Burgrave

A burgrave is literally the count of (i.e. appointed over) a castle or fortified town. The English form is derived through the French from the German Burggraf and Dutch burg- or burch-graeve (Mediaeval Latin language burcgravius or burgicomes).

There were four hereditary burgraviates ranking as principalities within the Holy Roman Empire:

It was still included among the subsidiary titles of several German (semi-)sovereign princes; and the king of Prussia, whose ancestors were burgraves of Nuremberg for over 200 years, maintained the additional style of Burggraf von Nürnberg.

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