The Conradines or Conradiner were a dynasty of

Franconia Franconia ( ; ; ) is a geographical region of Germany, characterised by its culture and East Franconian dialect (). Franconia is made up of the three (governmental districts) of Lower Franconia, Lower, Middle Franconia, Middle and Upper Franco ...

n counts and dukes in the 8th to 11th Century, named after Duke Conrad the Elder and his son King

Conrad I of Germany Conrad I (; c. 881 – 23 December 918), called the Younger, was the king of East Francia from 911 to 918. He was the first king not of the Carolingian dynasty, the first to be elected by the nobility and the first to be anointed. He was chosen as ...

History

The family is first mentioned in 832, with Count Gebhard in the lower

Lahn The Lahn () is a , right (or eastern) tributary of the Rhine in Germany. Its course passes through the States of Germany, federal states of North Rhine-Westphalia (23.0 km), Hesse (165.6 km), and Rhineland-Palatinate (57.0 km). ...

region. His sons are mentioned in 861 as ''propinqui'' (close relatives) of

Adalard the Seneschal Adalard, also known as Adalhard or Alard, and called ''the Seneschal'', was a Frankish nobleman of the 9th century. He served as warden of the Norman march from 861 to 865, and was Lord Chancellor of France under Louis the Pious. He was a son o ...

, who had served

Louis the Pious Louis the Pious (; ; ; 16 April 778 – 20 June 840), also called the Fair and the Debonaire, was King of the Franks and Holy Roman Emperor, co-emperor with his father, Charlemagne, from 813. He was also King of Aquitaine from 781. As the only ...

. But the clan's rise to prominence began with Oda, wife of Emperor

Arnulf of Carinthia Arnulf of Carinthia ( – 8 December 899) was the duke of Carinthia who overthrew his uncle Emperor Charles the Fat to become the Carolingian king of East Francia from 887, the disputed king of Italy from 894, and the disputed Holy Roman Emperor, ...

, who was a member of the family. In view of his family relationship with Oda, Conrad the Elder was frequently referred to as nepos (nephew, grandson, descendant) of the Emperor. He and his brothers apparently were in fact Arnulf's closest relatives, and he relied heavily on their support in his feud with the counts of Babenberg. Arnulf rewarded them by helping them gain territories, beyond their original realm in Hesse, in Thuringia and the Frankish regions along the Main river. After Arnulf's death, the Conradines were the only blood relatives of the new king,

Louis the Child Louis the Child (893 – 20/24 September 911), sometimes called Louis III or Louis IV, was the king of East Francia from 899 until his death and was also recognized as king of Lotharingia after 900. He was the last East Frankish ruler of the Car ...

, and thus the dominant family in the kingdom. Conrad's brother Gebhard became duke of Lorraine in 903. In 906, Conrad the Elder and his son Conrad the Younger decisively defeated the rival counts of Babenberg in the battle of

Fritzlar Fritzlar () is a small town (pop. 15,000) in the Schwalm-Eder-Kreis, Schwalm-Eder district in northern Hesse, Germany, north of Frankfurt, with a storied history. The town has a medieval center ringed by a wall with numerous watch towers. high ...

, thereby attaining supremacy in Franconia. Conrad the Elder died in the battle, but his son became duke of Franconia. Five years later, after the death of the last Carolingian wearing the crown of

East Francia East Francia (Latin: ) or the Kingdom of the East Franks () was a successor state of Charlemagne's empire created in 843 and ruled by the Carolingian dynasty until 911. It was established through the Treaty of Verdun (843) which divided the for ...

in 911, Conrad was elected king as Conrad I -- instead of the West Francian (and Carolingian) king

Charles the Simple Charles III (17 September 879 – 7 October 929), called the Simple or the Straightforward (from the Latin ''Carolus Simplex''), was the king of West Francia from 898 until 922 and the king of Lotharingia from 911 until 919–923. He was a memb ...

