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Sigismund von Luxemburg

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Zsigmond magyar király

http://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zikmund_Lucembursk%C3%BD

Zikmund Lucemburský

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigismund,_Holy_Roman_Emperor

Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor

Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor; King of the Romans, Bohemia, Italy, Hungary, Croatia and Dalmatia.

Reign 1433 - 1437
Coronation 31 May 1433 in Rome

Consort Mary of Hungary Barbara of Celje

Father Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor Mother Elizabeth of Pomerania

Born 14 February 1368 Prague

Died 9 December 1437 Znojmo Burial Oradea

Sigismund (February 14, 1368 – December 9, 1437) was Holy Roman Emperor for 4 years from 1433 until 1437, and the last Emperor of the House of Luxemburg. He was also one of the longest ruling Kings of Hungary and Croatia, reigning for 50 years from 1387 to 1437. Sigismund was one of driving forces behind the Council of Constance that ended the Papal Schism, but which in the end also led to the Hussite Wars that dominated the later period of Sigismund's life.

Born in Prague, Sigismund was the son of the Emperor Charles IV and of his fourth wife Elizabeth of Pomerania, the granddaughter of King Casimir III of Poland. In 1374 he was betrothed to Mary, eldest surviving daughter of king Louis I of Hungary and Poland, who intended Mary to succeed him in the Kingdom of Poland with her future husband as was the custom of the time. Sigismund became Margrave of Brandenburg on his father's death in 1378. Sent to the Hungarian court, Sigismund became thoroughly Magyarized and entirely devoted to his adopted country.

In 1381, the then 13-year-old Sigismund was sent to Kraków by his eldest brother and guardian Wenceslaus, King of the Romans, to learn Polish and to become acquainted with the land and its people. King Wenceslaus also gave him Neumark to facilitate communication between Brandenburg and Poland.

Because of his intrigues, Sigismund 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 Mary and her mother, Elizabeth of Bosnia at the mercy of conspirators. Years of civil war followed.

At the death of her father in 1382, his betrothed, Mary, became the Queen of Hungary and Sigismund married her in 1385 in Zvolen. She was however captured, together with her mother who has acted as the Regent of Hungary, in the following year by the rebellious Horvathys, Bishop Paul of Machva, his brother Ivanish and younger brother Ladislaus. This was according to an elaborate plan by the seventeen year-old Sigismund himself, and his mother-in-law was strangled (allegedly by Sigismund's men) in January 1387. Mary was only rescued in June 1387 through the aid of the Venetians (her uncle by adoption, Stefan Tvrtko of Bosnia, was then an honorary Venetian citizen), and she apparently reconciled with the Horvathys. Mary never forgave Sigismund for the death of her beloved mother, despite his claim to have punished the murderers, and they subsequently lived separate lives and had separate households. She died in 1395 in a suspicious horse accident while heavily pregnant.

In the meantime, Sigismund had arranged his own coronation as king of Hungary on 31 March 1387, and having raised money by pledging Brandenburg to his cousin Jobst, margrave of Moravia (1388), he was engaged for the next nine years in a ceaseless struggle for the possession of this unstable throne. The bulk of the nation headed by the great Garai family was with him; but in the southern provinces between the Save and the Drave, the Horvathys with the support of the Bosnian king Tvrtko I, Mary's maternal uncle, proclaimed as their king Ladislas, king of Naples, son of the murdered Hungarian king, Charles II. Not until 1395 did Nicholas II Garay succeed in suppressing them. On a number of occasions, Sigismund was imprisoned by nobles, but skilfully bribed his way out.

In 1396 Sigismund led the combined armies of Christendom against the Turks, who had taken advantage of the temporary helplessness of Hungary to extend their dominion to the banks of the Danube. This Last Crusade, preached by Pope Boniface IX, was very popular in Hungary. The nobles flocked in thousands to the royal standard, and were reinforced by volunteers from nearly every part of Europe, the most important contingent being that of the French led by John the Fearless, son of Philip II, Duke of Burgundy. Sigismund set out with 90,000 men and a flotilla of 70 galleys. After capturing Vidin, he camped before the fortress of Nicopolis. Sultan Bayezid I raised the siege of Constantinople and, at the head of 140,000 men, completely defeated the Christian forces in the Battle of Nicopolis fought between 25 and 28 September 1396. He returned across the sea and through the realm of Zeta, where he ordained a local Serb lord Đurađ with the islands of Hvar and Korčula for resistance against the Turks, which were returned to Sigismund after his death in April of 1403.

Deprived of his authority in Hungary, Sigismund then turned his attention to securing the succession in Germany and Bohemia, and was recognized by his childless half-brother Wenceslaus IV as Vicar-General of the whole Empire. However, he was unable to support Wenceslaus when he was deposed in 1400 and Rupert III, Elector Palatine, was elected German king in his stead.

During these years he was also involved in domestic difficulties, out of which sprang a second war with Ladislas of Naples; on his return to Hungary in 1401 he was once imprisoned and twice deposed. This struggle in its turn led to a war with the Republic of Venice, as Ladislas had sold the Dalmatian cities to the Venetians for 100,000 ducats before departing to his own land. In 1401 Sigismund assisted a rising against Wenceslaus, during the course of which the Bohemian king was made a prisoner, and Sigismund ruled Bohemia for nineteen months. He released Wenceslas in 1403.

In 1404 he introduced the Placetum Regium. According to this decree, Papal bulls could not be pronounced in Hungary without the consent of the king.

In about 1406 he remarried Mary's cousin Barbara of Celje (Barbara Celjska, nicknamed the "Messalina of Germany"), daughter of Count Hermann II of Celje. Hermann's mother Katarina Kotromanić (of the House ofKotromanic) and Mary's mother Queen Elizabeta (Elisabeth of Bosnia) were sisters, or cousins who were adopted sisters. Tvrtko I was their first cousin and adopted brother, and perhaps even became heir apparent to Queen Mary. Tvrtko may 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. He founded his personal order of knighthood, the Order of the Dragon, after this victory. Members of the order were mostly his political allies and supporters.

After the death of the Roman King Rupert in 1410, Sigismund - ignoring the claims of his half-brother Wenceslaus - was elected as successor by three of the electors on 10 September 1410, but he was opposed by his cousin Jobst of Moravia, who had been elected by four electors in a different election on 1 October. Jobst's death 18 January 1411 removed this conflict and Sigismund was again elected King on 21 July 1411. His coronation was deferred until 8 November 1414, when it took place at Aachen.

On a number of occasions, and in 1410 in particular, Sigismund allied himself with the Teutonic Knights against Wladyslaw Jagiello of Poland. In return for 300.000 ducats he would attack Poland from the south after the truce on St. John's Day, 24 June expired. However, he was opposed by most of his noblemen and was prevented to participate in the alliance of twenty-two western states against Poland in the decisive Battle of Grünwald in July of that year.

In 1412 – 23 he campaigned against the Venetians in Italy. The king took advantage of the difficulties of Antipope John XXIII to obtain a promise that a council should be called to Constance in 1414 to settle the Western Schism. He took a leading part in the deliberations of this assembly, and during the sittings made a journey into France, England and Burgundy in a vain attempt to secure the abdication of the three rival popes. The council ended in 1418, solving the Schism and — of great consequence to Sigismund's future career — having the Czech religious reformer, Jan Hus, burned at the stake for heresy in July 1415. The complicity of Sigismund in the death of Hus is a matter of controversy. He had granted him a safe-conduct and protested against his imprisonment; and the reformer was burned during his absence.

