Adolphe, Grand Duke of Luxembourg

Adolphe became Duke of Nassau in August 1839 after his father William died. That duchy ended in September 1866 when Prussia annexed it following Austria's defeat in the Austro-Prussian War. He spent the next quarter-century without a throne. Luxembourg had been yoked to the Netherlands in personal union since 1839, ruled by Dutch kings who treated it as a province. When King William III died in 1890 with only a daughter to succeed him, Dutch law allowed Wilhelmina to take the Netherlands crown - but Luxembourg's Salic law barred women. The Nassau Family Pact sent the grand duchy to Adolphe instead. He ruled fifteen years, the first of the Nassau-Weilburg line, and died in 1905. His son William IV succeeded him.