Lichtenberg

The lords of Lichtenberg were a knightly house of Lower Alsace named after Lichtenberg Castle. Their first securely documented member, Rudolf of Lichtenberg, appears as a canon of Strasbourg in 1203. They built a scattered but powerful lordship around Strasbourg and Hagenau, and controlled tolls and Rhine ferries on the Italy-to-Flanders road.

They secured town rights for Buchsweiler in 1291 and Lichtenberg in 1305. Around 1330 the inheritance was divided between an elder line under John II and a younger line under Louis III.

When the last male lord, James of Lichtenberg, died in 1480, the inheritance fell to his two nieces. Anna married Count Philip I the Elder of Hanau-Babenhausen, founding the County of Hanau-Lichtenberg; Elisabeth married Simon Wecker of Zweibruecken-Bitsch, and when that line died out in 1570 its half also passed to Hanau-Lichtenberg.