Kloster Uetersen

The Uetersen convent (Kloster) was founded in the 13th century and gradually acquired land holdings—some in Holstein-Pinneberg and some under the jurisdiction of other Holstein counts. All lands were Schaumburgian at the time of acquisition. However, by 1459 all Schaumburgian lines except Pinneberg had died out and the rest of Holstein became Danish. Thus, between 1459 and 1640, Kloster Uetersen was a subdivision of two different countries—the County of Holstein-Pinneberg (Schaumburgian) and the Duchy of Holstein (Danish). (The Danish portion was not included in the 1544 partition of Holstein, but was jointly ruled by the resulting countries. I render its country name simply as “Holstein” throughout the period covered.)

 

The Klosterhof (or convent grounds) fell under Danish sovereignty, despite being surrounded by Schaumburgian territory. That gave considerable weight to the Danish king’s desire to embrace the reformation, so in 1555, the nature of the Kloster changed—existing nuns were allowed to remain, but new residents performed no religious functions. The changes were orchestrated specifically to allow the Kloster to continue exercising secular authority over its land holdings rather than surrender that authority to the king (who was also Duke of Holstein-Segeberg). The retention of secular authority extended to the Schaumburgian holdings of the Kloster. In both cases, that meant that the Kloster had an administrative status similar to an Amt.

 

In 1640, the last of the Schaumburgians died out and Pinneberg reverted to Holstein—most of it going to the core duchy, where it became a “Herrschaft” because it retained more autonomy than an Amt. The portion of the Kloster that had been Schaumburgian remained subordinate to the Herrschaft, but the portion that had been Danish remained independent of any intermediate jurisdiction. In fact, the Danish portion was divided into three smaller jurisdictions. That leads to some confusing, but unavoidable, naming practices. I recognize the following names for parts of Kloster Uetersen:

 

1. Kloster Uetersen, Klosterhof (Danish);
2. Herrschaft Pinneberg, Klostervogtei Uetersen (Schaumburgian, but not to be confused with Amtsvogtei Uetersen, the territory of which had never been under the Kloster’s jurisdiction);
3. Kloster Uetersen, Gut Horst (Danish); and
4. Kloster Uetersen, Vogtei Krempdorf (Danish, but consisting of a mere five properties spread among three villages, making it too insignificant to appear in the database).