sentences:  The Imperial pledge was never redeemed by the Holy Roman Empire, and so all these villages, along with Föckelberg, remained under the Counts of Veldenz.In 1444, Friedrich III, the last Count of Veldenz, died without a male heir.Friedrich's daughter Anna was married to Count Palatine Stephan of Electoral Palatinate, who now took his own hereditary holdings in that state and the County of Zweibrücken, which he had bought, and combined them with his wife's inheritance (she had inherited the lands, but, because she was a woman, not the comital title).