May 31, 1613: Birth of Elector Johann-Georg II of Saxony.

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Albert Frederick of Prussia, Duke of Prussia, Elector of Saxony, Holy Roman Empire, John George I of Saxony, John George II of Saxony, John George III of Saxony, Magdalene-Sibylle of Brandenburg-Bayreuth, Magdalene-Sybille of Prussia

Johann-Georg II (May 31, 1613 – August 22, 1680) was the Elector of Saxony from 1656 to 1680. He belonged to the Albertine line of the House of Wettin.

Johann-Georg II, Elector of Saxony

He was the third but eldest surviving son of the Elector Johann-Georg I of Saxony (1585-1656) and Magdalene-Sybille of Prussia (1586-1659) his second spouse, the daughter of Albrecht-Friedrich, Duke of Prussia (1553-1618) and Marie-Eleonore of Cleves (1550–1608).

Johann-Georg succeeded his father as Elector of Saxony when Johann-Georg I died on October 8, 1656. In 1657 Johann-Georg II made an arrangement with his three brothers with the object of preventing disputes over their separate territories, and in 1664 he entered into friendly relations with King Louis XIV of France and Navarre. He received money from the French king, but the existence of a strong anti-French party in Saxony induced him occasionally to respond to the overtures of the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I.

Johann-Georg I, Elector of Saxony (Father)

The Elector’s primary interests were not in politics, but in music and art. He adorned Dresden, which under him became the musical centre of Germany; welcoming foreign musicians and others he gathered around him a large and splendid court, and his capital was the constant scene of musical and other festivals. He commissioned the building of the first opera house, the Opernhaus am Taschenberg.

Magdalene-Sybille of Prussia (Mother)

In 1658 Johann-Georg II was accepted into the Fruitbearing Society, through the patronage of Duke Wilhelm of Saxe-Weimar.

His enormous expenditure on the arts compelled Johann-Georg II in 1661 to grant greater control over monetary matters to the estates, a step which laid the foundation of the later system of finance in Saxony. Also, his government was less effective in establishing absolutist rule and a standing army than were Bohemia or Prussia.

Johann-Georg II’s reign saw the slow economic reconstruction of Saxony after the Thirty Years’ War. New trades and manufactures developed, such as textiles, hard coal and glass. Locally mined silver filled the Electorate’s empty treasury, and the Leipzig Trade Fair and the Bohemian Exulanten of 1654 also stimulated economic activity.

Elector Johann-Georg II of Saxony died in Freiberg on 22 August 22, 1680, aged 67.

Family

In Dresden on November 13, 1638 Johann-Georg II married his first cousin Magdalene-Sibylle of Brandenburg-Bayreuth (1612-1687) daughter of Christian, Margrave of Brandenburg-Bayreuth, and Marie of Prussia, she was by birth a Markgräfin, or Margravine, and a member of the Brandenburg-Bayreuth branch of the House of Hohenzollern. Her maternal grandparents were Albrecht-Friedrich, Duke of Prussia (1553-1618) and Marie-Eleonore of Cleves (1550–1608). Johann-Georg II’s mother and the mother of his spouse, Magdalene-Sibylle, were sisters.

They had three children:

1. Sibylle-Marie (September 16, 1642 – February 27, 1643)
2. Erdmuthe-Sophie (February 25, 1644 – June 22, 1670), married on 29 October 1662 to Christian Ernst, Margrave of Brandenburg-Bayreuth
3. Johann-Georg III (June 20, 1647 – September 12, 1691), his successor as Elector.

May 7, 1553: Birth of Prince Albrecht-Friedrich, Duke of Prussia

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Albert Frederick of Prussia, Brandenburg-Prussia, Duchy of Prussia, Elector of Brandenburg, Georg-Friedrich of Brandenburg-Kulmbach, House of Hohenzollern, Joachim-Friedrich, King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland, Kingdom of Poland, Maria Eleanor of Cleves

Albrecht-Friedrich (May 7, 1553 – August 28, 1618) was the Duke of Prussia, from 1568 until his death. He was a son of Duke Albrecht of Prussia, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach, and Anna Marie of Brunswick-Lüneburg, the daughter of Duke Eric I of Brunswick-Calenberg (1470–1540) and Elizabeth of Brandenburg (1510–1558). He was the second and last Prussian duke of the Ansbach branch of the Hohenzollern family.

