Arms of the House of Wittelsbach (14th-century).Arms of Louis IV as Holy Roman Emperor.
Louis IV (German:Ludwig; 1 April 1282 – 11 October 1347), calledthe Bavarian (Ludwig der Bayer,Latin:Ludovicus Bavarus), wasKing of the Romans from 1314,King of Italy from 1327, andHoly Roman Emperor from 1328 until his death in 1347.
Louis' election as king of Germany in 1314 was controversial, as hisHabsburg cousinFrederick the Fair was simultaneously elected king by a separate set of electors. Louis defeated Frederick in theBattle of Mühldorf in 1322, and the two eventually reconciled. Louis was opposed and excommunicated by the FrenchPope John XXII; Louis in turn attempted to depose the pope and install an anti-pope.
Louis was born inMunich, the son ofLouis II, Duke of Upper Bavaria and Count Palatine of the Rhine, andMatilda, a daughter of KingRudolph I.[3][4]
Though Louis was partly educated inVienna and became co-regent of his brotherRudolf I inUpper Bavaria in 1301 with the support of hisHabsburg mother and her brother, KingAlbert I, he quarreled with the Habsburgs from 1307 over possessions inLower Bavaria. A civil war against his brother Rudolf due to new disputes on the partition of their lands was ended in 1313, when peace was made at Munich.
In the same year, on November 9, Louis defeated his Habsburg cousinFrederick the Fair who was further aided by dukeLeopold I.[5] Originally, he was a friend of Frederick, with whom he had been raised. However, armed conflict arose when theguardianship over the young Dukes of Lower Bavaria (Henry XIV,Otto IV, andHenry XV) was entrusted to Frederick, even though the late DukeOtto III, the former King of Hungary, had chosen Louis. On 9 November 1313, Frederick was defeated by Louis in theBattle of Gammelsdorf and had to renounce thetutelage. This victory caused a stir within the Holy Roman Empire and increased the reputation of the Bavarian Duke.[1]
Election as German King and conflict with Frederick the Fair
The death of Holy Roman EmperorHenry VII in August 1313 necessitated the election of a successor. Henry's sonJohn, King ofBohemia since 1310, was considered by manyprince-electors to be too young,[6] and by others to be already too powerful. One alternative was Frederick the Fair, the son of Henry's predecessor,Albert I, of theHouse of Habsburg. In reaction, the pro-Luxembourg party among theprince electors settled on Louis as its candidate to prevent Frederick's election.[7]
This double election was quickly followed by two coronations: Louis was crowned atAachen – the customary site of coronations – by Archbishop Peter of Mainz, while the Archbishop of Cologne, who by custom had the right to crown the new king, crowned Frederick atBonn. In the following conflict between the kings, Louis recognized in 1316 the independence ofSwitzerland from the Habsburg dynasty.[1]
After several years of bloody war, victory finally seemed within the grasp of Frederick, who was strongly supported by his brotherLeopold. However, Frederick's army was decisively defeated in theBattle of Mühldorf[9] on 28 September 1322 on theAmpfing Heath, where Frederick and 1300 nobles from Austria andSalzburg were captured.
Louis held Frederick captive inTrausnitz Castle (Schwandorf) for three years, but the determined resistance by Frederick's brother Leopold, the retreat ofJohn of Bohemia from his alliance, and a ban byPope John XXII, whoexcommunicated Louis in 1324, induced Louis to release Frederick in theTreaty of Trausnitz of 13 March 1325. In this agreement, Frederick recognized Louis as legitimate ruler and undertook to return to captivity should he not succeed in convincing his brothers to submit to Louis.[10][11]
Golden Bull of Louis IV 1328
As he did not manage to overcome Leopold's obstinacy, Frederick returned to Munich as a prisoner, even though the Pope had released him from his oath. Louis, who was impressed by such nobility, renewed the old friendship with Frederick, and they agreed to rule theEmpire jointly. Since the Pope and theelectors strongly objected to this agreement,another treaty was signed atUlm on 7 January 1326, according to which Frederick would administer Germany asKing of the Romans, while Louis would be crowned asHoly Roman Emperor in Italy. However, after Leopold's death in 1326, Frederick withdrew from the regency of the Empire and returned to rule only Austria. He died on 13 January 1330.[1][7]
Coronation as Holy Roman Emperor and conflict with the Pope
After the reconciliation with the Habsburgs in 1326, Louis marched to Italy and was crowned King of Italy inMilan in 1327. Already in 1323, Louis had sent an army to Italy to protect Milan against theKingdom of Naples, which was together with France the strongest ally of the papacy. But now the Lord of MilanGaleazzo I Visconti was deposed since he was suspected of conspiring with the pope.[2]
In January 1328, Louis enteredRome and had himself crowned emperor by the aged senatorSciarra Colonna, calledcaptain of the Roman people. Three months later, Louis published a decree declaring Pope John XXII (Jacques Duèze), who resided inAvignon, deposed on grounds ofheresy. He then installed a SpiritualFranciscan,Pietro Rainalducci as antipopeNicholas V, who soon left Rome and a few years later submitted to Pope John XXII. In the meantime,Robert, King of Naples had sent both a fleet and an army against Louis and his allyFrederick II of Sicily. Louis spent the winter 1328/29 inPisa and stayed then in Northern Italy. When his co-ruler Frederick of Habsburg died in 1330, Louis returned from Italy. In fulfillment of an oath, Louis foundedEttal Abbey on 28 April 1330.[12]
Edward III becomes Vicar to the Emperor Louis IV.