It was also at this Council that a cardinal ventured to correct Sigismund's Latin (he had construed the word schisma as feminine rather than neuter). To this Sigismund famously replied:

“ Ego sum rex Romanus et super grammaticam ("I am king of the Romans and above grammar") ”

An alliance with England against France, and an attempt to secure peace in Germany by a league of the towns, which failed owing to the hostility of the princes, were his main acts of these years. Also, Sigismund granted control of the Margraviate of Brandenburg (which he had received back after Jobst's death) to Frederick I of Hohenzollern, burgrave of Nuremberg (1415). This step made the Hohenzollern family one of the most important in Germany.

In 1419, the death of Wenceslaus IV left Sigismund titular king of Bohemia, but he had to wait for seventeen years before the Czechs would acknowledge him. Although the two dignities of King of the Romans and King of Bohemia added considerably to his importance, and indeed made him the nominal temporal head of Christendom, they conferred no increase of power and financially embarrassed him. It was only as King of Hungary that he had succeeded in establishing his authority and in doing anything for the order and good government of the land. Entrusting the government of Bohemia to Sofia of Bavaria, the widow of Wenceslaus, he hastened into Hungary.

The Bohemians, who distrusted him as the betrayer of Hus, were soon in arms; and the flame was fanned when Sigismund declared his intention of prosecuting the war against heretics. Three campaigns against the Hussites ended in disaster. The Turks were again attacking Hungary. The king, unable to obtain support from the German princes, was powerless in Bohemia. His attempts at the diet of Nuremberg in 1422 to raise a mercenary army were foiled by the resistance of the towns; and in 1424 the electors, among whom was Sigismund's former ally, Frederick I of Hohenzollern, sought to strengthen their own authority at the expense of the king. Although the scheme failed, the danger to Germany from the Hussites led to the Union of Bingen, which virtually deprived Sigismund of the leadership of the war and the headship of Germany.

In 1428 he led another campaign against the Turks, but again with few results. In 1431 he went to Milan where on 25 November he received the Iron Crown; after which he remained for some time at Siena, negotiating for his coronation as emperor and for the recognition of the Council of Basel by Pope Eugenius IV. He was crowned emperor at Rome on 31 May 1433, and after obtaining his demands from the Pope returned to Bohemia, where he was recognized as king in 1436, though his power was little more than nominal.

He died in 19 December 1437 at Znaim (in Czech Znojmo, Moravia (now Czech Republic, and was buried at Nagyvárad, Hungary (in German Grosswardein, in Romanian Oradea, now Romania). By his second wife, Barbara of Celje, he left an only daughter, Elisabeth, who was married to Albert V, duke of Austria (later German king as Albert II) whom Sigismund named as his successor. As he left no sons his line of the house of Luxembourg became extinct on his death.

Sigismund married twice but the otherwise lucky monarch had little luck in securing the succession to his crowns. Each of his two marriages resulted in the birth of one child. His first-born child, probably a son, was born prematurely as a result of a horse riding accident suffered by Queen Mary of Hungary when she was well advanced in pregnancy. Mother and child both died shortly after the birth in the hills of Buda on May 17, 1395. This caused a deep succession crisis because Sigismund ruled over Hungary by right of his wife, and although he managed to keep his power, the crisis lasted until his second marriage to Barbara of Celje. Barbara's only child, born in the purple on October 7, 1409, probably in the castle of Visegrád, was Elisabeth, the future queen consort of Hungary, Germany and Bohemia. Queen Barbara was unable to give birth to any further issue.[citation needed] Elisabeth was thus the only surviving legitimate offspring of Sigismund. He may also have fathered[citation needed] an illegitimate son with a Wallachian woman, Elisabeth Morsina (Morzsinai in Hungarian), who later married a Wallachian boyar, Voicu (Vojk, Vajk in Hungarian). This son was allegedly John Hunyadi, the future regent of Hungary and father of king Matthias I Corvinus of Hungary.

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Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sigismund (February 14, 1368 – December 9, 1437) was Holy Roman Emperor for four years from 1433 until 1437, and the last Emperor of the House of Luxemburg. He was also one of the longest ruling Kings of Hungary, reigning for fifty years from 1387 to 1437. He also was King of Bohemia from 1419, of Lombardia from 1431, and of Germany from 1411.[3] Sigismund was one of the driving forces behind the Council of Constance that ended the Papal Schism, but which in the end also led to the Hussite Wars that dominated the later period of Sigismund's life.