Albrecht-Friedrich, Duke of Prussia

Duke of Prussia

Albrecht-Friedrich became Duke of Prussia after paying feudal homage to his cousin, the King Sigismund II Augustus of Poland, Grand Duke of Lithuania, on July 19, 1569 in Lublin. The homage was described by the Polish chronicler Jan Kochanowski in his work Proporzec (“Standard”). During the 1573 Polish election, Albrecht-Friedrich attempted to gain acceptance to the Polish senate but was opposed by the powerful Jan Zamoyski (later Grand Hetman of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland) who feared the influence of Protestants in the Polish legislative body.

Albrecht-Friedrich initially refused to recognize the election of Stefan Bathory and supported the candidacy of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II of Austria to the Polish throne. However, at the Toruń sejm of October 1576 he gave his support to the new monarch.

As the great grandson of the Polish king, Casimir IV Jagiellon, and as a Duke in Prussia who was fluent in Polish, Albrecht-Friedrich was himself seriously considered for a time as a possible candidate for the Polish throne. He particularly enjoyed the support of Polish Lutherans.

Marriage

Albert-Friedrich was married in 1573 to Marie Eleonore of Cleves, a daughter of Wilhelm, Duke of Jülich-Cleves-Berg and Archduchess Maria of Austria (1531–1581). Archduchess Maria was a daughter of Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor and Anna of Bohemia and Hungary. Marie Eleonore of Cleves was also the niece of Anne of Cleves, fourth wife of King Henry VIII of England and Ireland.

Marie Eleonore of Cleves

While Marie Eleonore’s her father was a Reform Catholic, she was of a strong willed character and displayed firm Lutheran sympathies early on. Her father was afraid that she would influence her younger sisters with her religious views, and therefore wished to have her married to someone of her own religious convictions as soon as possible in order to remove her from his domains, and thus considered grooms for his daughter that he would not otherwise have considered. Albrecht-Friedrich, Duke of Prussia, was thus accepted as a suitor, despite showing mental disorders.

In 1572 he began to exhibit signs of mental disorder. In early 1578, the regency was taken over by his cousin, Georg-Friedrich of Brandenburg-Kulmbach (1539–1603). After Georg-Friedrich death in 1603, the Polish King Sigismund III Vasa appointed Joachim-Friedrich as regent in 1605, and permitted his son, Johann-Sigismund, to succeed him in 1611. The latter became Duke of Prussia after Albrecht-Friedrich’s death in 1618.

With Georg-Friedrich of Brandenburg-Kulmbach taking over the regency of the Duchy of Prussia, this made the position of Marie Eleonore more difficult at the Ducal court of Köningsberg. In 1591, she returned with her daughters to Jülich, where she remained until 1592. She arranged the marriage of her daughters to German princes to avoid them being married by the regency council to Polish suitors, and by the marriage alliances she arranged, she ensured that the Duchy of Julich would come to the Brandenburg after the death of her brother.

Georg-Friedrich of Brandenburg-Kulmbach

Here is a list of the children of Albrecht-Friedrich of Prussia and Marie Eleonore of Cleves and their spouses:

1. Anna of Prussia (1576 – 1625). Married Johann-Sigismund, Elector of Brandenburg.
2. Marie of Prussia (1579 – 1649). Married Christian, Margrave of Brandenburg-Bayreuth.
3. Albrecht-Friedrich of Prussia (1 June 1580 – 8 October 1580).
4. Sophie of Prussia (1582 – 1610). Married Wilhelm Kettler of Courland.
5. Eleanor of Prussia (1583 – 1607). Married Joachim-Friedrich, Elector of Brandenburg.
6. Wilhelm-Friedrich of Prussia (1585 – 1586).
7. Magdalene Sibylle of Prussia (1586 – 1659). Married John George I, Elector of Saxony.

Since neither of Albrecht-Friedrich’s two sons survived until adulthood, at his death on August 28, 1618, the Duchy of Prussia passed to his son-in-law Johann-Sigismund, Elector and Margrave of Brandenburg, combining the two territories under a single dynasty and forming Brandenburg-Prussia. This new State of Brandenburg-Prussia would be the foundation upon on which both the Kingdom of Prussia and the German Empire were built.