Franciscan theologiansMichael of Cesena andWilliam of Ockham, and the philosopherMarsilius of Padua, who were all on bad terms with the Pope as well, joined Emperor Louis in Italy and accompanied him to his court atAlter Hof in Munich which became the first imperial residence of the Holy Roman Empire.[1]
In 1333, Emperor Louis sought to counter French influence in the southwest of the empire so he offeredHumbert II of Viennois theKingdom of Arles which was an opportunity to gain full authority over Savoy, Provence, and its surrounding territories. Humbert was reluctant to take the crown due to the conflict that would follow with all around him, so he declined, telling the emperor that he should make peace with the church first.[13]
Emperor Louis also allied withKing Edward III of England in 1337 againstKing Philip VI of France, the protector of the new PopeBenedict XII inAvignon. King Philip VI had prevented any agreement between the Emperor and the Pope. Thus, the failure of negotiations with the papacy led to thedeclaration at Rhense in 1338 by six electors to the effect that election by all or the majority of the electors automatically conferred the royal title and rule over the empire, without papal confirmation. King Edward III was the Emperor's guest at theImperial Diet in the Kastorkirche atCoblence in 1338 and was named Vicar-General of the Holy Roman Empire. However in 1341, the Emperor deserted Edward III but came to terms with Philip VI only temporarily. For the expected English payments were missing and Louis intended to reach an agreement with the Pope one more time.[2][4]
Louis IV was a protector of theTeutonic Knights. In 1337 he allegedly bestowed upon the Teutonic Order a privilege to conquerLithuania and Russia, although the Order had only petitioned for three small territories.[14] Later he forbade the Order to stand trial before foreign courts in their territorial conflicts with foreign rulers.[15]
Louis concentrated his energies also on the economic development of the cities of the empire, so his name can be found in many city chronicles for the privileges he granted. In 1330 the emperor for example permitted theFrankfurt Trade Fair, and in 1340Lübeck, as the leading member of theHanseatic League, received the coinage prerogative for goldengulden.[1]
With the death of dukeJohn I in 1340 Louis inherited Lower Bavaria and then reunited the duchy of Bavaria. John'smother, a member of the Luxemburg dynasty, had to return to Bohemia. In 1342 Louis also acquiredTyrol for the Wittelsbach by voiding the first marriage ofMargarete Maultasch withJohn Henry of Bohemia and marrying her to his own son Louis V, thus alienating the House of Luxemburg even more.[2]
In 1345 the emperor further antagonized the lay princes by conferringHainaut,Holland,Zeeland, andFriesland upon his wife,Margaret II of Hainaut. The hereditary titles of Margaret's sisters,one of whom was the queen of England, were ignored. Because of the dangerous hostility of the Luxemburgs, Louis had increased his power base ruthlessly.[1]
The acquisition of these territories and his restless foreign policy had earned Louis many enemies among the German princes. In the summer of 1346 theLuxembourgCharles IV was elected rival king, with the support ofPope Clement VI. Louis himself obtained much support from theImperial Free Cities and theknights and successfully resisted Charles, who was widely regarded as a papal puppet ("rex clericorum" asWilliam of Ockham called him). Also the Habsburg dukes stayed loyal to Louis. In theBattle of Crécy Charles' fatherJohn of Luxembourg was killed; Charles himself also took part in the battle but escaped.
But then Louis' sudden death avoided a longer civil war. Louis died in October 1347 from a stroke suffered during a bear-hunt in Puch nearFürstenfeldbruck. He is buried in theFrauenkirche in Munich. The sons of Louis supportedGünther von Schwarzburg as new rival king to Charles but finally joined the Luxembourg party after Günther's early death in 1349 and divided the Wittelsbach possessions amongst themselves again. In continuance of the conflict of the House of Wittelsbach with the House of Luxembourg, the Wittelsbach family returned to power in the Holy Roman Empire in 1400 with KingRupert of Germany, a great-grandnephew of Louis.[1]
^Urban, William.The Teutonic Knights: A Military History. Greenhill Books. London, 2003, p. 136.ISBN1-85367-535-0
^Bernd Schneidmüller (2013). "Kaiser Ludwig IV. Imperiale Herrschaft und reichsfürstlicher Konsens".Zeitschrift für Historische Forschung.40 (3):369–392.doi:10.3790/zhf.40.3.369.JSTOR43612325.
Arblaster, Paul (2018).A History of the Low Countries. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Blockmans, W.P. (2015). "The Formation of a Political Union". In Blom, J. C. H.; Lamberts, E. (eds.).History of the Low Countries. Translated by Kennedy, James C. Berghahn Books. pp. 55–142.
Cox, Eugene L. (1967).The Green Count of Savoy. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.LCCN67-11030.
Thomas, Andrew L. (2010).A House Divided: Wittelsbach Confessional Court Cultures in the Holy Roman Empire, c. 1550–1650. Brill.
Deed by Emperor Louis the Bavarian for the Hospital of the Holy Spirit (Heilig-Geist-Spital) in Nuremberg,"digitalised image".Photograph Archive of Old Original Documents (Lichtbildarchiv älterer Originalurkunden).University of Marburg.
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