Born in Nuremberg, Sigismund was the son of the Emperor Charles IV and of his fourth wife Elizabeth of Pomerania, the granddaughter of King Casimir III of Poland. In 1374 he was betrothed to Mary of Hungary, eldest surviving daughter of King Louis I of Hungary and Poland, who intended Mary to succeed him in the Kingdom of Poland with her future husband as was the custom of the time. Sigismund became Margrave of Brandenburg on his father's death in 1378. Sent to the Hungarian court, Sigismund entirely devoted to his adopted country. In 1381, the then 13-year-old Sigismund was sent to Kraków by his eldest brother and guardian Wenceslaus, King of the Romans, to learn Polish and to become acquainted with the land and its people. King Wenceslaus also gave him Neumark to facilitate communication between Brandenburg and Poland. Because of his intrigues[citation needed], Sigismund 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 Mary and her mother, Elizabeth of Bosnia at the mercy of conspirators. Years of civil war followed. [edit]King of Hungary At the death of her father in 1382, his betrothed, Mary, became the Queen of Hungary and Sigismund married her in 1385 in Zólyom (today Zvolen). She was however captured, together with her mother who has acted as the Regent of Hungary, in the following year by the rebellious Horvathys, Bishop Paul of Machva, his brother Ivanish and younger brother Ladislaus. This was according to an elaborate plan by the seventeen year-old Sigismund himself, and his mother-in-law was strangled (allegedly by Sigismund's men) in January 1387. Mary was only rescued in June 1387 through the aid of the Venetians (her uncle by adoption, Stefan Tvrtko of Bosnia, became then an honorary Venetian citizen), and she apparently reconciled with the Horvathys. Mary never forgave Sigismund for the death of her beloved mother, despite his claim to have punished the murderers, and they subsequently lived separate lives and had separate households. She died in 1395 in a suspicious horse accident while heavily pregnant. In the meantime, Sigismund had arranged his own coronation as King of Hungary on 31 March 1387, and having raised money by pledging Brandenburg to his cousin Jobst, margrave of Moravia (1388), he was engaged for the next nine years in a ceaseless struggle for the possession of this unstable throne. It was not for entirely selfless reasons that one of the leagues of barons helped him to power: Sigismund had to pay for the support of the lords by transferring a sizeable part of the royal properties. (For some years, the baron's council governed the country in the name of the Holy Crown ) The restoration of the authority of the central administration took decades of work. The bulk of the nation headed by the great Garai family was with him; but in the southern provinces between the Save and the Drave, the Horvathys with the support of King Tvrtko I of Bosnia, Mary's maternal uncle, proclaimed as their king Ladislas, king of Naples, son of the murdered Charles II of Hungary. Not until 1395 did Nicholas II Garay succeed in suppressing them. On a number of occasions, Sigismund was imprisoned by nobles, but skilfully bribed his way out. In 1396 Sigismund led the combined armies of Christendom against the Turks, who had taken advantage of the temporary helplessness of Hungary to extend their dominion to the banks of the Danube. This Last Crusade, preached by Pope Boniface IX, was very popular in Hungary. The nobles flocked in thousands to the royal standard, and were reinforced by volunteers from nearly every part of Europe, the most important contingent being that of the French led by John the Fearless, son of Philip II, Duke of Burgundy. Sigismund set out with 90,000 men and a flotilla of 70 galleys. After capturing Vidin, he camped before the fortress of Nicopolis. Sultan Bayezid I raised the siege of Constantinople and, at the head of 140,000 men, completely defeated the Christian forces in the Battle of Nicopolis fought between 25 and 28 September 1396. He returned across the sea and through the realm of Zeta, where he ordained a local Serb lord Đurađ II with the islands of Hvar and Korčula for resistance against the Turks, which were returned to Sigismund after his death in April of 1403. Deprived of his authority in Hungary, Sigismund then turned his attention to securing the succession in Germany and Bohemia, and was recognized by his childless half-brother Wenceslaus IV as Vicar-General of the whole Empire. However, he was unable to support Wenceslaus when he was deposed in 1400 and Rupert of Germany, Elector Palatine, was elected German king in his stead. During these years he was also involved in domestic difficulties, out of which sprang a second war with Ladislas of Naples; on his return to Hungary in 1401 he was once imprisoned and twice deposed. This struggle in its turn led to a war with the Republic of Venice, as Ladislas had sold the Dalmatian cities to the Venetians for 100,000 ducats before departing to his own land. In 1401 Sigismund assisted a rising against Wenceslaus, during the course of which the Bohemian king was made a prisoner, and Sigismund ruled Bohemia for nineteen months. He released Wenceslaus in 1403. In 1404 he introduced the Placetum Regium. According to this decree, Papal bulls could not be pronounced in Hungary without the consent of the king. In about 1406 he remarried Mary's cousin Barbara of Celje (Barbara Celjska, nicknamed the "Messalina of Germany"), daughter of Count Hermann II of Celje. Hermann's mother Katarina Kotromanić (of the House of Kotromanic) and Mary's mother Queen Elizabeta (Elisabeth of Bosnia) were sisters, or cousins who were adopted sisters. Tvrtko I was their first cousin and adopted brother, and perhaps even became heir apparent to Queen Mary. Tvrtko may have been murdered in 1391 on Sigismund's order[citation needed]. 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. He founded his personal order of knighthood, the Order of the Dragon, after this victory. Members of the order were mostly his political allies and supporters. During his long reign Royal castle of Buda became probably the largest Gothic palace of the late Middle Ages. [edit]King of the Romans After the death of King Rupert of Germany in 1410, Sigismund - ignoring the claims of his half-brother Wenceslaus - was elected as successor by three of the electors on 10 September 1410, but he was opposed by his cousin Jobst of Moravia, who had been elected by four electors in a different election on 1 October. Jobst's death 18 January 1411 removed this conflict and Sigismund was again elected King on 21 July 1411. His coronation was deferred until 8 November 1414, when it took place at Aachen. [edit]Anti-Polish alliances On a number of occasions, and in 1410 in particular, Sigismund allied himself with the Teutonic Knights against Wladyslaw Jagiello of Poland. In return for 300.000 ducats he would attack Poland from the south after the truce on St. John's Day, 24 June expired. However, he was opposed by most of his noblemen and was prevented from participating in the alliance of twenty-two western states against Poland in the decisive Battle of Grünwald in July of that year.

Council of Constance In 1412 – 23 he campaigned against the Venetians in Italy. The king took advantage of the difficulties of Antipope John XXIII to obtain a promise that a council should be called to Constance in 1414 to settle the Western Schism. He took a leading part in the deliberations of this assembly, and during the sittings made a journey into France, England and Burgundy in a vain attempt to secure the abdication of the three rival popes. The council ended in 1418, solving the Schism and — of great consequence to Sigismund's future career — having the Czech religious reformer, Jan Hus, burned at the stake for heresy in July 1415. The complicity of Sigismund in the death of Hus is a matter of controversy. He had granted him a safe-conduct and protested against his imprisonment; and the reformer was burned during his absence. It was also at this Council that a cardinal ventured to correct Sigismund's Latin (he had construed the word schisma as feminine rather than neuter). To this Sigismund famously replied: “ Ego sum rex Romanus et super grammaticam ("I am king of the Romans and above grammar")[1] ” An alliance with England against France, and an attempt to secure peace in Germany by a league of the towns, which failed owing to the hostility of the princes, were his main acts of these years. Also, Sigismund granted control of the Margraviate of Brandenburg (which he had received back after Jobst's death) to Frederick I of Hohenzollern, burgrave of Nuremberg (1415). This step made the Hohenzollern family one of the most important in Germany.

Hussite Wars In 1419, the death of Wenceslaus IV left Sigismund titular King of Bohemia, but he had to wait for seventeen years before the Czechs would acknowledge him. Although the two dignities of King of the Romans and King of Bohemia added considerably to his importance, and indeed made him the nominal temporal head of Christendom, they conferred no increase of power and financially embarrassed him. It was only as King of Hungary that he had succeeded in establishing his authority and in doing anything for the order and good government of the land. Entrusting the government of Bohemia to Sofia of Bavaria, the widow of Wenceslaus, he hastened into Hungary. The Bohemians, who distrusted him as the betrayer of Hus, were soon in arms; and the flame was fanned when Sigismund declared his intention of prosecuting the war against heretics. Three campaigns against the Hussites ended in disaster. The Turks were again attacking Hungary. The king, unable to obtain support from the German princes, was powerless in Bohemia. His attempts at the diet of Nuremberg in 1422 to raise a mercenary army were foiled by the resistance of the towns; and in 1424 the electors, among whom was Sigismund's former ally, Frederick I of Hohenzollern, sought to strengthen their own authority at the expense of the king. Although the scheme failed, the danger to Germany from the Hussites led to the Union of Bingen, which virtually deprived Sigismund of the leadership of the war and the headship of Germany.

In 1428 he led another campaign against the Turks, but again with few results. In 1431 he went to Milan where on 25 November he received the Iron Crown; after which he remained for some time at Siena, negotiating for his coronation as emperor and for the recognition of the Council of Basel by Pope Eugenius IV. He was crowned emperor in Rome on 31 May 1433, and after obtaining his demands from the Pope returned to Bohemia, where he was recognized as king in 1436, though his power was little more than nominal. He died in 19 December 1437 at Znaim (Czech: Znojmo, Moravia (now Czech Republic), and was buried at Nagyvárad, Hungary (today Oradea, Romania). By his second wife, Barbara of Celje, he left an only daughter, Elisabeth II of Bohemia, who was married to Albert V, duke of Austria (later German king as Albert II) whom Sigismund named as his successor. As he left no sons his line of the House of Luxembourg became extinct on his death. [edit]Issue Sigismund married twice but had little luck in securing the succession to his crowns. Each of his two marriages resulted in the birth of one child. His first-born child, probably a son, was born prematurely as a result of a horse riding accident suffered by Queen Mary of Hungary when she was well advanced in pregnancy. Mother and child both died shortly after the birth in the hills of Buda on May 17, 1395. This caused a deep succession crisis because Sigismund ruled over Hungary by right of his wife, and although he managed to keep his power, the crisis lasted until his second marriage to Barbara of Celje. Barbara's only child, born in the purple on October 7, 1409, probably in the castle of Visegrád, was Elisabeth of Bohemia, the future queen consort of Hungary, Germany and Bohemia. Queen Barbara was unable to give birth to any further issue.[citation needed] Elisabeth II of Bohemia was thus the only surviving legitimate offspring of Sigismund. He may also have fathered[citation needed] an illegitimate son with a Hungarian[2] woman, Erzsébet Morsinai , who later married a Wallachian boyar, Voicu (Vojk, Vajk in Hungarian). This son was allegedly John Hunyadi, the future regent of Hungary and father of king Matthias I Corvinus of Hungary.[citation needed] [edit]Family 1st spouse: Mary I of Anjou (1371-1395) N of Luxemburg (Son) (1395-1395) 2nd spouse: Barbara of Celje (1392-1451) Elisabeth of Luxemburg (1409-1442), married in 1421 Albert of Habsburg (Possible) Mistress: Elisabeth Morsina John Hunyadi (1409-1456)

