Bishopric of Passau

Who rules

Name

Wolfger of Erla (also called Wolfger of Ellenbrechtskirchen)

Title

Bishop of Passau, prince of the Empire

Since

Elected 1191; ordained priest and consecrated bishop only after his election

Born

About 1140, near Erla by the Enns; so about 60 on 1 January 1200

Family

Of the Erla family of the Austrian-Bavarian border country (parents not named in the sources consulted). He was married before he took orders and has a son, who appears several times in his travel accounts; nothing is known of the wife, or whether she died or entered a convent.

Confidence

high

de.wikipedia (Wolfger von Erla): provost of Pfaffmünster (1183) and of Zell am See (1184); elected 1191; helped settle the affair of Richard I's captivity (1195); went on Henry VI's crusade (1197-1198) and afterwards won papal approval for the German hospital order at Acre (the Teutonic Order); made a papal judge by Innocent III in 1199; built Wolfstein castle during his reign; patron of poets; elected patriarch of Aquileia in 1204; died at Aquileia on 23 January 1218. The Speyer protest of 28 May 1199 lists him among the absent princes who authorised it.

Overlord

The king of the Romans: Philip of Swabia. The see's lands lie within the duchy of Bavaria, whose dukes held a protective advocacy (Schirmvogtei) over the church until 1262 (de.wikipedia, Hochstift Passau); how far Duke Louis I uses it in 1200 is not pinned.

What the realm holds

• The city of Passau: jurisdiction, administration, market, mint and toll granted by Otto III to Bishop Christian in 999 (a royal burgrave intruded 1078-1099 only); the Ilzstadt and the Innstadt
• The abbey of Niedernburg with its lands and rights, given to the bishop by Frederick I in 1161; Henry VI granted Wolfger the royal tax and the advocacy over it in 1191 (de.wikipedia, Kloster Niedernburg; the city article gives 1193), and Wolfger deposed the abbess and put the house under a dean. Its forest land between the Ilz and the Bohemian border is the later Land der Abtei, confirmed by Frederick II only in 1217
• Wolfstein castle (Freyung), built during Wolfger's reign (date not pinned)
• Obernberg on the Inn: castle and market, Passau's from the end of the 12th century; Wolfger laid out the market square and castle square in 1199
• Mattsee by Salzburg: the collegiate church and its lordship, Passau's since 993
• Eferding (under the bishop's lordship by 1167, with a castle) and Ebelsberg (castle on the Traun, formerly Kremsmünster's) in the Traungau
• In Austria: St. Pölten (a town by Bishop Konrad's charter of 1159), Mautern (Passau's since 985 or 991, run from a fortified courtyard), Zeiselmauer with the eastern Tullnerfeld (given 836; the bishop's palace in the east of the diocese)
• Linz on the Danube: castle and market held of the bishop as a fief by Gottschalk (II) of Haunsberg, who sells it to Leopold VI in 1205-06 (Austria file's records Linz (Haunsberg) and Linz; de.wikipedia says Linz was under the Bavarian dukes until 1210)
• Lesser estates, tithes and patronage of parishes all down the Danube (not drawn)

How it was acquired

City rights 999; Niedernburg 1161 with the 1191 grant; Austrian estates from the 9th and 10th centuries; Mattsee 993; Obernberg late 12th century. Later and not yet: the county in the Ilzgau (1207), the Windberg county from the duke of Merania (early 13th century), Vichtenstein (1227), the Veste Oberhaus (1219).

Allies and rivals

King Philip and the pope both; his metropolitan the archbishop of Salzburg; the Babenberg duke Leopold VI, whose duchy is his diocese and who will want a bishop of his own at Vienna (Leopold's plan of 1207 is later); the duke of Bavaria, protective advocate; the Andechs-Meranians, neighbours at Neuburg on the Inn and Schärding; the counts of Wasserburg at Vichtenstein on the Danube just below the city (they will pledge it to Passau in 1218); the lords of Kamm at Hals castle above the Ilz (since 1190), who quarrelled with the bishops and the counts of Bogen (date of the quarrel not pinned).

