county · Germany and Central Europe
County of Rantzau
Origins
Christian zu Rantzau, a Danish statesman, bought the Holstein district of Barmstedt from the Duke of Holstein-Gottorp in 1649. In 1650 Emperor Ferdinand III raised him to imperial count and made Barmstedt an immediate imperial county, outside the duchy of Holstein.
Rule and society
The county covered only a few villages and the market town of Elmshorn, governed from Barmstedt and a castle on an island in the Rantzau lake. Its counts enjoyed full jurisdiction but depended on their Danish connections. In 1721 Count Christian Detlev was shot dead, and his brother Wilhelm Adolf was arrested and convicted of arranging the killing.
Decline and legacy
Wilhelm Adolf died in prison in 1734, but the Danish king had already occupied the county, and in 1726 it was annexed to Denmark under a prior agreement, becoming a district of Holstein. It later passed to Prussia with Schleswig-Holstein in 1867.
Lineage
On the connections map
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- County of Rantzau was part of Holy Roman Empire1650 CE – 1726 CE
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Cite this page
- APA
- The Epoch Institute. (2026). County of Rantzau. In The Epoch Institute States Register. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/county-of-rantzau
- MLA
- “County of Rantzau.” The Epoch Institute States Register, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/county-of-rantzau. Accessed .
- Chicago
- The Epoch Institute. “County of Rantzau.” The Epoch Institute States Register. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/county-of-rantzau.
- Harvard
- The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘County of Rantzau’, The Epoch Institute States Register. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/county-of-rantzau (Accessed: ).
Last reviewed October 2026Random state ↻