House of Hatzfeld

The House of Hatzfeld, also spelled House of Hatzfeldt, is the name of an ancient and influential German noble family, whose members played important roles in the history of the Holy Roman Empire, Prussia and Austria.

History

They belonged to high nobility originally from Hesse. The family is first mentioned in 1138 and has its ancestral seat in Hatzfeld. In 1418 the family inherited Wildenburg Castle near Friesenhagen, a Lordship with Imperial immediacy, from the Lords of Wildenburg.

Melchior von Hatzfeld, Imperial field marshal in the Thirty Years' War, became the first Count in 1635. He was enfeoffed with Trachenberg Castle in Silesia in 1641, and Gleichen Castle with the town of Wandersleben in Thuringia in 1651.
Franz Phillip Adrian became the first Prussian Fürst in 1741. The Hatzfeldt-Werther-Schönstein branch inherited Trachenberg and became Prussian Princes of Hatzfeldt and Trachenberg in 1803 and Prussian Dukes of Trachenberg in 1900. They lost their estates, including Trachenberg, when Silesia became part of Poland in 1945, whose Communist government expelled most of Silesia's German population.
The Hatzfeld-Wildenburg-Weisweiler branch inherited Crottorf, Schönstein, Kalkum as well as numerous other properties in 1794 and became Prussian Princes of Hatzfeld-Wildenburg in 1870. He is one of the largest landowners in Rhineland-Palatinate, also owning the castles of Crottorf and Schönstein.