Definition of "margrave" [mar•grave]

• The lord or military governor of a medieval German border province. (noun)
• Used as a hereditary title for certain princes in the Holy Roman Empire. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "One of his sons, Henry, called margrave and duke in Franconia, fell fighting against the Normans in 886; another, Poppo, was margrave in Thuringia from 880 to"
• "From this time the Babenbergs lost their influence in Franconia; but in 976 Leopold, a member of the family who was a count in the Donnegau, is described as margrave of the East Mark, a district not more than 60 m. in breadth on the eastern frontier of Bavaria which grew into the duchy of"
• "Charlemagne had established a strong body of troops under a commander who was called a margrave; and for some centuries this city, commanding the Danube, had been deemed one of the strongest defenses of the empire against Mohammedan invasion."