Duchy of Bavaria - House of Welf

House of Welf

The last Ottonian duke, Henry II's son Henry III, was elected King of the Romans in 1002. At different times the duchy was ruled by the German kings in personal union, by implemented dependent dukes, or even by the emperor's sons, a tradtition maintained by Henry's Salian successors. This period saw the rise of many aristocratic families, such as the Counts of Andechs or the House of Wittelsbach. In 1061 the dowager empress Agnes of Poitou enfeoffed the Saxon count Otto of Nordheim. Nevertheless, her son King Henry IV again seized the duchy on fallacious grounds, which ultimately led to the Saxon Rebellion of 1073. Henry entrusted Bavaria to Welf, a scion of the Veronese margravial House of Este and progenitor of the Welf dynasty, which intermittently ruled the duchy for the next 110 years.

Only with the establishment of Guelph rule as dukes from 1070 by Henry IV was there a re-emergence of the Bavarian dukes. This period is characterized by the Investiture Controversy between Emperor and Pope. It strengthened Guelph rule through siding with the pope's position.

A conflict with the Swabian dynasty of Hohenstaufen in the election of the king led the discretion of the Hohenstaufen Conrad III to the king but to the fact that Bavaria was given to the Babenbergs 1139. The Swabian area was during the reign of the Staufer king largely countryside. Increasingly, Franconia also became the center of Staufer power. Franken obtained a dominant position of the Bishop of Würzburg by the founding of the diocese of Bamberg, and new secular rulers lost 1007th The Hohenstaufen Frederick I Barbarossa attempted reconciliation with the Guelphs and in 1156 gave back the Marcha Orientalis scaled to Bavaria the Guelph Henry the Lion.

The detached Marcha Orientalis was the Babenbergs as the new Duchy of special privileges to the nucleus of the later Austria (Ostarrichi). Henry the Lion founded numerous cities, including Munich in 1158. Through his strong position as ruler of the two duchies of Saxony and Bavaria he came into conflict with Frederick I Barbarossa. With the banishment of Henry the Lion and the separation of Styria as a private duchy in 1180 the younger tribal duchy came to an end.

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