Everything about Sigismund Archduke Of Austria totally explained
» For the 17th-century Archduke, see Archduke Sigismund Francis of Austria.
Sigismund of Austria,
Duke, then
Archduke of
Further Austria (
October 26,
1427 –
March 4,
1496) was a
Habsburg archduke of
Austria and ruler of
Tirol from 1446 to 1490.
Sigismund (or Siegmund, sometimes also spelled Sigmund) was born in Innsbruck; his parents were
Frederick IV, Duke of Austria and
Anna of Brunswick. He was a first cousin of
Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor.
In 1446, upon the death of his father, he acceded to rulership over
Tirol and (other) Further Austria
Vorderösterreich, which included the
Sundgau in the
Alsace, the
Breisgau, and some possessions in
Swabia. In 1449, he married
Princess Eleanor of Scotland, the daughter of
James I,
King of Scots.
For much of his reign, Sigismund was engaged in disputes with
Nicholas of Cusa, then
bishop of Brixen, for the control of the
Isarco,
Pustertal and
Inn valleys. In
1460, when he'd Nicholas imprisoned, he was excommunicated by
Pope Pius II. The bishop fled to
Todi, but died before the archduke surrendered in order to receive the papal pardon.
In 1469, he sold his lands on the
Rhine and in the Alsace to
Charles, Duke of Burgundy. Sources are unclear whether he sold them due to his debts he'd accumulated owing to his luxury lifestyle or just "rented" them because he wanted to have them protected better against the expansion of the
Old Swiss Confederacy. In any case, he bought back these possessions in 1474, and together with the Swiss (with whom he'd concluded a peace treaty in
Konstanz) and the Alsatian cities, he sided against Charles in the
Battle of Héricourt.
In 1477,
Frederick III made him
archduke. Three years later, Eleanor died, and 1484, Sigismund married the 16-year-old
Katharina of Saxony, daughter of
Albert, Duke of Saxony. He had no offspring from either marriage.
In the later years of the 1470s and early 1480s Sigismund issued a decree that instituted a radical coinage reformation that eventually led up to the creation of the world's first really large and heavy silver coin in nearly a millennium, the
guldengroschen, which the Habsburgs in
Bohemia developed later into the
thaler. This coin was the ancestor of many the major European coin denominations to come later. Using new mining methods and technology, the largely quiescent silver mines in Tirol were brought back into production and soon numerous surrounding states were re-opening old mines and minting similar coins. This production of large coinage exploded as silver from the Spain's colonies in the Americas flooded the European economy. It is from these reforms in part that Sigismund acquired the nickname of
der Münzreiche, or "rich in coin".
Sigismund was easily swayed by the bad advice of his council and in March 1487 entered into a pointless war with the
Republic of Venice, sometimes called the War of Rovereto. Tirolese forces quickly seized silver mines in the
Valsugana valley owned by Venice, and in April 1487 Sigismund outraged Venice further when he imprisoned 130 Venetian merchants travelling to the fair at Bozen (modern
Bolzano) and confiscated their goods. Tirol stormed the Pass of
Calliano and later besieged the castle at
Rovereto using a massive
bombard, one of the earliest times such a large piece had been used in warfare. The war continued through summer but ended with no decisive victory for either side. One notable casualty of the conflict was the condottiero
Roberto Sanseverino, Prince of
Salerno.
By 1490 the opposition of the population of Tirol compelled Sigismund hand over the rulership to
Archduke Maximilian I, who later became
Holy Roman Emperor. Whether Sigismund voluntarily handed over power to Maximilian or was strongly coerced by the latter isn't clear.
Ancestry
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