Sophie was the heiress of Hesse, which she passed on to her son, Henry, upon her retention of the territory following her partial victory in the War of the Thuringian Succession, in which she was one of the belligerents.

Originally the western part of the Landgraviate of Thuringia, in the mid 13th century, it was inherited by the younger son of Henry II, Duke of Brabant, and became a distinct political entity.

He descends from the Hesse-Kassel branch of the family, which has been the genealogically senior male line since the house's major partition in 1567.

[1] The Battenbergs who later settled in England changed that name to Mountbatten after World War I at the behest of George V, who substituted British peerages for their former German princely title.

[1] Those descended from the marriage of Alexander of Battenberg, Prince of Bulgaria, contracted with a commoner after the loss of his throne, were granted the title Count von Hartenau.