Friedrich failed to match his father’s successes in diplomacy and expansion. More interested in establishing a grand court, he did manage to score one important success: he acquired the title of king. He obtained his crown through complicated diplomatic maneuvers. German sovereign princes were electors, grand dukes, counts, and many other things, but not kings, because they were nominally subordinate to the Holy Roman Emperor. Friedrich, however, took advantage of the fact that Brandenburg had acquired the duchy of Prussia, which lay to the east, outside the Holy Roman Empire’s borders. After
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