Henry I, Margrave of the Saxon Ostmark

Margrave Henry I, known as the Elder ( * 1070, † 1103) was Count on Eilenburg, from 1081 Margrave of Lusatia from 1089 and Margrave of Meissen, from the noble family of Wettin. He was the first Wettin, who received the Mark Meissen by the emperor as a fief, the long term remained in the hands of this dynasty from then and was expanded to house power.

Life

Henry was born in 1070 as son of Count Dedo II of Wettin, Margrave of Lusatia, and his second wife Adela of Brabant ( widow of Margrave Otto of Orlamünde Meissen, † 1067). In 1075 he came through the failed rebellion of his father Dedo II hostage of the Emperor Henry IV. This enfeoffed him in 1081 with the Lausitz. After the death of his father, in 1075, he was, as his only surviving son, to his heirs in the Margraviate of Lusatia, after Henry IV had granted only Vratislaw King of Bohemia. Henry I was a mainstay of Henry IV in the Reich. As a reward, he was in 1089 still invested with the Margraviate of Meissen, which for the first time a member of the House of Wettin ruled these lands. He was married to Gertrud the Younger of Brunswick, the daughter of the Margrave of Meissen Ekbert I., from which marriage the only son of Henry II the Younger emerged. Henry I died in battle against the Elbe Slavs on the Neisse.