Hanau-Lichtenberg In Strasbourg, Count Philipp Wolfgang of Hanau-Lichtenberg wrote his
will, in which he made his son
Friedrich Casimir his sole hier and successor, based on the
primogeniture decree, which was in force in the ruling family of Hanau since 1375. In case Friedrich Casimir was still underage when he inherited the county, his regents would be Georg II and Count
Johann Ernst of Hanau-Münzenberg. Georg II was selected, because there were no male-line members of the Hanau-Lichtenberg line left, and Georg II was related in the female line, his grandmother being
Anna Sibylle of Hanau-Lichtenberg, a daughter of Count
Philipp IV. This was the only case in the history of Hanau where a regent was appointed who was of lower rank than his ward. However, Count Johann Ernst, who was the closest living relative, and had the proper feudal rank, however, he lived in faraway Hanau. Philipp Wolfgang died on . He was survived by his second wife,
Dorothea Diana of Salm and his underage children Friedrich Casimir,
Johann Philipp,
Johann Reinhard II, Sophie Eleonore and
Agatha Christine. As these children were underage, a guardian was needed. Georg II took up this task, although he had been offered an attractive alternative: to become
governor of the
Duchy of Württemberg, which had been
confiscated by the Emperor.
Hanau-Münzenberg Count Johann Ernst died on 12 January 1642, leaving Georg II as the only remaining guardian and regent. His ward, Count Friedrich Casimir, inherited Hanau-Münzenberg in a politically precarious situation: • Even travelling to Hanau-Münzenberg through enemy territory was difficult. Friedrich Casimir had to travel in disguise, with only a numerically small company, including Georg II. • The
liege lords of several of Hanau-Münzenberg's possessions, especially the
Archbishop of Mainz, but also the
Elector of Saxony, the Landgrave of
Hesse-Darmstadt, the
Bishop of Würzburg, and the
Abbey of Fulda, held that Friedrich Casimir was only distantly related to Johann Ernst and saw this as an opportunity to terminate the
fief. Their legal position was fairly weak, since there was a clear family relationship between Johann Ernst and Friedrich Casimir, and moreover the inheritance treaty from 1610 between the Hanau-Lichtenberg and Hanau-Münzenberg lines clearly applied. However, in the confusion of the
Thirty Years' War, things were decided by a nobleman's military power, not by the legality or otherwise of his legal position. Georg II acknowledged the problem and ensured his position was supported by
Hesse-Kassel. Landgravine
Amalie Elisabeth, the widow of Landgrave
Wilhelm V who had been born a Countess of Hanau-Münzenberg and was Regent of Hesse-Kassel at the time, provided Georg II with diplomatic and political support. She aimed to preserve all of Hanau-Münzenberg's territory, because the county was heavily indebted to Hesse-Kassel. In return, Georg II as regent of Hanau-Münzenberg, signed an inheritance treaty with Hesse-Kassel, promising that if the House of Hanau were to die out in the male line, then Hanau-Münzenberg would fall to Hesse-Kassel. He also gave Hesse-Kassel the district of
Schwarzenfels and the territory of the former monastery in
Naumburg as securities for the debt. •
Hanau, the capital of the county, consisted to two legally separate cities: The old and the new town. The latter had been created at the turn of the 16th and 17th centuries to settle
Calvinist refugees from
France and the
Spanish Netherlands (today's
Belgium). City politics in New Hanau were dominated by wealthy merchants and traders who had acquired a very strong position in Hanau-Münzenberg due to their economic power. They intended to use the weak position of the new count and his regent to demand some concessions before he would accept his inheritance. After negotiating for ten days, Georg II concluded that he had no option but to give in to their demands. Their main demand was continuation of the religious
status quo. Friedrich Casimir, like all counts from the Hanau-Lichtenberg line, was a
Lutheran. Hanau-Münzenberg, however, had been
Calvinist since the reign of Count
Philipp Ludwig II (1576–1612). Fifty years earlier, Philipp Ludwig II had been able to prescribe the confession in his county under the principle . Georg II, however, found himself forced, not only to allow Calvinists to worship freely, but even to limit Lutheranism to the chapel in Hanau's city palace. Only in 1658 was Friedrich Casimir able to build a Lutheran church in Hanau, the St. Johann's church. In 1670, Hanau-Münzenberg officially became bi-confessional, although that did not stop the fierce debate among the confessions. It wasn't until 140 years later that the two churches in Hanau-Münzenberg could be united. == Death ==