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There is a story that the Countess Agnes of Orlamünde, many, many years ago, murdered her two children in order that she might marry the man of her choice, and that in penance her ghost is condemned to haunt the Old Palace of Berlin and that of Bayreuth.
Luther insisted, notwithstanding, that Carlstadt was 'an associate of the new prophets. He challenged him finally to abandon his intrigues and confute him openly in writing, and the heated interview ended by Carlstadt promising to do so, and by Luther giving him a florin as a pledge and token of the bargain. From Jena Luther went through Kahla, where also he preached, to Orlamunde.
But the noble Count Albert loved only one young lady, beautiful Beatrice of Hainault, and would marry none but her. The Countess Cunigunda of Orlamunde, however, was not aware of this, and sent him a message, asking him whether he would not like to marry her. She would give him, besides her hand, the splendid Plassenburg and all her other property.
He proceeded then to advocate polygamy, as permitted to the Jews in the Old Testament: he actually advised an inhabitant of Orlamunde to take a second wife, in addition to the one then living.
He bought a small property near Wittenberg, and repaired thither to live as a layman and peasant. He wore a peasant's coat, and mixed with the other peasants as 'Neighbour Andrew. Luther saw him there, standing with bare feet amid heaps of manure, and loading it on a cart. He found a place for the exercise of his new work in the church at Orlamunde on the Saale, above Jena.
This dread apparition that forebodes evil to the reigning house of Prussia, is supposed to be the spectre of Countess Agnes Orlamunde, who murdered her first husband, as well as her two children, who constituted an obstacle to her marriage with, one of the ancestors of the kaiser.
But as it is, I cannot do so. The burgrave referred to the eyes of his parents, who did not like the Countess of Orlamunde, and he wished to make them responsible for his refusal, so as not to offend the beautiful widow. But Cunigunda interpreted the words differently, and thought the four eyes, which the Burgrave said were in the way of their marriage, were those of her two children.
In truth, I should have thought that beautiful Cunigunda of Orlamunde would rather welcome me as a friend, for was it not I who avenged her on the faithless house of Hohenzollern?" "You try to mock me," said the spectre, "for your heart is filled with doubt, and your soul with pride.
After uttering these words, she put her head calmly on the block. The burgrave then had her buried at the convent of Himmelskron, and, by virtue of an old treaty, the Burgraves of Nuremberg now succeeded to the fiefs of the Counts of Orlamunde, whose line had become extinct.
The Hohenzollern Burggraf of Nurnberg, who had married a younger Sister of the Duke's two years before this accident, managed to get at least BAIREUTH and some adjacencies; big Orlamunde, who had not much better right, taking the lion's share.
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