During this reign the work of conquering and Germanizing the Slavonic tribes east of the Elbe was seriously taken in hand under the lead of Albert the Bear and Henry the Lion, and the foundation of the margraviate of Brandenburg by Albert tended to make life and property more secure in the north-east of Germany.
In 1 533 it was raised to a margraviate by the emperor Charles V., and wds held by various families until in 1799 it passed, through the Sultzbach branch of the Wittelsbachs, to the royal house of Bavaria, by whom it was renounced in favour of the Batavian republic in 1801.
Landsberg was the capital of a small margraviate of this name, ruled in the 12th century by a certain Dietrich, who built the town.
Towards the close of the 12th century Moravia was raised to the dignity of a margraviate, but with the proviso that it should be held as a fief of the crown of Bohemia.
With the aid of inquisitors from Rome, the evil was literally burnt out, but not before provinces, especially in the south and 1 In 1412 he pawned the twenty-four Zips towns to Poland, and, .in 1411 he pledged his margraviate of Brandenburg to the Hohenzollerns.