Mother Anna Gonzaga | Name Benedicta of | |
 | ||
IssueDetail Duchess Anne SophieCharlotte, Duchess of ModenaDuchess Henriette MariaWilhelmine, Holy Roman Empress Father Edward, Prince Palatine Spouse John Frederick, Duke of Brunswick-Luneburg (m. 1668) Children Wilhelmine Amalia of Brunswick-Luneburg, Duchess Charlotte of Brunswick-Luneburg Parents Anne Gonzaga, Edward, Count Palatine of Simmern Grandchildren Maria Josepha of Austria Similar People Duchess Charlotte of Brunswick‑Luneburg, Rinaldo d'Este, Maria Amalia of Austria, Maria Josepha of Austria, Eleonor Magdalene of Neuburg | ||
Princess Palatine Benedicta Henrietta (Benedicta Henrietta Philippina; 14 March 1652 – 12 August 1730) was a German princess, the third and youngest daughter of Prince Palatine Edward and his French wife, the political hostess Anna Gonzaga. Benedicta became the Duchess of Brunswick-Lüneburg, or of Hanover, by her marriage to Duke John Frederick. She was a descendant of the Paleologos and Angelos Byzantine emperors and an ancestor of Louis XVI of France and Louis Philippe I, King of the French, as well as the Habsburg-Lorraine dinasty from Francis I of Austria and of most Roman Catholic dynasties of Europe of the XIX, XX and XXI centuries.
Contents
Early life
Born in Paris to the landless Prince Palatine Edward, Bénédicte Henriette's paternal grandparents were Frederick V, Elector Palatine and Elizabeth Stuart, the Winter Queen. Her maternal grandparents were Charles I, Duke of Mantua and Montferrat and his French wife Catherine de Guise, daughter of Charles de Lorraine-Guise, Duke of Mayenne. She was the youngest of three daughters.
Bénédicte was reared by Louise de La Fayette, a courtier-turned-nun known as Sister Louise-Angélique.
Marriage and later life
She was married at the age of sixteen to a distant cousin, John Frederick, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, who was the same age as her father, and childless. They were married on 30 November 1668. The union, which had been arranged by the French diplomatist Gourville produced four daughters.
John Frederick died in 1679 without a male heir, and the duchy of Brunswick was inherited by his Protestant younger brother, Ernest Augustus, the husband of Benedicta Henrietta's paternal aunt, Sophia of Hanover, and father of George I of Great Britain. After her husband's death, Benedicta returned to her native France and resided there with her sister, the princess of Condé.
She corresponded with Gottfried Leibniz. Benedicta died the age of 78, at Asnieres, her late sister's residence near Paris, on 12 August 1730.