Margravate of Brandenburg

The Margraviate of Brandenburg (german: link=no, Markgrafschaft Brandenburg) was a major principality of the Holy Roman Empire from 1157 to 1806 that played a pivotal role in the history of Germany and Central Europe.

Brandenburg developed out of the Northern March founded in the territory of the Slavic Wends. It derived one of its names from this inheritance, the March of Brandenburg (). Its ruling margraves were established as prestigious prince-electors in the Golden Bull of 1356, allowing them to vote in the election of the Holy Roman Emperor. The state thus became additionally known as Electoral Brandenburg or the Electorate of Brandenburg ( or ).

The House of Hohenzollern came to the throne of Brandenburg in 1415. In 1417, Frederick I moved its capital from Brandenburg an der Havel to Berlin. By 1535, the electorate had an area of some and a population of 400,000. Preserved Smith
The Social Background of the Reformation.
1920. Page 17. Under Hohenzollern leadership, Brandenburg grew rapidly in power during the 17th century and inherited the Duchy of Prussia. The resulting Brandenburg-Prussia was the predecessor of the Kingdom of Prussia, which became a leading German state during the 18th century. Although the electors' highest title was " King in/of Prussia", their power base remained in Brandenburg and its capital Berlin.

The Margraviate of Brandenburg ended with the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806. It was replaced after the Napoleonic Wars with the Prussian Province of Brandenburg in 1815. The Hohenzollern Kingdom of Prussia was the primary driving force behind the unification of Germany. The Prussian-dominated North German Confederation later transformed in 1871 into the German Empire was the legal predecessor of the united German Reich of 1871–1945, and as such a direct ancestor of the present-day Federal Republic of Germany,

Geography

The territory of the former margraviate, commonly known as the , lies in present-day eastern Germany and western Poland. Geographically it encompassed the majority of the present-day German states of Brandenburg and Berlin, the Altmark (the northern third of Saxony-Anhalt), and the Neumark (now divided between Poland's Lubusz and West Pomeranian Voivodeships). Parts of the present-day federal state Brandenburg, such as Lower Lusatia and territory which had been Saxon until 1815, were not parts of the Mark. Colloquially but not accurately, the federal state Brandenburg is sometimes identified as the Mark or Mark Brandenburg.

The region was formed during the ice age and characterized by moraines, glacial valleys, and numerous lakes. The territory is known as a or march because it was a border county of the Holy Roman Empire (see also Margraviate of Meissen).

The Mark is defined by two uplands and two depressions. The depressions are taken up by rivers and chains of lakes with marsh and boggy soil along the shores; once used for peat collection, the riverbanks are now mostly drained and dry.

The Northern or Baltic Uplands of the Mecklenburg Lake Plateau have only minor extensions into Brandenburg. The approximately 230 km-long range of hills in the Mark's south begins in the Lusatian Highlands (near Żary (Sorau)) and continues past Trzebiel (Triebel) and Spremberg, then to the northwest through Calau, and ends in the bare and dry Fläming. The southern depression is generally to the north of this ridge and appears strikingly in the Spreewald (between Baruth/Mark and Plaue an der Havel). The northern depression, lying almost directly south of the Baltic uplands, is defined by the lowlands of the Noteć Rivers, the Oderbruch, the valley of the Finow, the Havelland moor, and the Oder River.

Between these two depressions is a low plateau that extends from the Poznań area westward to Brandenburg through Torzym (Sternberg), the Spree plateau, and the Mittelmark. From southeast to northwest, this plateau is intersected by the lowland of the Leniwa Obra and the Oder River below the confluence of the Lusatian Neisse, the Teltow, the Semmelberg near Bad Freienwalde (), the Müggelberge in Köpenick (), the Havelberge (), and the Rauen Hills near Fürstenwalde ().

The region is predominantly marked by dry, sandy soil, wide stretches of which have pine trees and erica plants, or heath. However, the soil is loamy in the uplands and plateaus and, when farmed appropriately, can be agriculturally productive.

Mark Brandenburg has a cool, continental climate, with temperatures averaging near in January and February and near in July and August. Precipitation averages between 500 mm and 600 mm annually, with a modest summer maximum.

History

Northern March

By the eighth century, Slavic Wends, such as the Sprewane and Hevelli (Havolane or Stodorans), started to move into the Brandenburg area. They intermarried with Saxons and Bohemians.

The Bishoprics of Brandenburg and Havelberg were established at the beginning of the tenth century (in 928 and 948, respectively).Koch, p. 23. They were suffragan to the Archbishopric of Mainz; the Bishopric of Brandenburg reached to the Baltic Sea.

King Henry the Fowler started governing in the region in 928–929, allowing Emperor Otto I to establish the Northern March under Margrave Gero in 936 during the German . However, the march and the bishoprics were overthrown by a Slavic rebellion in 983; until the collapse of the Liutizian alliance in the middle of the 11th century, the Holy Roman Empire government through bishoprics and marches came nearly to a standstill for approximately 150 years,Koch, p. 24. even though the bishopric was retained.

