Previously in Herodotus
125. This pyramid was made after the manner of steps, which some call "rows" and others "bases": and when they had first made it thus, they raised the remaining stones with machines made of short pieces of timber, raising them first from the ground to the first stage of the steps, and when the stone got up to this it was placed upon another machine standing on the first stage, and so from this it was drawn to the second upon another machine; for as many as were the courses of the steps, so many machines there were also, or perhaps they transferred one and the same machine, made so as easily to be carried, to each stage successively, in order that they might take up the stones; for let it be told in both ways, according as it is reported. However that may be, the highest parts of it were finished first, and afterwards they proceeded to finish that which came next to them, and lastly they finished the parts of it near the ground and the lowest ranges. On the pyramid it is declared in Egyptian writing how much was spent on radishes and onions and leeks for the workmen, and if I rightly remember that which the interpreter said in reading to me this inscription, a sum of one thousand six hundred talents of silver was spent; and if this is so, how much besides is likely to have been expended upon the iron with which they worked, and upon bread and clothing for the workmen, seeing that they were building the works for the time which has been mentioned and were occupied for no small time besides, as I suppose, in the cutting and bringing of the stones and in working at the excavation under the ground?
126. Cheops moreover came, they said, to such a pitch of wickedness, that being in want of money he caused his own daughter to sit in the stews, and ordered her to obtain from those who came a certain amount of money (how much it was they did not tell me); but she not only obtained the sum appointed by her father, but also she formed a design for herself privately to leave behind her a memorial, and she requested each man who came in to her to give her one stone upon her building: and of these stones, they told me, the pyramid was built which stands in front of the great pyramid in the middle of the three, each side being one hundred and fifty feet in length.
127. This Cheops, the Egyptians said, reigned fifty years; and after he was dead his brother Chephren succeeded to the kingdom. This king followed the same manner as the other, both in all the rest and also in that he made a pyramid, not indeed attaining to the measurements of that which was built by the former (this I know, having myself also measured it), and moreover there are no underground chambers beneath nor does a channel come from the Nile flowing to this one as to the other, in which the water coming through a conduit built for it flows round an island within, where they say that Cheops himself is laid: but for a basement he built the first course of Ethiopian stone of divers colours; and this pyramid he made forty feet lower than the other as regards size, building it close to the great pyramid. These stand both upon the same hill, which is about a hundred feet high. And Chephren they said reigned fifty and six years.
128. Here then they reckon one hundred and six years, during which they say that there was nothing but evil for the Egyptians, and the temples were kept closed and not opened during all that time. These kings the Egyptians by reason of their hatred of them are not very willing to name; nay, they even call the pyramids after the name of Philitis the shepherd, who at that time pastured flocks in those regions.
129. After him, they said, Mykerinos became king over Egypt, who was the son of Cheops; and to him his father's deeds were displeasing, and he both opened the temples and gave liberty to the people, who were ground down to the last extremity of evil, to return to their own business and to their sacrifices;: also he gave decisions of their causes juster than those of all the other kings besides. In regard to this then they commend this king more than all the other kings who had arisen in Egypt before him; for he not only gave good decisions, but also when a man complained of the decision, he gave him recompense from his own goods and thus satisfied his desire. But while Mykerinos was acting mercifully to his subjects and practicing this conduct which has been said, calamities befell him, of which the first was this, namely that his daughter died, the only child whom he had in his house: and being above measure grieved by that which had befallen him, and desiring to bury his daughter in a manner more remarkable than others, he made a cow of wood, which he covered over with gold, and then within it he buried this daughter who, as I said, had died.
130. This cow was not covered up in the ground, but it might be seen even down to my own time in the city of Saïs, placed within the royal palace in a chamber which was greatly adorned; and they offer incense of all kinds before it every day, and each night a lamp burns beside it all through the night. Near this cow in another chamber stand images of the concubines of Mykerinos, as the priests at Saïs told me; for there are in fact colossal wooden statues, in number about twenty, made with naked bodies; but who they are I am not able to say, except only that which is reported.
