von Sully was married to Eudes "Harpin" von Dun , who ruled for his wife as vice count. When Eudes decided in 1101 to go on an armed pilgrimage to the Holy Land, he pledged his vice-county to King Philip I for 60,000 sou to finance the trip. Eudes fought in Palestine in the second battle of Ramla in 1102 and, on his return home, entered Cluny Abbey as a monk , where he died around 1109. After that, Bourges and the Haut-Berry were incorporated into the immediate domain of the king, the Domaine royal , while the Bas-Berry remained with Aquitaine until the 13th century.