Anna Jagiellonka (Duchess of Pomerania)

Anna Jagiellonka was born on March 12, 1476 in Neshava . She was the eleventh of the thirteen children of King of Poland Casimir IV and Elizabeth of Habsburg. Grandfather and grandmother from the paternal side of Anna were Vladislav II Jagailo , Grand Duke of Lithuania and his fourth wife, Sophia Golshanskaya . The maternal grandparents were Albrecht II , king of Germany, Hungary and the Czech Republic, and Elizabeth of Luxembourg , Princess of the Holy Roman Empire .

The newborn girl received the name in honor of her mother’s sister, Anna of Luxembourg . From November 1479 until the fall of 1485, she was with her family in Lithuania. There is no evidence of her education.

Her father hoped to marry Anna to the German prince Maximilian of Habsburg , the son of Emperor Frederick III . In the spring of 1486, the Polish ambassadors arrived in Cologne . They had a portrait of a girl with them to show it to their future groom. But the Habsburgs refused such an offer.

At the turn of 1489 and 1490, Nikolai Koscielsky, the Helm bishop and diplomat, as the representative of the Polish side, began negotiations with the Duke of Pomerania Bohuslav X regarding his possible marriage with Princess Anne. Bohuslav X was already married. His first wife died in 1489, leaving no children.

On March 7, 1490, an agreement on the marriage of Anna and Boguslav was signed in Grodno . It was signed by the headman of Belgrade Adam Podevils, the headman of Szczecin, Werner Schuleburg, the knight of the Order of Malta Richard Schulenburg and Bernard Roth. A marriage by proxy has been attested.

In a dowry of his daughter, Casimir IV provided 32,000 Hungarian zlotys. Around January 15, 1491, Anna left Lentica and went to Pomerania. On February 2, 1491, a wedding ceremony was held in Szczecin. The celebrations were very magnificent. They were attended by the mother of Boguslav Sofia and his brothers - Magnus and Belshazzar.

The bride soon turned 15 years old. The groom was twenty-two years older than her. Their marriage was supposed to strengthen the friendly relations of the Kingdom of Poland with Pomerania.

Spouses spent most of their time in Szczecin, where Boguslav renewed and expanded the local castle . Soon Anna gave birth to her first child - a daughter, who was named Anna in her honor.

December 16, 1496 Boguslav went to support Maximilian I, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, in his war against King Charles of France VIII . Subsequently, he went to the Holy Land for a Christian pilgrimage. He returned home only on April 12, 1498. In his absence, affairs were managed by Bishop Kamensky Benedict Wallenstein and Chancellor Jerzy Kleist. Anna had the opportunity to join the publication of certain documents.

In the fall of 1502, the citizens of Szczecin rebelled. The duke and his family moved to Harz , from where Boguslav later sent his family to the castle in Ickermünde . There Anna gave birth to a youngest child - a son, who was called Otton.

As Tomasz Kantzow, a German chronicler, testifies, some say that the duchess became ill due to fear of a hasty departure, others because she entered the rooms that had just been whitewashed with lime, and the fumes affected her heart. One way or another, on August 12, 1503, Anna died at the age of twenty-seven. Modern scholars, based on the testimony of the chronicler Joachim Wedel, suggest that the cause of her death was pneumonia or tuberculosis. The duchess was buried in the Elden monastery in Greifswald . This is now evidenced by a memorial plaque embedded in the wall of the abbey.

The husband survived Anna for twenty years and died on October 5, 1523 in Szczecin. Boguslav was inherited by Anna and sons Jerzy and Barnim.

In total, the couple had eight children, only one of whom died in infancy:

• Anna (1492 - April 25, 1550), since 1521 the reigning countess Lubinsky; married to George I of Brzeg
• George I (1493-1531). Since 1513, married to Amalia (1490-1525), daughter of Elector Philip of Palatinate .
• Casimir VIII (April 28, 1494 - October 29, 1518)
• Elizabeth (d. 1518)
• Barnim (genus and d. Before 1501)
• Sofia (1498-1568), since 1525 the Queen of Denmark , married to Frederick I of Denmark ^[1]
• Barnim IX (1501-1573)
• Otto (before 1503 - until 1518)