- Herodotus, Book II
More Information: Egypt, Herodotus's Book.
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Monday, April 28, 2014
Brandenburg Pawned
Featuring Thomas Carlyle
Previously on The House of Hohenzollern Established in Brandenburg
Time: 1387
Place: Berlin, Brandenburg
No end of troubles to Sigismund, and to Brandenburg through him, from this sublime Hungarian legacy. Like a remote fabulous golden fleece, which you have to go and conquer first, and which is worth little when conquered. Before ever setting out (1387), Sigismund saw too clearly that he would have cash to raise: an operation he had never done with, all his life afterward. He pawned Brandenburg to cousin Jobst of Mähren; got "twenty thousand Bohemian gulden"--I guess, a most slender sum, if Dryasdust would but interpret it. This was the beginning of pawnings to Brandenburg; of which when will the end be? Jobst thereby came into Brandenburg on his own right for the time, not as tutor or guardian, which he had hitherto been. Into Brandenburg; and there was no chance of repayment to get him out again.
Jobst tried at first to do some governing; but finding all very anarchic, grew unhopeful; took to making matters easy for himself. Took, in fact, to turning a penny on his pawn-ticket; alienating crown domains, winking hard at robber barons, and the like--and after a few years, went home to Moravia, leaving Brandenburg to shift for itself, under a Statthalter (Viceregent, more like a hungry land-steward), whom nobody took the trouble of respecting. Robber castles flourished; all else decayed. No highway not unsafe; many a Turpin with sixteen quarters, and styling himself Edle Herr (noble gentleman), took to "living from the saddle": what are Hamburg pedlers made for but to be robbed?
The towns suffered much; any trade they might have had, going to wreck in this manner. Not to speak of private feuds, which abounded ad libitum. Neighboring potentates, Archbishop of Magdeburg and others, struck in also at discretion, as they had gradually got accustomed to do, and snapped away some convenient bit of territory, or, more legitimately, they came across to coerce, at their own hand, this or the other Edle Herr of the Turpin sort, whom there was no other way of getting at, when he carried matters quite too high. "Droves of six hundred swine"--I have seen (by reading in those old books) certain noble gentlemen, "of Putlitz," I think, driving them openly, captured by the stronger hand; and have heard the short querulous squeak of the bristly creatures: "What is the use of being a pig at all, if I am to be stolen in this way, and surreptitiously made into ham?" Pigs do continue to be bred in Brandenburg: but it is under such discouragements. Agriculture, trade, well-being and well-doing of any kind, it is not encouragement they are meeting here. Probably few countries, not even Ireland, have a worse outlook, unless help come.
Jobst came back in 1398, after eight years' absence; but no help came with Jobst. The Neumark of Brandenburg, which was brother Johann's portion, had fallen home to Sigismund, brother Johann having died; but Sigismund, far from redeeming old pawn-tickets with the Neumark, pawned the Neumark too--the second pawnage of Brandenburg. Pawned the Neumark to the Teutsch Ritters "for sixty-three thousand Hungarian gulden" (I think, about thirty thousand pounds), and gave no part of it to Jobst; had not nearly enough for himself and his Hungarian occasions.
Seeing which, and hearing such squeak of pigs surreptitiously driven, with little but discordant sights and sounds everywhere, Jobst became disgusted with the matter; and resolved to wash his hands of it, at least to have his money out of it again. Having sold what of the domains he could to persons of quality, at an uncommonly easy rate, and so pocketed what ready cash there was among them, he made over his pawn-ticket, or properly he himself repawned Brandenburg to the Saxon potentate, a speculative moneyed man, Markgraf of Meissen, "Wilhelm the Rich," so called. Pawned it to Wilhelm the Rich--sum not named; and went home to Moravia, there to wait events. This is the third Brandenburg pawning: let us hope there may be a fourth and last.
