Counts of Celje - Savior of The King

Savior of The King

Their rapid rise continued after the 1396 Battle of Nicopolis against the Ottoman Empire, where Count Hermann II of Cilli saved the life of King Sigismund of Hungary, the son of late Emperor Charles IV. As a reward the king donated (1397–99) the city of Varaždin, the county of Zagorje, and many estates in Croatia to the family. In 1401 the Counts of Cilli were among Sigismund's supporters against the relucting Hungarian magnates. Their alliance with the Imperial House of Luxembourg became even closer through the marriage of Hermann's daughter Barbara of Cilli to the king in 1405. In 1418 Count Hermann II inherited the Carinthian and Carniolan estates of the extinct Counts of Ortenburg.

In 1410 Sigismund had been elected King of the Romans and was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in 1433. In 1436 he elevated the Counts of Cilli to the rank of Princes of the Holy Roman Empire (although they retained their title of Graf (Slovene: grof)). The Habsburgs, whose strongest rivals they had become, reacted with a war that lasted until 1443, when an agreement of mutual inheritance was signed.

Count Ulrich II of Cilli was the most powerful member of the Cilli family. In 1432 he married Catherine, daughter of the Serbian despot Đurađ Branković. Ulrich held a large influence in many courts, which originated from the relationships the Cilli family had made in the past. Upon the death of the Habsburg king Albert II in 1439, he tried to get regency of Hungary, Bohemia and Austria through control over Albert's minor son Ladislaus the Posthumous. With such ambitions he got many opponents and rivals, such as the Hungarian Hunyadi family. After an unsuccessful claim to the Bosnian crown, Cilli obtained some territories in Croatia and Slavonia and in 1452 finally succeeded in forcing Emperor Frederick III to hand over the boy king Ladislaus to his keeping. Thus, Ulrich II became de facto regent of Hungary.