Adalbert of Metz (died 841)

Last updated

Adalbert [a] (died 13 May 841) was Frankish nobleman with lands scattered throughout the Carolingian Empire. He was one of the most trusted advisors of Emperor Louis the Pious. By 838, he was the count of Metz. He was strongly opposed to the ambition of the emperor's son, Louis the German, for a large kingdom in East Francia. After the elder Louis's death, he supported Emperor Lothar I and it was in the latter's service that he was killed in battle with Louis the German.

Contents

Early life

Adalbert was a Hattonian. His brothers were Banzleib and Hatto. The family's lands were spread throughout the empire in Le Mans, Metz, Nassau, Toulouse, Alemannia, Saxony and the Wormsgau. [2]

Adalbert is first recorded as the seneschal of Louis the Pious on 8 November 816, when he was sent as a missus dominicus (royal envoy) to hear a complaint from the abbey of Prüm against the alienation of a part of its forest by the serfs of the fisc at Thommen. [1] In 825, he is mentioned with the title of count when again acting as a missus, this time in the legatio of Trier alongside the city's archbishop, Hetti. [3]

Adalbert's prestige and influence increased rapidly the mid-830s. On 20 November 834 Louis tranformed his benefices in the Wormsgau and at a place called Cunigessunteri near Mainz into allods. That same month, he attended the imperial assembly at Attigny. He is recorded as one of Louis's fideles . [3]

It may be that Adalbert founded the monastery of Lindau, but the evidence is weak. According to its own necrology, the monastery was founded by a person called Adalbert. [b] The Translatio sanguinis Domini , preserves a false diploma of Louis the Pious that refers to the founder as Adalbert, "our faithful vassal and count of the sacred palace". The name, description and time are consistent. [5]

Count and counsellor of Louis the Pious

In 835, the emperor sent Adalbert to the abbey of Fulda to ensure that the imprisoned former archbishop Ebbo of Reims would be placed under greater security, since an attempt to free him was expected. [3] In 836, the emperor, calling him "our faithful vassal", rewarded him with the villa Fontanas in the pagus of Toulouse. [6]

By the late 830s, Adalbert was imperial doorkeeper. [7] The contemporary historian Nithard portrays him as one of the emperor's leading counsellors who set the emperor against his namesake son, Louis the German. According to Nithard, Adalbert and his ally, Archbishop Otgar of Mainz, so hated Louis that they wished him dead. [7] Although Nithard is heavily biased against Adalbert, the Annales Fuldenses agree that he was the "instigator of the disputes" between Louis the Pious and Louis the German. [8] The probable reason for this was strong opposition to the creation of a kingdom of East Francia that would have turned the Rhine into a border, since the Hattonians held lands on both sides of the river. [9]

By 838, Adalbert was count of Metz, a title first recorded by Nithard. [10] [11] In an imperial charter of 17 April 838, he is called consiliarius (counsellor), a common term for him in the chronicles but rare in the imperial chancery. This is the only known document that uses it. In it, Louis restores a villa [c] that Adalbert held in benefice from the emperor, to the cathedral of Le Mans, on the advice of Adalbert, "our counsellor and count". [12]

Rebellions of Louis the German

Adalbert attended the assembly at Nijmegen in June 838, when Louis the Pious made his eldest son, Lothar I, guardian of his younges, Charles the Bald. [9] The assembly otherwise dealt primarily with the Viking threat. He was the first layman to sign as a witness the charter issued there by Louis to the abbey of Fulda on 14 June, indicating his preeminent status. [11]

Adalber attended Charles's coronation as king of Neustria in September 838, where it was also announced that Louis the German's kingdom would be limited to Bavaria. [13] In response to this, Louis the German entered into open rebellion. When the emperor crossed the Rhine with 3,000 men in early 839, Adalbert rallied the Saxons "partly by threats, partly by persuasion", according to the Annales Fuldenses. [11] [14] In this he was probably helped by Banzleib, who was margrave of Saxony. For his role in putting down Louis's rebellion, the emperor rewarded him with grants of land in Alemannia. [14]

In January 840, the emperor, then in Aquitaine, ordered Adalbert and Bishop Drogo of Metz to defend the Rhine and prevent Louis the German from crossing until he could arrive in force. [11] [15]

Civil war and death

Around the time of Louis the Pious's death in June 840, Adalbert fell ill. [16] According to Nithard, he remained ill for "almost an entire year". [17] On 8 August, calling himself a "humble servant of Christ", Adalbert granted lands at Walluf and Koblenz to the abbey of Fulda "for my immeasurable sins and crimes". The charter, drawn up at Walluf, was still dated by the reign of the deceased emperor. [18]

