Hans Baldung, called Hans Baldung Grien,, was a painter, printer, engraver, draftsman, and stained glass artist, who was considered the most gifted student of Albrecht Dürer and whose art belongs to both German Renaissance and Mannerism.
Rupert of the Palatinate, sometimes known as Robert of the Palatinate, a member of the House of Wittelsbach, was Elector Palatine from 1398 and King of Germany from 1400 until his death.
The Electoral Palatinate or the Palatinate, officially the Electorate of the Palatinate, was a state that was part of the Holy Roman Empire. The electorate had its origins under the rulership of the Counts Palatine of Lotharingia in 915; it was then restructured under the Counts Palatine of the Rhine in 1085. These counts palatine of the Rhine would serve as prince-electors from "time immemorial", and were noted as such in a papal letter of 1261; they were confirmed as electors by the Golden Bull of 1356.
The House of Wittelsbach is a former German dynasty, with branches that have ruled over territories including the Electorate of Bavaria, the Electoral Palatinate, the Electorate of Cologne, Holland, Zeeland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Hungary, Bohemia, and Greece. Their ancestral lands of Bavaria and the Palatinate were prince-electorates, and the family had three of its members elected emperors and kings of the Holy Roman Empire. They ruled over the Kingdom of Bavaria which was created in 1805 and continued to exist until 1918.
Lucas Cranach the Elder was a German Renaissance painter and printmaker in woodcut and engraving. He was court painter to the Electors of Saxony for most of his career, and is known for his portraits, both of German princes and those of the leaders of the Protestant Reformation, whose cause he embraced with enthusiasm. He was a close friend of Martin Luther. Cranach also painted religious subjects, first in the Catholic tradition, and later trying to find new ways of conveying Lutheran religious concerns in art. He continued throughout his career to paint nude subjects drawn from mythology and religion.
A count palatine, also count of the palace or palsgrave, was originally an official attached to a royal or imperial palace or household and later a nobleman of a rank above that of an ordinary count. The title originated in the late Roman Empire. In the Middle Ages especially and into modern times, it is associated with the Holy Roman Empire, especially Electoral Palatinate.
Charles Theodore was a German nobleman of the Sulzbach branch of the House of Wittelsbach. He became Count Palatine of Sulzbach from his father Johann Christian in 1733, at the age of six. With the death of his cousin, Charles III Philip, he became Prince-elector and Count Palatine of the Rhine in 1742, being eighteen. In his fifties, he became Duke of Bavaria at the death of another cousin, Maximilian III Joseph, in 1777.
The Swabian League was a mutual defence and peace keeping association of Imperial Estates – free Imperial cities, prelates, principalities and knights – principally in the territory of the early medieval stem duchy of Swabia established on 14 February 1488.
John Casimir, Count Palatine of Simmern was a German prince and a younger son of Frederick III, Elector Palatine. A firm Calvinist, he was a leader of mercenary troops in the religious wars of the time, including the Dutch Revolt. From 1583–1592 he acted as regent for his nephew, Elector Palatine Frederick IV.
The German Renaissance, part of the Northern Renaissance, was a cultural and artistic movement that spread among German thinkers in the 15th and 16th centuries, which developed from the Italian Renaissance. Many areas of the arts and sciences were influenced, notably by the spread of Renaissance humanism to the various German states and principalities. There were many advances made in the fields of architecture, the arts, and the sciences. Germany produced two developments that were to dominate the 16th century all over Europe: printing and the Protestant Reformation.
Frederick IV, Elector Palatine of the Rhine, only surviving son of Louis VI, Elector Palatine and Elisabeth of Hesse, called "Frederick the Righteous".
Frederick III of Simmern, the Pious, Elector Palatine of the Rhine was a ruler from the house of Wittelsbach, branch Palatinate-Simmern-Sponheim. He was a son of John II of Simmern and inherited the Palatinate from the childless Elector Otto-Henry, Elector Palatine (Ottheinrich) in 1559. He was a devout convert to Calvinism, and made the Reformed confession the official religion of his domain by overseeing the composition and promulgation of the Heidelberg Catechism. His support of Calvinism gave the German Reformed movement a foothold within the Holy Roman Empire.
William IV was Duke of Bavaria from 1508 to 1550, until 1545 together with his younger brother Louis X, Duke of Bavaria. He was born in Munich to Albert IV and Kunigunde of Austria, a daughter of Emperor Frederick III.
Albert IV was duke of Bavaria-Munich from 1467, and duke of the reunited Bavaria from 1503.
Otto-Henry, Elector Palatine, a member of the Wittelsbach dynasty was Count Palatine of Palatinate-Neuburg from 1505 to 1557 and prince elector of the Palatinate from 1556 to 1559. He was a son of Rupert, Count Palatine, third son of Philip, Elector Palatine; and of Elizabeth of Bavaria-Landshut, daughter of George of Bavaria.
The War of the Succession of Landshut resulted from a dispute between the duchies of Bavaria-Munich and Bavaria-Landshut (Bayern-Landshut). An earlier agreement between the different Wittelsbach lines, the Treaty of Pavia (1329), concerned the law of succession and stated that if one branch should become extinct in the male line then the other would inherit. This agreement disregarded imperial law, which stipulated that the Holy Roman Emperor should inherit should a line fail.
Over its long history, the Holy Roman Empire used many different heraldic forms, representing its numerous internal divisions.
The Great Last Judgement is an oil on canvas altarpiece, painted by the Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens between 1614 and 1617. He created the composition and final touches and his is the only signature on the work, though it is believed between nine and nineteen studio assistants also worked on it. Its name distinguishes it from the same artist's The Small Last Judgement of 1619 and his The Fall of the Damned of 1620.
Heinrich Carl Brandt was an Austrian-German court painter. He created portraits of several noble families in Mainz, Mannheim and Munich. He is probably best known for the ones commissioned by the House of Wittelsbach.
