Sigehard or Sieghard (died on 12 August 1077), also known as Sigehard of Beilstein, was

patriarch of Aquileia This is a list of bishops and patriarchs of Aquileia in northeastern Italy. For the ecclesiastical history of the diocese, see Patriarchate of Aquileia. From 553 until 698 the archbishops renounced Papal authority as part of the Schism of the T ...

from 1068 to 1077. He was the member of a Bavarian noble family with estates in

Chiemgau Chiemgau () is the common name of a geographic area in Upper Bavaria. It refers to the foothills of the Alps between the rivers Inn and Traun, with the Chiemsee at its center. The political districts that contain the Chiemgau are Rosenheim and ...

. Sigehard remained faithful to Henry IV during the

investiture controversy The Investiture Controversy or Investiture Contest (, , ) was a conflict between church and state in medieval Europe, the Church and the state in medieval Europe over the ability to choose and install bishops (investiture), abbots of monasteri ...

between the Popes and the

Holy Roman Emperors The Holy Roman Emperor, originally and officially the 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 head of state of the Holy Roman Empire. ...

. For his loyalty, Henry rewarded Sigehard with the investiture of the

Friulan Friulian ( ) or Friulan (natively or ; ; ; ) is a Romance language belonging to the Rhaeto-Romance family. Friulian is spoken in the Friuli region of northeastern Italy and has around 600,000 speakers, the vast majority of whom also speak It ...

county on 3 April 1077. Struck with a sudden illness, the patriarch died in

Ulm Ulm () is the sixth-largest city of the southwestern German state of Baden-Württemberg, and with around 129,000 inhabitants, it is Germany's 60th-largest city. Ulm is located on the eastern edges of the Swabian Jura mountain range, on the up ...

a few months after. With Sigehard the Patriarchs of Aquileia became the direct vassals of the Emperors; their power now extended over a territory which was subject only to their jurisdiction. The territory then constituted an ecclesiastical and political "imperial and Italian principality" ( Patriarchal State of Aquileia).Gian Carlo Menis ''History of Friuli'', pp. 183-184, Pordenone 1988.

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* * 1077 deaths Patriarchs of Aquileia Investiture Controversy {{Slovenia-bio-stub