Vrijheer

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With Vrijheer or army was during the Ancien Régime the ruler of a glory in today's Netherlands titled. He was usually a feudal lord of his sovereign who exercised authority over him.

The oldest glories arose from allodial possessions, in which the army had absolute power. Later, the feudal rule developed from this , in that the property of the former Free Lord was subordinate to a higher noble ( sovereign ) who could be a count , duke , prince-bishop or prince abbot in the Netherlands . In the variant, where the army obtained its fief directly from the emperor / king and later from the states general , there is talk of the banner lord or of a glory directly from the empire . Those were able to evade the influence of a higher-ranking nobleman and therefore retain their independence. One of the splendors that remained independent was the Ravenstein lordship . The rule of Mechelen carried out a different development, which was ruled by the emperor himself and thus remained independent. In its glory the army had a great number of rights, including in justice:

• In the case of the lower glory ( Ambachtsherrlichkeit ) or manorial rule , the army had civil law jurisdiction for minor offenses
• In the case of the Indirect Glory , the army possessed a greater extent of legal and civil law
• In the case of the High Glory , the army or Vrijheer also had the authority to pronounce the highest punishments, such as the death penalty ( neck right ), in the event of serious violations

A number of other rights, which the army states in his glory, have included the tithe , mill rights , banalité , tax law and toll rights , hunting rights , fishing rights , the right to appoint carriers local public office and the right for keeping swans . At the side of the army was the lay judge's bank , which carried out the jurisdiction and was part of the respective village administration.

After the abolition of the Ancien Régime during the occupation of the Austrian Netherlands by the French and the proclamation of the Batavian Republic in 1795, all glorious rights were abolished. However, some of them were restored in 1848, including hunting and fishing rights. With the constitution of the Kingdom of Belgium in 1831, the Belgian armies lost the right to occupy the local community posts; in the Netherlands in the already mentioned year 1848. The real end in the Netherlands marked the year 1923 with the abolition of the last splendid rights , the game rights. After that, most armies had lost their title, some others were able to maintain a title.

Web links

• Historical description of Dutch glories. Retrieved April 19, 2014.