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Sigismund (Hungarian: Zsigmond, Croatian: Žigmund; 14 February 1368 – 9 December 1437) was King of Hungary and Croatia from 1387 to 1437, and Holy Roman Emperor for four years from 1433 until 1437, the last Emperor of the House of Luxemburg. He was also King of Bohemia from 1419, of Lombardy from 1431, and of Germany from 1411.[1] Sigismund was one of the driving forces behind the Council of Constance that ended the Papal Schism, but which in the end also led to the Hussite Wars that dominated the later period of Sigismund's life. Born in Nuremberg, Sigismund was the son of the Emperor Charles IV and of his fourth wife Elizabeth of Pomerania, the granddaughter of King Casimir III of Poland. In 1374 he was betrothed to Mary of Hungary, eldest surviving daughter of King Louis the Great of Hungary and Poland, who intended Mary to succeed him in the Kingdom of Poland with her future husband as was the custom of the time. Sigismund became Margrave of Brandenburg on his father's death in 1378. Sent to the Hungarian court, Sigismund became entirely devoted to his adopted country.

In 1381, the then 13-year-old Sigismund was sent to Kraków by his eldest brother and guardian Wenceslaus, King of the Romans, to learn Polish and to become acquainted with the land and its people. King Wenceslaus also gave him Neumark to facilitate communication between Brandenburg and Poland.

Because of his intrigues[citation needed], prince Sigismund 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 Mary and her mother, Elizabeth of Bosnia at the mercy of conspirators. Years of civil war followed. [edit] King of Hungary Hungarian clothes between 1370-1410 period

At the death of her father in 1382, his betrothed, Mary, became the Queen of Hungary and Sigismund married her in 1385 in Zólyom (today Zvolen). She was however captured, together with her mother who had acted as the Regent of Hungary, in the following year by the rebellious Horvathys, Bishop Paul of Machva, his brother Ivanish and younger brother Ladislaus. This was according to an elaborate plan by the seventeen year-old Sigismund himself, and his mother-in-law was strangled (allegedly by Sigismund's men) in January 1387. Mary was only rescued in June 1387 through the aid of the Venetians (her first cousin once removed, King Stjepan Tvrtko I of Bosnia, then became an honorary Venetian citizen), and she apparently reconciled with the Horvathys. Mary never forgave Sigismund for the death of her beloved mother, despite his claim to have punished the murderers, and they subsequently lived separate lives and had separate households. She died in 1395 in a suspicious horse accident while heavily pregnant.

Having secured the support of the nobility, Sigismund was crowned King of Hungary at Székesfehérvár on 31 March 1387.[2] Having raised money by pledging Brandenburg to his cousin Jobst, margrave of Moravia (1388), he was engaged for the next nine years in a ceaseless struggle for the possession of this unstable throne. It was not for entirely selfless reasons that one of the leagues of barons helped him to power: Sigismund had to pay for the support of the lords by transferring a sizeable part of the royal properties. (For some years, the baron's council governed the country in the name of the Holy Crown ) The restoration of the authority of the central administration took decades of work. The bulk of the nation headed by the great Garai family was with him; but in the southern provinces between the Save and the Drave, the Horvathys with the support of King Tvrtko I of Bosnia, Mary's maternal uncle, proclaimed as their king Ladislas, king of Naples, son of the murdered Charles II of Hungary. Not until 1395 did Nicholas II Garay succeed in suppressing them. On a number of occasions, Sigismund was imprisoned by nobles, but skilfully bribed his way out.

In 1396 Sigismund led the combined armies of Christendom against the Turks, who had taken advantage of the temporary helplessness of Hungary to extend their dominion to the banks of the Danube. This crusade preached by Pope Boniface IX, was very popular in Hungary. The nobles flocked in thousands to the royal standard, and were reinforced by volunteers from nearly every part of Europe, the most important contingent being that of the French led by John the Fearless, son of Philip II, Duke of Burgundy. Sigismund set out with 90,000 men and a flotilla of 70 galleys. After capturing Vidin, he camped before the fortress of Nicopolis. Sultan Bayezid I raised the siege of Constantinople and, at the head of 140,000 men, completely defeated the Christian forces in the Battle of Nicopolis fought between 25 and 28 September 1396. He returned across the sea and through the realm of Zeta, where he ordained a local Serb lord Đurađ II with the islands of Hvar and Korčula for resistance against the Turks, which were returned to Sigismund after his death in April of 1403.

Deprived of his authority in Hungary, Sigismund then turned his attention to securing the succession in Germany and Bohemia, and was recognized by his childless half-brother Wenceslaus IV as Vicar-General of the whole Empire. However, he was unable to support Wenceslaus when he was deposed in 1400 and Rupert of Germany, Elector Palatine, was elected German king in his stead.

During these years he was also involved in domestic difficulties, out of which sprang a second war with Ladislas of Naples; on his return to Hungary in 1401 he was once imprisoned and twice deposed. This struggle in its turn led to a war with the Republic of Venice, as Ladislas had sold the Dalmatian cities to the Venetians for 100,000 ducats before departing to his own land. In 1401 Sigismund assisted a rising against Wenceslaus, during the course of which the Bohemian king was made a prisoner, and Sigismund ruled Bohemia for nineteen months. He released Wenceslaus in 1403.

In 1404 he introduced the Placetum Regium. According to this decree, Papal bulls could not be pronounced in Hungary without the consent of the king.

In about 1406 he married Mary's cousin Barbara of Celje (Barbara Celjska, nicknamed the "Messalina of Germany"), daughter of Count Hermann II of Celje. Hermann's mother Katarina Kotromanić (of the House of Kotromanic) and Mary's mother Queen Elizabeta (Elisabeth of Bosnia) were sisters, or cousins who were adopted sisters. Tvrtko I was their first cousin and adopted brother, and perhaps even became heir apparent to Queen Mary. Tvrtko may have been murdered in 1391 on Sigismund's order[citation needed].

