Wagrier

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Tribal area of ​​the Wagria Wagria around the year 1000

The Wagrians (also Waigri or Waari ) were a sub-tribe of the West Slavic tribal association of the Abodrites, who lived in Wagrien during the Middle Ages .

Surname

The Wagrians are first mentioned in 967 by Widukind von Corvey in his Saxon history as Waari . The name is probably not of Slavic, but of Old Norse origin and could be translated as residents of the bay . So it is a foreign name. Earlier, the name of the Wagrians was supported by a minority of German researchers having regard to the Primary Chronicle also the name of the Germanic tribe of the Variner associated and the Slavic Wagrians instead of the Vikings as the origin of Waräger classified; This position, which is based only on phonetic similarity, is mostly considered to be refuted today, but is still partly represented, especially in Russian research, which, with reference to this hypothesis, denies the contribution of Scandinavian warriors to the formation of the Russian state.

Settlement area

Settlement areas of the Wagrier and Polaben (in brown) in the Viking Age in what is now Schleswig-Holstein

The Wagrians were the northwestern part of the Slavic tribal union of the Abodrites . In the 12th century, their settlement area comprised the areas of Ostholsteins and Plön and bordered the Limes Saxoniae in the west and the Trave in the south . The main castle of the Wagrier was the sea trading center Starigard / Oldenburg . There was the seat of the tribal prince and place of worship, an oak grove dedicated to the deity Prove. Another place of worship existed in Plön. The sub-tribal area was divided into the castle districts of Oldenburg, Plön, Lütjenburg , Eutin , Süsel and Dargun (Warder).

In contrast, the settlement area in the early Middle Ages was initially limited to a relatively small settlement chamber around Oldenburg. From the 9th century, a larger settlement area developed around the castles Bosau , Scharstorf and Belau . The castles Plön, Eutin-Uklei and Hassendorf were built there in the 10th century . Around the same time, the ramparts Giekau, Stöfs I and II and Sechendorf were built in the area around Lütjenburg .

history

When the sub-tribe of the Wagrier originated, it has not yet been clarified. There is only agreement to the extent that it had not yet formed, especially at the time of the Slavic conquest and in the 8th and 9th centuries. The ramparts and castles of the Wagrier were archaeologically researched and documented by Karl Wilhelm Struve in particular .

The first mentions of the Wagrians and their prince ( subregulus ) Selibur 967/8 in several independent contemporary sources mark the beginning of a temporary independence of the Wagrian princes that extended into the 12th century alongside the Abodritic velvet rulers who in turn resided in Mecklenburg . After Gottschalk's death in 1066, the Wagrier Kruto even gained control of the entire Abodritic tribal association.

The Wagrians resisted German efforts to Christianize for a relatively long time. After the submission by Otto I in the early 10th century, at least parts of the nobility were converted to Christianity , who in return retained their position. In Aldenburg across from the island of Fehmarn , a diocese was founded for the first time within the Billungermark around 968 , but it was already lost in the Slavic uprisings of 983 and 990. After a renewed establishment, the diocese went under again in 1066, this time for almost a century. With Kruto, a representative of the pagan part of the nobility came to power, a sure sign that the Christianization of the population had not taken place.

When power struggles broke out in Saxony after the death of Emperor Lothar in 1137, the Vagrian prince Pribislaw tried to gain sovereignty over Vagria, but failed because he captured the imperial victory castle in Segeberg . The newly appointed Count of Holstein and Stormarn, Heinrich von Badewide , then destroyed the Wagrier villages in the winter of 1138/39, killed the cattle and destroyed the supplies. The population fled to the castles where, as expected, famine broke out. When the seeds had risen in the summer of 1139, the fields of the Wagrians were devastated against the will of the Count von der Holsten and the heavily fortified Castle Plön was conquered. Pribislaw had to retreat to the Wagrian peninsula, which the count had granted him as a territory, and no longer played a political role. Wagrien was added to Holstein at the same time and thus lost its territorial independence. Duke Heinrich the Lion gave Wagrien as a fief to Count Adolf II of Holstein. This brought Frisians, Westphalians and Dutch into the country for the expelled Wagrier with great financial efforts from 1143 and settled them in the western and southern parts of Wagrien in order to close the gap left by the Holsten in the taxable population. The northern areas around Oldenburg and Lütjenburg initially remained purely Wagrisch settled. The descendants of the Wagrians were absorbed by the immigrant German population in the following centuries and adopted their language.

