In the high Middle Ages the Counts of Leiningen were the second most powerful rulers after the Palatin Counts in South Rhineland Palatinate. The first line of the Counts of Leiningen goes back to  the 8th century AD.  In 1779 the dynasty of Leiningen was created a Principality. Since then the members of the Principality of Leiningen belong to one of the oldest German noble families and call a moved historical past their own. The Principality of Leiningen originally lay on the left side of the Rhine, from Bad Dürkheim to Lothringen in Alsace.

During the French Revolution the castle, the theatre and the royal stables were set on fire by Napoleon Bonaparte troops and burnt to the ground in 1794 forcing Prince Carl Friedrich Wilhelm of Leiningen to leave his territory.

The expelled princes received a huge territory in the Odenwald and the Abbey of Amorbach in 1803. Amorbach became the capital and the ancestral seat of the Princedom of Leiningen.

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