Zwischen Haupthoflager, Jagdschloss und geistlichem Zentrum Die ernestinische »Residenzenlandschaft« und ihre Rolle in der frühen Reformationszeit (original) (raw)

2018, Fitschen, Klaus/ Schröter, Marianne/ Spehr, Christopher/ Waschke, Ernst-Joachim (Hgg.): Kulturelle Wirkungen der Reformation. Kongressdokumentation Lutherstadt Wittenberg August 2017, hrsg. unter Mitarbeit von Mathias Sonnleithner und Katrin Stöck, Band I bzw. II. Leipzig 2018

This paper (gally proof with corrections) in German language is the short version of a lecture held 2017 in Wittenberg at the “Cultural Impact of the Reformation”. Why did the Saxon prince elector didn’t react as his professor of moral-philosophy and theology, Martin Luther, posted his theses against the promulgation of indulgences at the very door of the castle church of Wittenberg, where the prince elector collected and proclaimed his own relics and indulgences? Why wasn’t the posting prevented? He just wasn’t on the spot. The Saxon prince and his court, including chaplain (Georg Spalatin), the court choir (incl. Georg Major) arrived at the 29. October 1517 Altenburg and stayed there until 16. November. Nevertheless, the news of the “positiones” Luther proclaimed reached Altenburg, 100 km or 2 days for a running courier south of Wittenberg, in the first days of November 1517. The chaplain Spalatin complained to Luther, that he didn’t inform the court about his plans to proclaim their (!) theses. This is indirect evidence that the Luther or someone else did proclaim the theses around 31. October 1517. This connection alone illustrates the importance of the knowledge about the court and ruling system of Saxony. This paper is delivering some examples for the failure of this residence system under the pressure of the early Reformation and the outcome of the specific ruling system in Saxony for the Reformation. The development of central administration, centers of power and “representation”, the so-called residences, is considered an essential step on the way from pre-modern sovereignty to modern statehood. The example of Elector Friedrich III. of Saxony (1463–1525) is intended to show that the path from itinerant rule to central residence in a country whose centers of rule were linked to dynastic coincidence, political circumstances and personal preferences was by no means a stringent one. As a diligent imperial politician, the Elector Friedrich attended numerous imperial diets and meetings of princes, traveled abroad several times as a pilgrim and in royal service, where he received cultural suggestions. Even in his own territory, which stretched from Coburg (90 km north of Nürnberg) via Weimar and Wittenberg to Beeskow (50 km southeast of Berlin), he remained active. In addition to the varying/rotating main court camps (Torgau, Weimar, Coburg, Altenburg etc.), he often travelled with parts of his court to side court camps at smaller castles. The residences received by this means individual characteristics with different functions. The relatively independence of the economic and legal administration and a considerable messenger system enabled the prince to be very mobile and to represent himself in a magnificent manner. However, this residence and ruling system was not always able to cope with the rapid developments in the early Reformation period.