Lorraine House

The first known ancestor of the house is Gerard I ( c. 708 - 779 ), the Count of Paris , who became the ancestor of the house of the Matfriedings (Gerardids) . His descendants at the turn of the 9th and 10th centuries appear in the chronicles as counts in Metz . They also managed various estates in Alsace and Lorraine . In 1047, Emperor Henry III transferred under the control of Count Adalbert the duchy of Upper Lorraine, which after the death of Adalbert in 1048 passed to his brother Gerhard . His descendants ruled Lorraine (and from 1484 the Duchy of Barsky ) until 1736 .

In the 16th century, the youngest branch of the Giza stood out from the Lorraine House, whose representatives played an outstanding role in the French politics of the Religious Wars and almost occupied the royal throne. In the XVII century, the younger line of this kind was dissolved in the ranks of the French nobility and existed until the Napoleonic Wars, its head bore the title of Duke of Elbef .

The eldest branch of the Lorraine House (called the Vaudemons) continued to hold Lorraine in its hands, although after the unification of France it was the only French-speaking region of Europe that was not part of the kingdom. The strengthening of imperialist sentiment in Versailles, especially during the reign of Louis XIV , forced the dukes to seek help from the main enemy of the Bourbons - the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire from the Habsburg dynasty.

By the eighteenth century, the political-dynastic alliance between the Habsburgs and the Lorraine house had become so close that the emperor Charles VI , without sons, issued a Pragmatic sanction and chose the lorraine duke Franz as husband of his heiress Maria Theresa . In 1745, he was elected emperor under the name of Franz I, and his descendants ruled the Austrian Empire with Maria Theresa until its fall in 1918 . Instead of Franz, the last duke of Lorraine was the ex-king of Poland, the father-in-law of Louis XV Stanislav Leszczynski . After his death in 1766, France annexed Lorraine.

Thus, in the XVIII century, the Lorraine house dissolves in the Habsburg house, and its representatives take the name Habsburg-Lorraine. Before Risorgimento, the lateral branches of the ruling dynasty in Austria occupied thrones in the Italian duchies of Tuscany (1737–1860), Parma (1738–48, 1814–47) and Modena (1814–59), as well as in Mexico (Emperor Maximilian , 1864–67) . They received Tuscany in exchange for Lorraine following the results of the War of the Austrian Succession .

Currently, according to the Lorraine rules of succession to the throne, the house is headed by the Duke of Hohenberg , a descendant of Archduke Franz Ferdinand from his marriage to Countess Sofia Hotek ( who died with him in Sarajevo ). In Austria, this branch of the genus is considered to be morganatic, and the great-grandson of the younger brother Franz Ferdinand, Karl von Habsburg (full title - Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, Bohemia, Croatia, Slavonia, Dalmatia, Galicia, Lodomeria, Illyria, Jerusalem, Duke of Lorraine, is recognized as heir to the throne) Bara, etc.).

• Matfridings
• Duchy of Lorraine
• List of Lorraine Rulers
• Hainaut's House (Reginarides)
• Ardennes (Baruansky) house (Vigerichids)

• Eduard Hlawitschka. Die Anfänge des Hauses Habsburg-Lothringen . - Saarbrucken, 1969.

• Counts of Metz on the Foundation for Medieval Genealogy website
• Dukes of Lorraine on the Foundation for Medieval Genealogy website
• FAMILIE DER GERHARDINER / ADALHARDEN GRAFEN VON PARIS
• FAMILIE DER MATFRIEDE