, thus ending Carolingian rule in East Francia. Conrad I had no children. Having largely failed to secure unity and order in the Empire in the face of obstinate resistance from the

dukes of Swabia The Dukes of Swabia were the rulers of the Duchy of Swabia during the Middle Ages. Swabia was one of the five stem duchy, stem duchies of the medieval German kingdom, and its dukes were thus among the most powerful magnates of Germany. The most no ...

, Bavaria and Lorraine, Conrad, on his deathbed in December 918, persuaded his brother Eberhard, margrave and subsequently duke of Franconia, to forgo any aspiration for the crown for himself and to recommend to the Frankish nobles the election of the powerful duke of Saxony,

Henry the Fowler Henry the Fowler ( or '; ; – 2 July 936) was the duke of Saxony from 912 and the king of East Francia from 919 until his death in 936. As the first non- Frankish king of East Francia, he established the Ottonian dynasty of kings and emper ...

(Henry I), as next king in order to ensure unity among the German tribes and preserve the Empire. Eberhard honored this request, and Henry was duly elected at the Reichstag of

in 919. With this, the Conradines reverted to the status of local princes. Conrad's brother Eberhard, the new duke of Franconia, remained loyal to the new (Saxon) king Henry and for a while (926-928) even held the troubled duchy of Lorraine in order to restore order. However, when Henry's son

Otto the Great Otto I (23 November 912 – 7 May 973), known as Otto the Great ( ) or Otto of Saxony ( ), was East Frankish ( German) king from 936 and Holy Roman Emperor from 962 until his death in 973. He was the eldest son of Henry the Fowler and Matilda ...

became king and emperor, Eberhard unwisely joined Arnulf of Bavaria and

Thankmar Thankmar (or Tankmaro, or Tammo) (c. 908 – 28 July 938) was the eldest (and only) son of Henry I of Germany (Henry the Fowler) by his first wife, Hatheburg of Merseburg. His mother had been previously married and widowed, after which she enter ...

, Henry's son from his first marriage, in a rebellion which ended in defeat and Eberhard's death at the battle of Andernach in 939 and the family's loss of the Franconian duchy. In 982 the family temporarily regained the duchy of Swabia, which they had inherited in 926 but then lost again, but they held it only until 1012. In 1036, the last Conradine count died and the family (in the male line) became extinct.

Genealogy

Elder line

Gebhard, Count of the Lahngau (d. 879) # Udo, Count in the Lahngau ##

Conrad, Duke of Thuringia Conrad (died 27 February 906), called the Old or the Elder, was the Duke of Thuringia briefly in 892–93. He was the namesake of the Conradiner family and son of Udo of Neustria. His mother (probably) was a daughter of Conrad I of Logenahe (8 ...

(d. 906) ###

(d. 918), Duke of

from 906, first

German king This is a list of monarchs who ruled over East Francia, and the Kingdom of Germany (), from Treaty of Verdun, the division of the Francia, Frankish Empire in 843 and Dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, the collapse of the Holy Roman Empire in ...

from 911 ### Eberhard (c. 885 – 939), Duke of Franconia from 918 ###Otto (d. after 918), Count in the

Ruhr The Ruhr ( ; , also ''Ruhrpott'' ), also referred to as the Ruhr Area, sometimes Ruhr District, Ruhr Region, or Ruhr Valley, is a polycentric urban area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. With a population density of 1,160/km2 and a populati ...

gau ##Eberhard (d. about 903), Count in the Niederlahngau ### Conrad Kurzbold (d. 948), Count in the Niederlahngau ###Gebhard (d. after 947), Count in the Ufgau ###Eberhard (d. 944), Count in the

Bonn Bonn () is a federal city in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, located on the banks of the Rhine. With a population exceeding 300,000, it lies about south-southeast of Cologne, in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr region. This ...

gau ###''a daughter'', married Werner, Count in the

Nahegau The Nahegau was a county in the Middle Ages, which covered the environs of the Nahe and large parts of present-day Rhenish Hesse, after a successful expansion of the narrow territory, which did not reach the Rhine, to the disadvantage of the Wo ...

