Fastrada

Fastrada (* 765, † August 10 794 in Frankfurt am Main ), the fourth wife of Charles the Great was.

Life

Fastrada was the daughter of Count Radulf of Thuringia and probably mainfränkischem Counts. In October 783, after the death of Charles's third wife Hildegard and his mother Bertrada, he married Fastrada, with whom he had two daughters: Theodrada (c. 785; † January 9 844/853, since 814 Abbess of Argenteuil ) and Hiltrud (* 787, † 800 ( probably after 814) ). It is regarded as the founder of the abbey Muensterschwarzach.

Charles chronicler Einhard tells in his vita Caroli Magni that Fastrada was very cruel and decreased the blood Court of Verden, supposedly 4500 Saxony had been executed in which their influence. However, Einhard knew Fastrada not personally, as these had already died before he arrived at the court of Charlemagne.

Writing is obtained from the year 785, in which Karl Fastrada asks you to come with the children to him on the Eresburg. Later Fastrada accompanied her husband probably not the time, but has always been in contact with him. Such a letter is obtained in which 791 concerned Karl asked about their health, because he has received no news of her for some time. Then he tells her about a victory against the Avars and asks them to leave hold thanksgiving services.

Grave

The sickly Fastrada died during the Synod of Frankfurt and was constructed in the monastery of St. Alban before Mainz, long before the church was completed, buried. That Fastrada was buried at this place and not at the Basilica of Saint -Denis, which served the French kings as grave lay, or the Abbey of St. Arnulf at Metz, as it would have been Frankish tradition, testifies to the great influence of the Archbishop of Mainz Richulf.

Fastradas grave stone was spent after the destruction of the monastery in 1552 in Mainz Cathedral and is found on the wall in the south aisle. The original grave font came from Theodulf of Orléans and was drafted in Greco-Latin hexameters. Due to the diction of the Latin located in the cathedral plate must be assumed that this inscription can not have originated in the 9th century, but comes from a late medieval anonymous.

Say

A magic ring that Fastrada to have received from her husband, is the subject of a legend who received the Brothers Grimm in the second volume of her German legends. This ring whose stone was a gift of a serpent, the king tied as to its wearer that he did not even want to release for burial her body as he began already to decay. Finally, the Archbishop of Reims Tilpin took the ring itself. So Charles affection rendered on him and he became a counselor to the king. Finally Tilpin have the ring submerged in a body of water, near which Charles then built his royal palace in Aachen, in whose chapel he was also buried.

Even the heart-shaped floor plan of Neustadt an der Saale, near which Karl had a palace built 790, goes the legend, on the king's love to Fastrada back.