Heribert of Kinziggau, part 1

Stewart Baldwin

unread,

Apr 8, 2002, 8:40:50 PM4/8/02

to

Recently, during Sprink Break, I used a couple of days of the time off
to do some driving and consult some sources to which I don't usually
have access. Although the picture is still not so complete as I would
like, I can now say more about the case of Heribert of Kinziggau. To
briefly recap, the following matters were the three main items that
were discussed before:

1. The status of Heribert as father-in-law of Frederick of Luxemburg.

2. Heribert's parentage.

3. The canonically prohibited relationship between Otto of Hammerstein
(Heribert's son) and Otto's wife Irmingard.

Of these, it is the first two that are of primary interest to the
ancestor table of Henry II of England that is my main reason for
looking at these matters, but the evidence for the third item is
closely tied to the first two.

Part 1:
The status of Heribert as father-in-law of Frederick of Luxemburg.

As stated in a previous posting, the most direct evidence for the wife
of Frederick of Luxemburg comes from the "Vita Adelheidis", which
gives (in addition to others not directly relevant) the following
table:

Since the three individuals in the latest generation are easily
identifiable as three children of Frederick of Luxemburg, "NN" must be
either Frederick or his wife. However, since the mother of Frederick
was named Mathilde, "NN" cannot be Frederick and must therefore be his
wife. The next obvious question is the identity of the husband of
Irmintrude/Irmintrudis.

Not everyone in the past has given Heribert of Kinziggau as the
husband of Irmintrude. Vanderkindere (1902) vol. 1, pp. 164ff. (see
table p. 179) stated that Irmintrude married first to a count Richard
(parent of NN, wife of Frederick) and then to Arnoul de Florennes, but
his theory is based on little more than the identification of two
women named Irmintrude.

The attribution of Heribert as Irmintrude's husband was apparently
first proposed by Schenk zu Schweinsberg, Genealogische Studien zur
Reichsgeschichte I & II, in Archiv für hessische Geschichte und
Altertumskunde 3 (1904), 6 (1909), and has been widely accepted since
then. Although I have not seen this work by Schenk zu Schweinsberg, I
have picked up the main outline of the argument from other sources,
primarily Hlawitschka and Jackman. The basic primary source for this
is "Genealogia Ottonis et Irmingardis", a short item found associated
with documents from the synod of Seligenstadt (1023), which discussed,
among other things, the canonically prohibited marriage of Otto of
Hammerstein and Irmingard of Verdun. The item is short enough to
quote in full:

"Gebehard et Udo nepotes, fi1ii duorum fratrum. Gebehard genuit
Cunonem. Udo genuit Ottonem. Cuno genuit Cunonem. Heribertus genuit
Ottonem.

Item ex a1ia parte Godefridus et Gerbirhc nepos et neptis. Godefridus
genuit Irmingardam. Gerbirhc genuit Imizam. Imiza genuit 0ttonem."

[The above is quoted in both Hlawitschka (p. 49) and Jackman (p. 18)]

Of these, it is the second that is relevant to the identity of
Frederick's father-in-law. It tells how Otto of Hammerstein (son of
Heribert of Kinziggau) was related to his wife Irmingard, but without
giving the full details of the earlier generations:

This shows that Heribert's wife was a certain Imiza, daughter of
Gerberga. As Imiza is a nickname for Irmintrude, it was suggested
that Otto's mother Imiza/Irmintrude, daughter of a Gerberga, was the
same person as Frederick of Luxemburg's mother-in-law Irmintrude, also
daughter of a Gerberga. A piece of supporting evidence beyond the
identification of the mother daughter pair Gerberga-Irmintrude can be
noted. A daughter of Frederick of Luxemburg, named Imiza (note the
use of the same nicname as Heribert's wife) called "de Glizperch" or
"de Glizberch" (i.e., of Gleiberg), was the wife of count Welf of the
"first" Welf family, and mother of Cuniza, who married Adalberto Azzo
of Este and became ancestor of the "second" house of Welf. [See
Genealogia Welforum, MGH SS 13, 734; Historia Welforum Weingartensis,
MGH SS 21, 460.] It appears that Gleiberg (located in Konradiner
territory) came into the possession of the house of Luxemburg through
the marriage of Frederick with Heribert's daughter, but I have not
seen the direct evidence for this cited. The Luxemburg connections to
Gleiberg are clear from the Welf genealogies mentioned above. I would
still like to see direct evidence placing the Konradiners in
possession of Gleiberg.

In any case, it seems that the above identification of the Irmintrudes
and Gerbergas is widely accepted. It would be nice to know what other
evidence Schenk zu Schweinsberg offered, if anyone has access to that
source.

Heribert's parentage will be discussed in part 2.

Bibliographical abbreviations:

Hlawitschka = Eduard Hlawitschka, Die Anfänge des Hauses
Habsburg-Lothringen (Saarbrücken, 1969)

Jackman = Donald C. Jackman, The Konradiner. A Study in genealogical
methodology (Frankfurt, 1990)

Vanderkindere = Léon Vanderkindere, La Formation Territoriale des
Principautés Belges au Moyen Age (2 vols., Brussels, 1902)

End Part 1

Stewart Baldwin

Albert B. Bach

unread,

Apr 9, 2002, 3:23:40 AM4/9/02

to

I look forward to seeing the continuing parts.

I have an aside question though.

You state that "Imiza is a nickname for Irmintrude" and then go on
mentioning "Cuniza, who married Adalberto Azzo of Este"

I understand Azzo is a nickname for Adalberto.

Someone else already commented once before that it is incorrect to
give the double name Adalberto Azzo, and that it is one or the other
that should be used.

Similarly we would not call her "Irmintrude Imiza."

Or am I mistaken? Is "Adalberto Azzo" an accepted use?

Thanks.

Stewart Baldwin

unread,

Apr 9, 2002, 12:25:04 PM4/9/02

to

On 9 Apr 2002 00:23:40 -0700, postal...@hotmail.com (Albert B.
Bach) wrote:

>I look forward to seeing the continuing parts.
>
>I have an aside question though.
>
>You state that "Imiza is a nickname for Irmintrude" and then go on
>mentioning "Cuniza, who married Adalberto Azzo of Este"
>
>I understand Azzo is a nickname for Adalberto.
>
>Someone else already commented once before that it is incorrect to
>give the double name Adalberto Azzo, and that it is one or the other
>that should be used.
>
>Similarly we would not call her "Irmintrude Imiza."

I put a slash between the two names, indicating that it was two
alternate forms of the same name rather than a double name.

>Or am I mistaken? Is "Adalberto Azzo" an accepted use?

I'm not sure what the best use is here. I wrote it that way out of
habit, because I have seen it done that way before. However,
"Historia Welforum Weingartensis" calls him just Azzo. ("Genealogia
Welforum" calls him "Etius", apparently in error.) I'm not sure if
any of the primary sources use the double name, so perhaps just Azzo
(or Adalberto/Azzo with the slash) would be better.

Stewart Baldwin