Matfrid

Matfried I, Count of Orléans (* 795, † 836/37 ), was the progenitor of the so-called Matfriede, one of the oldest continuously testified European noble families.

Rise

Matfrieds parentage is unknown. From 815 expressed at the court of the Emperor Louis the Pious, he played there from 817 to an important role and was entrusted with various political and military tasks. He remained a loyal follower of the Emperor, to this at the instigation of his second wife, the Empress Judith, who began to ask 817 decided in the " Ordinatio imperii " Empire unit in question and Judith, their open partisanship against Ludwig's sons from his first marriage, the yard and the Frankish nobility was divided into two hostile camps. Nevertheless, he and Count Hugo of Tours 826 were the companions of the Empress at the baptism of the Danish king Harald Klak in Ingelheim.

Fall

A little successful Spanish campaign in the year 827 was trigger his downfall. Moorish troops had the whole of the County of Barcelona occupied and looted. Emperor Louis appointed his son Pippin and the Count Hugo of Tours and Orléans Matfried to summon an army and to hasten the Count Bernhard of Barcelona to help. The recruitment took place but so hesitant that the Moorish troops were already on the decline, as the relief army was finally erected. On the court day in February, 828 in Aachen Hugo and Matfried were dismissed for their alleged procrastination and the delayed arrival of their army in the Pyrenees of their offices and fiefs. This was probably due to efforts of the court party to Empress Judith and Bernard of Septimania. Bernard's cousin Odo, who was a few years ago came from the Rhine -Nahe area to the west, received Matfrieds County Orléans.

Rebellion

Then Matfried was as unbending advocate of imperial unity idea of 817, implacable enemy of Louis the Pious. The uprising of the Emperor sons of 830 and 833/34 he particularly supported Lothair I, which could not be right that his father Hugo disempowered of Tours, and that Matfried by Odo, a cousin of Bernard of Septimania and protégé of Judith, had been replaced.

In April 830 to Ludwig's son Pepin of Aquitaine rose in open rebellion against his father. He moved to Orléans, where he began Matfried again in his county. On the national assembly in Compiègne in late April or early May 830 of adultery was accused Judith sent to a monastery. Bernhard had fled to Barcelona, ​​and Odo was exiled to Italy. But in October, the imperial assembly of Nijmegen, Emperor Louis Lord was again able. After Pippin was 832 inferior in Limoges against an imperial army and fled after a short exile in Trier to Italy, Matfried lost anew his county to the returning from Italy, Odo.

During the second rebellion of the sons of Louis, 833/834, Matfried won in the spring of 834 a crushing victory over his successor Odo and players selected from the Seine- Loire region Heerbann against him and Lambert of Nantes, the Margrave of Breton Mark son Lothar I led. Matfried and his outnumbered Lotharier surprised the too careless Odo on the border of Brittany and won a total victory. Odo fell in battle, as well as his brother William of Blois, Count Wido of Maine, Count Fulbert, and the abbot and imperial chancellor Theudo of Tours.

Exile and death

After the brothers Pepin and Louis, however, had allied against Lothar and put her father in March 834 again into office, Lothar his father had to throw in June 834 in Blois. Matfried had to go into exile in the wake of Lothair to Italy. Lothar compensated him and the others with him into exile previous trailer generous. Matfried and many other of them succumbed to 836/837 of a rampant epidemic.

Children

• Matfrieds son Matfrid II (c. 820; † after 882 ), managed by about 855-882 a county in Eifelgau.
• Matfrieds daughter Ingeltrud (* 820/825; † before 878 ) married his first wife, Boso, in second marriage Wangar.