And so we have now reached that point in Brandenburg history when, if some help does not come, Brandenburg will not long be a country, but will either get dissipated in pieces and stuck to the edge of others where some government is, or else go waste again and fall to the bisons and wild bears.
Who now is Kurfürst of Brandenburg, might be a question. "I unquestionably!" Sigismund would answer, with astonishment. "Soft, your Hungarian Majesty," thinks Jobst: "till my cash is paid may it not probably be another?" This question has its interest: the Electors just now (1400) are about deposing Wenzel; must choose some better Kaiser. If they wanted another scion of the house of Luxemburg--a mature old gentleman of sixty; full of plans, plausibilities, pretensions--Jobst is their man. Jobst and Sigismund were of one mind as to Wenzel's going; at least Sigismund voted clearly so, and Jobst said nothing counter: but the Kurfürsts did not think of Jobst for successor. After some stumbling, they fixed upon Rupert Kur-Pfalz (Elector Palatine, Ruprecht von der Pfalz) as Kaiser.
Rupert of the Pfalz proved a highly respectable Kaiser; lasted for ten years (1400-10), with honor to himself and the Reich. A strong heart, strong head, but short of means. He chastised petty mutiny with vigor, could not bring down the Milanese Visconti, who had perched themselves so high on money paid to Wenzel; could not heal the schism of the Church (double or triple Pope, Rome-Avignon affair), or awaken the Reich to a sense of its old dignity and present loose condition. In the late loose times, as antiquaries remark, most members of the Empire, petty princes even and imperial towns, had been struggling to set up for themselves; and were now concerned chiefly to become sovereign in their own territories. And Schilter informs us it was about this period that most of them attained such rather unblessed consummation; Rupert of himself not able to help it, with all his willingness. The people called him "Rupert Klemm (Rupert Smith's-vise)," from his resolute ways; which nickname--given him not in hatred, but partly in satirical good-will—is itself a kind of history. From historians of the Reich he deserves honorable regretful mention.
Continued
Previously on The House of Hohenzollern Established in Brandenburg
Time: 1387
Place: Berlin, Brandenburg
No end of troubles to Sigismund, and to Brandenburg through him, from this sublime Hungarian legacy. Like a remote fabulous golden fleece, which you have to go and conquer first, and which is worth little when conquered. Before ever setting out (1387), Sigismund saw too clearly that he would have cash to raise: an operation he had never done with, all his life afterward. He pawned Brandenburg to cousin Jobst of Mähren; got "twenty thousand Bohemian gulden"--I guess, a most slender sum, if Dryasdust would but interpret it. This was the beginning of pawnings to Brandenburg; of which when will the end be? Jobst thereby came into Brandenburg on his own right for the time, not as tutor or guardian, which he had hitherto been. Into Brandenburg; and there was no chance of repayment to get him out again.
Jobst tried at first to do some governing; but finding all very anarchic, grew unhopeful; took to making matters easy for himself. Took, in fact, to turning a penny on his pawn-ticket; alienating crown domains, winking hard at robber barons, and the like--and after a few years, went home to Moravia, leaving Brandenburg to shift for itself, under a Statthalter (Viceregent, more like a hungry land-steward), whom nobody took the trouble of respecting. Robber castles flourished; all else decayed. No highway not unsafe; many a Turpin with sixteen quarters, and styling himself Edle Herr (noble gentleman), took to "living from the saddle": what are Hamburg pedlers made for but to be robbed?
The towns suffered much; any trade they might have had, going to wreck in this manner. Not to speak of private feuds, which abounded ad libitum. Neighboring potentates, Archbishop of Magdeburg and others, struck in also at discretion, as they had gradually got accustomed to do, and snapped away some convenient bit of territory, or, more legitimately, they came across to coerce, at their own hand, this or the other Edle Herr of the Turpin sort, whom there was no other way of getting at, when he carried matters quite too high. "Droves of six hundred swine"--I have seen (by reading in those old books) certain noble gentlemen, "of Putlitz," I think, driving them openly, captured by the stronger hand; and have heard the short querulous squeak of the bristly creatures: "What is the use of being a pig at all, if I am to be stolen in this way, and surreptitiously made into ham?" Pigs do continue to be bred in Brandenburg: but it is under such discouragements. Agriculture, trade, well-being and well-doing of any kind, it is not encouragement they are meeting here. Probably few countries, not even Ireland, have a worse outlook, unless help come.
