Ducal Saxony (The Kalmar Union)

Ducal Saxony is a confederation of 7 duchies within the Holy Roman Empire. It borders various Imperial states including Electoral Saxony, Hesse-Kassel and Mainz-Würzburg-Bamberg among others. The capital is Jena and the combined population is about 974,000.

It has no singular Head of State, though Duke William VII of Saxe-Weimar-Neustadt is often regarded as the senior duke of the seven.

The official language is German.

The duchies have used the Bohemian Crown (BHC) since the collapse of the Cologne Mark. Regarded as nothing more than a stopgap measure the Diet is currently debating whether to create their own currency, or to join the Imperial Mark (HRM).

History
Part of the larger Duchy of Saxony until 1485 when the duchy was split into two parts. The elder brother Ernest at first took the electoral title and the Western half of the Duchy. Whilst his younger brother Albert took the Eastern portion Saxony The two branches of the Wettin family soon descended into sharp rivalry for the electorial title and although both would in time become Lutheran they stayed on opposite sides of the two Schmalkaldic Wars and the Fifty Years War and engaged in bitter fighting.

Ernestine Saxony was the originator of the Schmalkaldic League, Schmalkalden being a city in Ducal Saxony. As a result of Austria's subsequent defeat and the seceding of the League from the Empire, Albertine Saxony was given the electoral title (see Electoral Saxony).

Even as a integral part of the Schmalkaldic League, then Empire, Ducal Saxony was falling apart. In 1554 its Duke split the duchy between his three sons. It was divided into 4 by the end of the Fifty Years War, and by 1783 there were 7 separate duchies. After the Six Year War and the subsequent division of Regensburg the 7 duchies signed the Weimar Agreement. This effectively prevented the further division of the duchies and laid clear guidelines for the parcelling out of land should a ducal line be extinguished.

However all of the ducal lines survived. In 1906 the agreement was revised. This new agreement led to the creation of the 'confederation' of Ducal Saxony. All duchies are sovereign but their laws and taxes were to be synchronised and a central government set up to administer the whole region. A new unitary flag was created for the state.

The Seven Duchies are:


 * Saxe-Weimar-Neustadt
 * Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
 * Saxe-Eisenbach
 * Saxe-Meiningen
 * Saxe-Altenburg
 * Saxe-Römhild Its rulers would marry into the Svealandic royal family and would eventually inherit the kingdom and its territory in 1842. Saxe-Römhild itself remains in personal union with Svealand.
 * Saxe-Jena

Offers for the neighbouring Duchies of Rudolstadt and Sondershausen, the Counties of Reuss and Hennenberg, as well as the ecclesiastical state of Erfurt, to join in a greater 'Thuringia' are occasionally made but have so far been turned down.

Government
Under the terms of the 1906 Weimar Agreement all seven duchies are governed as a single unit by a bicameral diet in Jena. The Lower house is chosen by free vote by the male population of the Duchy, the Upper house is apportioned equally between the sovereign duchies to be filled with appointed (and often ennobled) figures. Once passed through both houses laws are then signed into force by a simple majority of the Dukes. The current Prime Minister is Friedrich Schröter.

The seven duchies operate as separate entities in the Imperial Diet but vote as a bloc much like the cantons of the Swiss Confederation