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The House of Hohenlohe

The Hohenlohes are a Franconian family of counts, later princes, who shaped the north-east of today's Baden-Württemberg from the twelfth century onwards [2]. Their county was divided again and again, and the house today consists of six lines [2]. This page relies on the Neue Deutsche Biographie (NDB) article on the house, on the State Archives of Baden-Württemberg, which look after the family archive at Neuenstein, and on the website of Langenburg Castle, seat of the Hohenlohe-Langenburg line.

Origins

According to the NDB, the family has been documented since the middle of the twelfth century (1153), with its own lands in the middle Tauber valley and the old Franconian Gollachgau; its ancestors probably already lived there in Salian times [1]. It first named itself after its fortified seats of Pfitzingen, Röttingen and Weikersheim, and from the early thirteenth century took the name Hohenlohe, after a castle now in ruins at Hohlach near Uffenheim [1]. The Langenburg website names the first bearer of the name as Konrad, son of the Konrad of Weikersheim first mentioned in 1153 [4].

The decisive step came around 1200, when the Hohenstaufen granted the family the advocacy (Vogtei) over the collegiate foundation of Öhringen, with large estates and royal rights on the imperial road east of Wimpfen [1]. From the middle of the thirteenth century the Öhringen area became the centre of Hohenlohe territorial policy and the legal basis of its later sovereignty [1].

Servants of emperors

The NDB stresses that the house never steered imperial policy, but that its members supported it at decisive moments [1]. Under Frederick II, the brothers Gottfried (d. 1254) and Konrad (d. 1249) held leading positions, and their brother Heinrich (d. 1249) was Grand Master of the Teutonic Order; a later Gottfried (d. 1310) held the same office [1]. Members of the family became bishops of Würzburg, Bamberg and Passau [1].

Counts of the Empire, and many divisions

The Langenburg website states that Emperor Frederick III raised the family to the rank of counts of the Empire under Kraft V on 13 May 1450; after a long dispute over the title with Landgrave Ludwig of Hesse was settled in 1495, that year is regarded as the birth of the counts of Hohenlohe [4].

About twenty divisions since the mid-thirteenth century weakened the house politically, and led to many family treaties, including the main division of 1511 [1]. The State Archives describe the "seniorate" constitution traceable from 1511, under which the eldest ruling count received and granted the fiefs; it was restated in 1703 [3]. The Reformation was introduced in 1566 [1].

Two main lines, two confessions

The house came to be divided into two main lines, Neuenstein and Waldenburg [1][3]. In 1667 the Waldenburg counts Ludwig Gustav and Christian converted to Catholicism [1]. When a Catholic, Count Philipp Ernst of Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, first became senior of the house in 1715, all the branches agreed to create a separate Protestant senior [3]. In the mid-eighteenth century the Waldenburg princes refused to recognise a common senior and fought decades of lawsuits with the Neuenstein line; a house treaty of 12 June 1782 restored the old constitution [3].

Note on sources. The sources give different dates for the princely rank. The NDB says the Catholic Waldenburg line was made princely by Emperor Francis I in 1757, and the Protestant Neuenstein line in 1764 [1]. The State Archives connect the Waldenburg dispute with "the elevation to the princely rank in 1744" [3]. The Langenburg website gives 1764 for the counts of Hohenlohe [4]. GOTHA reports these dates without choosing between them.

1806: mediatization

Under the Imperial Recess of 1803, Hohenlohe received three votes in the College of Princes [1]. With mediatization in 1806 it lost its independence: most of its lands went to the Kingdom of Württemberg, and the lordship of Schillingsfürst to Bavaria [1][5]. The archives of the old courts stayed where they were; after 1945 they were gathered at Neuenstein Castle, and under a 1971 agreement the archive remains the property of the house but is managed by the state [2].

Notable members

Among later members, the NDB names Prince Ludwig Aloys (1765–1829), who entered French service in 1816 and became a Marshal and Peer of France, and Prince Joseph (1740–1817), prince-bishop of Breslau [1]. Princess Marie (1855–1934), who married Prince Alexander of Thurn und Taxis, made Duino Castle a meeting place for writers and artists, Rilke among them [1].

The Hohenlohe-Langenburg line

Langenburg Castle has belonged to the Hohenlohes since the thirteenth century [5]. In 1610 Count Philipp Ernst inherited Langenburg and made it his residence, rebuilding it as a Renaissance castle [5]. The line has had close links with the British royal family since the eighteenth century: the castle's website points to Adelaide, consort of William IV, and to Princess Feodora of Leiningen, Queen Victoria's elder half-sister, who married Prince Ernst I in 1828 [4][5]. Prince Ernst II (1863–1950) was regent of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha from 1900 to 1905 [4]. Prince Gottfried (1897–1960) married Princess Margarita of Greece and Denmark, the eldest sister of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh [4].

Prince Kraft (1935–2004) rebuilt the castle after the fire of 1963 and founded the German Automobile Museum in 1970 [4]. His son, Prince Philipp (born 20 January 1970), married Saskia Binder in 2003 and has three children: Max-Leopold (2005), Gustav (2007) and Marita (2010) [4].

The other lines, such as Oehringen and Schillingsfürst, are not covered here because GOTHA has not yet checked their own sources.

Key dates

Licence: this article is original GOTHA text, released under CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Its sources are summarised or briefly quoted.