Rupert I "the Red", Elector Palatine (; 9 June 1309, Wolfratshausen – 16 February 1390,

Neustadt an der Weinstraße Neustadt (German for ''new town'' or ''new city'') may refer to: Places * Neustadt (urban district) Czech Republic *Neustadt an der Mettau, Nové Město nad Metují *Neustadt an der Tafelfichte, Nové Město pod Smrkem * Nové Město na Mo ...

) was

Count Palatine of the Rhine This article lists counts palatine of Lotharingia, counts palatine of the Rhine, and electors of the Palatinate (), the titles of three counts palatine who ruled some part of the Rhine region in the Kingdom of Germany and the Holy Roman Empire b ...

from 1353 to 1356, and

Elector Palatine This article lists counts palatine of Lotharingia, counts palatine of the Rhine, and electors of the Palatinate (), the titles of three counts palatine who ruled some part of the Rhine region in the Kingdom of Germany and the Holy Roman Empire b ...

from 10 January 1356 to 16 February 1390. He was the son of

Rudolf I, Duke of Bavaria Rudolf I of Bavaria, called "the Stammerer" (; 4 October 1274 – 12 August 1319), a member of the Wittelsbach dynasty, was Duke of Upper Bavaria and Count Palatine of the Rhine from 1294 until 1317. Life Rudolf was born in Basel, the son o ...

and Mechtild of Nassau, the daughter of Adolf of Nassau-Weilburg, King of Germany. With the death of his brother,

Rudolf II Rudolf II (18 July 1552 – 20 January 1612) was Holy Roman Emperor (1576–1612), King of Hungary and Croatia (as Rudolf I, 1572–1608), King of Bohemia (1575–1608/1611) and Archduke of Austria (1576–1608). He was a member of the H ...

, on 4 October 1353, he inherited his domains and became sole Count for the territory, whereas they had previously shared that privilege. The

Golden Bull of 1356 The Golden Bull of 1356 (, , , , ) was a decree issued by the Imperial Diet at Nuremberg and Metz ( Diet of Metz, 1356/57) headed by the Emperor Charles IV which fixed, for a period of more than four hundred years, important aspects of the con ...

guaranteed the Palatinate the right of participating in the election of the

Holy Roman Emperor The Holy Roman Emperor, originally and officially the Emperor of the Romans (disambiguation), Emperor of the Romans (; ) during the Middle Ages, and also known as the Roman-German Emperor since the early modern period (; ), was the ruler and h ...

. Previous Counts Palatine had participated in other Imperial elections. In 1386, Rupert founded

Heidelberg University Heidelberg University, officially the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg (; ), is a public research university in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Founded in 1386 on instruction of Pope Urban VI, Heidelberg is Germany's oldest unive ...

, the third university in the

Holy Roman Empire The Holy Roman Empire, also known as the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation after 1512, was a polity in Central and Western Europe, usually headed by the Holy Roman Emperor. It developed in the Early Middle Ages, and lasted for a millennium ...

, which was named after him. Rupert was married twice: firstly to Elisabeth, Countess of Namur (daughter of

John I, Marquis of Namur John I (1267 – 31 January 1330) was the count of Namur from 1305 to 1330. He was a member of the House of Dampierre, the son of Guy of Dampierre, Count of Flanders and Marquis of Namur, and his second wife Isabelle of Luxembourg. John was th ...

), secondly to Beatrix of Jülich-Berg, the great-granddaughter of his elder brother Adolf, Count Palatine of the Rhine. Neither marriage produced an heir. He was succeeded by his nephew, Rupert II, Elector Palatine, grandfather of his second wife.

References

1309 births 1390 deaths 14th-century Prince-electors of the Palatinate House of Wittelsbach Counts Palatine of the Rhine Heidelberg University {{Germany-noble-stub