1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Günther of Schwarzburg

GÜNTHER OF SCHWARZBURG (1304–1349), German king, was a descendant of the counts of Schwarzburg and the younger son of Henry VII., count of Blankenburg. He distinguished himself as a soldier, and rendered good service to the emperor Louis IV., on whose death in 1347 he was offered the German throne, after it had been refused by Edward III., king of England. He was elected German king at Frankfort on the 30th of January 1349 by four of the electors, who were partisans of the house of Wittelsbach and opponents of Charles of Luxemburg, afterwards the emperor Charles IV. Charles, however, won over many of Günther’s adherents, defeated him at Eltville, and Günther, who was now seriously ill, renounced his claims for the sum of 20,000 marks of silver. He died three weeks afterwards at Frankfort, and was buried in the cathedral of that city, where a statue was erected to his memory in 1352.

See Graf L. Ütterodt zu Scharffenberg, Günther, Graf von Schwarzburg, erwählter deutscher König (Leipzig, 1862); and K. Janson, Das Königtum Günthers von Schwarzburg (Leipzig, 1880).