page_title: Grand duchy
section_title: Grand duchies of the past
hierarchical_section_title: Grand duchy / Grand duchies of the past
caption_attribution_description: English: Map of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany in circa 1627 by Jodocus Hondius
context_page_description: A grand duchy is a country or territory whose official head of state or ruler is a monarch bearing the title of grand duke or grand duchess.
  Relatively rare until the abolition of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, the term was often used in the official name of countries smaller than most continental kingdoms of modern Europe yet larger than most of the sovereign duchies in the Holy Roman Empire, Italy or Scandinavia. During the 19th century there were as many as 14 grand duchies in Europe at once. Some of these were sovereign and nominally independent, some sovereign but held in personal union with larger realms by a monarch whose grand-dukedom was borne as a subsidiary title, some of which were client states of a more powerful realm, and some whose territorial boundaries were nominal and the position purely titular.
  In the 21st century, only Luxembourg remains a grand duchy.
context_section_description: The contemporary independent republics of Finland and Lithuania have been grand duchies during certain eras of their history.
  The same is true for the core state of what would ultimately become the Russian Empire: the grand duchy of Muscovy.
caption: The Grand Duchy of Tuscany (1569–1860, part of Italy afterwards)
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