Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I, Frederick Barbarossa and Erfurt

This year 2022 marks the 900th anniversary of the birth of Emperor Frederick I, known as Barbarossa. During his reign as king (1152-1190) and as emperor (1155-1190), Erfurt obviously played a prominent role for him. Indeed, no king or emperor of the early and high Middle Ages visited the city as frequently as Frederick I. It was here that he received the submission of the deposed Duke of Saxony and Bavaria Henry the Lion.

In his lecture as part of the TU Ilmenau Citizens' Campus, Prof. em. Karl Heinemeyer, who taught at the University of Erfurt with a focus on medieval history, traces the reasons for the special importance of today's Thuringian state capital in the second half of the 12th century. And he also links this to the questions of how we should imagine the Mainzian center in Thuringia for emperor and empire at that time and what opportunities Erfurt may have offered the ruler.