Brandenburg-Schwedt

Because of a lack of money in the late days of the disastrous Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), the "Great Elector Frederick William of Brandenburg in about 1640 mortgaged the Schwedt region to the Baltic German noble Gustav Adolf von (Varrensback, Varensbeke) for the sum 25,000 Thalers.

His second wife, Electress Sophia Dorothea, daughter of Duke Philip of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, personally re-acquired the territory for 26,500 Thalers shortly after the birth of her first son Prince Philipp William (1669–1711).

In 1692 he came to terms with his elder half-brother Elector Frederick III in 1692, obtained a considerable severance payment and the title of a "Margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt"; intensively cultivating his dominions and furnishing his castle in a Baroque style at great expense.

His younger brother Albert Frederick (1672–1731) became a general lieutenant and Grand Master of the Order of Saint John; the third-born, Charles Philip (1673–1695) likewise became an officer and shortly before his death secretly married the Piedmontese noblewoman Caterina di Balbiano, who called herself Madame de Brandebourg as a widow.

As he left no male heirs upon his death, Philip William's youngest son, Frederick Henry (1709-1788) ruled as the last Margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt and developed Schwedt into a cultural center.