, progenitor of the

Salian dynasty The Salian dynasty or Salic dynasty () was a dynasty in the High Middle Ages. The dynasty provided four kings of Germany (1024–1125), all of whom went on to be crowned Holy Roman emperors (1027–1125). After the death of the last Ottonia ...

Gebhard, Duke of Lorraine Gebhard of Lahngau ( 860/868 – 22 June 910), of the Conradine dynasty, son of Odo (aka Udo, died 879), count of Lahngau, and Judith, was himself count of Wetterau (909–910) and Rheingau (897–906) and then duke of Lotharingia (Lorraine). In ...

(d. 910) ### Herman I, Duke of Swabia (d. 949) ### Odo (d. 949), Count in the

Wetterau The Wetterau (, ) is a fertile undulating tract, watered by the Wetter (river), Wetter, a tributary of the Nidda (river), Nidda River, in the western German state of Hesse, between the hilly province Oberhessen and the north-western Taunus mounta ...

, married Cunigunda, daughter of Herbert I, Count of Vermandois #### Heribert, Count in the Wetterau (925–992) #####Ermentrude (972–1015), married Count Frederick of Luxembourg #####Otto of Hammerstein (975–1036), Count of Zutphen, married Ermengarde, daughter of

Godfrey I, Count of Verdun Godfrey I (died 1002), called the Prisoner or the Captive (''le Captif''), sometimes the Old (''le Vieux''), was the count of Bidgau and Methingau from 959 and the sovereign count of Verdun 963 to his death. In 969, he obtained the Margraviate of ...

## Rudolph (d. 908), Bishop of

Würzburg Würzburg (; Main-Franconian: ) is, after Nuremberg and Fürth, the Franconia#Towns and cities, third-largest city in Franconia located in the north of Bavaria. Würzburg is the administrative seat of the Regierungsbezirk Lower Franconia. It sp ...

#Waldo, Abbot of St. Maximin's at Trier 868/879 # Bertulf, Archbishop of

Trier Trier ( , ; ), formerly and traditionally known in English as Trèves ( , ) and Triers (see also Names of Trier in different languages, names in other languages), is a city on the banks of the Moselle (river), Moselle in Germany. It lies in a v ...

from 869 until 883 # Berengar (d. after 879), Count in the

Hessengau Hessengau is an historical region of modern-day Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen ...

## Oda, wife of

Younger line

Conrad I, Duke of Swabia (d. 997), also ''Kuno of Öhningen'', descent uncertain, probably a grandson of Count Gebhard in the Ufgau; married Richlint, a scion of the royal

Ottonian dynasty The Ottonian dynasty () was a Saxons, Saxon dynasty of German monarchs (919–1024), named after three of its kings and Holy Roman emperors, especially Otto the Great. It is also known as the Saxon dynasty after the family's origin in the German ...

# Herman II, Duke of Swabia (d. 1003), married Gerberga, daughter of King Conrad of Burgundy ## Matilda (988–1032), married Conrad I, Duke of Carinthia, secondly Frederick II, Duke of Upper Lorraine ## Gisela (989–1043), married Brun I, Count of Brunswick, secondly Ernest I, Duke of Swabia, thirdly

Conrad II, Holy Roman Emperor Conrad II (, – 4 June 1039), also known as and , was the Holy Roman Emperor, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire from 1027 until his death in 1039. The first of a succession of four Salian dynasty, Salian emperors, who reigned for one century ...

##Beatrix (d. after 1025), married Adalbero, Duke of Carinthia ## Hermann III, Duke of Swabia (d. 1012) #''a daughter'' (?), married Grand Prince Vladimir I of Kiev

Sources

*Reuter, Timothy (trans.)
The Annals of Fulda
'. (Manchester Medieval series, Ninth-Century Histories, Volume II.) Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1992. {{Authority control

History

Genealogy

Elder line

Younger line

See also

Sources