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The title of Prince of Leiningen (German : Fürst zu Leiningen) was created by the Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II, who elevated Carl Friedrich Wilhelm, Count of Leiningen-Dagsburg-Hardenburg (a younger branch of the House of Leiningen) to the rank of Reichsfürst (Prince of the Holy Roman Empire) on 3 July 1779. Together with all other titles of nobility in Germany, it was abolished with the 1919 Weimar Constitution.
From 1560 until 1725, Hardenburg Castle was the main seat of the branch. After its partial destruction during the Nine Years' War, the residence was moved to Bad Dürkheim.
In 1801, this line was deprived by France of its lands on the left bank of the Rhine, namely Hardenburg, Dagsburg and Durkheim. However, it received the secularized Amorbach Abbey in 1803 as ample compensation for these losses. The complete titles of Carl Friedrich Wilhelm, 1st Prince of Leiningen, were Imperial Prince of Leiningen, Count palatine of Mosbach, Count of Düren, Lord of Miltenberg, Amorbach, Bischofsheim, Boxberg, Schüpf and Lauda.
A few years later, the short-lived Principality of Leiningen at Amorbach was mediatized. Its territory is now included mainly in Baden, but also partly in Bavaria and in Hesse. Amorbach Abbey is still today the seat of the Prince of Leiningen. A former hunting lodge named Waldleiningen Castle at Mudau is now run as a hospital by the family.
The second prince, Emich Charles, married Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. After his death in 1814, the princess married Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn, a younger son of George III of the United Kingdom, by whom she became the mother of Queen Victoria. The Queen's half-siblings, Carl, 3rd Prince of Leiningen and Princess Feodora remained close to their half-sister.
The fourth prince, Ernst, pursued a career in the British Royal Navy and married Princess Marie of Baden.
The sixth prince, Karl, married Grand Duchess Maria Kirillovna of Russia, daughter of Princess Victoria Melita who was in turn daughter of Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Queen Victoria's second son.
In 1991, the seventh prince, Emich, disinherited his eldest son, the Hereditary Prince Karl Emich, after he married his second wife, Dr Gabriele Thyssen, on May 24 of that same year. The disinheritance was upheld by the German courts, and so on Emich's death later that year, he was succeeded by his second son, Andreas, who has been the eighth prince from that time. He married Princess Alexandra of Hanover.
The heir apparent is Ferdinand, Hereditary Prince of Leiningen (born 1982).
Princess Alexandra of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha was the fourth child and third daughter of Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia. As the wife of Ernst II, she was Princess consort of Hohenlohe-Langenburg. She was a granddaughter of both Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom and Tsar Alexander II of Russia.
Amorbach is a town in the Miltenberg district in the Regierungsbezirk of Lower Franconia (Unterfranken) in Bavaria, Germany, with some 4,000 inhabitants. It is situated on the small river Mud, in the northeastern part of the Odenwald.
Hohenlohe-Langenburg was a German county and later principality in the Holy Roman Empire. It was located around Langenburg in what is now northeastern Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Starting in medieval times and continuing until 1806, this small state was ruled by a branch of the House of Hohenlohe, first as lords, then as counts and ultimately as ruling princes of the Holy Roman Empire after 1764. The princely House of Hohenlohe-Langenburg still owns and lives in Langenburg Castle today.
The House of Leiningen is the name of an old German noble family whose lands lay principally in Alsace, Lorraine, Saarland, Rhineland, and the Palatinate. Various branches of this family developed over the centuries and ruled counties with Imperial immediacy.
Princess Feodora of Leiningen was the only daughter of Emich Carl, Prince of Leiningen (1763–1814) and Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. Feodora and her older brother Carl, Prince of Leiningen, were maternal half-siblings to Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom.
Carl Friedrich Wilhelm, Prince of Leiningen was a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire and the first ruler of the Principality of Leiningen.
Emich Carl, Prince of Leiningen was the reigning Fürst of the Principality of Leiningen. After his death, his widow, Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, married a son of George III of the United Kingdom and her only child from that marriage was Victoria, Queen of the United Kingdom.
Karl, Prince of Leiningen, KG was the third Prince of Leiningen and maternal half-brother of Queen Victoria. Leiningen served as a Bavarian lieutenant general, before he briefly played an important role in German politics as the first Prime Minister of the Provisorische Zentralgewalt government formed by the Frankfurt Parliament in 1848.
Ernst, Prince of Leiningen was a German nobleman who served with distinction in the British Royal Navy.
Hermann, Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg was the 6th Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg and the second son of Ernst I, Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg, and Princess Feodora of Leiningen.
Carl Ludwig II, 5th Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg, was the eldest son of Ernst I, Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg. He was the fifth Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg.
The Principality of Leiningen was a short-lived principality ruled by the Prince of Leiningen.
Emich Kyrill, Prince of Leiningen was a German entrepreneur and son of Karl, Prince of Leiningen. He was the 7th Prince of Leiningen from 1946 until his death in 1991.
Karl, Prince of Leiningen was a German military officer and the eldest surviving son of Emich, Prince of Leiningen. Upon his father's death in 1939, he became the sixth Prince of Leiningen.
Emich, Prince of Leiningen was the son of Ernst, Prince of Leiningen. He was the fifth Prince of Leiningen from 1904 to 1918, and afterwards titular Prince of Leiningen from 1918 until his death.
The County of Leiningen consists on a group of counties, which were ruled by the Leiningen family.
Johann Karl August, Count of Leiningen-Dagsburg-Falkenburg was a German nobleman. By descent, he was Count of Leiningen and Dagsburg, by heritage, he was Lord of Broich and Bürgel.
Countess Johanna Magdalene of Hanau-Lichtenberg was a daughter of Johann Reinhard II of Hanau-Lichtenberg (1628–1666) and the Countess Palatine Anna Magdalena of Birkenfeld-Bischweiler (1640–1693).
Princess Elise of Hohenlohe-Langenburg was Princess Reuss Younger Line as the wife of Heinrich XXVII. She was the eldest daughter of Hermann, Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg and his wife Princess Leopoldine of Baden.
Schloss Dürkheim is a former Baroque-style palace in Bad Dürkheim, a spa town in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It was the seat of the Counts and later Princes of Leiningen. Except for a few remnants, it has disappeared; today, the Kurhaus and the Kurpark-Hotel stand in its place.