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Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen

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The Archdiocese of Bremen (German: Erzbistum Bremen) is a historical Roman Catholic diocese and a former eccesiastical state, named Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen (German: Erzstift Bremen) in the Holy Roman Empire. The secular state did not include all the diocesan territory. Eg. the city of Bremen was no part of the prince-archbishopric but belonged to the archdiocese. Most of the prince-archbishopric lay rather in the area to the north of the city of Bremen, between the Weser and Elbe rivers. Even more confusingly parts of the prince-archbishopric belonged in religious respect to the neighboured diocese of Verden. While Verden (IPA: [ˈfeːɐdn]) itself had a double identity too as Diocese of Verden (German: Bistum Verden) and Prince-Bishopric of Verden (German: Hochstift Verden). Each prince-bishopric had the status of an Imperial State or Imperial Estate (German singular: Reichsstand, plural: Reichsstände), which were represented in the Diet (German: Reichstag) of the Holy Roman Empire. The Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen belonged to the Saxon Circle (later the Lower Saxon Circle; German: Sächsischer or later Niedersächsischer Kreis), an administratve substructure of the Empire. The Prince-Bishopric of Verden, on the other hand, belonged to the Lower Rhenish-Westphalian Circle (sometimes called Westphalian Circle) and sent its own representative to the Diet. Even when the two prince-bishoprics were ruled in personal union, in order to maintain the two seats in the Diet they were never formally united in a real union. The same is true for the Duchies of Bremen and Verden (German colloquial: Herzogtümer Bremen und Verden, but formally Herzogtum Bremen und Fürstentum Verden) which emerged in 1648 from the securalised two prince-bishoprics.


History

The Archdiocese before statehood

The foundation of the diocese belongs to the period of the missionary activity of Willehad on the lower Weser. It was erected July 15, 787, at Worms, on Charlemagne's initiative, his jurisdiction being assigned to cover the Saxon territory on both sides of the Weser from the mouth of the Aller, northward to the Elbe and westward to the Hunte, and the Frisian territory for a certain distance from the mouth of the Weser.

Willehad fixed his headquarters at Bremen, though the formal constitution of the diocese took place only after the subjugation of the Saxons in 804 or 805, when Willehad's disciple, Willerich, was consecrated bishop of Bremen, with the same territory. The diocese was probably at that time ecclesiastically subject to Cologne. When, after the death of Bishop Leuderich (838–45), it was given to Ansgar, it lost its independence, and from that time was permanently united with Hamburg.

The new combined see was regarded as the headquarters for missionary work in the north, and new sees to be erected were to be subject to its jurisdiction. Ansgar's successor, Rimbert, the "second apostle of the north," was troubled by onslaughts first of the Normans and then of the Wends, and by renewed claims on the part of Cologne. The see of Bremen attained its greatest prosperity and later had its deepest troubles under Adalbert. The next two archbishops, Liemar and Humbert, were determined opponents of Gregory VII.

Under the latter the archbishopric of Lund was erected, and Bremen had suffragan sees only in name, the Wendish bishoprics having been destroyed.

The Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen as a territory of imperial immediacy

When in 1180 the Duchy of Saxony had been shattered and before its last duke Henry III, the Lion was send to Exile in 1182, the territory of Saxony was devided. The Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen became one of the Duchy of Saxony's successor states, holding only a small part of the former Duchy's territory. The Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen had the satus of an Imperial State or Imperial Estate (German singular: Reichsstand, plural: Reichsstände) in the Holy Roman Empire with a vote in the Reichstag or Imperial Diet. Rulers of territories of Imperial Estate status or of Imperial Immediacy (Reichsunmittelbarkeit) had no authority above them except the Holy Roman Emperor himself; furthermore, they possessed several important rights and privileges, including a degree of autonomy in the rule of their territories.

Schisms in Church and State marked the next two centuries, and in spite of the labours of the Windesheim and Bursfelde congregations, the way was prepared for the Reformation, which made rapid headway, partly because the last Roman Catholic prince-archbishop, Christopher of Brunswick, was also prince-bishop of Verden and resided there.

By the time he died (1558), nothing was left of the old religion apart from a few monasteries and the districts served by them. The title of prince-archbishop, with the secular jurisdiction, was borne for a time by Protestant princes. The Peace of Westphalia (1648) secularised it and made it (with Verden) a duchy and an appanage of the crown of Sweden, which also fully recognised the secularisation. By the Peace of Westphalia (1648) the territory's status changed from a prince-archbishopric to that of a duchy.

In 1712 it passed into the possession of Denmark, and three years later was sold to the Electorate of Brunswick and Lüneburg (or, colloquially Electorate of Hanover; German: Kurfürstentum Braunschweig und Lüneburg, or Kurhannover), to which it was restored in 1813 after the Napoleonic disturbances. Its former diocesan territory was distributed at this time among the still-existing neighbouring dioceses of Hildesheim, Osnabrück, and Münster. The imperial city of Bremen and the surrounding district being administered by the vicar-apostolic of the northern missions.

List of bishops and archbishops of Bremen

Bishops of Bremen, 787-865

in Personal-Union with Archbishops of Hamburg 865-1072

Archbishops of Bremen, 1072-1179

Prince-Archbishops of Bremen, 1180-1558

Protestant Administrators of the Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen, 1558-1648

References

  • Dannenberg, Hans-Eckhard and Heinz-Joachim Schulze (eds.) (1995–2008). Geschichte des Landes zwischen Elbe und Weser (3 vol., vol. 1 Vor- und Frühgeschichte (1995), vol. 2 Mittelalter (einschl. Kunstgeschichte) (1995), vol. 3 Neuzeit (2008), (Schriftenreihe des Landschaftsverbandes der ehem. Herzogtümer Bremen und Verden; vol. 7) ed.). Stade: Landschaftsverband der ehem. Herzogtümer Bremen und Verden. ISBN (vol. 1) ISBN 3-9801919-7-5, (vol. 2) ISBN 3-9801919-8-2, (vol. 3) ISBN 3-9801919-9-9. {{cite book}}: |first= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: date format (link)
  • H.Grote: Stammtafeln, Leipzig 1877, S. 506
  • Public Domain This article incorporates text from a publication in the public domain: Jackson, Samuel Macauley, ed. (1914). New Schaff–Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge (third ed.). London and New York: Funk and Wagnalls. {{cite encyclopedia}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  • Schleif, Hans (1972). Regierung und Verwaltung des Erzstifts Bremen am Beginn der Neuzeit (1500-1645): Eine Studie zum Wesen der modernen Staatlichkeit (zugl.: Hamburg, Univ., Diss., 1968, (Schriftenreihe des Landschaftsverbandes der ehem. Herzogtümer Bremen und Verden; vol. 1) ed.). Stade: Landschaftsverband der ehem. Herzogtümer Bremen und Verden. ISBN 3-931879-23-5.

See also

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