See also
| Husband: | Louis II (1229-1294) | |
| Wife: | Matilda of HABSBURG (1253-1304) | |
| Children: | Agnes (1267- ) | |
| Rudolf I (1274- ) | ||
| Mechtild (1275- ) | ||
| Ludwig IV (1282- ) | ||
| Marriage | 27 Oct 1273 | |
| Name: | Louis II | |
| Sex: | Male | |
| Father: | Otto II (1206-1253) | |
| Mother: | Agnes of PALATINATE (1201-1267) | |
| Birth | 13 Apr 1229 | |
| Occupation | Duke of Upper Bavaria | |
| Death | 2 Feb 1294 (age 64) | |
| Name: | Matilda of HABSBURG | |
| Sex: | Female | |
| Father: | Rudolph I of GERMANY (1218-1291) | |
| Mother: | Gertude of HOHENBERG (1225-1281) | |
| Birth | 1253 | Rheinfelden |
| Occupation | Duchess Consort of Bavaria | |
| Death | 23 Dec 1304 (age 50-51) | Munich, Bavaria |
| Name: | Agnes | |
| Sex: | Female | |
| Birth | 1267 | |
| Name: | Rudolf I | |
| Sex: | Male | |
| Birth | 4 Oct 1274 | |
| Name: | Mechtild | |
| Sex: | Female | |
| Birth | 1275 | |
| Name: | Ludwig IV | |
| Sex: | Male | |
| Birth | 1 Apr 1282 | |
Duke Louis II of Bavaria (German: Ludwig II der Strenge, Herzog von Bayern, Pfalzgraf bei Rhein) (13 April 1229 – 2 February 1294) was Duke of Bavaria and Count Palatine of the Rhine from 1253. Born in Heidelberg, he was a son of duke Otto II and Agnes of Palatinate. She was a daughter of the Welf Henry V, Count Palatine of the Rhine, her grandfathers were Henry XII the Lion and Conrad of Hohenstaufen.
The young Louis supported in 1246 his brother-in-law King Conrad IV of Germany against the usurpation of Heinrich Raspe. In 1251 Louis was at war again against the bishop of Regensburg.
Louis succeeded his father Otto as Duke of Bavaria in 1253. When the Wittelsbach country was divided in 1255 among Otto's sons, Louis received the Palatinate and Upper Bavaria, while his brother duke Henry XIII of Bavaria received Lower Bavaria. This partition was against the law and therefore caused the anger of the bishops in Bavaria who allied themselves with king Otakar II of Bohemia in 1257. In August 1257 Ottokar invaded Bavaria, but Louis and Henry managed to repulse the attack. It was one of the rare concerted and harmonious actions of the two brothers, who often argued.
Louis resided in Munich and Heidelberg Castle. As one of the Prince-electors of the empire he was strongly involved in the royal elections for forty years. During the German interregnum after King William's death in 1256 Louis supported King Richard of Cornwall. Together with his brother, Louis also aided his young Hohenstaufen nephew Conradin in his duchy of Swabia, but it was not possible to enforce Conradin's election as German king. As a result of his support for the Hohenstaufen, Louis was banned by the pope in 1266. In 1267 when his nephew crossed the Alps with an army, Louis accompanied Conradin only to Verona. After the young prince's execution in Naples in 1268, Louis inherited some of Conradin's possessions in Swabia and supported the election of the Habsburg Rudolph I against Ottokar II in 1273. On 26 August 1278 the armies of Rudolph and Louis met Otakar's forces on the banks of the River March in the Battle of Dürnkrut and Jedenspeigen where Otakar was defeated and killed. In 1289 the electoral dignity of Bavaria passed to Bohemia again, but Louis remained an elector as Count Palatine of the Rhine. After Rudolph's death in 1291 Louis could not enforce the election of his Habsburg brother-in-law Albert I against Adolf of Nassau.
Louis died at Heidelberg. His eldest surviving son Rudolf succeeded him, with Adolf of Nassau becoming his father-in-law a few months later. Louis was buried in the crypt of Fürstenfeld Abbey.
[edit] Family and children
Louis II with his first two wives Marie of Brabant (middle) and Anna of Glogau (right), 16th centuryLouis II was married three times.
[edit] The execution of Marie of BrabantHe had his first wife Marie of Brabant —a daughter of Henry II, Duke of Brabant and Marie of Hohenstaufen— executed in Donauwörth in 1256 due to mistaken suspicion of adultery; back in those days the punishment for an adulterous wife was beheading. Any actual guilt on her part could never be validated. As expiation Louis founded the Cistercian friary Fürstenfeld Abbey (Fürstenfeldbruck) near Munich.
Different sources tell varying tales about how this terrible mistake could happen in the first place: In 1256 Louis had been away from home for an extended time, due to his responsibilities as a sovereign in the area of the Rhine. His wife wrote two letters, one to her husband, and another to the earl of Kyburg at Hunsrück, a vassal of Louis. Details about the actual content of the second letter vary, but according to the chroniclers the messenger who carried the letter to Ludwig had been given the wrong one, and Louis came to the conclusion that his wife had a secret love affair.
