Elizabeth Charlotte of Pfalz (1597–1660)

Elizabeth Charlotte is the daughter of Elector Frederick IV of Pfalz and his wife, Louise Juliana of Orange, Nassau . July 24, 1616 in Heidelberg, Elizabeth Charlotte married the future Elector of Brandenburg, George Wilhelm . The marriage between the Protestant dynasties of Brandenburg and the Palatinate was concluded for political purposes.

The brother of the young elector Frederick V of Pfalz , who simultaneously led the Evangelical Union , played an important role in imperial politics. In the autumn of 1618, during the class uprising in Bohemia, he received the Bohemian crown and thereby served as the cause of the Thirty Years War , the situation in Brandenburg also worsened. Georg Wilhelm was a weak and indecisive person, so Elizabeth Charlotte managed to insist that her brother, after being expelled from Bohemia, take refuge in Brandenburg Kustrin . Brandenburg thereby found himself in opposition to the Austrian imperial house.

Despite the fact that the elector had little interest in politics, they played a large role in domestic politics. So, she with the "Protestant Party" at court, she unsuccessfully opposed the pro-Austrian Catholic Minister Adam von Schwarzenberg . The future Minister of Brandenburg, Baron Otto von Schwerin, made a career in public service thanks to an invitation to the court from the Elector in 1637.

Another important merit of Elizabeth Charlotte was the role of the mother of the future Great Elector Friedrich Wilhelm . For his upbringing, along with his mother, the headmaster Johann Friedrich von Calcum was responsible. Mother influenced the Protestant consciousness of the future ruler. Friedrich Wilhelm was very attached to his mother, which was unusual at the time.

The Elector spent the last years of her life in her widowhood in Crossen an der Oder, where she died on April 26, 1660 . She was buried in the crypt of the Hohenzollern in the Berlin Cathedral .

In a marriage with Elector Georg Wilhelm were born:

• Louise Charlotte (1617–1676), married to Duke of Courland Jacob Kettler (1610–1681)
• Friedrich Wilhelm (1620–1688), Great Elector, married to Princess Louise Henrietta of Nassau of Orange (1627–1667), then Princess Dorothea of ​​Sofia Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg (1636–1689)
• Gedwig Sofia (1623–1683), married to the Landgrave Hesse-Kassel Wilhelm VI (1629–1663)
• Johann Sigismund (1624)

• Ernst Daniel Martin Kirchner . Die Kurfürstinnen und Königinnen auf dem Throne der Hohenzollern. - 2. Teil: Die letzten acht Kurfürstinnen. - B. , 1867, p. 182-220 Portrait of Elizabeth Charlotte (inaccessible link)