Background
She was the daughter of Count Gumprecht II and his wife Amöna, a daughter of Count Wirich V of Daun-Falkenstein.
She was the daughter of Count Gumprecht II and his wife Amöna, a daughter of Count Wirich V of Daun-Falkenstein.
By marriage, she was Countess of Tecklenburg. They resided alternately in Bentheim and Steinfurt, and when they grew older, mostly in Tecklenburg. Via Magdalena"s relatives, they had close ties with the leading Calvinist princes in the Holy Roman Empire.
Her half-sister Amalia was married to Elector Palatine Frederick III. Over time, they introduced the new faith in the territories of the County of Tecklenburg.
The County suffered when the Eighty Years" War raged in the neighbouring Netherlands. However, the Duke of Jülich-Cleves-Berg, who was the liege lord of Limburg, did not recognize her right to inherit and claimed Limberg for himself as a completed fief.
Archbishop Ernest of Cologne occupied Limburg militarily in 1584, with permission from the Emperor, to prevent this expansion of the Duke"s territory. He then tried to keep the county and annex it to his Archbishopric.
Although Magdalena"s right to inherit was recognized by the courts, the county and the castle remained occupied by Cologne, until 1610.
Cologne only ended the occupation when it was pressured by the Netherlands. Some of them were still minors, and she acted as regent until 1609. In 1616, she ceded the county to Conrad Gumprecht.
In 1618, he died and ownership of the county reverted to Magdalena, who appointed her son"s widow Johanetta Elisabeth of Nassau-Dillenburg as governor.
Arnold and Magdalena had the following children:
Otto (22 December 1574 in Steinfurt – 1574)
Eberwin Wirich (14 January 1576 in Bentheim – 31 May 1596 in Padua)
Adolf (7 July 1577 in Steinfurt – 5 November 1623), married in 1606 to Margaret of Nassau-Wiesbaden
Anna (4 January 1579 – 9 December 1624), married in 1595 to Prince Christian I of Anhalt-Bernburg
Arnold Jost (4 April 1580 – 26 August 1643), married in 1608 to Anna Amalia of Isenburg-Büdingen
Amalie Amoena (15 May 1581 in Tecklenburg – 31 January 1584 in Bentheim)
William Henry (13 February 1584 in Bentheim – 6 October 1632), married in 1617 with Anna Elisabeth of Anhalt-Dessau
Conrad Gumprecht (10 March 1585 in Bentheim – 10 March 1618), married in 1616 Johannetta Elisabeth of Nassau-Siegen
Amoena Amalia (19 March 1586 in Bentheim – 3 September 1625)married in 1606 to Prince Louis I of Anhalt-Köthen
Frederick Ludolph (23 August 1587 in Bentheim – 8 January 1629)
Magdalena (6 May 1591 in Steinfurt – 1649) married on 24 May 1631 in Steinfurt with George Ernest, son of Jobst of Limburg.