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Hersfeld Abbey
Hersfeld Abbey was an important Benedictine imperial abbey in the town of Bad Hersfeld in Hesse (formerly in Hesse-Nassau), Germany, at the confluence of the rivers Geisa, Haune and Fulda. The ruins are now a medieval festival venue. History Hersfeld was founded by Saint Sturm, a disciple of Saint Boniface, before 744. Because its location rendered it vulnerable to attacks from the Saxons, however, he transferred it to Fulda. Some years later, in or about 769 after the defeat of the Saxons by the Franks, Lullus, archbishop of Mainz, re-founded the monastery at Hersfeld. Charlemagne (who had recently succeeded to the Frankish royal crown) and other benefactors provided endowments, and in 775 gave it the status of a (); i.e., territorially independent prince-abbacy within the empire. Pope Stephen III granted it exemption from episcopal jurisdiction. It soon possessed 1050 hides of land and a community of 150 monks. Lullus was buried in the church at his death in 786. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Imperial Abbey
Princely abbeys (, ''Fürststift'') and Imperial abbeys (, ''Reichskloster'', ''Reichsstift'', ''Reichsgotthaus'') were religious establishments within the Holy Roman Empire which enjoyed the status of imperial immediacy (''Reichsunmittelbarkeit'') and therefore were answerable directly to the Emperor. The possession of imperial immediacy came with a unique form of territorial authority known as '' Landeshoheit'', which carried with it nearly all the attributes of sovereignty. Princely abbeys and imperial abbeys The distinction between a princely abbey and an imperial abbey was related to the status of the abbot: while both prince-abbots and the more numerous imperial abbots sat on the ecclesiastical bench of the College of ruling princes of the Imperial Diet, prince-abbots cast an individual vote while imperial abbots cast only a curial (collective) vote alongside his or her fellow imperial abbots and abbesses. Eight princely abbeys (including similar status priories) and ro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hesse
Hesse or Hessen ( ), officially the State of Hesse (), is a States of Germany, state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt, which is also the country's principal financial centre. Two other major historic cities are Darmstadt and Kassel. With an area of 21,114.73 square kilometers and a population of over six million, it ranks seventh and fifth, respectively, among the sixteen German states. Frankfurt Rhine-Main, Germany's second-largest metropolitan area (after Rhine-Ruhr), is mainly located in Hesse. As a cultural region, Hesse also includes the area known as Rhenish Hesse (Rheinhessen) in the neighboring state of Rhineland-Palatinate. Etymology The German name , like the names of other German regions ( "Swabia", "Franconia", "Bavaria", "Saxony"), derives from the dative plural form of the name of the inhabitants or German tribes, eponymous tribe, the Hessians (, singular ). The geographical name represents a short equivalent o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hide (unit)
The hide was an English unit of land measurement originally intended to represent the amount of land sufficient to support a household. The Anglo-Saxon hide commonly appeared as of arable land, but it probably represented a much smaller holding before 1066. It was a measure of value and tax assessment, including obligations for food-rent ('), maintenance and repair of bridges and fortifications, manpower for the army ('), and (eventually) the ' land tax. The hide's method of calculation is now obscure: different properties with the same hidage could vary greatly in extent even in the same county. Following the Norman Conquest of England, the hidage assessments were recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086, and there was a tendency for land producing £1 of income per year to be assessed at 1 hide. The Norman kings continued to use the unit for their tax assessments until the end of the 12th century. The hide was divided into four yardlands or virgates. It was hence nominally ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pope Stephen III
Pope Stephen III (; 720 – 24 January 772) was the bishop of Rome and ruler of the Papal States from 7 August 768 to his death on 24 January 772. Stephen was a Benedictine monk who worked in the Lateran Palace during the reign of Pope Zachary. In the midst of a tumultuous contest by rival factions to name a successor to Pope Paul I, Stephen was elected with the support of the Roman officials. He summoned the Lateran Council of 769, which sought to limit the influence of the nobles in Papal selection before 1059, papal elections. The council also opposed iconoclasm. Early career A Greeks, Greek born in Sicily, Stephen III was the son of a man named Olivus.Mann, pg. 369 Coming to Rome during the pontificate of Pope Gregory III, he was placed in the San Crisogono, monastery of St. Chrysogonus, where he became a Benedictine monk. During the pontificate of Pope Zachary, he was ordained a priest, after which the pope decided to keep him to work at the Lateran Palace. Stephen gradual ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Archbishop Of Mainz