Prince Pribislav of the Hevelli came to power at the castle of Brenna () in 1127. During Pribislav's reign, in which he cultivated close connections with the German nobility, Germans succeeded in binding to the Holy Roman Empire the Havolane region from to Spandau. The disputed eastern border continued between the Hevelli and the Sprewane, recognized as the Havel-Nuthe line. Prince Jaxa of Köpenick (''Jaxa de Copnic'') of the Sprewane lived in Köpenick east of the dividing line.

Ascanians

During the second phase of the German Ostsiedlung, Albert the Bear began the expansionary eastern policy of the Ascanians. From 1123 to 1125 Albert developed contacts with Pribislav, who served as the godfather for the Ascanian's first son, Otto, and gave the boy the Zauche region as a christening present in 1134. In the same year, Emperor Lothair III named Albert margrave of the Northern March and raised Pribislav to the status of king, although that was later rescinded. Also in 1134, Albert succeeded in securing for the Ascanians the inheritance of the childless Pribislav. After the latter's death in 1150, Albert received the Havolane residence of Brenna. The Ascanians also began to build the castle of Spandau.

In contrast to their leaders who had accepted Christianity, the Havolane population still worshipped old Slavic deities and opposed Albert's assumption of power. Jaxa of Köpenick, a possible relative of Pribislav and a claim-holder to Brandenburg, controlled Brandenburg with Polish help, and ruled the land of the Stodorans. Older historical research dates this conquest to 1153, although there are no definite sources for the date. More recent researchers (such as Lutz Partenheimer) date it to spring 1157, as it is doubtful that Albert would not have responded to Jaxa's actions for four years.

With bloody victories on 11 June 1157, Albert the Bear was able to reconquer Brandenburg, exile Jaxa, and found a new lordship. Because he already held the title of margrave, Albert styled himself as Margrave of Brandenburg () on 3 October 1157, thereby beginning the Margraviate of Brandenburg.

The territorial limits of the original margraviate differed from the area of the current Bundesland Brandenburg, consisting merely of the Havelland and Zauche regions. In the following 150 years the Ascanians succeeded in winning the Uckermark, Teltow, and Barnim regions east of the Havel and Nuthe, thereby extending the Mark to the Oder River. The ("New March") east of the Oder was acquired gradually through purchases, marriages, and aid to the Piast dynasty of Poland.Koch, p. 25.

Because of the sandy soil prevalent in Brandenburg, the agriculturally meager principality was denigrated as "the sandbox of the Holy Roman Empire". Albert invited colonists to settle the new territory, many of whom came from the ("Old March", a later name for the original Northern March), the Harz, Flanders (hence the region), and the Rhineland. After the capture of territory along the Elbe and Havel Rivers in the 1160s, Flemish and Dutch settlers from flooded regions in Holland used their expertise to build dikes in Brandenburg. Initially, the Ascanians protected the country by settling knights in villages; castles fortified with knights were mostly located in the border region of the Neumark. After a 14th-century decline in imperial power, however, knights began constructing castles throughout the principality, granting them more independence.

After Albert's death in 1170, his son succeeded him as Otto I, Margrave of Brandenburg. The Ascanians pursued a policy of expanding to the east and the northeast with the goal of connecting their territories through Pomerania to the Baltic Sea. This policy brought them into conflict with the Kingdom of Denmark. After the Battle of Bornhöved (1227), Margrave John I staked his claim to Pomerania, receiving it as a fief from Emperor Frederick II in 1231. The middle of the 13th century was a time of important developments for the Ascanian House, as it won Stettin (Szczecin) and the Uckermark (1250), although the former was later lost to the Duchy of Pomerania. Also around 1250 it took over Lubusz Land from then-fragmented Poland and subsequently conquered northwestern parts of the Duchy of Greater Poland in the late 13th century, moving the border east of the Oder river. Henry II, the last Ascanian margrave, died in 1320.

Wittelsbachs

Having defeated the Habsburgs, the Wittelsbach Emperor Louis IV, an uncle of Henry II, granted Brandenburg to his oldest son, Louis I (the "Brandenburger") in 1323. As a consequence of the murder of Provost Nikolaus von Bernau in 1325, Brandenburg was punished with a papal interdict. From 1328 onwards, Louis was in war against Pomerania which he claimed as a fiefdom and the conflict did not end before 1333. The rule of Margrave Louis I was rejected by the domestic nobility of Brandenburg, and, after the death of Emperor Louis IV in 1347, the margrave was confronted with the False Waldemar, an imposter of the deceased Margrave Waldemar. The pretender was recognized as Margrave of Brandenburg on 2 October 1348 by the new emperor, Charles IV of Luxembourg, but was exposed as a fraud after a peace between the Wittelsbachs and Luxembourgs at Eltville. In 1351 Louis gave the Mark to his younger half-brothers Louis II (the "Roman") and Otto V in exchange for the sole rule over Upper Bavaria.

Louis the Roman forced the False Waldemar to renounce his claims to Brandenburg and succeeded in establishing the Margraves of Brandenburg as prince-electors in th