With the fall of the Hohenstaufen dynasty in the first half of the 13th century, royal power within Franconia evaporated and the former stem duchy fragmented into separate independent states.

When Franconia fragmented in the early 13th century with the fall of the Hohenstaufen dynasty, Nassau emerged as an independent state as part of the Holy Roman Empire.

[10] However, Erich Brandenburg in his Die Nachkommen Karls des Großen states that it is most likely that Gerhard was Robert I's son, because Gerard was the name of Beatrix of Limburg's maternal grandfather.

With the fall of the Hohenstaufen in the first half of the 13th century royal power within Franconia evaporated and the former stem duchy fragmented into separate independent states.

Nassau, originally a county, but part of the duchy of Franconia, developed on the lower Lahn river in what is known today as Rhineland-Palatinate.

By 1128, they acquired the bailiwick of the Bishopric of Worms, which had numerous rights in the area, and thus created a link between their heritage at the lower Lahn and their possessions near Siegen.

In the middle of the 12th century, this relationship was strengthened by the acquisition of parts of the Hesse-Thüringen feudal kingdom, namely the Herborner Mark, the Kalenberger Zent and the Court of Heimau (Löhnberg).

He was the second in the succession of so-called count-kings of several rivalling comital houses striving after the Roman-German royal dignity after the expiration the Hohenstaufen.

The Nassaus, however, were not on the imperial throne long enough to establish themselves in larger landholdings to increase their hereditary power such as the Luxemburgers did in Bohemia or the Habsburgs did in Austria.

Count of Merenberg (German: Graf von Merenberg) is a hereditary title of nobility that was bestowed in 1868 by the reigning Prince of Waldeck and Pyrmont, George Victor, upon the morganatic wife and male-line descendants of Prince Nikolaus Wilhelm of Nassau (1832–1905), younger brother of Adolf, last Duke of Nassau/Grand Duke of Luxembourg.

Nicholas married Natalia Alexandrovna Pushkina (1836–1913), former wife of Russian general Mikhail Leontievich von Dubelt.

In 1907, William IV, obtained passage of a law in Luxembourg confirming the exclusion of the Merenbergs from succession to the grand ducal throne.

In 1329, under Adolf's son Gerlach I of Nassau-Weilburg the House of Nassau and thereby, Wiesbaden, received the right of coinage from Holy Roman Emperor Louis the Bavarian.

After his death in 1544 the county was split into three parts, the three lines (Ottweiler, Saarbrücken proper and Kirchheim) were all extinct in 1574 and all of Nassau-Saarbrücken was united with Nassau-Weilburg until 1629.

Following Frederick Augustus' death, the princely title was adopted (in pretense) by his half brother through an unequal marriage, Karl Philip.

[16] The partition of the county of Nassau between Otto, and his older brother Walram (above), resulted in a permanent division between the 2 branches of the family.

The connection was via Engelbert I, who offered his services to the Duke of Burgundy, married in 1403 Johanna van Polanen, the heiress of the barony of Breda, the lordship of den Lek and other lands in the duchy of Brabant at the mouth of the Rhine delta and the Scheldt river.

The Stuarts and the Bourbons came to power at the same time as the Oranges, the Vasas and Oldenburgs were able to establish a hereditary kingship in Sweden and Denmark, and the Hohenzollerns were able to set themselves on a course to the rule of Germany.

Although the institutions of the United Provinces became more republican and entrenched as time went on, William the Silent had been offered the countship of Holland and Zealand, and only his assassination prevented his accession to those offices.

Louis of Nassau, Lord of De Lek and Beverweerd was a younger illegitimate son of Prince Maurice and Margaretha van Mechelen.

Orange had been invaded and captured by King Louis XIV in 1672 during the Franco-Dutch War, and again in August 1682, but William did not concede his claim to rule, and recovered the principality via the peace treaties.

He enfeoffed François Louis, Prince of Conti, a Bourbon relative of the Chalon dynasty, with the Principality of Orange, so that there were three claimants to the title.

He named his cousin John William Friso of Nassau-Dietz as his heir in The Netherlands and the principality of Orange, passing over the claims of the Hohenzollerns of Brandenburg/Prussia.

His eldest son, William Louis "Us Heit" (West Frisian for "our father") was Stadholder of Friesland, Groningen, and Drenthe, a General in the Dutch States Army and the chief lieutenant of his cousin Prince Maurice of Nassau, in their innovations in military strategy and organization, victories in the field, and governing of the Dutch Republic.

In addition, as a special thanks for his role in establishing the Peace of Westphalia, he was elevated to the rank of prince in 1650 by Emperor Ferdinand III.

Count Henry of the Protestant line married Mary Magdalene of Limburg-Stirum, who brought the Lordship of Wisch in the County of Zutphen into the marriage.

Blue, because of its nearness to purple, which in the northern climes tended to fade (red was the other choice), was also a popular color for those with royal aspirations.

The principle ones are depicted below, i.e. Then, And in Germany, Finally, in the Netherlands, the real base of their wealth and power: In most of the estates in the more populous provinces of Holland and Zealand, the land itself was secondary to the profit on the commerce that flowed through it.

The family spawned many famous statesmen and generals, including two of the acknowledged "first captains of their age", Maurice of Nassau and the Marshal de Turenne.

L'écartelé Nassau-Luxembourg sommé de la couronne royale (sans supports ni manteau).Armoiries fixées par S.A.R.