Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor
For other nobles of the same name, please see Sigismund.Sigismund (
14/
February 15,
1368 -
December 9,
1437) was
Holy Roman Emperor from
1410 to
1437.
*
German:
Sigismund*
Hungarian:
Zsigmond*
Czech:
Zikmund*
Slovak,
Croatian and
Serbian:
Žigmund*
Slovene:
Sigismund Luksemburški.
Early life
The third and last
German Emperor and fourth
Bohemian king of the
Luxembourg dynasty, Sigismund, second son of the Emperor
Charles IV, was born in
Nuremberg.
Sigismund was
margrave of
Brandenburg from
1378, succeeding his father, until
1388 he handed it to his cousin
Jobst of Moravia. After Jobst's death in
1411, he again became margrave of Brandenburg until
1415, when he granted the territory to
Frederick I,
burgrave of Nuremberg, making the
Hohenzollern family one of the most important in Germany.
In 1381, the then 13-year-old Sigismund was sent to
Cracow by his eldest brother and guardian king
Venceslaus IV of Bohemia, to learn
Polish and to become acquainted with the land and its people, because Sigismund was engaged to
Mary of Hungary (1371-95), eldest surviving daughter of king
Louis I of
Poland and
Hungary, who intended Mary to succeed him in the hereditary kingdom of Poland with her future husband as was the custom of the time. King Venceslaus also gave him
Neumark to facilitate communication between Brandenburg and Poland.
Through his marriage to Mary
1382-
1385 and
1386-
1395, Sigismund, always the jealous type, became only her consort. Earlier, because of Sigismund's intrigues, he was expelled from Poland, which was then given to Mary's younger sister
Jadwiga I of Poland, who married
Jogaila of
Lithuania. When an opposing candidate for the
Árpád throne appeared, Sigismund fled, leaving his wife Queen Mary and her mother and widow of King Louis,
Elizabeth of Bosnia (Elizabeta Kotromanić) at the mercy of
conspirators. Years of civil war followed.
King of Hungary
Sigismund arranged the kidnapping of his mother-in-law, who was eventually murdered in
1387 January, and his wife Mary, who was released in July 1387. During his wife's captivity, Sigismund arranged his own crowning as the
King of Hungary in 1387 despite opposition among the majority of nobility. Mary never forgave him for the death of her beloved mother. They lived separate lives and had separate households.
Sigismund did not participate, or, more precisely, was not allowed to participate in the
Battle of Kosovo in June of
1389 won by Mary's maternal uncle, the
Bosnian King Tvrtko I. In
1395 Queen Mary of Hungary died while heavily pregnant under suspicious circumstances.
In
1396 he was forced to organize a crusade to repel the
Ottoman Turks, who were threatening Hungary from the south. The
Christian forces were routed at the
Battle of Nicopolis (now
Nikopol,
Bulgaria). Sigismund eventually fled and arrived by the
Venetian ship to
Dubrovnik on the
Christmas Day of 1396.
On a number of occasions, Sigismund was imprisoned by nobles, but skilfully bribed his way out.
|
Sigsimund and Barbara of Celje at the Council of Constance |
In about
1406 he remarried Mary's cousin
Barbara of Celje (Barbara Celjska), daughter of
Hermann II,
Count of Celje (Cilli).Hermann's mother Katarina Kotromanić and Mary's mother Queen Elizabeta were sisters, or cousins who were adopted sisters. Tvrtko I was their first cousin and adopted brother, perhaps became even an heir apparent to Queen Mary. Tvrtko might have been murdered in
1391 on Sigismund's order.
Sigismund personally lead an army of almost 50,000 "
crusaders" against the
Croats and Bosnians, which culminated in
1408 with the
Battle of Dobor, and a massacre of about 200 noble families, many of them victors of numerous battles against the Ottomans.
1410
In
1410, in a disputed election, Sigismund was elected emperor. His rivals to the title were his elder half-brother
Wenceslaus of Bohemia, who had never accepted his deposition as King of the Romans ten years earlier, and
Jobst of Moravia, who was elected in a rival election. However, Jobst died a few months later and Wenceslaus then resigned his claim to the empire in favour of Sigismund, leaving the latter universally recognised as emperor.
On a number of occasions, and in 1410 in particular, Sigismund allied himself with the
Teutonic Knights against Jogaila of Poland. However, he was opposed by most of his noblemen and was prevented to participate in the alliance of 22 Western States against Poland in the decisive
Battle of Tannenberg in July of that year.
Council of Constance
As emperor, Sigismund was instrumental in helping convene the
Council of Constance (
1414 -
1418), which ended the
Papal schism and — of great consequence to Sigismund's future career —
burned the at the stake for
heresy Czech religious reformer
Jan Hus in July
1415. Sigismund had given Hus a
safe-conduct to the Council but, keen not to endanger the success of the Council, did nothing more than protest verbally when the Council disregarded the safe-conduct and arrested Hus. The monarch signed Hus' death sentence; decades of
Hussite Wars followed.
It was also at this Council that a
cardinal ventured to correct Sigismund's
Latin, to which Sigismund famously replied,
Ego sum rex Romanus et super grammaticam ("I am the
king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar"). According to
The Nuttall Encyclopaedia, this reply caused him to receive the nickname
Super-Grammaticam.
Hussite Wars
It was as
King of Bohemia from
1419 in succession to
Wenceslaus IV that Sigismund faced the greatest challenge of his reign. Because of his part in the burning of Hus, Sigismund was ejected by the
Hussite forces on his attempt to take over the country (
1420).
A bitter conflict continued for 15 years, extending across Bohemia's borders. Only in
1437, the year of his death, was Sigismund accepted by the major Czech factions.
Sigismund had no children by Mary of Hungary, but he had an only daughter with Empress Barbara (who was called
Messalina of Germany),
Elisabeth (1409-1442). She married
Albert II, Holy Roman Emperor, who was eventually to succeed his father-in-law as King of Hungary and Bohemia, and as German King.