Jobst came back in 1398, after eight years' absence; but no help came with Jobst. The Neumark of Brandenburg, which was brother Johann's portion, had fallen home to Sigismund, brother Johann having died; but Sigismund, far from redeeming old pawn-tickets with the Neumark, pawned the Neumark too--the second pawnage of Brandenburg. Pawned the Neumark to the Teutsch Ritters "for sixty-three thousand Hungarian gulden" (I think, about thirty thousand pounds), and gave no part of it to Jobst; had not nearly enough for himself and his Hungarian occasions.
Seeing which, and hearing such squeak of pigs surreptitiously driven, with little but discordant sights and sounds everywhere, Jobst became disgusted with the matter; and resolved to wash his hands of it, at least to have his money out of it again. Having sold what of the domains he could to persons of quality, at an uncommonly easy rate, and so pocketed what ready cash there was among them, he made over his pawn-ticket, or properly he himself repawned Brandenburg to the Saxon potentate, a speculative moneyed man, Markgraf of Meissen, "Wilhelm the Rich," so called. Pawned it to Wilhelm the Rich--sum not named; and went home to Moravia, there to wait events. This is the third Brandenburg pawning: let us hope there may be a fourth and last.
And so we have now reached that point in Brandenburg history when, if some help does not come, Brandenburg will not long be a country, but will either get dissipated in pieces and stuck to the edge of others where some government is, or else go waste again and fall to the bisons and wild bears.
Who now is Kurfürst of Brandenburg, might be a question. "I unquestionably!" Sigismund would answer, with astonishment. "Soft, your Hungarian Majesty," thinks Jobst: "till my cash is paid may it not probably be another?" This question has its interest: the Electors just now (1400) are about deposing Wenzel; must choose some better Kaiser. If they wanted another scion of the house of Luxemburg--a mature old gentleman of sixty; full of plans, plausibilities, pretensions--Jobst is their man. Jobst and Sigismund were of one mind as to Wenzel's going; at least Sigismund voted clearly so, and Jobst said nothing counter: but the Kurfürsts did not think of Jobst for successor. After some stumbling, they fixed upon Rupert Kur-Pfalz (Elector Palatine, Ruprecht von der Pfalz) as Kaiser.
Rupert of the Pfalz proved a highly respectable Kaiser; lasted for ten years (1400-10), with honor to himself and the Reich. A strong heart, strong head, but short of means. He chastised petty mutiny with vigor, could not bring down the Milanese Visconti, who had perched themselves so high on money paid to Wenzel; could not heal the schism of the Church (double or triple Pope, Rome-Avignon affair), or awaken the Reich to a sense of its old dignity and present loose condition. In the late loose times, as antiquaries remark, most members of the Empire, petty princes even and imperial towns, had been struggling to set up for themselves; and were now concerned chiefly to become sovereign in their own territories. And Schilter informs us it was about this period that most of them attained such rather unblessed consummation; Rupert of himself not able to help it, with all his willingness. The people called him "Rupert Klemm (Rupert Smith's-vise)," from his resolute ways; which nickname--given him not in hatred, but partly in satirical good-will—is itself a kind of history. From historians of the Reich he deserves honorable regretful mention.
Continued
Sunday, April 27, 2014
The House of Hohenzollern Established in Brandenburg
Featuring Thomas Carlyle
Time: 1380
Place: Berlin, Brandenburg
Blog’s Preface:
The Hohenzollern family had gotten rich and were ready to make their move into nobility by the late 1300’s. Meanwhile in Berlin, the Elector Charles IV died. Carlyle, in his own pictorial style describes the subsequent complications by which the Hohenzollerns got hold of the region. They would eventually rule all of Germany and plunge the world into World War I but first they had to start.
