Jens Grand
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article or section may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please help improve this article or replace this tag with a more specific message. This article has been tagged since April 2006. (help, talk) |
Jens Grand (1260? -May 29, 1327) was a Danish archbishop (1289-1302), titular Archbishop of Riga (1304-1310), and Archbishop of Bremen (1310-1327), known as the central figure of the second ecclesiastical struggle in Denmark in the late 1200s.
Grand belonged to a Danish magnate's family, he was related to both Archbishop Jakob Erlandsen and to many of the outlaws after the regicide 1286. He appeared as a political factor when he was elected as archbishop during the years of crisis. From the start he firmly opposed the royal power, openly sympathising with the exiled magnates and refusing any support of the royal family. Like Jacob Erlandsen he seems to have been the supporter of an independent church without any obligations towards the State or the king. These views that seem to have been stated in a both daring and provoking way made him appear to the young Eric VI as a pure traitor especially at a time of danger.
In 1294, Jens Grand was arrested on orders of the king and for over two years he was imprisoned on Søborg Castle in Northern Zealand under both humiliating and unhealthy conditions but refused to yield. In 1296, however, he succeeded in escaping by the help of a cook and fled to his castle on Bornholm whereafter he started the process in Rome. The crisis led to interdict and a papal ban on the king but without much effect, both the bishops and much of the people seem to have preferred a peaceful solution.
The Grand affair lasted from 1297 to 1302 and was a foreign political strain on the Danish government. The archbishop demanded a huge compensation for his arrest together with general royal concessions. In return king Eric accused him of disloyal behaviour and treason. The king’s firm attitude together with a half-hearted support by the church weakened Grand’s case and after a royal rapprochement to Pope Boniface VIII the affair ended 1302 with the payment of a much lesser penalty than expected while Jens Grand was removed from his Danish see.
Grand’s later career was marked by new struggles. From 1310 he was Archbishop of Bremen where he came into an insoluble conflict with his subordinates and at last he settled in Avignon where he lived for the rest of his life engaged in bitter lawsuits.
Though coloured by the opinion of his enemies and opponents the negative name left behind Jens Grand looks remarkably unanimous. He seems to have been a man of courage, administrative ability, firmness and principality but also hot-tempered, cantankerous and reckless. Even in an age of great respect of the clergy he lacked general support. The reason of his defeat was probably also that the power of the Pope was on decline.
