Lütet Attena (died: , in
Dornum) was a 14th-century
East Frisian chieftain
The East Frisian chieftains (german: Häuptlinge, Low German: ''hovetlinge / hovedlinge'') assumed positions of power in East Frisia during the course of the 14th century, after the force of the old, egalitarian constitution from the time of Frisi ...
of
Dornum and Nesse in the
Norderland area.
Life
Lütet Attena was a son of
Hero Attena. His brothers were Eger and Enno Attena. In 1395 Lütet married Ocka tom Brok, the daughter of the chieftain
Ocko I tom Brok and
Foelke Kampana
Foelke Kampana (1355 – c. 1418), also known as Foelke the Cruel, was a Frisian noble. She served as regent for the Frisian territories Oldeborg, Brokmerland, Auricherland and Emsigerland in East Frisia in 1400 during the absence of her son Keno ...
from the adjacent
Brokmerland
The Brokmerland is a landscape and an historic territory, located in western East Frisia, which covers the area in and around the present-day communities of Brookmerland and Südbrookmerland. The Brokmerland borders in the east on the Harlingerl ...
. They had two daughters named Etta and Hebe.
Legend
Legend has it that when Lütet complained to Foelke, his mother-in-law about the infidelity of his wife Ocka, Foelke advised him to kill Ocka. When Lütet again caught Ocka in an act of adultery, he did just that. Foelke then sought revenge and tried to utilize the situation to expand the influence of her family on the Attena's territory. Lütet fled to his father's castle in Dornum,
Norderburg Castle. Foelke besieged the castle and conquered it. In 1397, Hero was executed in the courtyard of Norderburg Castle on her orders. This earned her the nickname ("evil Foelke").
[Ubbo Emmius: ''Rerum Frisicarum historiae decades'', originally written in Latin and published in 1598, translated into German by Erich von Reeken as ''Friesische Geschichte'', Frankfurt am Main 1981, vol. 2, section 255]
Modern research suggests that, although there may be a grain of truth in some parts of the legend, the story about the execution is definitely incorrect: Hero and Lüten were executed much later, in 1410 or 1411, on the orders of Foelke's son Keno II. For that matter, there is no historic evidence that she deserved her nickname os "evil Foelke".
See also
*
East Frisian chieftains
The East Frisian chieftains (german: Häuptlinge, Low German: ''hovetlinge / hovedlinge'') assumed positions of power in East Frisia during the course of the 14th century, after the force of the old, egalitarian constitution from the time of Fri ...
*
tom Brok
The tom Brok family (, also: tom Broke, tom Brook, tom Broek, ten Brok, ten Broke; equivalent to Dutch , "at the marsh") were a powerful East Frisian line of chieftains, originally from the Norderland on the North Sea coast of Germany. From the s ...
External links
"Culture circle tom Brok" with information on the history of tom Brok
Footnotes
East Frisian chieftains
14th-century births
1390s deaths
Year of birth uncertain
{{EastFrisia-stub