Over time a great many tales of folklore sprang up around Louis' bloody deed, most of them written long after his death: Ballad-mongers embellished the tale into a murderous frenzy, during which Louis allegedly not only killed his wife after having ridden home for five days and nights, but also stabbed the messenger who brought him the wrong letter, then upon entering his castle stabbed his own castellan and a court lady and threw his wife's maid from the battlements, before he massacred his wife either by stabbing her or cutting off her head.
Several more restrained chronicles support the account of Marie's execution on January 18, 1256 in Donauwörth at castle Mangoldstein by ducal decree for alleged adultery, but nothing beyond that.
[edit] Later marriages
Louis' third wife, Matilda of HabsburgIn 1260 Louis married his second wife Anna of Glogau. They had the following children:
1.Maria (b. 1261), a nun in Marienburg abbey.
2.Ludwig (13 September 1267–23 November 1290, killed at a tournament at Nuremberg.
He married his third wife Matilda of Habsburg, one of king Rudolph's daughters, on 27 October 1273. Their children were:
1.Agnes (ca. 1267/77–1345), married to:
1.1290 in Donauwörth Landgrave Henry II of Hesse;
2.1298/1303 Heinrich I "Ohneland" ("Lackland"), Margrave of Brandenburg.
2.Rudolf I (4 October 1274, Basle–12 August 1319).
3.Mechthild (1275–28 March 1319, Lüneburg), married 1288 to Duke Otto II of Braunschweig-Lüneburg.
4.Ludwig IV (1 April 1282, Munich–11 October 1347, Puch bei Fürstenfeldbruck).
Louis II was succeeded by his oldest son Rudolf.
Matilda of Habsburg or Melchilde (Rheinfelden, 1253[1]-Munich, Bavaria, 23 December 1304) was the eldest daughter of Rudolph I of Germany and Gertrude of Hohenburg. She was regent of Bavaria in the minority of her son.
Matilda was the fourth of nine children, her younger sister, Judith married Wenceslaus II of Bohemia was the mother of ten children, among them were Wenceslaus III of Bohemia and Elisabeth, Queen of Bohemia. Her sister Clementia married Charles Martel of Anjou and was mother of Charles I of Hungary.
Matilda's maternal grandparents were Burchard V, Count of Hohenberg and his wife Mechtild of Tübingen. Her paternal grandparents were Albert IV, Count of Habsburg and his wife Hedwig of Kyburg.
[edit] Biography[edit] MarriageOn the 24 October 1273, Matilda married Louis II, Duke of Bavaria in Aachen, she was his third and final wife. There was a large age difference, Louis was twenty three years older than Matilda.
Matilda and Louis had the following children:
1.Agnes (d.1345), married to:
1.1290 in Donauwörth Landgrave Henry II of Hesse;
2.1298/1303 Heinrich I "Ohneland" ("Lackland"), Margrave of Brandenburg.
2.Rudolf I (4 October 1274, Basle–12 August 1319).
3.Mechthild (1275–28 March 1319, Lüneburg), married 1288 to Duke Otto II of Braunschweig-Lüneburg.
4.Ludwig IV (1 April 1282, Munich–11 October 1347, Puch bei Fürstenfeldbruck).
[edit] Widowhood and RegencyOn her husband's death in 1294, Matilda acted as regent for her young son Rudolf. A decision was made for Matilda to take part of the duchy and her son to take the other part. Matilda took a large part of Upper Bavaria while her son took the cities such as: Ingolstadt, Neuberg, Langenfeld and Rietberg. Within a couple of years her son came of age and ruled the kingdom by himself.
Though Matilda had her younger son, Louis partly educated in Vienna and became co-regent of his brother Rudolf I in Upper Bavaria in 1301 with the support of Matilda and her brother King Albert I, he quarrelled with the Habsburgs from 1307 over possessions in Lower Bavaria. A civil war against his brother Rudolf due to new disputes on the partition of their lands was ended in 1313, when peace was made at Munich.
Matilda and Rudolf continued to be at odds and in 1302 Matilda was arrested by Rudolf and brought to München, where she signed an agreement promising never to interfere in the government again, but as soon as she was outside the boarders of Bavaria, Matilda declared the agreement null and void, and got the support of her brother, Albert, Louis the Bavarian and others.[2]
Matilda's son, Louis defeated his Habsburg cousin Frederick the Handsome. Originally, he was a friend of Frederick, with whom he had been raised. However, armed conflict arose when the tutelage over the young Dukes of Lower Bavaria (Henry XIV, Otto IV and Henry XV) was entrusted to Frederick. On November 9, 1313, Frederick was beaten by Louis in the Battle of Gamelsdorf and had to renounce the tutelage.[3][4]
Matilda died on 23 December 1304 at Munich, Bavaria.