Marriages
In 1229 she married Frederick of Babenberg, son and heir of Duke Leopold VI of Austria. Her husband, who was known as "the Quarrelsome", [2] had just divorced his first wife Eudokia Laskarina ("Sophia"), a daughter of the Byzantine emperor Theodore I Laskaris, due to childlessness. He succeeded his father as Austrian duke in 1230. Based on the dowry of his wife including large Andechs estates in the March of Carniola and the Windic March, he also began to call himself a "Lord of Carniola" from 1232.
However, Frederick II also divorced Agnes due to childlessness in 1243. The haughty Austrian ruler hurled himself into a fierce border conflict with King Béla IV of Hungary and was killed in the 1246 Battle of the Leitha River. As he left no surviving children, the male line of the Babenberg dynasty became extinct with him. The inheritance fell to his sister Margaret and his niece Gertrude.
From 1250 Agnes is documented as consort of Ulrich of Sponheim, son of Duke Bernhard of Carinthia. Ulrich could succeed Agnes' late husband as Lord in Carniola and became Carinthian duke upon his father's death in 1256. The couple had two children, who nevertheless died young. Agnes died in 1263 and was buried at Stična Abbey in the Windic March (now in Slovenia). After her second husband's death in 1269, her dowry passed to King Ottokar II of Bohemia.
The House of Babenberg was a noble dynasty of Austrian Dukes and Margraves. Descending from the Popponids and originally from Bamberg in the Duchy of Franconia, the Babenbergs ruled the imperial Margraviate of Austria from its creation in 976 AD until its elevation to a duchy in 1156, and from then until the extinction of the line in 1246, whereafter they were succeeded by the House of Habsburg.
Frederick II, known as Frederick the Quarrelsome, was Duke of Austria and Styria from 1230 until his death. He was the fifth and last Austrian duke from the House of Babenberg, since the former margraviate was elevated to a duchy by the 1156 Privilegium Minus. He was killed in the Battle of the Leitha River, leaving no male heirs.
Margaret of Austria, a member of the House of Babenberg, was German queen from 1225 until 1235, by her first marriage with King Henry (VII), and Queen of Bohemia from 1253 to 1260, by her second marriage with King Ottokar II.
Berthold IV, a member of the House of Andechs, was Margrave of Istria and Carniola. By about 1180/82 he assumed the title of Duke of Merania, referring to the Adriatic seacoast of Kvarner which his ancestors had conquered in the 1060s and annexed to Istria and Carniola.
The Marchof Carniola was a southeastern state of the Holy Roman Empire in the High Middle Ages, the predecessor of the Duchy of Carniola. It corresponded roughly to the central Carniolan region of present-day Slovenia. At the time of its creation, the march served as a frontier defense against the Kingdoms of Hungary and Croatia.
Gertrude Anne of Hohenberg was German queen from 1273 until her death, by her marriage with King Rudolf I of Germany. As queen consort, she became progenitor of the Austrian House of Habsburg.
Otto III, a member of the House of Andechs, was Count of Burgundy from 1231 and the last duke of Merania from 1234 until his death.
Otto I, a member of the House of Andechs, was Duke of Merania from 1204 until his death. He was also Count of Burgundy from 1208 to 1231, by his marriage to Countess Beatrice II, and Margrave of Istria and Carniola from 1228 until his death.
Beatrice II reigned as Countess Palatine of Burgundy from 1205 until her death. She was a member of the Swabian Hohenstaufen dynasty, the daughter of Count Otto I of Burgundy and Margaret, Countess of Blois, thereby a granddaughter of Emperor Frederick Barbarossa.
Bernhard von Spanheim, a member of the noble House of Sponheim, was Duke of Carinthia for 54 years from 1202 until his death. A patron of chivalry and minnesang, Bernhard's reign marked the emergence of the Carinthian duchy as an effective territorial principality.
The March of Istria was originally a Carolingian frontier march covering the Istrian peninsula and surrounding territory conquered by Charlemagne's son Pepin of Italy in 789. After 1364, it was the Istrian province of the Habsburg monarchy, the Austrian Empire and Austria-Hungary.
The House of Sponheim or Spanheim was a medieval German noble family, which originated in Rhenish Franconia. They were immediate Counts of Sponheim until 1437 and Dukes of Carinthia from 1122 until 1269. Its cadet branches ruled in the Imperial County of Ortenburg-Neuortenburg and various Sayn-Wittgenstein states until 1806.
The House of Andechs was a feudal line of German princes in the 12th and 13th centuries. The counts of Dießen-Andechs obtained territories in northern Dalmatia on the Adriatic seacoast, where they became Margraves of Istria and ultimately dukes of a short-lived imperial state named Merania from 1180 to 1248. They were also self-styled lords of Carniola.
The Windic March was a medieval frontier march of the Holy Roman Empire, roughly corresponding to the Lower Carniola region in present-day Slovenia. In Slovenian historiography, it is known as the Slovene March.
Albert IV was Count of Tyrol from 1202 until his death, the last from the original House of Tirol. He also served as Vogt of the bishoprics of Trent and Brixen.
Ulrich III was the Lord in the March of Carniola from c. 1249 and Duke of Carinthia from 1256 until his death, the last ruler from the House of Sponheim. His rule had long-lasting consequences. In Carniola, he acquired the former Meranian possessions, thus becoming the first undisputed princeps terrae, provincial lord or landgrave, creating the power and legal basis of the future Duchy of Carniola. The center of his original Carniolan possessions, Ljubljana, became the new administrative center and thus the provincial capital, as well as the center of Ulrich's power. In Carinthia, which he took over after his father's death, his seal became the coat of arms of Carinthia up to today. Despite his attempts to secure the vast Babenberg inheritance through two marriages, first to Agnes of Merania, widow of the last Babenberg duke Frederick II of Austria, and then to Frederick's niece Agnes of Baden, Ulrich remained childless. After a short interregnum by his younger brother Philip of Spanheim, patriarch of Aquileia, the House of Spanheim went extinct, and all of Ulrich's possessions were inherited by his cousin Ottokar II of Bohemia.
Agnes of Baden, was a German noblewoman by birth member of the House of Baden and by her two marriages Duchess of Carinthia and Countess of Heunburg.
Henry II, Margrave of Istria, born c.1175 and died 18 July 1228 in Slovenj Gradec (Windischgraz), was a noble from the House of Andechs who ruled the March of Istria and Carniola from 1204 to 1228. He inherited the County of Stein, and expanded his domains to the Windic March through marriage. He died childless, and his vast possessions were eventually inherited by his niece Agnes of Merania.
The Duchy of Merania was a fiefdom of the Holy Roman Empire from 1152 until 1248. The dukes of Merania were recognised as princes of the Empire enjoying imperial immediacy at a time when these concepts were just coming into use to distinguish the highest ranks of imperial nobility.
