The Probert Encyclopaedia of People

BRUNSWICK

Brunswick was a distinguished German family founded by Albert Azo II., Marquis of Reggio and Modena, a descendant, by the female line, of Charlemagne. In 1047 he married Cunigunda, heiress of the Counts of Altorf, thus uniting the two houses of Este and Guelph. From his son, Guelph, who was created Duke of Bavaria in 1071, and married Judith of Flanders, a descendant of Alfred of England, descended Henry the Proud, who succeeded in 1125, and by marriage acquired Brunswick and Saxony. Otho, the great-grandson of Henry by a younger branch of his family, was the first who bore the title of Duke of Brunswick (1235). By the two sons of Ernest of Zeil, who became duke in 1532, the family was divided into the two branches of Brunswick -Wolfenbluttel (II.) and Brunswick-Hanover, from the latter of which comes the present royal family of Britain. The former was the German family in possession of the duchy of Brunswick until the death of the last duke in 1884. George Louis, son of Ernest Augustus and Sophia, granddaughter of James I of England, succeeded his father as Elector of Hanover in 1698, and was called to the throne of Great Britain in 1714 as George I.
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