George William, often called the "heath duke" ("Heideherzog"), led the princely court during its final flourish. During his reign the baroque theatre was built that is still open today, the French Garden was laid out and palace façade designed in its current baroque form. After his death in 1705, George of Hanover, who was both the benefactor of Georges William's 1658 renunciation in favour of his younger brother Ernest Augustus and the husband of George William's morganatic daughter Sophie Dorothea, inherited the state of Lüneburg, which was merged into the Electorate of Brunswick-Lüneburg and finally lost its independence.