The Wagrians were feared pirates in the western Baltic Sea region who, like Vikings, harassed the Danish islands in particular.

swell

  • Adam of Bremen : Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum . In: Werner Trillmich , Rudolf Buchner (Hrsg.): Sources of the 9th and 11th centuries on the history of the Hamburg Church and the Empire. (FSGA 11), 7th edition. Darmstadt 2000, ISBN 3-534-00602-X , pp. 137-499.
  • Helmold : Slawenchronik = Helmoldi Presbyteri Bozoviensis Chronica Slavorum (= selected sources on German history of the Middle Ages. Vol. 19). Retransmitted and explained by Heinz Stoob . Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt 1963 (2nd, improved edition, ibid 1973, ISBN 3-534-00175-3 )
  • The chronicle of Arnold von Lübeck . Translated from the edition of the Monumenta Germaniae by Johann Christian Moritz Laurent. With a foreword by Johann Christian Moritz Laurent. Revised by Wilhelm Wattenbach (Die Geschichtschreiber der deutschen Vorzeit. Second complete edition, vol. 71), third, unchanged edition, Leipzig 1940. ( Digitized version of the 1853 edition in Google books)

literature

  • Christian Lübke, Wagrier in: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde , Volume 33, Berlin 2006 weblink

Remarks

  1. ^ Res gestae Saxonicae III, 68: Selibur preerat Waaris, Mistav Abdritis.
  2. ↑ Christian Lübke, Wagrier in: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde , Volume 33, Berlin 2006
  3. ^ Rudolf Usinger, Wariner and Wagrier In: Journal of the Society for the History of the Duchies of Schleswig, Holstein and Lauenburg , Vol. 2 (1872), pp. 42–53
  4. ↑ Vsevolod Merkulov, Ostholstein - the home of the old Russian Varangians In: Federkiel , 10th edition, 2014. pp. 4–9.
  5. ^ In detail on the castle landscape of the Wagrier Fred Ruchhöft, From the Slavic tribal area to the German bailiwick; the development of the territories in Ostholstein, Lauenburg, Mecklenburg and Western Pomerania in the Middle Ages. (Archeology and History in the Baltic Sea Region, Volume 4), Rahden / Westf. 2008 ISBN 978-3-89646-464-4 , p. 86
  6. ↑ So already Friedrich Wigger: Mecklenburgische Annalen up to the year 1066. A chronologically ordered collection of sources with notes and treatises. Schwerin 1860, p. 104; fundamentally Wolfgang Herrmann Fritze: Problems of the abodritical tribal and imperial constitution and its development from a tribal state to a ruling state. In: H. Ludat (ed.): Settlement and constitution of the Slavs between the Elbe, Saale and Oder. Giessen 1960, pp. 141-219, especially p. 156 ff .; most recently Fred Ruchhöft: From Slavic tribal area to German bailiwick; the development of the territories in Ostholstein, Lauenburg, Mecklenburg and Western Pomerania in the Middle Ages. (Archeology and History in the Baltic Sea Region, Volume 4), Rahden / Westf. 2008, ISBN 978-3-89646-464-4 , pp. 85 f.
  7. ↑ Widukind by Corvey III, 68, 69; Annalista Saxo for the year 967; Thietmar von Merseburg , Chronicon II, 14
  8. ↑ Helmold I, 25; on this in detail Wolfgang Herrmann Fritze, Problems of the abodritic tribal and imperial constitution and its development from a tribal state to a ruling state in: H. Ludat, (Ed.) Settlement and constitution of the Slavs between Elbe, Saale and Oder , Gießen 1960, pp. 141-219 , in particular pages 168 ff.
  9. ↑ Helmold I, 56
  10. ↑ Fred Ruchhöft: From the Slavic tribal area to the German bailiwick. The development of the territories in Ostholstein, Lauenburg, Mecklenburg and Western Pomerania in the Middle Ages (= archeology and history in the Baltic Sea area. Vol. 4). Leidorf, Rahden (Westphalia) 2008, ISBN 978-3-89646-464-4 , pp. 158, 160.
  11. ↑ SHRU Vol. I, Certificate No. 162: Ego Adolfus, Dei gratia comes Wagrie, Holtsatie et Stormarie