Poppo II or Boppo II (died after 906) was the
Duke of Thuringia from 880 until his deposition in 892.
Poppo, a
Popponid (
Elder House of Babenberg), was the younger brother of
Henry of Franconia. They also had a younger brother named
Egino. All three may have been the sons or grandsons of
Poppo I of Grapfeld.
Poppo replaced
Radulf II in the
Sorbian March no later than 880. In that year, the
Daleminzi,
Bohemians, and
Sorbs
Sorbs (; ; ; ; ; also known as Lusatians, Lusatian Serbs and Wends) are a West Slavs, West Slavic ethnic group predominantly inhabiting the parts of Lusatia located in the German states of Germany, states of Saxony and Brandenburg. Sorbs tradi ...
threatened to invade
Thuringia
Thuringia (; officially the Free State of Thuringia, ) is one of Germany, Germany's 16 States of Germany, states. With 2.1 million people, it is 12th-largest by population, and with 16,171 square kilometers, it is 11th-largest in area.
Er ...
and burn the German-allied Slav districts. Poppo's subsequent expedition against them is recorded in three different variations in the three different manuscript traditions of the ''
Annales Fuldenses
The ''Annales Fuldenses'' or ''Annals of Fulda'' are East Francia, East Frankish chronicles that cover independently the period from the last years of Louis the Pious (died 840) to shortly after the end of effective Carolingian rule in East Fran ...
''. He may or may not have led the
Thuringii in this campaign, but he was certainly victorious.
The reasons behind Poppo's battles in 882, 883, and 884 are unknown. In the previous year, he and the Thuringii had been defeated under Egino in a war that they had instigated with
Saxons
The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony () which became a Carolingian " stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany. Many of their neighbours were, like th ...
In 883, he again fought his brother Egino, who was recorded as a co-duke of the Thuringii, and was defeated savagely and forced to retreat with only a few men.
Poppo was deprived of his offices and titles in 892.
[AF(B), 892 (p. 124 and n9).] According to
Regino of Prüm
Regino of Prüm or of Prum (, ; died 915 AD) was a Benedictine Order, Benedictine monk, who served as abbot of Prüm Abbey, Prüm (892–99) and later of St. Maximin's Abbey, Trier, Saint Martin's at Trier, and chronicler, whose ''Chronicon'' is ...
, Poppo had advised
Arn, Bishop of Würzburg, to undertake the expedition against the Slavs on which he was killed earlier that year. Because Poppo was replaced in Thuringia by
Conrad and Arn was replaced by
Rudolf, both
Conradines
The Conradines or Conradiner were a dynasty of Franconian counts and dukes in the 8th to 11th Century, named after Duke Conrad, Duke of Thuringia, Conrad the Elder and his son King Conrad I of Germany.
History
The family is first mentioned in 8 ...
, it has been supposed that
King Arnulf was merely patronising one family over another: the Conradines and Babenbergers were feuding shortly afterwards. On the other hand, Poppo may have been punished for the ill-advised campaign of Arn. He was restored to his lands in 899 and made Count of the
Bavarian Nordgau in 903. He was Count of the
Volkfeld in 906. He died sometime after.
Sources
*
Reuter, Timothy. ''Germany in the Early Middle Ages 800–1056''. New York: Longman, 1991.
*Reuter, Timothy (trans.)
The Annals of Fulda'. (Manchester Medieval series, Ninth-Century Histories, Volume II.) Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1992.
Notes
{{Authority control
Dukes of Thuringia
9th-century dukes in Europe
House of Babenberg