Konrad the Curly ( pl, Konrad Kędzierzawy; c. 1198 – 4 September 1213 in Czerwony Kosciol), was a Polish prince member of the Piast dynasty in his Silesian branch. He was the third son of

Henry I the Bearded Henry the Bearded ( pl, Henryk (Jędrzych) Brodaty, german: Heinrich der Bärtige; c. 1165/70 – 19 March 1238) was a Polish duke from the Piast dynasty. He was Duke of Silesia at Wrocław from 1201, Duke of Kraków and High Duke of all Pol ...

, Duke of Wroclaw, by his wife (and later Saint)

Hedwig Hedwig may refer to: People and fictional characters * Hedwig (name), a list of people and fictional characters with the given name * Grzegorz Hedwig (born 1988), Polish slalom canoeist * Johann Hedwig, (1730–1799), German botanist * Romanus Adol ...

, daughter of

Berthold IV, Duke of Merania Berthold IV (c. 1159 – 12 August 1204), a member of the House of Andechs, was Margrave of Istria and Carniola (as Berthold II). By about 1180/82 he assumed the title of Duke of Merania, referring to the Adriatic seacoast of Kvarner which his ...

Life

Little is known about his early years. The death of his older brother Bolesław in 1208 left him in the second place over the Silesian inheritance, after his brother and new heir

Henry II the Pious Henry II the Pious ( pl, Henryk II Pobożny; 1196 – 9 April 1241) was Duke of Silesia and High Duke of Poland as well as Duke of South-Greater Poland from 1238 until his death. Between 1238 and 1239 he also served as regent of Sandomierz and ...

. He died very young after a fall from his horse during a

hunt Hunting is the human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, or killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to harvest food (i.e. meat) and useful animal products (fur/ hide, bone/tusks, horn/antler, e ...

and was buried in Trebnitz, where his sister Gertrude was the Abbess. Prince Konrad was the hero of the first alleged ethnic conflict between the

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, w ...

and

Germans , native_name_lang = de , region1 = , pop1 = 72,650,269 , region2 = , pop2 = 534,000 , region3 = , pop3 = 157,000 3,322,405 , region4 = , pop4 = ...

Silesia Silesia (, also , ) is a historical region of Central Europe that lies mostly within Poland, with small parts in the Czech Republic and Germany. Its area is approximately , and the population is estimated at around 8,000,000. Silesia is split ...

. According to an anonymous Silesian monk, the author of the " Polish-Silesian Chronicle" from the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries, Henry I the Bearded tried to leave all his inheritance to Henry II the Pious. This led in a quarrel between the brothers, which degenerated in an open conflict with the passive attitude of their parents. In this dispute, the young Konrad had the support of the Polish, and Henry II gained the favour of the Germans. As a result, both forces clashed in the Battle of Studnica near Opole in 1213, the Germans under the leadership of Henry II defeated the Polish troops of Konrad. The chronicles suggest that Konrad's fatal accident shortly after wasn't coincidental. Thanks to this information, by the 19th and early 20th century, Prince Konrad became a Polish national hero.

Historiography Historiography is the study of the methods of historians in developing history as an academic discipline, and by extension is any body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiography of a specific topic covers how historians ha ...

recognized the Battle of Studnica as a breakthrough event for Polish

. The Silesian writer Jan Mikołaj Jaroń created a 1920 drama with the title ''Konrad the Curly''. In 1928,

Leon Schiller Leon Schiller or Leon Schiller de Schildenfeld (14 March 1887 – 25 March 1954) was a Polish theatre and film director, as well as critic and theatre theoretician. He also wrote theatre and radio screenplays and composed music. He was born in Kra ...

developed the ''Silesian Drama at the beginning of the 13th century in five acts''. As a defender of the Prince,

Zofia Kossak-Szczucka Zofia Kossak-Szczucka ( (also Kossak-Szatkowska); 10 August 1889 – 9 April 1968) was a Polish writer and World War II resistance fighter. She co-founded two wartime Polish organizations: Front for the Rebirth of Poland and Żegota, set up ...

wrote ''Legnickie Pole'' in 1931. Konrad's brother and antagonist, Henry II the Pious, was recognized as pro-German.

References

*''This article was translated from the version in Polish Wikipedia''. {{DEFAULTSORT:Konrad The Curly 1198 births 1213 deaths Piast dynasty 13th-century Polish nobility