Soběslav II (Bohemia)

Soběslav II. (* Around 1128, † January 29, 1180 ) was Duke of Bohemia and Landgrave of Moravia from the Přemyslid family .

The second-born son of Soběslav I. initially left Bohemia after the death of his father. During the absence of Duke Vladislav II, he tried to win the crown on the second crusade, but was imprisoned in Zdice by Děpold at the Přimda Castle in 1148 . In 1150 he managed to escape. He found shelter at the court of Friedrich Barbarossa . In 1161 he occupied Olomouc . Vladislav could not defeat Soběslav and therefore invited him to Prague . There he was captured again and again arrested at Přimda Castle until 1173, when he had to be released at the behest of the emperor.

In 1173 Vladislav II resigned and handed the government over to his son Friedrich (Bedřich). The emperor disempowered Frederick, who had been installed without his express consent, and appointed Soběslav's brother Oldřich as duke. However, this had no support in the Bohemian nobility and immediately passed the rule on to Sobeslav.

The new duke was quickly drawn into the disputes between the emperor and the pope on the side of Barbarossa. In 1176 he invaded Austria . With that he pulled himself under the spell of the Pope. At the same time the resistance within the Bohemian nobility, led by the Moravian margrave Konrad III, grew . Otto and Duke Friedrich . They intervened with the emperor, and as relations between the pope and emperor had also improved, Barbarossa Soběslav deposed in 1178. With his support, the Bohemian nobility re-elected Friedrich as duke. The new duke invaded Moravia and, in 1178, Prague. When Friedrich was summoned to Swabia by the Emperor , Friedrich tried to conquer Prague Castle . After Soběslav's first victory in the bloody battle of Loděnice on January 23, 1179, in which many leading nobles fell on both sides, Frederick was able to crush him at Nové Město (now part of Prague). Soběslav II fled to Poland, where he died in 1180. He left his wife Eliška, daughter of the Polish Duke Mieszko III. The marriage remained childless.

supporting documents

^ Václav Novotný: České dějiny. Díl 1, Část 2: Od Břetislava I. do Přemysla I. (= Laichterův výbor nejlepšich spisů poučných. 40, ZDB -ID 1001687-9 ). Laichter, Prague 1913.

predecessor	Office	successor
Friedrich	Duke of Bohemia 1174–1178	Friedrich

personal data
SURNAME	Sobeslav II.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Duke of Bohemia and Landgrave of Moravia from the Premyslid family
DATE OF BIRTH	around 1128
DATE OF DEATH	January 29, 1180

[novotny-1] Václav Novotný: České dějiny. Díl 1, Část 2: Od Břetislava I. do Přemysla I. (= Laichterův výbor nejlepšich spisů poučných. 40, ZDB -ID 1001687-9 ). Laichter, Prague 1913.