[December 13] Albert I, duke of Bavaria

Parents: Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor, and Margaret of Holland
Date of Birth: 25 July 1336
House: Wittelsbach
Spouse(s): (1) Margaret, daughter of Louis I, duke of Legnica, and Agnes of Sagan, then (2) Margaret, daughter of Adolph III, count of Mark, and Margaret of Jülich
Predecessor: Louis IV
Reign: 1347 – 1404

Brief: For being a duke of Bavaria, Albert I spent very little time in his ancestral lands. At the age of ten, Albert became a duke alongside his five brothers, Louis V, Stephen II, Louis VI, William I, and Otto V. As Germans, the lands were divided among them. His eldest brother from his mother, William I, fought against his mother, eventually wresting control of Holland, Zeeland, and Hainaut from her between 1354 and 1356. Albert was soon after appointed governor of these counties since William had gone slightly insane. He left his second son, Albert II, in Bavaria to oversee his lands there. The Dutch leaders supported Albert I's regency and Albert finally became count when his brother died in 1388. Through Albert's daughter, Margaret, all three counties would eventually pass to the duchy of Burgundy, one of the wealthiest inheritances in history. When Albert's mistress was killed in 1392, Albert went on a rampage, destroying all political opposition against him in Holland. His son, William, fled to Hainaut while Albert himself began fighting the neighboring Frisians. When he died, he left his lands in Bavaria and the Low Countries undivided to his son, William. Another son, John, became bishop of Liège and lost a short succession war against William's daughter over the Low Countries before Burgundy took the region over.
Date of Death: 13 December 1404

Successor: William II

Other Monarchs Who Died Today:

• Childebert I, king of the Franks (558)
• Callixtus II, pope of Rome (1124)
• Henry IX, duke of Bavaria (1126)
• Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (1250)
• Manuel I, king of Portugal (1521)
• Mahmud I, sultan of the Ottoman Empire (1754)

[October 20] Henri X, duke of Bavaria

Surnamed: "The Proud"
Parents: Henry IX, duke of Bavaria, and Wulfhilde of Saxony
Born: circa 1108
House: Welf
Spouse(s): Gertrud, daughter of Lothar III, Holy Roman Emperor, and Richenza of Northeim
Predecessor: Henri IX

Reign: 1126 – 1138
Brief: Henry was the eldest surviving son of his parents, and the heir not only to Bavaria, but to Saxony as well. He shared his territories with his younger brother, Welf VI. Henry furthered his fortunes in 1127 by marrying the only child of Holy Roman Emperor Lothar III. She was the heiress to three more Saxon families. Much of Henry's reign was spent campaigning for the Hohenstaufen brothers Frederick II of Swabia and Conrad of Franconia. Civil unrest in Bavaria forced Henry to forcefully repression rebellion. In 1136, Henry lead an army to southern Italy where he devastated the land. For his actions, he was made margrave of Tuscany and named Lothar's successor in Saxony. Lothar died the next year and Henry was a strong candidate for the Imperial crown, but he was blocked and Conrad of Franconia became emperor. A dispute broke out, and Henry was deprived of Saxony and Bavaria. He was preparing for war soon after retaking Saxony in 1139 when he died suddenly. Bavaria passed to a brother of the Emperor while Saxony passed to Albert the Lion of the Ascania family. Henry's son, Henry the Lion, eventually regained both duchies.

Date of Death: 20 October 1139
Successor: Leopold

Other Monarchs Who Died Today:

• Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor (1740)

[September 27] Maximilian I, duke of Bavaria

Surnamed: "The Great"
Parents: William V, duke of Bavaria, and Renata of Lorraine
Date of Birth: 17 April 1573
House: Wittelsbach
Spouse(s): (1) Elisabeth Renata, daughter of Charles III, duke of Lorraine, and Claude of France, then (2) Maria Anna, daughter of Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor, and Maria Anna of Bavaria
Predecessor: William V

Reign: 1597 – 1651
Brief: Raised by Jesuits, Maximilian was instrumental as a Catholic leader during the Thirty Years' War. When the Protestant Union was formed by princes in Northern Germany, Maximilian became the military leader of the rival Catholic League in 1609. In 1623, after years of warfare in and around Germany, Maximilian's head general conquered the Palatinate of the Rhine and the electoral dignity of that branch of the Wittelsbachs was revoked the transferred to Maximilian I, who became the first elector of Bavaria. While Bavaria lost the Thirty Years' War after Swedish and French troops sacked Munich in 1632, Maximilian was able to retain the electoral dignity and some of his conquered Palatinate lands at the end of the war in 1648. Maximilian died three years later at Ingolstaft and was buried in Munich.