Now begins Thomas Carlyle:
Karl left three young sons, Wenzel, Sigismund, Johann; and also a certain nephew much older; all of whom now more or less concern us in this unfortunate history.
Wenzel, the eldest son, heritable Kurfuerst of Brandenburg as well as King of Bohemia, was as yet only seventeen, who nevertheless got to be kaiser--and went widely astray, poor soul. The nephew was no other than Margrave Jobst of Moravia, now in the vigor of his years and a stirring man: to him, for a time, the chief management in Brandenburg fell, in these circumstances. Wenzel, still a minor, and already Kaiser and King of Bohemia, gave up Brandenburg to his two younger brothers, most of it to Sigismund, with a cutting for Johann, to help their appanages; and applied his own powers to govern the Holy Roman Empire, at that early stage of life.
To govern the Holy Roman Empire, poor soul--or rather "to drink beer and dance with the girls"; in which, if defective in other things, Wenzel had an eminent talent. He was one of the worst kaisers and the least victorious on record. He would attend to nothing in the Reich; "the Prag white beer, and girls" of various complexion, being much preferable, as he was heard to say. He had to fling his poor Queen's Confessor into the river Moldau--Johann of Nepomuk, Saint so called, if he is not a fable altogether; whose Statue stands on Bridges ever since, in those parts. Wenzel's Bohemians revolted against him; put him in jail; and he broke prison, a boatman's daughter helping him out, with adventures. His
Germans were disgusted with him; deposed him from the kaisership; chose Rupert of the Pfalz; and then, after Rupert's death, chose Wenzel's own brother Sigismund in his stead--left Wenzel to jumble about in his native Bohemian element, as king there, for nineteen years longer, still breaking pots to a ruinous extent.
He ended by apoplexy, or sudden spasm of the heart; terrible Ziska, as it were, killing him at second hand. For Ziska, stout and furious, blind of one eye and at last of both, a kind of human rhinoceros driven mad, had risen out of the ashes of murdered Huss, and other bad papistic doings, in the interim; and was tearing up the world at a huge rate. Rhinoceros Ziska was on the Weissenberg, or a still nearer hill of Prag since called Ziska-berg (Ziska Hill); and none durst whisper of it to the King. A servant waiting at dinner inadvertently let slip the word: "Ziska there? Deny it, slave!" cried Wenzel, frantic. Slave durst not deny. Wenzel drew his sword to run at him, but fell down dead: that was the last pot broken by Wenzel. The hapless royal ex-imperial phantasm self-broken in this manner. Poor soul, he came to the kaisership too early; was a thin violent creature, sensible to the charms and horrors of created objects; and had terrible rhinoceros ziskas and unruly horned cattle to drive. He was one of the worst kaisers ever known--could have done Opera Singing much better--and a sad sight to Bohemia. Let us leave him there: he was never actual Elector of Brandenburg, having given it up in time; never did any ill to that poor country.
The real Kurfürst of Brandenburg all this while was Sigismund, Wenzel's next brother, under tutelage of cousin Jobst or otherwise--a real and yet imaginary, for he never himself governed, but always had Jobst of Mähren or some other in his place there. Sigismund was to have married a daughter of Burggraf Friedrich V; and he was himself, as was the young lady, well inclined to this arrangement. But the old people being dead, and some offer of a king's daughter turning up for Sigismund, Sigismund broke off; and took the king's daughter, King of Hungary's--not without regret then and afterward, as is believed. At any rate, the Hungarian charmer proved a wife of small merit, and a Hungarian successor she had was a wife of light conduct even; Hungarian charmers, and Hungarian affairs, were much other than a comfort to Sigismund.
