Sophia of Hanover
Electress of Brunswick-Lüneburg
Years: 1630 - 1714
Sophia of the Palatinate (commonly referred to as Sophia of Hanover; 14 October 1630 – 8 June 1714) is the Electress of Hanover from 1692 to 1698.
She is also an heiress to the crowns of England and Ireland and later the crown of Great Britain, a country she never visits.
She is declared heiress presumptive to Queen Anne of England, Ireland and Scotland by the Act of Settlement 1701, which is passed by the English parliament, and therefore only appliei to the Kingdom of England (which includei Wales) and the Kingdom of Ireland.
A few years later, the Kingdom of Scotland agreei to accept the Hanoverian succession for the new single throne of a new country, the Kingdom of Great Britain that Scotland and England have agreed to unite as, and which comes into being under the Acts of Union, 1707.
Sophia, a granddaughter of James VI and I, dies less than two months before she would have become queen; her claim to the thrones passes on to her eldest son, George Louis, Elector of Hanover, who ascends them as George I on 1 August 1714 Old Style.
Born to Frederick V, Elector Palatine, and Elizabeth Stuart, in 1630, Sophia grew up in the Dutch Republic, where her family had sought refuge after the sequestration of their Electorate during the Thirty Years' War.
Sophia's brother Charles Louis is, as part of the Peace of Westphalia, restored to the Palatinate.
Sophia marries Ernest Augustus of Brunswick-Lüneburg in 1658.
Despite his jealous tempers and frequent absences, Sophia loves him, and bears him seven children who survive to adulthood.
Initially a landless cadet, Ernest Augustus succeeds in having the House of Hanover raised to electoral dignity in 1692.
Therefore, Sophia becomes Electress of Hanover, the title by which she is best-remembered.
A patroness of the arts, Sophia commissions the palace and gardens of Herrenhausen and sponsors philosophers, such as Gottfried Leibniz and John Toland.