He founded his personal order of knighthood, the Order of the Dragon, after this victory. Members of the order were mostly his political allies and supporters. The most important European monarchs became members of the order. He encouraged international trade by abolishing internal duties, regulating tariffs on foreign goods and standardising weights and measures throughout the country. Due to his frequent absences attending to business in the other countries over which he ruled, he was obliged to consult Diets in Hungary with more frequency than his predecessors and institute the office of Palatine as chief administrator while he was away.[3] During his long reign Royal castle of Buda became probably the largest Gothic palace of the late Middle Ages. [edit] King of Croatia

In Slavonia he managed to establish control. He did not hesitate to use the violent methods (see Bloody Sabor of Križevci) but from the river Sava to the south his control was weak. Sigismund personally led 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. [edit] King of the Romans

After the death of King Rupert of Germany in 1410, Sigismund - ignoring the claims of his half-brother Wenceslaus - was elected as successor by three of the electors on 10 September 1410, but he was opposed by his cousin Jobst of Moravia, who had been elected by four electors in a different election on 1 October. Jobst's death 18 January 1411 removed this conflict and Sigismund was again elected King on 21 July 1411. His coronation was deferred until 8 November 1414, when it took place at Aachen. [edit] Anti-Polish alliances

On a number of occasions, and in 1410 in particular, Sigismund allied himself with the Teutonic Knights against Wladyslaw Jagiello of Poland. In return for 300.000 ducats he would attack Poland from the south after the truce on St. John's Day, 24 June expired. However, he was opposed by most of his noblemen and was prevented from participating in the alliance of twenty-two western states against Poland in the decisive Battle of Grünwald in July of that year.

Council of Constance

In 1412 – 23 he campaigned against the Venetians in Italy. The king took advantage of the difficulties of Antipope John XXIII to obtain a promise that a council should be called to Constance in 1414 to settle the Western Schism. He took a leading part in the deliberations of this assembly, and during the sittings made a journey into France, England and Burgundy in a vain attempt to secure the abdication of the three rival popes. The council ended in 1418, solving the Schism and — of great consequence to Sigismund's future career — having the Czech religious reformer, Jan Hus, burned at the stake for heresy in July 1415. The complicity of Sigismund in the death of Hus is a matter of controversy. He had granted him a safe-conduct and protested against his imprisonment; and the reformer was burned during his absence.

It was also at this Council that a cardinal ventured to correct Sigismund's Latin (he had construed the word schisma as feminine rather than neuter). To this Sigismund famously replied: “ Ego sum rex Romanorum et super grammaticam ("I am king of the Romans and above grammar")[4] ”

An alliance with England against France, and an attempt to secure peace in Germany by a league of the towns, which failed owing to the hostility of the princes, were his main acts of these years. Also, Sigismund granted control of the Margraviate of Brandenburg (which he had received back after Jobst's death) to Frederick I of Hohenzollern, burgrave of Nuremberg (1415). This step made the Hohenzollern family one of the most important in Germany.

Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor began to shift his alliance from France to England after the French defeat at the Battle of Agincourt. The Treaty of Canterbury (August 15, 1416) culminated diplomatic efforts between Henry V of England and Sigismund and resulted in

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http://www.genealogie-mittelalter.de/deutschland_koenige_2/sigismun...

"Kaiser Sigismund.Herrscher an der Schwelle zur Neuzeit 1368-1437."

SIGISMUNDVON LUXEMBURG

SIGISMUNDVON LUXEMBURG hat - wie im Hofmilieu der Zeit üblich - wenig elterliche Zuwendung erfahren. Seine erste Teilnahme an einem Staatsakt ist für den 2. Oktober 1273 nachzuweisen, als er auf einem Prager Hoftag zusammen mit seinen Brüdern WENZEL und Johann von dem kaiserlichen Vater mit der Mark Brandenburg belehnt wurde. Zu diesem Zeitpunkt hatte längst die konsequente Ausbildung des Kaisersohnes eingesetzt. Neben dem vom Hofmeister überwachten, von den Kaplänen und ihnen zugewesenen Lehrern erteilten Unterricht im Lesen und Schreiben, Rechnen und der Religion kam der Vermittlung von Fremdsprachen ein hoher Stellenwert zu. KARLS Söhne wuchsen zweisprachig - tschechisch und deutsch - auf und erhielten früh Französisch- und Lateinunterricht. Der sprachbegabte SIGISMUND lernte darüber hinaus Ungarisch, Italienisch und "Slavisch" - wohl eher Polnisch als Kroatisch. Er wurde zudem nicht nur mit der Heiligen Schrift und den Kirchenvätern, sondern auch mit den Werken antiker Autoren sowie den Grundlagen des römischen und kanonischen Rechts bekannt gemacht. Er reiste im Februar 1374 mit der königlichen Hofhaltung in die Mark Brandenburg und blieb nach des Vaters Abreise in Tangermünde zurück.
Bereits bei seiner Geburt war SIGISMUND mit Katharina von Zollern, der Tochter des Burggrafen Friedrich V., verlobt worden. Durch die Geburt von zwei Söhnen verlor diese Verbindung jeglichen Sinn. Anfang 1372 wurde eine Ehevereinbarung zwischen SIGISMUND und einer ungarischen Prinzessin getroffen. Ludwig von Ungarn benannte erst am 21. Juni 1373 seine Zweitgeborene Maria als Verlobte SIGISMUNDS. In dem am 14. April 1375 in Brünn abgeschlossenen Ehevertrag kam es zu keinen Vereinbarungen über die ungarische Thronfolge. Auch nach dem Tod der ungarischen Thronfolgerin Katharina (Mai/Oktober 1378) gelang es seinem Vater nicht mehr, die Nachfolge seines Sohnes in Ungarn abzusichern. Im September 1379 fand die Verlobung mit der 8-jährigen Maria statt, die SIGISMUND hier zum ersten Mal sah. Zur weiteren Erziehung wurde der junge Prinz dem Schwiegervater übergeben, um sich mit den Sitten und Gebräuchen vertraut zu machen. Obgleich ihn König Ludwig als geeigneten Nachfolger in beiden Reichen einstufte, scheint sich SIGISMUND nicht nur das Missfallen der dominierenden Königs-Mutter Elisabeth(+ 29.12.1380) zugezogen zu haben, sondern bald auch die sich zu Hass steigernde Abneigung seiner künftigen Schwiegermutter, der bosnischen Prinzessin Elisabeth Kotromanic.