As for the disappointed princess, Burggraf Friedrich's daughter, she said nothing that we hear; silently became a Nun, an Abbess: and through a long life looked out, with her thoughts to herself, upon the loud whirlwind of things, where Sigismund (oftenest an imponderous rag of conspicuous color) was riding and tossing. Her two brothers also, joint Burggraves after their father's death, seemed to have reconciled themselves without difficulty. The elder of them was already Sigismund's brother-in-law; married to Sigismund's and Wenzel's sister--by such predestination as we saw. Burggraf Johann III was the name of this one; a stout fighter and manager for many years; much liked, and looked to, by Sigismund, as indeed were both the brothers, for that matter; always, together or in succession, a kind of right hand to Sigismund. Frederick (Friedrich), the younger Burggraf, and ultimately the survivor and inheritor (Johann having left no sons), is the famed Burggraf Friedrich VI the last and notablest of all the Burggraves--a man of distinguished importance, extrinsic and intrinsic; chief or among the very chief of German public men in his time; and memorable to Posterity, and to this history, on still other grounds! But let us not anticipate.
Sigismund, if appanaged with Brandenburg alone, and wedded to his first love, not a king's daughter, might have done tolerably well there; better than Wenzel, with the empire and Bohemia, did. But delusive Fortune threw her golden apple at Sigismund too; and he, in the wide high world, had to play strange pranks. His father-in-law died in Hungary, Sigismund's first wife his only child. Father-in-law bequeathed Hungary to Sigismund, who plunged into a strange sea thereby; got troubles without number, beatings not a few, and had even to take boat, and sail for his life down to Constantinople, at one time. In which sad adventure Burggraf Johann escorted him, and as it were tore him out by the hair of the head. These troubles and adventures lasted many years; in the course of which, Sigismund, trying all manner of friends and expedients, found in the Burggraves of Nuremberg, Johann and Friedrich, with their talents, possessions, and resources, the main or almost only sure support he got.
Continued
Time: 1380
Place: Berlin, Brandenburg
Blog’s Preface:
The Hohenzollern family had gotten rich and were ready to make their move into nobility by the late 1300’s. Meanwhile in Berlin, the Elector Charles IV died. Carlyle, in his own pictorial style describes the subsequent complications by which the Hohenzollerns got hold of the region. They would eventually rule all of Germany and plunge the world into World War I but first they had to start.
Now begins Thomas Carlyle:
Karl left three young sons, Wenzel, Sigismund, Johann; and also a certain nephew much older; all of whom now more or less concern us in this unfortunate history.
Wenzel, the eldest son, heritable Kurfuerst of Brandenburg as well as King of Bohemia, was as yet only seventeen, who nevertheless got to be kaiser--and went widely astray, poor soul. The nephew was no other than Margrave Jobst of Moravia, now in the vigor of his years and a stirring man: to him, for a time, the chief management in Brandenburg fell, in these circumstances. Wenzel, still a minor, and already Kaiser and King of Bohemia, gave up Brandenburg to his two younger brothers, most of it to Sigismund, with a cutting for Johann, to help their appanages; and applied his own powers to govern the Holy Roman Empire, at that early stage of life.
To govern the Holy Roman Empire, poor soul--or rather "to drink beer and dance with the girls"; in which, if defective in other things, Wenzel had an eminent talent. He was one of the worst kaisers and the least victorious on record. He would attend to nothing in the Reich; "the Prag white beer, and girls" of various complexion, being much preferable, as he was heard to say. He had to fling his poor Queen's Confessor into the river Moldau--Johann of Nepomuk, Saint so called, if he is not a fable altogether; whose Statue stands on Bridges ever since, in those parts. Wenzel's Bohemians revolted against him; put him in jail; and he broke prison, a boatman's daughter helping him out, with adventures. His
Germans were disgusted with him; deposed him from the kaisership; chose Rupert of the Pfalz; and then, after Rupert's death, chose Wenzel's own brother Sigismund in his stead--left Wenzel to jumble about in his native Bohemian element, as king there, for nineteen years longer, still breaking pots to a ruinous extent.
