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– ISENBURG –
[Pagus:- 1. Moselgau ante 1059-post 1110. 2. Einrich 1139-c. 1160. Numbering conventions: Distinctions between various persons named Gerlach, Reginbold and Henry have not been fully resolved.] The brothers Gerlach and Reginbold document as counts in the 1050s. For the next few generations we consistently find brother pairs Gerlach and Reginbold, where Gerlach is usually but not always named before Reginbold. By the end of the century they had adopted the cognomen of Isenburg, but for a while they also used the cognomen of Rommersdorf, where they founded a monastery in the early twelfth century. To judge from their cognomens the family was essentially Hessian. A Gerlach of Isenburg is count in 1096, and the brothers Gerlach and Reginbold are counts in 1110. In the mid-twelfth century a Reginbold of Isenburg is count of Einrich as heir of Ludwig III of Arnstein, but around 1160 this title was sold to the house of Katzenelnbogen. It is very likely that the earliest of this lineage were brothers of Count Godebold of Lower Lahngau, from whom the house of Diez should descend. This can account for evidence of an Isenburg presence across the Rhine primarily in Maienfeld, since Godebold’s line attaches to the house of Stromburg, which long held the county of Maienfeld. In 1052 a Count Gerlach appears in a witness list between Counts Berthold IV of Stromburg and Stephen I of Sponheim (Berthold’s inferable brother-in-law). He is probably identical to Burgrave Gerlach of Mainz (1047), whose comital title should stem from a subdivision of the Maingau pagus. The burgravate did not remain in the family. The most striking evidence is found not only across the Rhine but well up the Mosel river, where Count Reginbold appears as cathedral advocate of Trier in 1075. The Trier advocacy was carried in the house of Laach, and it clearly arrived to that family in the marriage of the Ezzoner Hermann (III) to a woman of the Luxembourg family. We should infer that Reginbold married a daughter of Hermann. He must have succeeded Dietrich of Laach, who died in 1073. In any event, he is identifiable as a Reginbold who in 1059 was count in the pagus of Moselgau, essentially in Luxembourg territory. Later a county in this general region was detached in favor of Count Hermann I of Virneburg, who emerges in 1107. Conceivably he was Reginbold’s grandson, but the evidence is generally disappointing. Isenburgs continue to appear with a title, and in view of the Counts Gerlach and Reginbold documented in 1110, after the Virneburg emergence, one hesitates to apply the same explanation to their comital status. Possibly Count Gerlach (1096) held this county and then passed it to Virneburg, just as his descendant passed the county in Einrich to the Katzenelnbogens. The double documentation of 1110 might simply be an aberration. It is difficult to believe that both Gerlach and Reginbold held counties, when subsequently there is no evidence of any county. Yet Gerlach is separately documented with comital title in 1110. The alternative is to suppose that fragmentation in the Luxembourg sphere was advanced enough to justify an almost arbitrary creation of counties, and likewise their rapid dissolution through transferal of rights. This might not have had a large impact on unitary succession: it need only reflect an ongoing adjustment, especially in complex situations. This outlook has a particular advantage for the problems under consideration: it allows a more comprehensive resolution of the various strands of allodial, feudal and jurisdictional inheritance. For the Isenburgs, however, the discussion is not especially relevant, since only a renunciation of rights is at issue. The Isenburgs are peculiar in their repeated failure to maintain comital status. At the beginning of the thirteenth century they were positioned to inherited the county of Kleeberg. The castle of Kleeberg and advocacy for Limburg (Lahn) arrived to Henry I of Isenburg-Grenzau, and it is supposed that the heiress was his wife. In view of his name Henry (a Rhenish palatine name) and that of his brother Frederick (a name from the Bavarian house of Peilstein that had succeeded in Kleeberg), the mother would actually seem a much better possibility. Indeed, advocacy over the Hessian possessions of St. Maria Laach descended in the line of Henry’s brother, Gerlach I of Isenburg-Kobern. Yet despite the impressive extent of the inheritance, the comital title fell into abeyance.
SHIELD Arms for Henry II of Isenburg-Grenzau preserved in the Bigot Roll show an eagle of argent on field of gueules, which is simply an inheritance of the Hochstaden arms via Henry II’s wife. Presumably this shield associates with a forlorn claim to Hochstaden county, which was given to the archdiocese of Cologne in 1246. The Isenburg arms proper were two fasces in sable on field of argent. The younger lines of Isenburg descended from Henry I’s uncle Reginbold, whose two sons both made marriages that affected their arms. The elder married the heiress of Kempenich, and the younger married the heiress of Wied. Henceforward the the shield of Isenburg-Kempenich bore fasces in gueules, and the shield of Isenburg-Braunsberg (i.e.Wied) placed the fasces in gueules on a field of or. The old houses of Wied and Kempenich were of the same agnatic lineage, and one can draw the inference that the Wied colors were preserved on the Isenburg-Braunsberg shield.
BIBLIOGRAPHY Sources: – Mainzer UB I.
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