Ludovic of Luetzelbach was the first documented ancestor of the Frankenstein dynasty and is first recorded in the year 1115, his descendant Wieknand again in 1160. His grandson Konrad I. and his offspring built the homonymous
Breuberg Castle around 1200 and named
themselves after it. In 1239, owing to his son's Eberhard I. Reiz von Breuberg marriage with Mechtild (Elisabeth?), one of the five heiresses of Gerlach II. von Büdingen, imperial
bailiff of the
Wetteraukreis, the power, possessions and interests were also relocated into the Wetterau region, where the Breubergians Arrois, Gerlach and Eberhard III. held the
bailiffship consecutively. They found their last resting-place in the monastery of Konradsdorf, where the family had made many
donations. Before 1250, Lord Konrad II. Reiz von Breuberg erected
Frankenstein Castle near
Darmstadt and since named himself "von und zu Frankenstein". He was the founder of the free imperial
lordship Frankenstein, which was subject
only to the jurisdiction of the emperor, with possessions in Nieder-Beerbach, Darmstadt, Ockstadt,
Wetterau and
Hesse. Additionally the Frankensteins held other possession and
Sovereignty-rights as
Burgraves in Zwingenberg (
Auerbach (Bensheim), in
Darmstadt,
Groß-Gerau,
Frankfurt am Main and
Bensheim. In the year 1292 the Frankensteins opened the castle to the counts of Katzenelnbogen (
County of Katzenelnbogen) and leagued with them. Being both strong opponents of the
Protestant Reformation and following territorial conflicts, connected disputes with the
Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt, as well as the adherence to the catholic faith and the associated "right of
patronage", the family head Lord Johannes I. decided to sell the lordship to the landgrave in 1662, after various lawsuits at the
Imperial Chamber Court. Because of many vacancies in relation with the reformation, some family members could fill a number of unengaged offices and posts in various Chapters, Abbeys and Dioceses as
Canons,
Abbesses and
Prince-Bishops. After the sale of Frankenstein and being awarded the imperial baron dignity in 1670, the family retired to its possessions in Wetterau and acquired the lordship of
Ullstadt in the beginning of the 17th century in Middle
Franconia. In the 19th century they also bought the Lordship of
Thalheim bei Wels in
Austria. The family still consists of two existing branches in Germany, Austria and the US. == Prominent family members ==