Ekbert Of Bamberg

Place: Bamberg

Death: 1237

Biography:

Ekbert of Andechs-Meranien (also called Ekbert of Bamberg) was bishop of Bamberg, Germany from 1203 until his death in 1237. He was the son of Berthold IV, Duke of Merania and Agnes of Rochlitz, and a brother of Saint Hedwig of Silesia and Gertrude of Merania, Queen of Hungary. Ekbert was a partisan of Emperor Friedrich II and took part in the imperial invasion of the Duchy of Austria in 1236. He became governor for Austria and Styria installed by the emperor, but died shortly thereafter. During Ekbert's episcopate, Bamberg Cathedral was built. In 1208, after Count Otto VIII of Wittelsbach murdered the Hohenstaufen King Philip of Swabia in Bamberg, Bishop Ekbert and his brother Margrave Henry II of Istria were suspected of knowing about the Wittelsbach family's plans to murder the king, and they initially fell out of favor with the royal family. Ekbert fled to Hungary to his sister Gertrude of Merania, Queen of Hungary. The medieval historians either express doubts about the complicity of the Andechs, or they do not even address other perpetrators outside the narrower context of the Wittelsbachs.