In the civil war between his sons that followed the emperor's death, Adalbert sided with Lothar. He was an inveterate enemy of Louis the German, who always blamed his father's counsellors, especially Adalbert, for his exclusion from the division of the empire (except Bavaria). Adalbert was the most important of Lothar's advisors. According to Nithard: "at that time Adalbert was so skilled in counsel that no one dared question a thing he said. At his instigation, Lothar gathered an infinite multitude and set out for the Rhine" in early 841. [19] When Louis retreated to Bavaria, Lothar left Adalbert in charge east of the Rhine with the title, according to Nithard, of dux Austrasiorum ("commander of the Austrasians"). [11] [19]

In May 841, Louis broke out of Bavaria by luring Adalbert's larger army into the Ries. On 13 May, he defeated him in a major battle on the banks of the Wörnitz. Adalbert was killed in action. His death was noted by many chronicles. [20]

Notes

  1. ↑ Spelling variants found in the Latin documents include Adalbertus, Adhelbertus and Adalberhtus. [1]
  2. ↑ He is called stifter dis munsters. [4]
  3. ↑ The villa is called Bonalla in region called the pagus Carmicense. [11]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Louis the Pious</span> Emperor of the Carolingian Empire from 813 to 840

Louis the Pious, also called the Fair and the Debonaire, was King of the Franks and co-emperor with his father, Charlemagne, from 813. He was also King of Aquitaine from 781. As the only surviving son of Charlemagne and Hildegard, he became the sole ruler of the Franks after his father's death in 814, a position that he held until his death except from November 833 to March 834, when he was deposed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Louis the German</span> King of East Francia from 843 to 876

Louis the German, also known as Louis II of Germany, was the first king of East Francia, and ruled from 843 to 876 AD. Grandson of emperor Charlemagne and the third son of Louis the Pious, emperor of Francia, and his first wife, Ermengarde of Hesbaye, he received the appellation Germanicus shortly after his death, when East Francia became known as the kingdom of Germany.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carolingian Empire</span> Frankish empire in Western and Central Europe (800–887)

The Carolingian Empire (800–887) was a Frankish-dominated empire in Western and Central Europe during the Early Middle Ages. It was ruled by the Carolingian dynasty, which had ruled as kings of the Franks since 751 and as kings of the Lombards in Italy from 774. In 800, the Frankish king Charlemagne was crowned emperor in Rome by Pope Leo III in an effort to transfer the status of Roman Empire from the Byzantine Empire to Western Europe. The Carolingian Empire is sometimes considered the first phase in the history of the Holy Roman Empire.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lothair I</span> Carolingian Emperor from 817 to 855

Lothair I was a 9th-century Carolingian emperor and king of Italy (818–855) and Middle Francia (843–855).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Judith of Bavaria (died 843)</span> Carolingian empress from 819 to 840

Judith of Bavaria was the Carolingian empress as the second wife of Louis the Pious. Marriage to Louis marked the beginning of her rise as an influential figure in the Carolingian court. She had two children with Louis, Gisela and Charles the Bald. The birth of her son led to a major dispute over the imperial succession, and tensions between her and Charles' half-brothers from Louis' first marriage. She eventually fell from grace when Charles' wife, Ermentrude of Orléans, rose to power. She was buried in 843 in Tours.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rorik of Dorestad</span> 9th-century Danish Viking

Rorik was a Danish Viking, who ruled over parts of Friesland between 841 and 873, conquering Dorestad and Utrecht in 850. Rorik swore allegiance to Louis the German in 873. He was born in Denmark around 800. He died at some point between 873 and 882.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Drogo of Metz</span>

Drogo, also known as Dreux or Drogon, was an illegitimate son of Frankish emperor Charlemagne by the concubine Regina.

Matfrid was the Frankish count of Orléans in the reign of Emperor Louis the Pious. He is usually thought to have been the first of the lineage known to historians as the Matfriede.

<i>Annales Fuldenses</i> Medieval Frankish chronicle

The Annales Fuldenses or Annals of Fulda are East Frankish chronicles that cover independently the period from the last years of Louis the Pious to shortly after the end of effective Carolingian rule in East Francia with the accession of the child-king, Louis III, in 900. Throughout this period they are a near contemporary record of the events they describe and a primary source for Carolingian historiography. They are usually read as a counterpart to the narrative found in the West Frankish Annales Bertiniani.

Henry was the leading military commander of the last years of the Carolingian Empire. He was commander-in-chief under Kings Louis the Younger and Charles the Fat. His early career was mostly restricted to East Francia, his homeland, but after Charles inherited West Francia in 884 he was increasingly active there. During his time, raids by the Vikings peaked in Francia. The sources describe at least eight separate campaigns waged by Henry against the Vikings, most of them successful.

