Background
He may have been the son of Count Palatine Wigeric of Lotharingia and Cunigunda. Siegfried held possessions from his father in Upper Lorraine.
He may have been the son of Count Palatine Wigeric of Lotharingia and Cunigunda. Siegfried held possessions from his father in Upper Lorraine.
He was an advocate of the abbeys of Saint-Maximin de Trêves and Saint-Willibrord d"Echternach. Although his title of "count" is not disputed, the extent of the lands he possessed remains unclear. From 958, he sought to acquire the territories of Count Warner in the region of Bodeux near the Benedictine Abbey of Stavelot.
However, the Abbot of Stavelot, Werinfried, reluctant to have an ambitious landowner as his neighbor, acquired the village of Bodeux himself in 959.
As Siegfried"s ambitions to expand towards the Meuse River had failed, and as he was unwilling to confront the powerful episcopal cities of Trier or Metz, which ruled out expanding towards the Moselle River, he turned his attention towards the Alzette valley. Acquisition of "Lucilinburhuc" (Luxembourg)
In the mid-10th century, Siegfried acquired the rocky promontory known as Lucilinburhuc and its immediate surrounding area, as well as usage rights for the river from the Abbey of Saint-Maximin in Trier.
This was in exchange for land he owned near Feulen. In 963 Siegfried built a stronghold, a castellum Lucilinburhuc, around which a town started to grow.
The structure may have been a refurbishment of an existing building.
Siegfried gradually extended his territory towards the west, avoiding the Abbey"s lands and those of the emperor. Though Siegfried used the title of count, the title "count of Luxembourg" was only applied to William some 150 years later. Siegfried remained a loyal servant of the Holy Roman Emperors.
At the death of Otto II in 983, Siegfried fought at the side of the widowed Empress consort and regent Theophanu against the ambitions of Lothair of France.
They had the following issue:
Henry I of Luxembourg
Siegfried, cited in 985
Frederick I, Count of Salm and Luxembourg, married Ermentrude of Gleiberg, daughter of Heribert I, Count of Gleiberg and Ermentrud (Imizi). Dietrich II, bishop of Metz, 1006-1047
Adalberon, canon of Trier
Gislebert (d1004), count in the Moselgau
Cunigunda, married Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor
Eve, married Gerard, Count of Metz
Ermentrude, abbess
Luitgarde, married Arnulf, Count of Holland
a daughter, married Thietmar.