The realm that morning

Wolfger holds the city and his lordships in peace on 1 January 1200 as far as the sources show; his movements that winter are not pinned. The Niedernburg forest land is interlaced with the comital rights of the Ilzgau (others' until 1207), advocacies and fiefs. Throne war: Staufen (absent authoriser of the Speyer protest, May 1199), and also Innocent III's judge since 1199: the best-placed go-between of the realm.

Wealth

Tolls on the Danube and the Inn at Passau; the salt that comes down the Salzach and Inn from Reichenhall and Hallein and goes north on packhorses by the Golden Path (Goldener Steig) to Prachatice in Bohemia (the road named indirectly in 1010), with grain coming back; the Passau mint; forest, timber and new clearings in the Abtei land; Wachau and Danube wine from Mautern and Zeiselmauer; St. Pölten's market; the tithes and dues of the largest diocese of the Empire.

Military

Ministeriales and vassals of the church, not pinned by name for 1200; castles at Passau (the bishop's palace and city walls; the Veste Oberhaus is not built until 1219), Obernberg (new), Wolfstein (being built under Wolfger), Ebelsberg, Eferding, Mautern's fortified courtyard. No campaign of Wolfger's own is recorded; his weapon is diplomacy.

Threats

• Ducal ambitions in Austria over the church's estates and the diocese itself
• Bavarian ducal advocacy
• The lords of Kamm at Hals and other neighbours on the Ilz
• The schism: a pope who leans to Otto and a king who needs Wolfger

Officers and household

Not pinned by name for 1200: the cathedral dean and chapter, the dean set over Niedernburg, the officials (later called Pfleger) at Mautern, the steward at Zeiselmauer. Wolfger's son and household appear in his travel accounts of 1203-04.

Coinage

Passau pennies from the mint granted in 999.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. 1200 (not pinned)Wolfger serves Philip as envoy and the pope as judge; the new markets and castles at Obernberg and Wolfstein go on being built.Depends on: Peace in the see. Stopped by: War with Bavaria or Austria, or the bishop's absence.
2. 8 April 1200 onwardsAs senior suffragan he is drawn into the Salzburg succession after Adalbert's death (no role pinned).Depends on: Adalbert's death. Stopped by: Adalbert living.
3. 1203-1204 (beyond 1200)His travel accounts record, at Zeiselmauer on 12 November 1203, five long shillings to the singer Walther von der Vogelweide for a fur coat, the only record of Walther outside his poems. Wolfger's patronage before 1203 is likely but not documented.Depends on: Nothing in 1200. Stopped by: Not applicable.
4. 1204 (beyond 1200)Wolfger is elected patriarch of Aquileia and leaves Passau.Depends on: The Aquileia vacancy of 1204. Stopped by: His death or a different election.

Places of note

• Niedernburg abbey: Royal abbey given to the see in 1161, under a dean since Wolfger
• Wolfstein castle: Built under Wolfger (date not pinned)

Where the sources disagree

• The date of Henry VI's grant over Niedernburg differs: 1191 (de.wikipedia, Kloster Niedernburg) or 1193 (de.wikipedia, Passau).
• campaign notes call Wolfger patron of Walther von der Vogelweide: true, but the one dated record is 12 November 1203; in January 1200 the patronage is not documented.

Evidence: Wolfger's career is well documented (de.wikipedia, the Speyer list, his travel accounts). The city grant and Niedernburg are dated. The extent of the Abtei land in 1200 and the boundaries of the Austrian lordships are reconstructed from later territories.

On the map: The Abtei land is drawn to the later Land der Abtei (east of the Ilz, north of the Danube, up to the forest frontier with Bohemia); in 1200 its northern half was forest and new clearings, and the Ilzgau county inside it was not yet the bishop's. The Austrian and Traungau lordships are separate lord records.

Primary sources for this realm

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Annals of Schäftlarn and the Bavarian annals (12th and 13th centuries). Brief Bavarian annals. Read online
• The Austrian and Salzburg annals (kept in the 12th and 13th centuries, with continuations to the late 13th century). A family of monastic annals from Austria, Styria and Salzburg, printed together. Read online
• Bavarian monuments: the charters of the Bavarian monasteries and bishoprics (charters from the 8th century onward, published 1763 to 1916). The great charter series of Bavaria, arranged by monastery and bishopric. Read online