The Duchy of Luxemburg (French: Luxembourg, Luxembourgish: Lëtzebuerg) was a state of the Holy Roman Empire, the ancestral homeland of the noble House of Luxembourg. The House of Luxemburg, now actually the Duke of Limburg, became one of the most important political forces in the 14th century, contending with the House of Habsburg for supremacy in Central Europe. They would be the heirs to the Přemyslid dynasty in the Kingdom of Bohemia, succeeded to the Kingdom of Hungary, and contributed with four Holy Roman Emperors, until their own male line came to an end and the House of Habsburg themselves got the pieces, as the two Houses had actually agreed in the Treaty of Brünn in 1364.
In 1411, Sigismund of Luxembourg lost the duchy to his niece Elisabeth because he defaulted on a loan. Elizabeth later sold the duchy to the Duke of Burgundy, Philip the Good of the House of Valois-Burgundy, who paid her off in 1444. The Dukes of Burgundy had previously acquired a number of other possessions in the Low Countries, including Flanders, Artois, Hainaut, Brabant, Zeeland, Holland, and Namur; Luxembourg and these other Burgundian possessions in the Low Countries are collectively referred to during this period (1384–1482) as the Burgundian Netherlands. The male line of the Dukes of Burgundy died out in 1477 when Philip's son Charles the Bold died at the Battle of Nancy, leaving his only child Mary of Burgundy as his heiress. After his death, Mary married Archduke Maximilian I of the House of Habsburg, who later became Holy Roman Emperor; thereafter the Burgundian Netherlands came under the rule of the House of Habsburg, thereby beginning the period of the Habsburg Netherlands (1482–1581).