Count Moritz V of Delmenhorst

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• Reference Number: 37031

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• Name: Theoderic the Lucky, Theoderic of Oldenburg
• Reference Number: 37029

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Derrick or Dietrich of Oldenburg, Latin-based anglicization also Theoderic of Oldenburg (c. 1398-February 14, 1440), nicknamed Theoderic the Lucky or the Fortunate (Teudericus Fortunatus), was a feudal lord in northern Germany, holding the counties of Delmenhorst and Oldenburg. He was called "Fortunatus" as he was able to secure Delmenhorst for his branch of the Oldenburgs.

Dietrich is the father of Christian I of Denmark, a male-line ancestor to the present-day Danish throne under Margaret II of Denmark as well as the last czar of imperial Russia, Nicolas II.

Dietrich of Oldenburg was the son of Count Christian V of Oldenburg (who became count in about 1398 and died in 1423) and his wife, Countess Agnes of Honstein. His grandfather, Count Conrad I of Oldenburg (d. ca. 1368) had left his lands divided between his father and his uncle Conrad II.

Dietrich’s father, Christian V, managed to gain the upper hand when Conrad II's son Maurice IV died in 1420. After this, most of the Oldenburg family patrimony was under the power of Dietrich’s branch. However, the house had several minor branches who had estates and claims, as was usual in any medieval fief.

Dietrich of Oldenburg was the grandson of Ingeborg of Itzehoe, a Holstein princess who had married count Conrad I of Oldenburg. After the death in 1350 of her only brother, Count Gerhard V of Holstein-Itzehoe-Plön, Ingeborg and her issue were the heirs of her own grandmother Ingeborg of Sweden (d. ca. 1290, first wife of Gerhard II of Plön-Itzehoe), the eldest daughter of King Valdemar of Sweden and Queen Sophia, who herself was the eldest daughter of the sonless King Eric IV of Denmark and his wife Jutta of Saxony. Since other legitimate descent from King Valdemar apparently was extinct by this time, Dietrich was considered the heir general of Kings Valdemar I of Sweden and Eric IV of Denmark.

Dietrich succeeded his father as head of the House of Oldenburg in 1423.

He had firstly, as a child, married (for reasons of succession and uniting the hereditary fiefs) a distant cousin, Countess Adelheid of Oldenburg-Delmenhorst (who is said to have died already in 1404), daughter of Oldenburg Count Otto IV of Delmenhorst, and in 1423 he married for a second time, Helvig of Schauenburg (born in about 1398-1400, died 1436), widow of Prince Balthasar of Mecklenburg and daughter of the murdered Duke Gerhard VI of Schleswig-Holstein and his wife Elisabeth of Brunswick, thus sister of the reigning Duke Adolf VIII. All his legitimate children were born of the second wife.

His second marriage strengthened this interest in Scandinavian monarchies, since Helvig was a descendant of King Eric V of Denmark, King Haakon V of Norway and King Magnus I of Sweden.

At this time, all Scandinavia lived under the Kalmar Union erected by Queen Margaret I of Denmark. In 1387 she had lost her own heir Olav IV of Norway, the new heirs now being Eric of Pomerania, and his sister Catherine who was married with a prince of the Palatinate and Bavaria.

Count Theodoric of Oldenburg is said to have been a rival claimant to the crowns of Sweden and Denmark during the reign of Eric VII/ Eric XIII, whose succession was through Christopher I of Denmark, the younger brother of the murdered Eric IV, and through Magnus I of Sweden, younger brother of the deposed King Valdemar.

Count Theodoric had three surviving sons and one daughter:
Christian (1426-1481), who succeeded him as Count of Oldenburg and Delmenhorst, and became later King Christian I of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, as well as Duke of Schleswig and Holstein.
Maurice (1428-1464); when his elder brother became king, he was given the County of Delmenhorst.
Gerhard (1430-1500); when his eldest brother had become king, he was given the county of Oldenburg, and from his other brother's heirs he also inherited Delmenhorst in about 1483. The third son got his name from usages of the mother's Holstein clan.
Adelheid (1425-1475), first married count Ernest III of Hohnstein (d. 1454) and then in 1474 Count Gerhard VI of Mansfeld (d. 1492).

Dietrich — Hedwig of Schleswig. Hedwig (daughter of Gerhard VI of Holstein-Rendsburg and Catherine Elisabeth of Brunswick) was born 1398; died 1436. [Group Sheet]

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• Reference Number: 37030

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Helvig of Schauenburg (1398-1436), also known as Hedwig of Schauenburg, was a duchess of Schleswig and a countess of Holstein from the family of Schauenburg, and ancestor of the Danish Royal houses of Oldenburg and Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg.
She was a daughter of Count Gerhard VI of Holstein-Rendsburg and his wife Elisabeth of Brunswick. Her brother was Adolf VIII/I, Count of Holstein/Duke of Schleswig. Through their father, Helvig and Adolf were Cognatic descendants of the King Eric V of Denmark.

On 18 April 1417 Helvig was married to Prince Balthasar of Mecklenburg, who died of the plague in 1421. In 1423 she was married to Count Dietrich of Oldenburg. From her second marriage she had the following issue:
Christian (1426-1481), who succeeded his father as Count of Oldenburg and Delmenhorst. In 1448, partly because of his mother's ancestry, he was elected King of Denmark. He also inherited the counties of Schleswig and Holstein upon the death of his childless uncle, Adolf VIII.
Maurice (1428-1464); when his elder brother became king, he was given the County of Delmenhorst.
Gerhard (1430-1500); when his eldest brother had become king, he was given the county of Oldenburg, and from his other brother's heirs he also inherited Delmenhorst in about 1483.
Adelheid (1425-1475), first married count Ernest III of Hohnstein (died 1454) and then in 1474 Count Gerhard VI of Mansfeld (died 1492).

