page_title: Przemysł II
section_title: Royal government and death
hierarchical_section_title: Przemysł II / King of Poland (1295–1296) / Royal government and death
caption_attribution_description: Polski: Poznań, Katedra pw. śś. Apostołów Piotra i Pawła
context_page_description: Przemysł II, was the Duke of Poznań from 1257–1279, of Greater Poland from 1279–1296, of Kraków from 1290–1291, and Gdańsk Pomerania from 1294–1296, and then King of Poland from 1295 until his death. After a long period of Polish high dukes and two nominal kings, he was the first to obtain the hereditary title of king, and thus to return Poland to the rank of kingdom. A member of the Greater Poland branch of the House of Piast as the only son of Duke Przemysł I and the Silesian princess Elisabeth, he was born posthumously; for this reason he was brought up at the court of his uncle Bolesław the Pious and received his own district to rule, the Duchy of Poznań in 1273. Six years later, after the death of his uncle, he also obtained the Duchy of Kalisz.
  In the first period of his government, Przemysł II was involved only in regional affairs, first in close collaboration and then competing with the Duke of Wrocław, Henryk IV Probus. This policy caused the rebellion of the prominent Zaremba family and the temporary loss of Wieluń. Working with the Archbishop of Gniezno, Jakub Świnka, he sought the unification of the principalities of the Piast dynasty.
context_section_description: After the coronation, Przemysł II went to Pomerelia and came to Słupsk On 30 July, where he confirmed the privileges of the Cistercian monasteries in Oliwa and Żarnowiec. He then visited other major cities: Gdańsk, Tczew and Świecie. In August 1295 he returned to Greater Poland but in October he was again in Gdańsk. This demonstrates how important the Duchy of Pomerelia was for Przemysł II.
  Taking into account the fact that these events took place in the 13th century, the sources that stated any details concerning Przemysł II's death are dubious; the Kronika wielkopolska failed to mention the events in Rogoźno.
  Sources are divided about who are the perpetrators of the murder of the Polish King: the margraves of Brandenburg, some Polish families (the Nałęczs or Zarembas or the two families at the same time), and finally attempts to reconcile the two theories.
  One of the first sources who must be taken into account was the almost contemporary Rocznik kapituły poznańskiej. The records shows that the margraves of Brandenburg, Otto V, another Otto (perhaps Otto IV), and John IV, nephew of Przemysł II (as son of his oldest sister Constance), sent an army who arrived in the dawn on 8 February 1296 to the town of Rogoźno, where the King spent the Carnival to kidnap him. However, because he showed strong resistance and was wounded, the men, unable to take him injured to Brandenburg, finally killed him. The motive for the crime was the hatred of the margraves toward the Polish King because of his coronation.
  The murder of King Przemysł II by men of the margraves of Brandenburg was also supported by the Kronika oliwska (Chronicle of Oliva), which stipulates that after the coronation:
  lived one year, was captured by the adjutant of Waldemar, Margrave of Brandenburg, and was murdered in revenge for his wife, the holy Lukarda, which, he suspected had killed before.
  With high probability it is assumed that the first part of this information, was translated from the Liber Mortuorum Monasterii Oliviensis by the author of the Kronika oliwska, Abbot Stanisław, and the message about the motives of the murder as a revenge for Ludgarda's death is the result of a latter addition of the Abbot. This passage established the main indication that Margrave Waldemar of Brandenburg was guilty of the crime; however, during the tragic events he could not have participated because in 1296 he had less than 15 years old. Waldemar certainly gained notoriety only around 1308, after his failed attempt to seize Pomerania.
  Another earlier source who wrote about the death of Przemysł II at the hands of Brandenburg, was the Rocznik kołbacki of the Cistercian monastery in Kołbacz on Western Pomerania. The brief information is valuable primarily because it was the only one who named the direct perpetrator of the crime, a man named Jakub Kaszuba. The problem is that nothing certain about him was found in other sources, and besides, the name of Piotr, under what is known Przemysł II in the chronicle, raises big surprise. Most likely this is a mistake of the author.
  Finally, another source who accused the margraves of Brandenburg was the relative later Chronicle of Henry of Hertford, which although written during the mid-14th century, was reliable enough because was from Germany (and therefore unsuspected of being partial). There he stated that Przemysł II died during a war between Brandenburg and Greater Poland. Another German chronicler, who unequivocally accused the House of Ascania was Dietmar of Lübeck, which also pointed out that Przemysł II's wife Margaret took part in the conspiracy which killed him, due to her family relations. It is unknown whether the chronicler found this information, from earlier sources or deduced it based on the simple relationship: because Margaret came from the family accused of the murder, she had to participate.
  There are a number of sources, both Polish and foreign, who accused some Polish noble families as perpetrators of the crime. Among the Polish sources who established this fact are: the Rocznik małopolski in the Szamotuły cod
caption: Archcathedral Basilica of St. Peter and St. Paul in Poznań, the burial place of Przemysł II
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