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 BRUNSWICK 363 the ancient cathedral of St. Blaiae are the tombs of the ducal family. There are 10 churches and a synagogue. The Gewandhaus, in the old Gewandhaus. German style of architecture, and the council house, an elaborate Gothic structure, are among the most picturesque buildings. The museum Council House. in the arsenal contains a gallery of valuable paintings. The most prominent institution of learning, the Collegium Carolinum, which was founded in 1745, was in 1861 converted into a polytechnic school. The city has also a Luther- an gymnasium, a Realgymnasium, an institution for the blind, and one for the deaf and mute. Monuments have been erected to the two dukes of Brunswick who fell at Jena and at Quatre Bras; to the memory of Schill and his com- panions, 14 of whom were shot here ; and to Lessing, who died here. Reitschel's statue in honor of Lessing was erected in 1853. The most extensive of the many charitable and san- itary institutions is a great asylum which ac- commodates 250 orphans. BRUNSWICK, House of, one of the oldest fami- lies in Germany, a branch of which occupies the throne of Great Britain. The Brunswick territory, then forming a part of Saxony, was by Charlemagne united to the Prankish em- pire, and with the other Saxon provinces was governed successively by the princes of the house of Saxe, Billung, Supplingenburg, and Guelph. The Guelph house, of mixed Italian and German origin, obtained, in the person of Otho the Young, in 1235, the city of Bruns- wick as a fief of the empire, which with its de- pendencies was then first erected into a duchy. The two sons of Otho, Albert and John, reign- ed in common from 1252 to 1267, and then divided the paternal inheritance. John receiv- ed the city of Hanover and the duchy of Ltine- burg; Albert, the duchy of Brunswick, the Hartz, and the district of the Weser ; the city of Brunswick remained common property. John and Albert thus founded the elder branches of Luneburg and Wolfenbuttel. The former of these became extinct in 1369, and its possessions reverted to the latter. Al- bert left three sons, Henry, Albert the Fat, and William, who divided the inheritance, and founded the three lines of Grubenhagen, Gottingen, and Wolfenbuttel. The first of these divided into two branches in 1361, both of which became extinct in 1596, and their possessions returned to the Wolfenbuttel line. The Gottingen branch became extinct in 1463, and its possessions were transferred to the duke of Kalenberg. From the Wolfenbuttel branch sprang in 1409 the two new branches of Lune- burg and Wolfenbuttel-Kalenberg, the latter of which in 1634 transferred its possessions to the duke of Brunswick-Luneburg-Dannenberg, a descendant of the Luneburg branch. The Luneburg branch had divided in 1569, and had another offshoot in the family of Bruns- wick Luneburg, which has furnished the electo- ral and royal dynasty of Luneburg-Hanover. Henry, duke of Brunswick-Luneburg-Dannen- berg, who died in 1598, was the founder of the present dynasty of Brunswick. His line was divided in 1666 into the branches of Bruns- wick-Wolfenbuttel and Brunswick-Bevern, the former of which became extinct in 1735, the possessions passing to the latter, which has re- tained them undivided from that time to the present. Among the queens belonging to this family have been Sophia Dorothea, wife of