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THE

HISTORY

OF THE

HOUSE OF HANOVER.

BOOK Vİ.

CONTAINING THE HISTORY OF OTHO, FIRST DUKE
OF BRUNSWICK AND LUNEBURG, SURNAMED
THE CHILD (DAS KINDT.)

On the death of Henry Duke of Saxony, and

Count Palatine of the Rhine, Otho, the only

BOOK VI.

A.D. 1227. Otho succeeds to the

son of William, Prince of Luneburg, became, States of Brunswick as has already been stated, the male represen

tative of the House of Guelph.

Otho was born at Luneburg, the residence of his father, in 1204, and at nine years of age was left an orphan. His uncle, the Emperor, after whom he was named, was too much engaged in defending the rights of the empire, and the privileges of his crown, to pay any attention to the private affairs of his family, and the

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BOOK VI.

A.D. 1227.

in retirement:

Count Palatine for a time had a son of his own, whose welfare engaged the whole of his His early years spent affections. The young Prince of Luneburg, (for so he was styled,) was in consequence allowed to pass his youth in retirement with his mother, and under her guardianship he received the greater part of his education. The death of the Prince Palatine, in 1214, may be said to have opened to him a more splendid succession than what belonged to the very circumscribed patrimony of his father; but as his uncle Henry hesitated between a desire to aggrandize his own children (daughters) and a sense of what was due to the male representative of his name and family, Otho reaped little advantage from these enlarged prospects.

His uncle executes a deed in his favour:

At last, in 1223, Henry executed a deed, by which he appointed his nephew his successor in all that remained of the allodial domains of the duchies of Saxony and Bavaria, and also in the private fiefs which he held as an individual in other parts of the empire. These states, however, constituted so small a portion of the former wealth of his illustrious house, that we should have thought there was scarcely a pretext for either envy or alarm in the breast of his

BOOK VI.

A.D. 1227.

trigues against him:

enemy, yet when the Emperor was made acquainted with the intentions of the Count Palatine, he began to intrigue with his The emperor indaughters. That he might have a pretence for depriving Otho of the succession at his uncle's death, he purchased from the Margravine of Baden and the Duchess of Bavaria their claims as the only issue of the Duke of Saxony; and no sooner was the death of Henry announced, than the King of the Romans was despatched with an imperial force Invades Brunswick: to take possession of the city and territory of Brunswick. But Otho, who was then in the 23d year of his age, had been regularly acknowledged by the states as their legitimate sovereign and had been received as such by the city and principality. They therefore joined him heartily in repelling this invasion, and the king and his army were compelled to retire, without being able to effect the object which

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the King of Denmark:

To be prepared against any future at- Otho leagues with tempt of the same kind, Otho judged prudent at this time to enter into a treaty with his uncle the King of Denmark, by which they respectively bound themselves to support

BOOK VI.

A.D. 1227.

The cause of that league:

each other against all enemies whatsoever. This treaty, which was no doubt considered by the duke and his councillors as a very proper measure, was in the end most injurious to the states of Brunswick.

During the civil war which followed the decease of Frederick Barbarossa, the empire was in such a state of disorder, that the Danes found little difficulty in encroaching upon her boundaries; and in addition to the provinces which had been yielded up to Denmark, when Henry the Lion was driven from Saxony, that kingdom had succeeded in getting possession of Hamburg, Lubeck, and other cities, which it still held when Frederick II. succeeded to the crown. But in 1222, Waldemar the second, King of Denmark, had some difference with the Count of Swerin; and the latter being unable to cope with the monarch in the open field, had recourse to stratagem. In an unguarded moment, he got hold of the king and his son, and carried them off prisoners to his strong castle of Danneberg, where, notwithstanding the efforts of the Danes and their allies, they were kept in confinement for more than three years. At this unfortunate period, many of

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