The wife of the above-mentioned Count Burkhardt was a Countess of Schwarzbruck, Elisabeth by name. She was the mother of two daughters—one named Gertrude, the other Sophia. Gertrude married a young Count of Mansfeldt, the cousin of Count Burkhardt, and Sophia married a Burggraf of Querfurdt.
Now Count Burkhardt, in the same year that he finished the building and furnishing of the aforesaid convent, departed joyfully from this present life; and after his departure the noble countess, Frau Elisabeth, his widow, found that the place chosen near the castle of Mansfeldt was not suitable for a spiritual life, and therefore, in the fifth year after the death of her lord, by the advice of persons of good understanding, she removed and rebuilt the convent at a place called Rodardsdorff. And when it had remained there twenty-four years it was again removed to Helpede or Hellfde, as the following history relates.
Now when the above-named countess, Frau Elisabeth, had removed the convent to Rodardsdorff, she betook herself thither, and there did she serve God, and ended her life well and blissfully.
The first abbess of this convent was Frau Kunigunde of Halberstatt, and a truly God-fearing and devout woman. And when she had lived seventeen years at Rodardsdorff, she there died a blessed death in the year 1251. And on the day following her departure there was chosen by the direction of the Holy Ghost, as the above-named abbess, Frau Kunigunde, had predicted, to be abbess in her room, the sister Gertrude, born of the noble family of Hackeborn, and a sister by birth of the blessed and marvellously endowed Mechthild, of whom the Book of spiritual graces gives the history.
This Abbess Gertrude was chosen unanimously, as being of a wholly spiritual and devout manner of life. She was nineteen years old at the time of her election, and she filled her office for forty years and eleven days; and during her time the nuns of the cloister lived holy and God-fearing lives, and God bestowed upon them marvellous gifts. And when she had lived fifty-nine years, she was taken away from this world, joyfully and piously, and entered into the gladness and the glory of the everlasting kingdom in the year of our Lord 1291.
And when the cloister had now been standing twenty-four years at Rodardsdorff, and she had been abbess at that place seven years, then for the third time was the site of the convent changed, and it was renewed and rebuilt as follows:—
It was seen and observed by Count Hermann of Mansfeldt, a son of Frau Gertrude, the elder daughter, and Burggraf Burkhardt of Querfurdt, a son of Frau Sophia, the younger daughter of the mighty Count Burkhardt of Mansfeldt, the founder of the convent, that at Rodardsdorff there was a great want of water, so that it could not have been well for the convent longer to remain there. Therefore these two counts made an exchange of the convent with the two barons, the Lord Albert and the Lord Ludolf of Hackeborn, for the manor and village of Hellfde, adding on their part other estates. And at Hellfde was the cloister for the third time rebuilt.
The nuns of the convent of Rodardsdorff were removed to the convent of Hellfde in the year 1258, on the Sunday of the Holy Trinity. To this inauguration of the convent did the aforesaid two Counts of Mansfeldt and Querfurdt invite many lords and gentlemen, such as Rupert, the archbishop of Magdeburg, Bishop Volradt, of Halberstatt, also many other lords and prelates, spiritual and temporal.
Count Hermann of Mansfeldt had no male issue, but only three daughters. Two of these, Sophia and Elisabeth, did he place in the convent of Hellfde, where they lived godly lives. One of them became an able writer, who wrote many good and useful books for the convent, and afterwards became the abbess thereof. The other was for a long time prioress, and was a skilful painter, who laboured industriously at the adorning of the books and of other things which pertained to the service of God. The third daughter was given in marriage by Count Hermann of Mansfeldt to a Baron von Rabbinswalt.
And because the aforesaid Count Hermann had no male heirs, he sold the castle and the county of Mansfeldt to the Burggraf Burkhardt of Querfurdt. And thus did Mansfeldt and the land come into the family of Querfurdt, as also other estates of Count Hermann in the land of Thuringia.