Ulrich I. (Cilli)

Ulrich I von Cilli (* 1331 in Cilli  ? † July 26, 1368 ) was Count of Cilli .

Life

Ulrich was a son of Count Friedrich I and Diemut von Walsee . At a young age he joined Ludwig I of Anjou , the king of Hungary and Croatia , who were then ruled in personal union, and took part in his siege of the city of Zara (Zadar in Croatia) in 1354. The Counts of Cilli began to be interested in the political situation in the Balkans at an early age and therefore soon established close relationships with the kings of Hungary and Croatia.

Ulrich was a war entrepreneur and mercenary leader on a grand scale of the type of a real condottiere . He made his mercenaries available to anyone who needed them, paid well, and saw the greatest advantages for himself. Ulrich was active on all battlefields in Central and Eastern Europe. In 1354 he accompanied the later Emperor Charles IV from the House of Luxemburg on his train to Rome. Ulrich and his troops fought side by side with the Luxembourgers and Habsburgs on the battlefields of Dalmatia , Serbia and Bulgaria . In Tyrol he fought shoulder to shoulder with the Wittelsbachers . Soon his war ventures took him far north, where he took to the field against the then pagan Pruzzen . In 1355 he was again on the side of Louis I of Anjou in the fight against the Venetians ; and in 1359 he took part in his campaign against Serbia. At that time it was possible to decisively defeat the Serbian army at the foot of a high mountain ridge in Raszien (Raška) (grandi montagna de Rascia) and to penetrate far into Serbia.

On his campaigns, Ulrich made important and beneficial relationships, which had the greatest part in the fact that the Cillier rose so quickly and steeply. Ulrich's wife was Adelheid von Ortenburg , the widow of Count Albrecht zu Oettingen. This connection resulted in Count Wilhelm, who continued his father's mercenary business. He took Anna, the daughter of Casimir III. the Great (Wielki), King of Poland ( Piast ) as wife. Their daughter - also - Anna became the wife of the King of Poland Władysław II Jagiełło .

Ulrich I von Cilli became governor of Carniola under the Habsburgs , like his father once did. Relations between the Cillier and the Habsburg dynasty were peaceful and amicable at the time. With the approval and suggestion of the Habsburgs, Ulrich and his father, who until then still called themselves Lords of Sanegg , were raised to the rank of count in 1341. Since then they have held the title of Counts of Cilli.

Ulrich's son Wilhelm took part in a campaign by Sigmund of Luxembourg (1368–1437) against Serbia in 1392 , who succeeded Ludwig von Anjou, was elected German Emperor in 1433 and was married to Ulrich's great niece Barbara . After returning from Serbia, Wilhelm died in Vienna. Ulrich's successor was therefore his younger brother Hermann I. Because of his politics, Ulrich paved the way for the steep ascent of the Counts of Cilli. And the marriage of his brother Hermann I to Katharina, the daughter of the Banus of Bosnia, Stjepan II. Kotromanić , which only made Ulrich's connections possible, completely changed the direction of the high politics of the Counts of Cilli to the east.

coat of arms

Coat of arms of the Counts of Cilli

Square shield : 1 and 4 two red bars in the silver field ( Sanneck family coat of arms ); 2 and 3 three eight-pointed (also six-pointed) golden stars (arrangement 2.1) in the blue field (Heunburg) (representation after Kraßler).

literature

• Hans Wagner:  Cilli, Count of. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 3, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1957, ISBN 3-428-00184-2 , p. 254 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Milko Kos: Grofje Celjski (The Counts of Cilli). In: Srednjeveška kulturna, družbena in politična zgodovina Slovencev, izbrane razprave. (The history of the culture, society and politics of the Slovenes in the Middle Ages, selected treatises). Slovenska matica, Ljubljana 1985, pp. 258-270.
• Peter suchtwirt : From graff Ulreichen von Tzili. In: Alois Primisser (ed.): Peter suchtwirt's works from the fourteenth centuries. A contribution to contemporary and moral history. Wallishausser, Vienna 1827 ( digitized version ).
• Ignacij Voje: Slovenci pod pritiskom turškega nasilja (Slovenes under pressure from Turkish violence). Ljubljana 1996, ISBN 86-7207-083-6 .
• Karl Schmutz, Historisch-topographisches Lexicon von Steyermark: A - G , Volume 1, S.218f