Mecklenburg: Difference between revisions
Knorrepoes (talk | contribs) m (Text replacement - " Wapen- en Vlaggenboek van Gerrit Hesman (1708)" to " Wapen- en Vlaggenboek van Gerrit Hesman (1708)") |
Knorrepoes (talk | contribs) m (Text replacement - "===Official blazon=== " to "{| class="wikitable" |+Official blazon |- |'''German''' | ") |
||
Line 5: | Line 5: | ||
[[File:mecklenburg.jpg|center|550 px]] | [[File:mecklenburg.jpg|center|550 px]] | ||
= | {| class="wikitable" | ||
|+Official blazon | |||
|- | |||
|'''German''' | |||
| | |||
===Origin/meaning=== | ===Origin/meaning=== |
Revision as of 11:13, 5 July 2022
This page is part of the German heraldry portal Deutsche Wappensammlung |
Heraldry of the World |
German heraldry:
|
Selected collector's items from Germany:
|
MECKLENBURG
German |
Origin/meaningMecklenburg is an area in the north-east of present Germany. It was a Duchy from the 13th century until 1701. The area of Mecklenburg was settled by Slavic tribes in the 7th century. During the 9th-11th century the was under influence of the Germanic eastward colonisation. In 1160 Prince Niklot, who resided in the castle of Mecklenburg, accepted Heinrich der Löwen (Henry the Lion), Duke of Saxony and Bavaria as his overlord. Duke Heinrich made the newly founded city of Schwerin the capital of the region and founded the County of Schwerin, and gave Pribislaw, the son of Niklot most of the area in loan. Pribislaw became thus the first Prince of Mecklenburg until 1178. At the end of the 12th century the Princes of Mecklenburg and their cousins, the Princes of Rostock, became vassals of the Danish Kings. The oldest seals of the Princes of Mecklenburg date from around 1200 and show a griffin. The meaning of the griffin, or a possible relation with neighbouring Pommern is not known. Of the four new territories, Rostock kept the girffin, the other three all used the bull's head as their symbol. To distinguish the different arms, the Lords of Mecklenburg started to use the bull's head with a piece of skin of the neck still attached, as can be seen on the seal of Heinrich I, Lord of Mecklenburg (ruled 1264-1302) below.
Heinrich II of Mecklenburg (ruled until 1329) slowly increased his territory. First with the estate of Stargard, which had no arms, thus no change was made in the seals of Mecklenburg. Between 1314 and 1323 he acquired the Lordship of Rostock and he combined the arms of Mecklenburg and Rostock in his seal, see image below.
During the 14th century the Lords of Mecklenburg became direct vassals of the German Emperor and were promoted to the rank of Duke. In 1352 the Duchy was divided into the Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin and the Duchy of Mecklenburg-Stargard. In 1358 Albrecht II of Mecklenburg-Schwerin acquired the County of Schwerin and added the arms of the county (a divided shield of gold and red) to his arms. Initially the seal showed the three arms separately, his sons combined the three arms into one single shield, see below.
Besides the combined arms, the Dukes of Mecklenburg also used a small shield with the bull's head on smaller seals. The colours of the arms are also used from the late 14th century. During the 15th century the Dukes of Mecklenburg gradually acquired the Lordship/Principality of Werle and the Duchy of Mecklenburg-Stargard, which meant a further division of the arms. For Werle the bull's head with extended tongue, but without the skin in the neck was taken, but for Stargard no arms or symbol existed. For unknown reasons, a woman's arm with a ring was chosen as a symbol to represent Stargard in the new arms. During the next decades the basic design of the arms remained the same, but some of the smaller details were changed. The open mouth of the original Mecklenburg bull was changed into a nose-ring and the bull's head of Werle was rotated 45 degrees, based on an old seal. This resulted in the arms as shown below.
After the Thirty-years war the Dukes of Mecklenburg lost some territory to Sweden, but received as compensation the Principalities (and former dioceses) of Schwerin and Ratzeburg. The arms of these territories needed to be added to the arms, which created an even more complicated shield. The final design took a long time to complete and fianlly resulted in the arms as shown on top of the page. The initial design from 1658 is shown below. The different fields represent :
In 1701 the Duchy was divided in Mecklenburg-Strelitz, and Mecklenburg-Schwerin, but both used the same arms as above until 1918. Contact and SupportPartners: Your logo here ?
© since 1995, Heraldry of the World, Ralf Hartemink Literature : Hupp, 1897; Schutt 2002. |