Date of Death: 27 September 1651

Successor: Ferdinand Maria

Other Monarchs Who Died Today:

• Raymond VII, count of Toulouse (1249)
• Go-Nara, emperor of Japan (1557)
• Urban VII, pope of Rome (1590)
• Innocent XII, pope of Rome (1700)

[July 5] Albert VI, duke of Bavaria-Leuchtenberg

Wittelsbach family coat of arms

Parents: William V, duke of Bavaria, and Renata of Lorraine
Date of Birth: 26 February 1584
Royal House: Wittelsbach
Spouse: Mechthilde, daughter of Georg Ludwig, landgrave of Leuchtenberg, and Marie Salome of Baden-Baden
Predecessor: Georg
Reign: 1646 – 1650
Summary: A minor duke of the Bavarian line of the Wittelsbachs, Albert married into his true inheritance which he gained in 1646. He was the youngest son of William V, duke of Bavaria, and as such he had a fourth share of the Bavarian estate. To avoid dividing the lands, William married his son off to Mechthilde, the heiress of the small neighboring landgraviate of Leuchtenberg. His two older, but not eldest, brothers both became clerics, the elder becoming the bishop of Regensburg and a cardinal, the younger the prince-elector of Cologne. Albert, meanwhile, got a small portion of the family estate. He obtained his wife's estates in 1646 but traded them with his brother for the county of Haag in 1650. Leuchtenberg passed to the second son of his brother and then to Bavaria. Haag remained in Albert's family until his own son, Maximilian Heinrich, who was also prince-elector of Cologne, died in 1688, after which Haag was also inherited into Bavaria. When his eldest brother, Maximilian, died in 1651, Albert served as regent for his nephew, the young Ferdinand Maria. Nothing important is noted about Albert's reign in Bavaria or Leuchtenberg.
Date of Death: 5 July 1668
Successor: Maximilian II (in Leuchtenberg), Maximilian Heinrich (in Haag)

Other Monarchs Who Died Today:

• Charles III, count of Alençon (1375)

[February 29] Ludwig I, king of Bavaria

Parents: Maximilian I, king of Bavaria, and Augusta Wilhelmine of Hesse-Darmstadt

Date of Birth: 25 August 1786

House: Wittelsbach

Spouse: Therese, daughter of Frederick, duke of Saxe-Altenburg, and Charlotte Georgine of Mecklenburg-Strelitz

Reign: 1825 – 1848

Predecessor: Maximilian I

Summary: A victim of the 1848 revolutions, Ludwig of Bavaria began his life with the cursed name of Ludwig, named after King Louis XVI of France. Still, the prince was lucky in that the elder line of the Wittelsbach, the Sulzbach-Palatine line, died out in 1799 leaving his father with the entire Wittelsbach inheritance. In the midst of the Napoleonic Wars, Maximilian became the first king of Bavaria. Ludwig, meanwhile, went on to study in Landshut and married Theresa of Saxe-Hildburghausen in 1810, prompting the first of the annual Oktoberfests. Ludwig served as a commander of the Bavarian army on the side of the French during the Napoleonic Wars despite his reservations. His father died in 1825 leaving him the throne.


As king, Ludwig I was an autocratic king, though one who enjoyed culture. In 1837, he reorganized Bavaria into its historic regions and also re-erected several closed and dilapidated monasteries. Ludwig also worked to unite the Palatinate with the rest of Bavaria, but ended up losing around two-thirds of it to regional powers. Still, as a modernist, Ludwig spent great amounts of money creating the Ludwig Canal, building the first German railroad, and encouraging independence movements around Europe. His second son, Otto, was even elected the first king of Greece. After 1830, though, Ludwig began to stamp out liberal movements within Bavaria. This made the people mad. The Roman Catholic Church, which had strong support in Bavaria, supported a movement known as the Ultramontes, which sought to remove Protestant provisions from the Bavarian constitution. The movement died out, but it was not forgotten. The king continued to censor the press and beer riots broke out in 1844 after Ludwig added a tax to beer. During the 1848 Revolutions, the middle class demanded a new constitution and the king refused. The cabinet, in response, forced him to abdicate the throne. He spent the rest of his life in Munich promoting the fine arts with his own capital. He died in Nice on the French Riviera and was buried in Munich.

Date of Death: 29 February 1868

Successor: Maximilian II

[February 7] William V, duke of Bavaria

Surnamed: The Pious (der Fromme)

Parents: Albert V, duke of Bavaria, and Anna of Austria

Date of Birth: 29 September 1548

Royal House: Wittelsbach

Spouse: Renata of Lorraine

Reign: 1579 – 1597

Predecessor: Albert V

Summary: William was born in Catholic Bavaria during a trying time in Holy Roman Imperial history. He was raised by Jesuits and was a proponent of the Counter Reformation. He was devout (hence his name, "The Pious"). He lived at Trausnitz Castle and upgraded it from a Gothic fortress to a renaissance palace.

As duke, William V fought hard against the Protestants. He secured the archbishopric of Cologne for his brother, Ernest, in 1583. He then fought a war with the help of another brother, Ferdinand, to retain Cologne. William won the war with Spanish support and the archbishopric stayed in the Wittelsbach family for 200 years. His son, Ferdinand, eventually became the next archbishop. William, in his fervor, exiled all non-Catholics from Bavaria and William founded the Geistlicher Rat, a council to made ecclesiastical decisions for Bavaria. The new council regulated Catholicism in Bavaria, administered devotion tests to public officials, founded and funded schools and religious houses, and controlled Bavarian missionary activity. Meanwhile, William presided over multiple witch hunts in Bavaria during this time. These church reforms cost Bavaria much and eventually William decided to abdicate in favor of his son, Maximilian. William retired to Schleissheim Palace where he spent the remainder of his life in prayer and contemplation.

Date of Death: 7 February 1626

Successor: Maximilian I

Other Monarchs Who Died Today:

• Boleslaus II, king of Bohemia (999)
• Go-Suzaku, emperor of Japan (1045)
• Gustav IV Adolf, king of Sweden (1837)
• Pius IX, pope of Rome (1878)
• Hussein, king of Jordan (1999)