Ate 
KASPAR HAUSER. 
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CHAPTER I 
KARLSRUHE, 
[ 4 
2 
1 
THE royal family of Baden dates its origin from Guntram the 
Rich, who in the tenth century founded the House of Zihringen, 
so called from the ancestral castle situated just above the village 
of Zahringen, near Freiburg, in Breisgau. 
The eldest son of Guntram, Gebhard by name, founded the 
line of Zihringen, and the younger son, Lanzelin, the Habsburg 
line. After the death of Duke Berthold I. in 107%, the Ziihringen 
line divided into two branches, the Ducal branch, which became 
extinct with Berthold V., the founder of Berne, in 1218, and the 
Margrave branch, which founded the line of Baden. 
The various districts which constitute the Grand Duchy of 
Baden were first united into one Government in 1503, under 
Margrave Christoph, the head of the whole royal family, and 
father of Margrave Ernst, who founded the present line of Baden 
Durlach. 
Baden is a small, and, in itself, an unimportant State; its 
political consequence depending mainly upon the close relation. 
ship of its rulers with the great European powers. 
[n history it is distinguished chiefly for the brilliancy and 
extravagance of its Court, the licentiousness of its princes, and the 
tragical end which has overtaken many members of the royal 
family. . Within a period of forty years three princes shot them- 
selves by accident, and the records of the State. as well as the