Schönburg family

The House of Schönburg (also Schumburg; Czech: ze Šumburka) is a noble family of princely and historically sovereign rank.

For several hundred years, the lords of Schönburg (Saale) have appeared in the history of southwestern Saxony, beginning in 1130, with the mention of Ulricus de Schunenberg (also Sconenberg).

[1] The lords of Schönburg acquired several possessions over the centuries: Glauchau, where they had built a castle as an imperial fief around 1170, came into their ownership in 1256.

The territory of Schönburg overlapped into Saxony, Bohemia, and eventually Thuringia and all of it fell under the legal jurisdiction of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation.

The honor carried an important implication: the lordship was allodial, not a fief, thus the title, to the property and to the status, was inalienable (it could not be taken away).

Finally, at his coronation 9 October 1790, Leopold II raised the Waldenburg-Hartenstein branch of the family to the status of a princely house.

The Soviet-directed agrarian land reform of September 1945 limited the size of any property, generally, to 1 square kilometer (0.39 sq mi).

The Bohemian possessions included Údlice (Eidlitz), Ahníkov (Hagensdorf), Hasištejn (Hassenstein), Perštejn (Pürstein), Kadaň (Kaaden), Žacléř (Schatzlar), Trutnov (Trautenau) and Šumburk (Schönburg).

Immediately after the battle was won, Charlemagne discovered that the man who saved him had survived, and recognized him as a Schönburg.