Krankheiten und das Ende

Als SIGISMUND am 12. August 1437 nach Prag zurückkehrte, dürfte seine Gesundheit bereits angegriffen gewesen sein, denn er musste sich am 9. September einer Operation unterziehen, bei der er die bei der Amputation einer großen Zehe auftretenden starken Schmerzen heldenhaft ertrug. Bei der von den Zeitgenossen als "ignis sacer" (Höllenbrand), "cancer" oder recht allgemein "infirmitas pollicis in pede" bezeichneten Erkrankung dürfte es sich um schwere arterielle Durchblutungsstörungen gehandelt haben, die "Gangraena senilis" (Altersbrand) hervorgerufen hatten. SIGISMUND verfügte über eine recht robuste Konstitution, obgleich er durch übermäßiges Essen und Trinken sowie durch die Strapazen des ständigen Reisens seinen Körper zeitlebens großen Belastungen ausgesetzt hatte. Bereits in seinen frühen ungarischen Jahren sind fast immer Mediziner in seiner Umgebung nachzuweisen. Verwundungen in Gefechten oder bei Turnieren scheint er nicht erlitten zu haben. Eine ernsthafte Erkrankung ist erstmals für das Jahr 1404 belegt, als SIGISMUND bei der Belagerung von Znaim wohl eher eine schwere Ruhr durchmachte und nicht wegen eines Giftanschlags lebensgefährlich darniederlag. Einen riskanten Sturz vom Pferd bei der Jagd 1412, nach dem der ohnmächtige König von seiner Umgebung schon aufgegeben wurde, hat er ebenso folgenlos überstanden wie mehrere Attentate und Vergiftungsversuche. Nach einem heftigen Gichtparoxysmus im Jahre 1422 litt er, wie er den im Mai 1426 in Nürnberg auf ihn wartenden Reichsständen mitteilte, an einer Krankheit "mit namen die sciatia des Ruckes". 1429 zwang ihn ein erneuter Gichtanfall in Preßburg zu bleiben, so dass er auch einen für November nach Wien ausgeschriebenen Reichstag nicht zu besuchen vermochte. Während des Romzuges müssen ihn ebenfalls so große Gichtschmerzen geplagt haben, dass er im September/Oktober 1432 von Siena aus den Besuch der Thermen von Petriolo in Erwägung zog. Auch bei seinem Aufenthalt in Basel muss seine Sehschärfe nachgelassen haben, weil er im März 1434 den ihm seit langem gut bekannten Frankfurter Schöffen Walter von Schwarzenberg um die Zusendung einer Brille bitten ließ. Er legte selbst noch den Ablauf der Totenfeier fest und hörte am Morgen des 9. Dezember im kaiserlichen Ornat und gekrönt die Heilige Messe. Anschließend in sein Totengewand gekleidet, starb er im Schlaf am Nachmittag des 9. Dezember 1437, auf seinem Thron sitzend, nachdem er 50 Jahre in Ungarn, 27 Jahre im Reich und - nominell - 18 Jahre in Böhmen regiert und über 4 Jahre das kaiserliche Diadem getragen hatte.

1385

• 1. oo Maria von Ungarn, Tochter des Königs Ludwig I.

    x   1370-17.5.1395 

11.5.1396

• v. oo Margarete von Brieg, Tochter des Herzogs Heinrich VII.

         1380/84-2.10. nach 1408 

6.12.1405

• 2. oo Barbara von Cilly, Tochter des Grafen Hermann II.

         1392-11.7.1451 

                  Melnik 

*Kinder:

• 2. Ehe Elisabeth

 1409-19.12.1441 

28.9.1421

  oo '''ALBRECHT II. VON HABSBURG''' König des Deutschen Reiches 

       16.8.1397-27.10.1439 

===Illegitim:===

Janos Hunyadi

 1408-11.8.1456 

Literatur:

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Hoensch, Jörg K.: Die Luxemburger. Eine spätmittelalterliche Dynastie gesamteuropäischer Bedeutung 1308-1437. Verlag W. Kohlhammer 2000 Seite 39,159,163-167,170,191,193,202,204-207,210-214, 217-224,226,231-306 - Hoensch, Jörg K.: Kaiser Sigismund. Herrscher an der Schwelle zur Neuzeit 1368-1437. Verlag C.H. Beck München 1996 - Hoensch, Jörg K.: Matthias Corvinus. Diplomat, Feldherr und Mäzen. Verlag Styria Graz Wien Köln 1998 Seite 7,14,16-20,23-29,31,34,36,50,70,76,81, 85,87,95,100,102,120,124,143,145,200,208,243,246,256,259 - Höfer, Manfred: Die Kaiser und Könige der Deutschen, Bechtle Verlag Esslingen 1994, Seite 155-161 - Hoyer, Siegfried: Siegmund, in Deutsche Könige und Kaiser des Mittelalters. Urania-Verlag Leipzig Jena Berlin 1989, Seite 341-354 - Jaeckel, Gerhard: Die deutschen Kaiser. Die Lebensgeschichten sämtlicher Monarchen von Karl dem Großen bis Wilhelm II., Weltbild Verlag Augsburg, Seite 128-137 - Krieger, Karl-Friedrich: Die Habsburger im Mittelalter. Von Rudolf I. bis Friedrich III. Verlag W. Kohlhammer Stuttgart Berlin Köln 1994, Seite 155-159,161,164, 168,173,179,189 - Schwennicke Detlev: Europäische Stammtafeln Neue Folge Band I. 1, Vittorio Klostermann GmbH Frankfurt am Main 1998 Tafel 82 - Thiele, Andreas: Erzählende genealogische Stammtafeln zur europäischen Geschichte Band I, Teilband 1, R. G. Fischer Verlag Frankfurt/Main 1993 - Veldtrup, Dieter: Zwischen Eherecht und Familienpolitik. Studien zu den dynastischen Heiratsprojekten Karls IV., Studien zu den Luxemburgern und ihrer Zeit Verlag Fahlbusch/Hölscher/Rieger Warendorf 1988 - Westmitteleuropa - Ostmitteleuropa. Vergleiche und Beziehungen. Festschrift für Ferdinand Seibt zum 65. Geburtstag, hg. von Winfried Eberhard, Hans Lemberg, Heinz-Dieter Heimann und Robert Luft, R. Oldenbourg Verlag München 1992, Seite 166,168-169,173,180-181,183,309,314,316-317,319,328-329 -

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Sigismund

Sigismund, aged approximately 50, depicted by unknown artist in the 1420s — the only contemporary portrait Holy Roman Emperor Reign 1433–1437 Coronation 31 May 1433 in Rome Predecessor Charles IV Successor Frederick III King of Hungary and Croatia (with Mary) Reign 1387–1437 Coronation 31 March 1387 in Székesfehérvár Predecessor Mary Successor Albert King of Bohemia Reign 1419–1437 Coronation 27 July 1420 in Prague Predecessor Wenceslaus IV Successor Albert King of the Romans Reign 1410–1437 Coronation 8 November 1414 in Aachen Predecessor Rupert Successor Albert II

Spouse Mary of Hungary Barbara of Celje Issue Elisabeth, Queen of Bohemia House House of Luxemburg Father Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor Mother Elizabeth of Pomerania Born 14 February 1368 Nuremberg Died 9 December 1437(1437-12-09) (aged 69) Znojmo Burial Oradea

Sigismund (Hungarian: Zsigmond, Croatian: Žigmund, Czech: Zikmund,) (14 February 1368 – 9 December 1437) was King of Hungary, of Croatia from 1387 to 1437, of Bohemia from 1419, and Holy Roman Emperor for four years from 1433 until 1437, the last Emperor of the House of Luxemburg. He was also King of Lombardy from 1431, and of Germany from 1411.[1] Sigismund was one of the driving forces behind the Council of Constance that ended the Papal Schism, but which in the end also led to the Hussite Wars that dominated the later period of Sigismund's life.

Born in Nuremberg, Sigismund was the son of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV and of his fourth wife Elizabeth of Pomerania, the granddaughter of King Casimir III of Poland. King Louis the Great of Hungary and Poland always kept good and close relationships with Emperor Charles IV. Young Sigismund was sent to the Hungarian court, and soon learnt the Hungarian language and Hungarian way of life, where he became entirely devoted to his adopted country. King Louis appointed Sigismund for succeeding him as King of Hungary, Louis named him his heir, and arranged the marriage with his eldest daughter Mary of Hungary. Accordingly, Sigismund was betrothed to Mary in 1374, who intended Mary to succeed him in the Kingdom of Poland with her future husband as was the custom of the time. Sigismund became Margrave of Brandenburg on his father's death in 1378.

In 1381, the then 13-year-old Sigismund was sent to Kraków by his eldest brother and guardian Wenceslaus, King of the Romans, to learn Polish and to become acquainted with the land and its people. King Wenceslaus also gave him Neumark to facilitate communication between Brandenburg and Poland.

