shoumˈboorkh-lĭpˈə, former state, N Germany, E of the Weser River. In 1946 it was placed in Lower Saxony. Bückeburg was the capital. It was situated in a fertile agricultural region. The county of Schauenburg (as Schaumburg was originally called) included a considerable part of Westphalia in the 12th cent., and its lord, Count Adolf, was invested with Holstein in 1111. The direct line died out in 1459, and the branch line that succeeded retained only Schaumburg and the seigniory of Pinneberg in Holstein. When it in turn became extinct (1640), Pinneberg passed to the Danish crown and part of Schaumburg was divided between Brunswick-Lüneburg (later the electorate of Hanover) and Hesse-Kassel. The remainder of Schaumburg passed to Count Philip of Lippe, thus forming the county of Schaumburg-Lippe. The county became a principality in 1807. The last prince abdicated in 1918, and Schaumburg-Lippe joined the Weimar Republic.

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