Georg Albrecht, Margrave of Brandenburg-Bayreuth

Georg Albrecht of Brandenburg-Bayreuth (b. Bayreuth, 20 March 1619 - d. Schretz, 27 September 1666), was a German prince and member of the House of Hohenzollern.

He was the eighth of the nine children of Christian, Margrave of Brandenburg-Bayreuth, by his wife, Marie of Prussia. He was last child of his parents who survive adulthood; his younger brother Frederick Wilhelm, born in 1620, live only one day.

Life

Georg Albrecht's older brother, the Hereditary Margrave Erdmann August, died in 1651, four years before the death of their father. However, despite the fact he was the only surviving son of his father, he couldn't inherited Bayreuth, because the late prince left a son, Christian Ernst (born in 1644) who replaced him in the line of succession.

When the Margrave Christian died in 1655, his grandson Christian Ernst succeded him. But, because he was too young to reign, Georg Albrecht acted as regent of his nephew until 1664, when Christian Ernst asumed the full government of Bayreuth.

When his father died, Georg Albrecht received Kulmbach as appanage, but never ruled over this land. His title of Margrave of Brandenburg-Bayreuth-Kulmbach was only nominal.

Succession of Bayreuth

When the only surviving son of his nephew Christian Ernst died withoit surviving male issue in 1726, Georg Albrecht's eldest grandson, Georg Frederick Karl inherited Bayreuth. But the son and succesor of Georg Frederick Karl, Frederick, also died without male descendants in 1763, and the youngest Georg Albrecht's grandson, Frederick Christian, became in the last Margrave of the Younger line of the Brandenburg-Bayreuth.

Marriages and Children

In Bayreuth on 10 December 1651, Georg Albrecht married firstly with Marie Elisabeth of Scheleswig-Holstein-Sondenburg-Glücksburg. They had six children:

1. Christian Philipp (b. Bayreuth, 29 May 1653 - d. Bayreuth, 8 August 1653).
2. Sophie Amalie (b. Bayreuth, 20 June 1655 - d. Bayreuth, 20 February 1656).
3. Georg Frederick (b. Bayreuth, 1 October 1657 - d. Bayreuth, 14 April 1658).
4. Erdmann Philipp (b. Bayreuth, 11 May 1659 - d. after falling from his horse at Schlosshof, Bayreuth, 5 September 1678).
5. Christian Heinrich (b. Bayreuth, 29 July 1661 - d. Weferlingen, 5 April 1708).
6. Karl August (b. Kulmbach, 28 March 1663 - d. Neustadt am Aisch, 26 March 1731).

In Colditz on 11 November 1665 (seventeen months after the death of his first wife), Georg Albrecht married secondly with Sophie Marie of Solms-Baruth-Wildenfels, Dowager Countess of Schönburg-Lichtenstein. They had only one son:

1. Georg Albrecht (b. posthumously, Plassenburg, 7 December 1666 - d. Oberkotzau, 24 January 1703), received as appanage the town of Oberkotzau. He married in Alt-Kinsberg on 7 May 1699 to Regina Magdalena Lutz (b. Bayreuth, 22.4.1678 - d. Oberkotzau, 27.10.1755), daughter of an administrator in Oberkotzau. This marriage was morganatic and the issue born of them was barren of the succesion of Bayreuth. Regina was created Frau von Kotzau in 1701. Their descendants, the Freiherren von Kotzau were extint in male line in 1976.