He ended by apoplexy, or sudden spasm of the heart; terrible Ziska, as it were, killing him at second hand. For Ziska, stout and furious, blind of one eye and at last of both, a kind of human rhinoceros driven mad, had risen out of the ashes of murdered Huss, and other bad papistic doings, in the interim; and was tearing up the world at a huge rate. Rhinoceros Ziska was on the Weissenberg, or a still nearer hill of Prag since called Ziska-berg (Ziska Hill); and none durst whisper of it to the King. A servant waiting at dinner inadvertently let slip the word: "Ziska there? Deny it, slave!" cried Wenzel, frantic. Slave durst not deny. Wenzel drew his sword to run at him, but fell down dead: that was the last pot broken by Wenzel. The hapless royal ex-imperial phantasm self-broken in this manner. Poor soul, he came to the kaisership too early; was a thin violent creature, sensible to the charms and horrors of created objects; and had terrible rhinoceros ziskas and unruly horned cattle to drive. He was one of the worst kaisers ever known--could have done Opera Singing much better--and a sad sight to Bohemia. Let us leave him there: he was never actual Elector of Brandenburg, having given it up in time; never did any ill to that poor country.
The real Kurfürst of Brandenburg all this while was Sigismund, Wenzel's next brother, under tutelage of cousin Jobst or otherwise--a real and yet imaginary, for he never himself governed, but always had Jobst of Mähren or some other in his place there. Sigismund was to have married a daughter of Burggraf Friedrich V; and he was himself, as was the young lady, well inclined to this arrangement. But the old people being dead, and some offer of a king's daughter turning up for Sigismund, Sigismund broke off; and took the king's daughter, King of Hungary's--not without regret then and afterward, as is believed. At any rate, the Hungarian charmer proved a wife of small merit, and a Hungarian successor she had was a wife of light conduct even; Hungarian charmers, and Hungarian affairs, were much other than a comfort to Sigismund.
As for the disappointed princess, Burggraf Friedrich's daughter, she said nothing that we hear; silently became a Nun, an Abbess: and through a long life looked out, with her thoughts to herself, upon the loud whirlwind of things, where Sigismund (oftenest an imponderous rag of conspicuous color) was riding and tossing. Her two brothers also, joint Burggraves after their father's death, seemed to have reconciled themselves without difficulty. The elder of them was already Sigismund's brother-in-law; married to Sigismund's and Wenzel's sister--by such predestination as we saw. Burggraf Johann III was the name of this one; a stout fighter and manager for many years; much liked, and looked to, by Sigismund, as indeed were both the brothers, for that matter; always, together or in succession, a kind of right hand to Sigismund. Frederick (Friedrich), the younger Burggraf, and ultimately the survivor and inheritor (Johann having left no sons), is the famed Burggraf Friedrich VI the last and notablest of all the Burggraves--a man of distinguished importance, extrinsic and intrinsic; chief or among the very chief of German public men in his time; and memorable to Posterity, and to this history, on still other grounds! But let us not anticipate.
Sigismund, if appanaged with Brandenburg alone, and wedded to his first love, not a king's daughter, might have done tolerably well there; better than Wenzel, with the empire and Bohemia, did. But delusive Fortune threw her golden apple at Sigismund too; and he, in the wide high world, had to play strange pranks. His father-in-law died in Hungary, Sigismund's first wife his only child. Father-in-law bequeathed Hungary to Sigismund, who plunged into a strange sea thereby; got troubles without number, beatings not a few, and had even to take boat, and sail for his life down to Constantinople, at one time. In which sad adventure Burggraf Johann escorted him, and as it were tore him out by the hair of the head. These troubles and adventures lasted many years; in the course of which, Sigismund, trying all manner of friends and expedients, found in the Burggraves of Nuremberg, Johann and Friedrich, with their talents, possessions, and resources, the main or almost only sure support he got.
Continued
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
