The merry builder of the renaissance palace in Weikersheim, Count Wolfgang II, not only had children together with his wife, he also turned to the lady's maid Anna, who, after she had been quickly married to the groom of the chamber, Jörg Weber, gave birth to a boy. This boy was baptized with the name Wolfgang, raised at the cost of the Count and in the end became Hohenlohe Councilor in Neuenstein. The well-educated man "latinized" his name Weber to ”Textor”; and in future all first-born male children were given the first name Wolfgang. In accordance with this family tradition, the imperial councilor from Frankfurt, Goethe, who had married ”Aja” Textor, baptized his son Johann Wolfgang. The famous poet knew of this family relationship and wrote:
"Vom Vater hab ich die Statur,
des Lebens ernstes Führen,
vom Mütterchen die Frohnatur,
die Lust zu fabulieren.
Urahnherr war der Schönsten hold,
das spukt so hin und wieder;
Urahnfrau liebte Schmuck und Gold
das zuckt wohl durch die Glieder".
Count Carl Ludwig von Hohenlohe-Weikersheim loved to build. He is responsible for the baroque decoration of the palace, gardens and town of Weikersheim. His friend Prince Bishop Lothar Franz von Schönborn once remarked, "How could the artists and craftsmen that God would have in this world survive if He did not also create fools to feed them."
On 7 Mai 1740 the "Dutiful Reservations" were presented in which the royal councilors set down their suggestions on how to increase revenues and decrease expenditures. The Count's family took a position: depending on the topic, first Carl Ludwig, then Elisabeth Friederike Sophie, and finally Albrecht Ludwig Friedrich.
Carl Ludwig proved to be a ruler and a sovereign lord, torn between the will to represent and an appreciation for the need to save. Elisabeth Friederike Sophie was apparently a sovereign who made few concessions and Albrecht Ludwig Friedrich was a hereditary count who was class-consciousness and very demanding.
The "reservations" also included personnel matters: A court servant suggested to His Grace: "When the trumpeter Peter Model dies, his position could also remain unfilled." The Count answered: "Yes! And the sooner the better. "
The folklorist and historian Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl wandered through the Tauber river valley in the fall of 1865 and "stopped at an inn in Weikersheim”. He observed: "One would not be considered an educated man by the residents of Weikersheim if he were to passed through the town without having seen the Hohenlohe palace with its Rittersaal and its French garden. (...) The people are right - the palace is a landmark of their town. It encompasses the total of the artistic impressions which delight the petty bourgeois from its youth on (...)". The spirit rests comfortably in the palace gardens with "its statues of male and female dwarfs in the most manifold guises and its goddesses and nymphs with extremely few garments".
The last princely castellan of the Hohenlohe family, Friedrich Leopold Erhard (1897-1966), was famous for his service to the preservation of the precious cultural value of Weikersheim Palace. In 1965 a respected daily newspaper in Hamburg advised its readers, "Visit Weikersheim soon to experience one of the most original guided tours through an original palace".