County of Montbéliard
| County of Montbéliard | ||||||||||
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Grafschaft Mömpelgard (German) Comté de Montbéliard (French) |
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| State of the Holy Roman Empire | ||||||||||
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| Capital | Montbéliard | |||||||||
| Government | Principality | |||||||||
| Historical era |
Middle Ages Early modern period |
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| • | Established by Henry III | 1042 | ||||||||
| • | Acquired by County of Württemberg | 1444 | ||||||||
| • | Württemberg raised to duchy | 1495 | ||||||||
| • | Occupied by France | 1793 | ||||||||
| • | Ceded to France | 1796 | ||||||||
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Coat of arms
The County of Montbéliard (French: Comté de Montbéliard; German: Grafschaft Mömpelgard), was a feudal county of the Holy Roman Empire seated in the city of Montbéliard in the present-day Franche-Comté region of France. From 1444 onwards it was held by the House of Württemberg.
The county was established in 1042 by Emperor Henry III on the territory of the County of Burgundy, part of the Kingdom of Arles, a constituent of the Empire since 1033. It was led by a line of Counts of Montbéliard descending from Conrad's vassal Louis of Mousson in Upper Lorraine, husband of Countess Sophie of Bar, and their successors from the Scarpone family. In 1163 Lord Amadeus II of Montfaucon became Count of Montbéliard by marriage to Sophie, daughter of Count Theodoric II (Thierry II), who left no male heirs.
In 1407, the marriage of Countess Henriette, heiress of Count Stephen of Montfaucon with Eberhard IV of Württemberg tipped the county into the fold of the Swabian nobility in Germany. In addition to the County of Montbéliard, Countess Henrietta brought wedding dowries: fiefdoms, such as lordships in Granges-le-Bourg, Clerval, Passavant, Etobon, Porrentruy, with the fiefdoms of Saint-Hippolyte, and lands of Franquemont (Goumois). Some of them were in the County of Burgundy, but the countess administered the County of Burgundy by the sovereign right by virtue of the legacy that is of her grandfather Stephen of Montfaucon, and the tribute that she received from the Burgundian Duke John the Fearless. By the advent of this marriage, inheritance of the County of Montbéliard and its dependencies added to Württemberg who brought the lordship of Riquewihr, Ferrette and the County of Horbourg in Alsace.
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