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• Reference Number: 37039

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Count Christian V of Oldenburg (died 1423) was the ruling count of Oldenburg from 1398 until his death in 1423. He was born sometime before 1347 to Count Conrad I of Oldenburg and Ingeborg of Brunswick. He married Agnes of Honstein, and through his son and successor Count Dietrich of Oldenburg, descends the Danish Royal houses of Oldenburg and Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg. Through the dynastic marriages of his descendants he is an ancestor of many European Royal houses.

Christian — Agnes of Honstein. [Group Sheet]

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• Reference Number: 37040

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• Reference Number: 37041

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Gerhard VI (~1367-1404) was the Count of Holstein-Rendsburg from 1382.

Gerhard VI was born around 1367, the son of Count Henry II from the Rendsburg line of the House of Schauenburg and Ingeburg of Mecklenburg. On 15 September 1386 he was rewarded with the Duchy of Schleswig by King Olav III of Denmark. After the lines of Plön and Kiel had died out in 1390 he succeeded in 1403 to the whole of Holstein with the exception of Holstein-Pinneberg. That placed Schleswig-Holstein under one ruler. He fell in the Battle on the Hamme on 4 August 1404 during the attempt to subjugate Dithmarschen.

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In 1391 Gerhard married Catherine Elizabeth of Brunswick, daughter of Magnus II of Brunswick-Lüneburg. They had the following children:
Henry IV (b 1397; d 1427), Duke of Schleswig, Count of Holstein
Ingeborg (b 1398; d 1465)
Helvig (b ca. 1400; d ca. 1436), married Dietrich of Oldenburg, mother of Christian I, King of Denmark.
Adolphus VIII (b 1401; d 1459), Duke of Schleswig, Count of Holstein
Gerhard VII (b 1404; d 1433), Duke of Schleswig, Count of Holstein

Gerhard — Catherine Elisabeth of Brunswick. Catherine (daughter of II Magnus and Catherine) died Aft 1423. [Group Sheet]

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• Reference Number: 37042

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In 1404, Elisabeth was widowed while her son, the successor of her spouse, was still a minor. She thereby became regent. She was forced to the political act of handing the guardian regency over the County of Holstein to her former brother-in-law, Bishop Henry of Osnabrück, and the guardian regency of the Duchy of Sønderjylland, as well as the custody of her son, Duke Henry, to Queen Margaret I of Denmark and King Erik: her son Duke Henry was taken to Denmark, and her daughter Ingeborg was by Queen Margaret sent to Vadstena Abbey in Sweden. In the following years, Queen Margaret acquired large parts of Sønderjylland as security (Tønder fief, Frisland, episcopal manors in Svabsted and Stubbe), by purchase (Trøjborg, Skinkelborg, Grødersby); King Erik took over Haderslev fief as security from the fiefholder Helene Ahlefeldt, and Flensborg by the queen.

When Gottorp was about to be taken over by the Danish crown, however, Elisabeth called her son Henry back from Denmark (1408) and had a declaration of hostility sent to King Erik 14 June 1410. This led to a number of feuds, instability and the pawning of several fiefs. Her own dower lands Als, Ærø and Sundeved was taken by King Erik. Several foreign princes, among them her brother Duke Henry the Mild of Brunswick and Lunenburg (Wolfenbüttel), tried to intervene and mediate but without lasting peace. In 1415, her son Henry was declared of legal majority, the reign of Elisabeth ended and she is no longer mentioned much in the documents. In 1417, she was present in Rendsborg at the side of her son when King Erik took Slesvig and when Henry was forced to seek help from Hamburg. In 1423, her sons formed a complaint that their mother had been assaulted by the royal soldiers despite the promise that she was to be left out of the conflict: her carriage had been attacked and her male staff had been mugged and captured. This is the last time she is mentioned.

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• Reference Number: 37043

Conrad — Ingeborg of Brunswick. [Group Sheet]

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• Reference Number: 37044

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• Reference Number: 37053

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• Name: Magnus with the Necklace
• Reference Number: 37058

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Magnus (1324-1373), called Magnus with the Necklace (Latin: Magnus Torquatus) or Magnus II, was Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, ruling the Brunswick-Lüneburg principalities of Wolfenbüttel (colloquially also called Brunswick) and, temporarily, Lüneburg.

Magnus was the son of Magnus the Pious, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg (Wolfenbüttel). In 1362 Magnus and his brother Louis helped their brother Prince-Archbishop Albert II of Bremen to assert himself against the incumbent diocesan administrator Morris of Oldenburg, who claimed the see for himself. Magnus, Louis and the latter's father-in-law William II, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg (Celle), and their troops beleaguered Morris in the prince-archiepiscopal castle in Vörde and forced him to sign his resignation.

After the death of his brother Louis in 1367, Magnus became the designated heir of both ducal principalities, Wolfenbüttel and Celle (colloquially also Lüneburg). When both his father and William II, who ruled over Celle, died in 1369, Magnus gained both ducal principalities. But already in 1370, he lost Celle to the Ascanian dukes of Saxe-Wittenberg (Albert and his uncle Wenceslas, Elector of Saxe-Wittemberg), who had been given the principality by Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor, who had also banned Magnus. Several cities, including Lüneburg (Lunenburg), Uelzen, and Hanover switched allegiance to the Ascanians; Magnus managed to keep the City of Braunschweig (Brunswick) among his allies only with difficulties. The Lüneburg War of Succession continued for several years after Magnus died in the Battle of Leveste (a part of today's Gehrden), near the Deister, on 25 July 1373.

II — Catherine. [Group Sheet]

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• Reference Number: 37059