sentences:  The last Count of Veldenz, Friedrich III, died in 1444 without a son to inherit the county.His daughter Anna was married to Count Palatine Stephan, a son of the King and Elector of the Palatinate, Ruprecht.Combining his own Palatine holdings and his wife's inheritance, Stephan now created the County Palatine of Zweibrücken, which in the fullness of time came to be known as the Duchy of Palatinate-Zweibrücken.