Albrecht Wolfgang (Schaumburg-Lippe)

Albrecht Wolfgang Count of Schaumburg-Lippe

Albrecht Wolfgang Graf zu Schaumburg-Lippe (* May 8, 1699 in Bückeburg ; † September 24, 1748 ibid) was a military and military leader in the early days of the Enlightenment . From 1728 to 1748 he was the ruling lord of the small county of Schaumburg-Lippe .

Life

Albrecht Wolfgang was born the son of Friedrich Christian Graf zu Schaumburg-Lippe (1655–1728) and his first wife Johanna Sophie zu Hohenlohe-Langenburg .

His first wife was from 1721 Margarete Gertrud, b. Countess von Oeynhausen (1701–1726), the youngest of three illegitimate daughters of Elector Georg Ludwig von Hannover (who ruled as King George I of Great Britain from 1714 ) and his long-time mistress Melusine von der Schulenburg (1667–1743), since 1719 Duchess of Kendal . Her sister Margarethe (1668–1753), married to Raben Christoph von Oeynhausen, chamberlain and chief hunter Georg I, had officially raised Margarete Gertrud as her own daughter. At the instigation of the king, his daughter was in 1721 by Emperor Charles VI. raised to the personal status of imperial count as Countess von Oeynhausen in order to be able to marry the Hereditary Count Albrecht Wolfgang without this as a marriage to the left would have called his inheritance claims into question. In 1722 her foster parents were also given the status of imperial count. The marriage to the daughter of the neighboring elector and lord of a major European power meant for the small county the neutralization of the territorial expansionist desires of Kurhannover and the acquisition of a protective power against competing claims of the Landgraviate Hessen-Kassel on the Schaumburg-Lippische territory.

After her death in 1730 he married Charlotte Friederike Amalie (1702–1785), the widow of Prince Leopold von Anhalt-Köthen and daughter of Prince Friedrich Wilhelm I of Nassau-Siegen . Albrecht Wolfgang's younger brother Friedrich Ludwig Carl Graf zu Schaumburg-Lippe (1702-1776) was twenty years French officer and therefore temporarily lived in Paris, where he informed the court Bückeburger an ongoing literary news, including on the Enlightenment to Voltaire .

Albrecht Wolfgang had two sons: the elder, Georg (1722–1742), died in a duel, the younger Wilhelm (1724–1777) would later become the most famous representative of the Schaumburg-Lippe family. The year 1740 (in May) not only brought the birth of Albrecht Wolfgang's illegitimate son Charles - his mother was his mistress, Countess Charlotte Sophie Bentinck (1715–1800), with whom (and his wife) he was married at the time Lived triangular relationship in Bückeburg. In November 1740 the “ Antimachiavell ” of the hopeful Prussian Prince Friedrich was read together (with Countess Bentinck and Johann Heinrich Meister , who was the tutor of Albrecht Wolfgang's son Wilhelm) . The famous Voltaire stayed in Bückeburg from December 9th to 11th, 1740, he was returning from Berlin and conversations were held - again with Countess Bentinck, who made her familiar friendship with Voltaire here. Voltaire's letter of thanks to Albrecht Wolfgang from Herford on December 12, 1740 also testifies to the visit.

In 1743 Albrecht Wolfgang and his son Wilhelm took part in the Anglo-Hanoverian army in the War of the Austrian Succession in Germany and in the Battle of Dettingen (June 27). On May 11, 1745 Albrecht Wolfgang fought with his regiment (on the side of the Anglo-Hanover-Dutch army) in the battle of Fontenoy against the French in the War of the Austrian Succession . In 1747 Albrecht Wolfgang left his Dutch military service because of differences with the Prince of Orange. When Albrecht Wolfgang died in 1748, he left a heavily indebted country to his son Wilhelm .

This representative of enlightened absolutism was the first head of a ruling German house to become a Freemason . He appeared in 1725 in the membership lists of the Rummer and Grapes Lodge in London, one of the four founding lodges of the United Grand Lodge of England . He was friends there with the Grand Masters John Theophilus Desaguliers and George Payne. In 1738 he was the decisive person who brought Frederick the Great to Freemasonry.

literature

• Curd Ochwadt: Voltaire and the Counts of Schaumburg-Lippe . Bremen, Wolfenbüttel: Jacobi-Verlag 1977. ISBN 3-87447-230-2
• Hella S. Haasse: I always disagree. The irrepressible life of Countess Bentinck . Novel. Translated from the Dutch by Maria Csollány. Reinbek near Hamburg: Wunderlich 1997. ISBN 3-8052-0580-5 - Paperback edition: Rowohlt 1999 (rororo. 22465) ISBN 3-499-22465-8
• Anna-Franziska von Schweinitz: On the 300th birthday of the first German Freemason, Albrecht Wolfgang, ruling Count of Schaumburg-Lippe . In: Quatuor Coronati No. 35, Yearbook 1998, pp. 69-96
• Frédéric Deloffre: The making of Voltaire's 'Candide'. From Bückeburg to Constantinople . In: Schaumburg and the world. On Schaumburg's Foreign Relations in History . Edited by Hubert Höing. Bielefeld (et al.) 2002, pp. 143–152. ISBN 3-89534-411-7
• Eugen Lennhoff / Oskar Posner: International Freemason Lexicon . Almathea-Verlag Munich 1980, reprint from 1932, ISBN 3-85002-038-X

Web links

• Correspondence with Frederick the Great
• Tripota - Trier portrait database

predecessor	Office	successor
Friedrich Christian	Count of Schaumburg-Lippe 1728–1748	Wilhelm