Engelbert was born in 1185 in Schloss Burg as the younger son of Count Engelbert I of Berg and his wife Margarete of Guelders.

In a time when clerical and episcopal positions were a part of political patronage, Englebert was made provost of churches in Cologne and Aachen, Germany while still a young boy, and of the Cologne cathedral at age 14.

He led a worldly and dissolute youth and was known for his good looks, keen mind, and wild ways. Englebert went to war, to support his cousin Archbishop Adolf, against Archbishop Bruno. For this, and for threatening to attack the Holy Roman Emperor Otto IV, both Engelbert and Adolf were excommunicated in 1206 by Pope Innocent III.

In 1208 Engelbert publicly submitted to the pope’s authority and was received back into the Church. He fought the Albigensians in 1212. Chosen archbishop of Cologne on 29 February 1216.

Engelbert enforced clerical discipline, helped establish the Franciscans in his diocese in 1219 and the Dominicans in 1221, built monasteries and insisted on strict observance in them, and used a series of provincial synods to regulate church matters.

Engelbert was appointed guardian of the juvenile King Henry VII and administrator of the Holy Roman Empire by Emperor Frederick II in 1221.

However, for all that he was loved by his people for the stability and security he brought, many of the nobility hated and were afraid of him. Hence, he had to travel with a troupe of bodyguards.

Pope Honorius III and Emperor Frederick II advised Engelbert to protect the nuns of Essen who were being oppressed and harassed by Engelbert’s cousin, Count Frederick of Isenberg.

To prevent any action by the archbishop, Count Frederick and some henchmen ambushed Engelbert on the road from Soest to Schwelm, stabbing him 47 times. Engelbert is considered a martyr as he died over the defence of religious sisters.

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