History
In the 1680 partition the former Franconian lands of the extinct House of Henneberg fell to Ernest's third son, Bernhard, who chose the town of Meiningen as his residence and became the first Duke of Saxe-Meiningen. From 1682 Duke Bernhard I had the Schloss Elisabethenburg built and in 1690 established a court orchestra (Hofkapelle), in which Johann Ludwig Bach later became the Kapellmeister (1711).
In the reshuffle of Ernestine territories that occurred following the extinction of the Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg line upon the death of Duke Frederick IV in 1825, Duke Bernhard II of Saxe-Meiningen received the lands of the former Duchy of Saxe-Hildburghausen as well as the Saalfeld territory of the former Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld duchy. As Bernhard II had supported Austria in the 1866 Austro-Prussian War, the prime minister of victorious Prussia, Otto von Bismarck enforced his resignation in favour of his son Georg II, after which Saxe-Meiningen was admitted to join the North German Confederation.
In the German Revolution after World War I Duke Bernhard III, brother-in-law of Emperor Wilhelm II, on 10 November 1918 was forced to abdicate. The succeeding Free State of Saxe-Meiningen was merged into the new state of Thuringia in 1920.
In 1905 the capital Meiningen had an area of 2,468 km² and a population of 269,000. The summer residence was at Altenstein Castle. Since 1868 the duchy comprised the Kreise (districts) of Hildburghausen, Sonneberg and Saalfeld as well as the northern exclaves of Camburg and Kranichfeld.
As of 2012 the head of the Ducal House of Saxe-Meiningen, Prince Frederick Konrad (born 1952), has no heir, so the representation of his house, after its extinction, will pass to the Head of the Grand Ducal House of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach.
Read more about this topic: Duchy Of Saxe-Meiningen
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