The Stellinga or Stellingabund was a movement of Saxon frilingi (freemen) and lazzi (freedmen) between 841 and 843. These were the middle two Saxon castes, below the nobility and above the unfree. The aim of the Stellinga was to recover those rights the two castes had possessed before their forced conversion from Germanic paganism to Christianity in the 770s. At that time they had still possessed political privileges, but Charlemagne, having won over to his cause the Saxon nobility, had reduced them to mere peasants. The Stellinga thus despised the Lex Saxonum, which had been codified by Charlemagne, preferring to live in accordance with ancient and unwritten tribal custom. The movement was violently resisted by the uppermost caste, the nobiles (nobility), not always with the support of the Frankish kings.

Poppo I was a Frankish count in the Grapfeld (Grabfeld) from 819–839. As a grandson of Heimrich, Count in the Upper Rheingau, he was a descendant of the Robertian count Cancor. He was the founder of the Frankish Popponids.

The Hattonids were an important imperial noble family in the first half of the 9th century, during the reigns of the Carolingian kings Charlemagne and Louis the Pious. They lost their position under Louis the German. They were patronised by the emperors and were enfeoffed with benefices on imperial estates. They attended empire-wide councils and were given military commands on the borders to defend the empire from Danish Vikings and Slavs.

Banzleibs was a mid-ninth-century Frankish magnate of the Hattonid family in the Carolingian Empire.

Gilbert (Giselbert), Count of Maasgau was a Frankish noble in what would become Lotharingia, during his lifetime in the 9th century. The Carolingian dynasty created this "middle kingdom" and fought over it, and he is mentioned as playing a role on both sides.

Gozbald, in Latin Gozbaldus or Gauzbaldus, was the abbot of Niederaltaich from 825, and the bishop of Würzburg from 842, until his death. He also served as chorbishop of the diocese of Passau. On the basis of an entry in the confraternity book of Reichenau Abbey, the historian Gerd Althoff suggests that Gozbald belonged to the Hattonian family.

The Linones were a small Slavic people first recorded in the early 9th century. They lived north and east of the Elbe, across from Höhbeck in the region around Lenzen, south of the Wilzi and Obotrites, north of the Hevelli and northeast of the Saxons. They may have been a sub-group of the Wilzi and were often under Obotrite control. They may be associated with the medieval Gau Liezizi.

Baturich, also spelled Baturic or Baturicus, was the abbot of Saint Emmeram's and bishop of Regensburg from 817 until his death.

Helisachar was a churchman and statesman in the Carolingian Empire. He served as the chancellor of Aquitaine from 808 to 814 and archchancellor of the empire from 814 until 819. He remained an influential figure at court into the 830s and was entrusted with military responsibilities in 824 and 827. He was rewarded with multiple abbacies and composed an antiphonary.

The battle of the Ries of 13 May 841 was a major engagement of the Carolingian civil war of 840–843. King Louis the German surprised and routed the army of Count Adalbert of Metz on the banks of the river Wörnitz in the Ries. Adalbert, who had been charged by the Emperor Lothar I with preventing Louis from breaking out of Bavaria, was killed in the fighting. The victory allowed Louis to join up with King Charles the Bald and defeat Lothar in the battle of Fontenoy-en-Puisaye in late June.

References

  1. 1 2 Depreux 1997, p. 69.
  2. ↑ Goldberg 2006, pp. 83n and 88.
  3. 1 2 3 Depreux 1997, p. 70.
  4. ↑ Depreux 1997, p. 72.
  5. ↑ Depreux 1997 , p. 72: fidelis vassalus noster et sacri palatii comes.
  6. ↑ Depreux 1997, pp. 70–71.
  7. 1 2 Goldberg 2006, p. 88.
  8. ↑ Goldberg 2006, p. 174.
  9. 1 2 Goldberg 2006, pp. 88–89.
  10. ↑ Goldberg 2006, p. 76.
  11. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Depreux 1997, p. 71.
  12. ↑ Depreux 1997, pp. 71–72.
  13. ↑ Goldberg 2006, pp. 89–90.
  14. 1 2 Goldberg 2006, p. 90.
  15. ↑ Goldberg 2006, p. 93.
  16. ↑ Goldberg 2006, p. 94.
  17. ↑ Goldberg 2006, p. 99.
  18. ↑ Goldberg 2006, pp. 94–95.
  19. 1 2 Goldberg 2006, pp. 98–99.
  20. ↑ Goldberg 2006, pp. 99–100.

Bibliography

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.