Louis IV, Landgrave of Thuringia

Who was Louis IV, Landgrave of Thuringia?

Ludwig IV or Louis IV was the Landgrave of Thuringia from 1217 to 1227.

Louis was born in Creuzburg to Hermann I, Landgrave of Thuringia, and Duchess Sophia, a daughter of Otto of Wittelsbach, Duke of Bavaria. Upon his father's death in 1216, Louis ascended the Thuringian throne at the age of sixteen. On the Feast of St. Kilian in 1218 at age eighteen, he was armed as a knight in the Church of St. George in Eisenach. At Wartburg Castle in 1220 at age twenty, Louis married 14-year-old Elisabeth of Hungary, with whom he had three children: Hermann II, Landgrave of Thuringia, Sophie of Thuringia, and Gertrud, later abbess at Altenberg. He set up court in Eisenach.

In 1226, Louis was called to the Diet in Cremona, where he promised Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, to take up the cross and accompany him to the Holy Land. He embarked for the Sixth Crusade in 1227, partly inspired also by the tales of his uncle, who had been to the Levant with the Holy Roman Emperor.