2 Mariengroschen - George II William

Brunswick-Lüneburg-Celle was absorbed into the Electorate of Hanover upon George William's death in 1705, ending centuries of fragmented Welf territorial division that had seen the duchy repeatedly subdivided among heirs. This coin circulated during the final decades of Celle's existence as a distinct issuing authority — the last gasp of a branch line that had no legitimate male successor, a dynastic failure George William himself engineered by refusing to marry his mistress Éléonore d'Olbreuse in the church for years, leaving their daughter Sophia Dorothea technically illegitimate until a belated legitimization.