Because of his intrigues, prince Sigismund 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 Mary and her mother, Elizabeth of Bosnia at the mercy of conspirators. Years of civil war followed.

At the death of her father in 1382, his betrothed, Mary, became the Queen of Hungary and Sigismund married her in 1385 in Zólyom (today Zvolen). She was however captured, together with her mother who had acted as the Regent of Hungary, in the following year by the rebellious Horvathys, Bishop Paul of Machva, his brother Ivanish and younger brother Ladislaus. This was according to an elaborate plan by the seventeen-year-old Sigismund himself, and his mother-in-law was strangled (allegedly by Sigismund's men) in January 1387. Mary was only rescued in June 1387 through the aid of the Venetians (her first cousin once removed, King Stjepan Tvrtko I of Bosnia, then became an honorary Venetian citizen), and she apparently reconciled with the Horvathys. Mary never forgave Sigismund for the death of her beloved mother, despite his claim to have punished the murderers, and they subsequently lived separate lives and had separate households. She died in 1395 in a suspicious horse accident while heavily pregnant.

Having secured the support of the nobility, Sigismund was crowned King of Hungary at Székesfehérvár on 31 March 1387.[2] Having raised money by pledging Brandenburg to his cousin Jobst, margrave of Moravia (1388), he was engaged for the next nine years in a ceaseless struggle for the possession of this unstable throne. It was not for entirely selfless reasons that one of the leagues of barons helped him to power: Sigismund had to pay for the support of the lords by transferring a sizeable part of the royal properties. (For some years, the baron's council governed the country in the name of the Holy Crown ) The restoration of the authority of the central administration took decades of work. The bulk of the nation headed by the great Garai family was with him; but in the southern provinces between the Save and the Drave, the Horvathys with the support of King Tvrtko I of Bosnia, Mary's maternal uncle, proclaimed as their king Ladislas, king of Naples, son of the murdered Charles II of Hungary. Not until 1395 did Nicholas II Garay succeed in suppressing them. On a number of occasions, Sigismund was imprisoned by nobles, but skilfully bribed his way out.

In 1396 Sigismund led the combined armies of Christendom against the Turks, who had taken advantage of the temporary helplessness of Hungary to extend their dominion to the banks of the Danube. This crusade preached by Pope Boniface IX, was very popular in Hungary. The nobles flocked in thousands to the royal standard, and were reinforced by volunteers from nearly every part of Europe, the most important contingent being that of the French led by John the Fearless, son of Philip II, Duke of Burgundy. Sigismund set out with 90,000 men and a flotilla of 70 galleys. After capturing Vidin, he camped with his Hungarian armies before the fortress of Nicopolis. Sultan Bayezid I raised the siege of Constantinople and, at the head of 140,000 men, completely defeated the Christian forces in the Battle of Nicopolis fought between 25 and 28 September 1396. He returned across the sea and through the realm of Zeta, where he ordained a local Serb lord Đurađ II with the islands of Hvar and Korčula for resistance against the Turks, which were returned to Sigismund after his death in April of 1403.

The disaster in Nicopolis caused the anger of several Hungarian lords, that created instability in the kingdom. Deprived of his authority in Hungary, Sigismund then turned his attention to securing the succession in Germany and Bohemia, and was recognized by his childless half-brother Wenceslaus IV as Vicar-General of the whole Empire. However, he was unable to support Wenceslaus when he was deposed in 1400 and Rupert of Germany, Elector Palatine, was elected German king in his stead.

Meanwhile in Hungary the situation became worse, and a group of Hungarian noblemen swore loyalty the last Anjou monarch, putting their hands over the relique of Sain Ladislas of Hungary in Nagyvárad. The last Anjou monarch was Ladislaus of Naples, the son of the murdered Charles II of Hungary, and thus far relative from the long ago died king Louis I of Hungary. Then, during these years Sigismund was involved in domestic difficulties, out of which sprang a war with Ladislas of Naples; on his return to Hungary in 1401 he was once imprisoned and twice deposed. This struggle in its turn led to a war with the Republic of Venice, as Ladislas had sold the Dalmatian cities to the Venetians for 100,000 ducats before departing to his own land. In 1401 Sigismund assisted a rising against Wenceslaus, during the course of which the Bohemian king was made a prisoner, and Sigismund ruled Bohemia for nineteen months. He released Wenceslaus in 1403.

In 1404 he introduced the Placetum Regium. According to this decree, Papal bulls could not be pronounced in Hungary without the consent of the king.

In about 1406 he married Mary's cousin Barbara of Celje (Barbara Celjska, nicknamed the "Messalina of Germany"), daughter of Count Hermann II of Celje. Hermann's mother Katarina Kotromanić (of the House of Kotromanic) and Mary's mother Queen Elizabeta (Elisabeth of Bosnia) were sisters, or cousins who were adopted sisters. Tvrtko I was their first cousin and adopted brother, and perhaps even became heir apparent to Queen Mary. Tvrtko may have been murdered in 1391 on Sigismund's order[citation needed].

He founded his personal order of knighthood, the Order of the Dragon, after this victory. Members of the order were mostly his political allies and supporters. The most important European monarchs became members of the order. He encouraged international trade by abolishing internal duties, regulating tariffs on foreign goods and standardising weights and measures throughout the country. Due to his frequent absences attending to business in the other countries over which he ruled, he was obliged to consult Diets in Hungary with more frequency than his predecessors and institute the office of Palatine as chief administrator while he was away.[3] During his long reign royal castle of Buda became probably the largest Gothic palace of the late Middle Ages.

[edit] King of CroatiaIn Slavonia he managed to establish control. He did not hesitate to use violent methods (see Bloody Sabor of Križevci) but from the river Sava to the south his control was weak. Sigismund personally led 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.

[edit] King of the RomansAfter the death of King Rupert of Germany in 1410, Sigismund – ignoring the claims of his half-brother Wenceslaus – was elected as successor by three of the electors on 10 September 1410, but he was opposed by his cousin Jobst of Moravia, who had been elected by four electors in a different election on 1 October. Jobst's death 18 January 1411 removed this conflict and Sigismund was again elected King on 21 July 1411. His coronation was deferred until 8 November 1414, when it took place at Aachen.

On a number of occasions, and in 1410 in particular, Sigismund allied himself with the Teutonic Knights against Wladyslaw Jagiello of Poland. In return for 300.000 ducats he would attack Poland from the south after the truce on St. John's Day, 24 June expired. However, he was opposed by most of his noblemen and was prevented from participating in the alliance of twenty-two western states against Poland in the decisive Battle of Grünwald in July of that year.

Sigismund and Barbara of Celje at the Council of Constance.[edit] Council of ConstanceIn 1412 – 23 he campaigned against the Venetians in Italy. The king took advantage of the difficulties of Antipope John XXIII to obtain a promise that a council should be called to Constance in 1414 to settle the Western Schism. He took a leading part in the deliberations of this assembly, and during the sittings made a journey into France, England and Burgundy in a vain attempt to secure the abdication of the three rival popes. The council ended in 1418, solving the Schism and — of great consequence to Sigismund's future career — having the Czech religious reformer, Jan Hus, burned at the stake for heresy in July 1415. The complicity of Sigismund in the death of Hus is a matter of controversy. He had granted him a safe-conduct and protested against his imprisonment; and the reformer was burned during his absence.

