[May 26] Charles II, elector palatine of the Rhine

True Name: Karl
Parents: Charles I Louis, elector palatine of the Rhine, and Charlotte of Hesse-Kassel

Date of Birth: 31 March 1651

House: Wittelsbach-Simmern
Spouse: Wilhelmina Ernestine, daughter of Frederick III, king of Denmark, and Sophie Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg

Predecessor: Charles I Louis

Reign: 1680 – 1685

Summary: Charles was born into a family that had lost much in the past fifty years. His grandfather, Frederick V, had been placed under the ban of the Empire, with all his electoral titles passing to the distant Bavarian branch of the family. The Palatinate had become Calvinist when it passed to the Simmern line in 1559 and France was constantly worried about such influence on its borders. Frederick's son, Charles I, was able to negotiate a return of the titles in 1648 at the Peace of Westphalia, but his new title was lower in rank than the old. Charles I supported the royalist cause at first in England, where his first cousin, Charles I, was at war with his parliament. Yet by the end, Charles supported the Parliamentary cause. Charles moved to England in 1644 and even was considered a likely candidate for the English throne in opposition to Charles I of England. When he returned to the Palatinate, he began to rebuild the territory that had been so ravaged in the previous years. It is during this time that Charles II was born. Charles was born and raised a Calvinist and he was quite fond of his aunt, Sophia of Hanover. She arranged his marriage to the Danish princess Wilhelmina Ernestina, to secure a better position against Catholic France. Unfortunately for Charles, they never produced any children and he, being the last of the Simmern line, faced a succession crisis throughout his brief reign that began in 1680 when his father died.

Charles was once again in England when his father died. He was made a Knight of the Garter and was made a doctor of Oxford University. When he returned to the Palatinate, he made his former teacher, Paul Hachenberg, his chief minister. Charles II was a strict Calvinist ruler who preferred military exercises but not actual warfare. He opened the doors of the Palatinate to Calvinists from all over Europe, a move recommended by his second chief minister, Johann Ludwig Langhanns. Lutheranism, on the other hand, was suppressed throughout his realm. Within two years, his government was suffering from run-away inflation aused by a budget that could not support the size of his court. When Charles died in 1685, the Simmern line ended. The next in line was a Catholic branch, while King Louis XIV of France attempted to claim the title through his sister-in-law, Elizabeth Charlotte, Charles II's sister. The result was the Nine Years War, also known as the War of the Palatine Succession. Most of Europe fought against Louis in this war out of fear that Louis would tip the balance of power in his favor. Philip William, the Neuburg heir, was able to take over in the Palatinate despite the war but his reign was brought with difficulties and it would be a decade before peace was restored to the Palatinate.

Date of Death: 26 May 1685

Successor: Philip William

Other Monarch Deaths:

Ali ar-Rida, imam of Shi'a Islam (818)

Edmund I, king of England (946)

Adalbert, margrave of Austria (1055)

Mehmed I, sultan of the Ottoman Empire (1421)

Bayezid II, sultan of the Ottoman Empire (1512)

Ferdinand Maria, elector of Bavaria (1679)