Dorothea Hedwig von Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Norburg, Gräfin von Rantzau-Hohenfeld

Äbtissin des Reichsstift Gandersheim von 1665

"In 1678 Princess Dorothea Hedwig von Holstein-Norburg, at the age of 42, married Count Christof von Rantzau. However she abandoned her husband, and travelled to southern Europe. in 1681 in Rome, she announced to have given birth to a son, sired by her husband. It is likely that the boy was from an Italian orphanage. After her death, the boy, Alexander Leopold Anton, claimed to be Count von Rantzau, while his 'mother's' estranged husband was still alive.

"He ended up in Holland and the Dutch East Indies. The nobility never fully regarded him as one of theirs, and he and his issue married in a way uncustomary for people of 'his' class in that era."

Sources

• Leo van de Pas, Genealogics, Graf Alexander Leopold Anton von Rantzau
• M. Sjöström, Von Rantzau at soc.genealogy.medieval (Dec. 14, 2012)

Links:

• The Peerage
• Geneall
• Wikipedia in German
• Johan the Younger #40