It was also at this Council that a cardinal ventured to correct Sigismund's Latin (he had construed the word schisma as feminine rather than neuter). To this Sigismund replied:

I am king of the Romans and above grammar[4]

An alliance with England against France, and an attempt to secure peace in Germany by a league of the towns, which failed owing to the hostility of the princes, were his main acts of these years. Also, Sigismund granted control of the Margraviate of Brandenburg (which he had received back after Jobst's death) to Frederick I of Hohenzollern, burgrave of Nuremberg (1415). This step made the Hohenzollern family one of the most important in Germany.

Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor began to shift his alliance from France to England after the French defeat at the Battle of Agincourt. The Treaty of Canterbury (August 15, 1416) culminated diplomatic efforts between Henry V of England and Sigismund and resulted in a defensive and offensive alliance against France. This, in turn, led the way to resolution of the papal schism.[5]

Portrait of Emperor Sigismund, painted by Albrecht Dürer after the emperor's death[edit] Hussite WarsIn 1419, the death of Wenceslaus IV left Sigismund titular King of Bohemia, but he had to wait for seventeen years before the Czechs would acknowledge him. Although the two dignities of King of the Romans and King of Bohemia added considerably to his importance, and indeed made him the nominal temporal head of Christendom, they conferred no increase of power and financially embarrassed him. It was only as King of Hungary that he had succeeded in establishing his authority and in doing anything for the order and good government of the land. Entrusting the government of Bohemia to Sofia of Bavaria, the widow of Wenceslaus, he hastened into Hungary.

The Bohemians, who distrusted him as the betrayer of Hus, were soon in arms; and the flame was fanned when Sigismund declared his intention of prosecuting the war against heretics. Three campaigns against the Hussites ended in disaster. The Turks were again attacking Hungary. The king, unable to obtain support from the German princes, was powerless in Bohemia. His attempts at the diet of Nuremberg in 1422 to raise a mercenary army were foiled by the resistance of the towns; and in 1424 the electors, among whom was Sigismund's former ally, Frederick I of Hohenzollern, sought to strengthen their own authority at the expense of the king. Although the scheme failed, the danger to Germany from the Hussites led to the Union of Bingen, which virtually deprived Sigismund of the leadership of the war and the headship of Germany.

In 1428 he led another campaign against the Turks, but again with few results. In 1431 he went to Milan where on 25 November he received the Iron Crown; after which he remained for some time at Siena, negotiating for his coronation as emperor and for the recognition of the Council of Basel by Pope Eugenius IV. He was crowned emperor in Rome on 31 May 1433, and after obtaining his demands from the Pope returned to Bohemia, where he was recognized as king in 1436, though his power was little more than nominal.

He died in 9 December 1437 at Znojmo (German: Znaim), Moravia (now Czech Republic), and as ordered in life, he was buried at Nagyvárad, Hungary (today Oradea, Romania), next to the tomb of the king Saint Ladislaus I of Hungary, who was the ideal of the perfect monarch, warrior and Christian for that time and was deeply venerated by Sigismund.[6] By his second wife, Barbara of Celje, he left an only daughter, Elisabeth of Bohemia (1409–1442), who was married to Albert V, duke of Austria (later German king as Albert II) whom Sigismund named as his successor. As he left no sons his line of the House of Luxembourg became extinct on his death.

Sigismund married twice but had little luck in securing the succession to his crowns. Each of his two marriages resulted in the birth of one child. His first-born child, probably a son, was born prematurely as a result of a horse riding accident suffered by Queen Mary of Hungary when she was well advanced in pregnancy. Mother and child both died shortly after the birth in the hills of Buda on 17 May 1395. This caused a deep succession crisis because Sigismund ruled over Hungary by right of his wife, and although he managed to keep his power, the crisis lasted until his second marriage to Barbara of Celje. Barbara's only child, born in the purple on 7 October 1409, probably in the castle of Visegrád, was Elisabeth of Bohemia, the future queen consort of Hungary, Germany and Bohemia. Queen Barbara was unable to give birth to any further issue.[citation needed] Elisabeth of Bohemia was thus the only surviving legitimate offspring of Sigismund.

Family:

1st spouse: Mary I of Hungary (1371–1395) N of Luxemburg (Son) (1395–1395) 2nd spouse: Barbara of Celje (1392–1451) Elisabeth of Luxemburg (1409–1442), married in 1421 Albert of Habsburg [edit] Names in other languagesCroatian: Žigmund (Luksemburški) Czech: Zikmund (Lucemburský) German: Sigismund (von Luxemburg) Hungarian: (Luxemburgi) Zsigmond Italian: Sigismondo (del Lussemburgo) Lithuanian: Zigmantas Liuksemburgietis Polish: Zygmunt (Luksemburski) Romanian: Sigismund de Luxemburg Serbian: Жигмунд (Луксембуршки) / Žigmund (Luksemburški) Slovak: Žigmund (Luxemburský) Slovene: Sigismund (Luksemburški) Spanish: Segismundo (de Luxemburgo) Titles:

Holy Roman Emperor; King of the Romans, Hungary, Bohemia, Italy, Lombardy, Dalmatia, Croatia, Rama, Serbia, Galicia, Lodomeria, Cumania and Bulgaria; Prince of Silesia and Luxembourg; Margrave of Moravia, Lusatia and Brandenburg.[7]

[edit] See alsoKings of Germany family tree. [edit] In popular cultureSigismund has been portrayed in several films by different actors.

Mircea (1989) John Hus (1977) The Whore (2010), played by Götz Otto [edit] Notes^ Sigismund. (2009). In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 25 September 2009, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/543594/Sigismund ^ Michaud, "The Kingdoms of Central Europe in the Fourteenth Century", p. 743. ^ "Hungary Kings". Fmg.ac. http://fmg.ac/Projects/MedLands/HUNGARY.htm#LajosIdied1382B. Retrieved 2010-05-22. ^ Original Latin: Ego sum rex Romanorum et super grammaticam; Thomas Carlyle (1858): History of Friedrich II of Prussia, Called Frederick the Great (Volume II). [1] ^ B. Guenee. Between Church and State: The Lives of Four French Prelates in the Late Middle Ages [2] ^ Bertényi Iván. (2000). A Tizennegyedik Század története. Budapest: Pannonica kiadó. ^ "1000 év törvényei". 1000ev.hu. http://www.1000ev.hu/index.php?a=3&param=564. Retrieved 2010-05-22. [edit] References This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (Eleventh ed.). Cambridge University Press.

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Luxemburgi Zsigmond (németül Sigismund von Luxemburg), (Prága, 1368. február 14. – Znaim, Morvaország, 1437. december 9.) magyar, német és cseh király, német-római császár, a késő középkor egyik legjelentősebb uralkodója volt. Zsigmond a hercegi birtokáról Luxemburginak nevezett német eredetű uralkodócsaládból származott. Nevéhez fűződik az utolsó összeurópai keresztes hadjárat megszervezése (1396), a nagy nyugati egyházszakadás felszámolása (1417), és a huszitizmus elleni harc megkezdése. Magyar királyként elsősorban Dalmácia elvesztésével, Visegrád és Buda nyugati színvonalú kiépítésével, illetve az Oszmán Birodalommal szembeni defenzívába vonulással, a végvárrendszer kiépítésével, valamint törvényeinek gazdasági és jobbágyokkal kapcsolatos előremutató jellegével írta be magát a történelembe. Fiú örökös hiányában utódjául lánya férjét, Hasburg Albertet jelölte.