The Elector of Mainz was one of the seven Prince-electors of the Holy Roman Empire. As both the Archbishop of Mainz and the ruling prince of the Electorate of Mainz, the Elector of Mainz held a powerful position during the Middle Ages. The Archbishop-Elector was president of the electoral college, archchancellor of the empire, and the Primate of Germany as the papal legate north of the Alps, until the dissolution of the empire in 1806. The origin of the title dates back to 747, when the city of Mainz was made the seat of an archbishop, and a succession of able and ambitious prelates made the district under their rule a strong and vigorous state. Among these men were important figures in the history of Germany such as Hatto I, Adalbert of Mainz, Siegfried III, Peter of Aspelt and Albert of Brandenburg. There were several violent contests between rivals for the archbishopric, and their power struggles occasionally moved the citizens of Mainz to revolt. The lands of the elector ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lullus
Saint Lullus (also known as Lull or Lul, born AD 710 – died 16 October 786) was the first permanent archbishop of Mainz, succeeding Saint Boniface, and first abbot of the Benedictine Hersfeld Abbey. He is historiographically considered the first official sovereign of the Electorate of Mainz. Monk to archbishop Lullus was born in Wessex around AD 710. He was a monk in the Benedictine monastery of Malmesbury Abbey in Wiltshire. His earlier name may have been "Rehdgerus" (possible in a multitude of spellings including Ratkar, Hredgar, Raedgar, etc.). During a pilgrimage to Rome in 737, he met Saint Boniface and decided to join him in his missionary work in northern Germany. In 738, Lullus joined the Benedictine monastery of Fritzlar, founded by Boniface in 732. There, his teacher was abbot Saint Wigbert, who had also come from England. In 741, Charles Martel died, and in this year the most important phase of Boniface's career started, with Lullus as his closest assistant. Many of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Franks
file:Frankish arms.JPG, Aristocratic Frankish burial items from the Merovingian dynasty The Franks ( or ; ; ) were originally a group of Germanic peoples who lived near the Rhine river, Rhine-river military border of Germania Inferior, which was the most northerly province of the Roman Empire in continental Europe. These Frankish tribes lived for centuries under varying degrees of Roman hegemony and influence, but after the collapse of Roman institutions in western Europe they took control of a large empire including areas which had been ruled by Rome, and what it meant to be a Frank began to evolve. Once they were deeply established in Gaul, the Franks became a multilingual, Catholic Christian people, who subsequently came to rule over several other post-Roman kingdoms both inside and outside the old empire. In a broader sense much of the population of western Europe could eventually described as Franks in some contexts. The term "Frank" itself first appeared in the third cent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Saxons
The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony () which became a Carolingian " stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany. Many of their neighbours were, like them, speakers of West Germanic dialects, including the inland Franks and Thuringians to the south, and the coastal Frisians and Angles to the north who were among the peoples who were originally referred to as "Saxons" in the context of early raiding and settlements in Roman Britain and Gaul. To their east were Obotrites and other Slavic-speaking peoples. The political history of these continental Saxons is unclear until the 8th century and the conflict between their semi-legendary hero Widukind and the Frankish emperor Charlemagne. They do not appear to have been politically united until the generations leading up to that conflict, and before then they were reportedly ruled by regional "satraps". Previous Frankish rulers of Austrasia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boniface
Boniface, OSB (born Wynfreth; 675 –5 June 754) was an English Benedictine monk and leading figure in the Anglo-Saxon mission to the Germanic parts of Francia during the eighth century. He organised significant foundations of the church in Germany and was made Archbishop of Mainz by Pope Gregory III. He was martyred in Frisia in 754, along with 52 others, and his remains were returned to Fulda, where they rest in a sarcophagus which remains a site of Christian pilgrimage. Boniface's life and death as well as his work became widely known, there being a wealth of material available — a number of , especially the near-contemporary , legal documents, possibly some sermons, and above all his correspondence. He is venerated as a saint in the Christian church and became the patron saint of Germania, known as the "Apostle to the Germans". Norman Cantor notes the three roles Boniface played that made him "one of the truly outstanding creators of the first Europe, as the apos ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Saint Sturm
Sturm ( – 17 December 779), also called Sturmius or Sturmi, was a disciple of Boniface and founder and first abbot of the Benedictine monastery and abbey of Fulda in 742 or 744. Sturm's tenure as abbot lasted from 747 until 779. Life Sturm was born in Lorch, Austria, and was most likely related to the Agilolfing dukes of Bavaria. His parents placed him under the care of Boniface, who was carrying out the church reorganization in Bavaria and Austria (founding the bishoprics of Salzburg, Regensburg and Würzburg). He was educated in the Benedictine monastery of Fritzlar by abbot Wigbert. He was then active as a missionary in northern Hesse, where in 736 he established a monastic settlement in ''Haerulfisfeld'' ( Hersfeld). Ordained in 740 as priest in Fritzlar. Boniface sent him to work for three years as a missionary in Westphalia. He then was a hermit at Hersfeld, until raiding Saxons drove him from his unprotected hermitage. Sturm was instructed by Boniface in 744 to e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
