Lehen

Lehen
Municipality
Flag Seal
Mottoes:  Concilio et Labore By wisdom and effort
Country	Ebenthal
Region	Ebenthaler Riviera
Settled	1974
Inc. Ebenthal	30 December 2019
Monarchy end	19 November 2021
Government
• Type	Executive-led devolved administration
• Chief Executive	Henri Sãens
Area
• Total	1 km2 (0.4 sq mi)
Population  (2024)
• Total	18 (permanent)
• Rank	3rd
Demonym	Lehian
Time zone	UTC−3
Postal Code (CEP)	25900-000 to 25938-360
Area code	+55 21
HDI (2022)	0.810 very high (TBD)

Lehen , officialy Municipality of Lehen (Portuguese: Município de Lehen) is one of the eight municipalities of Ebenthal. It is both the third most populous and geographically larger municipality in the country, with 18 permanent residents within its 1 km² landlocked within the Brazilian municipality of Magé. Lehen is governed by an assembly-independent executive-led devolved government led by a Chief Executive appointed by the King of Ebenthal according to the municipality's parliamentary representation.

Before European colonization, the territory of present-day Lehen was home to indigenous people of the Tapuya and Tupi ethnic groups. The arrival of the first Portuguese settlers in the region in 1566, shortly after the establishment of the State of Brazil as a colony of the Portuguese Empire, led to massacre, enslavement and dispersion of the local indigenous population. After the independence of Brazil in 1822, the parish of Magé was elevated to the status of city in 1857. A little over a hundred years later, in 1971, the Portuguese-Brazilian Carlos Santos acquired two plots of land in that city and built a villa in order to live off the income from renting houses. In 2019, when his adopted grandson Arthur van der Bruyn became King of Ebenthal, Carlos's estate was incorporated into the new unrecognized microstate. Following Carlos death, he was succeeded by his only son Reinaldo, Arthur's stepfather; therefore, the Ebenthaler monarch became the apparent heir to the ownership of Lehen's properties. Carlos's Magé's estate, annexed into Ebenthal as the Principality of Carlenburg, which lasted until 2022 when the Ebenthaler subnational monarchies were abolished. In early 2024 the Redivision Act completely restructured Ebenthal's model of administrative divisions and the provincial government, which had succeeded the absolute princely government, was disestablished and replaced by the municipality of Sanktstaat, whose name was later altered to Lehen.

The Lehian territory is comprised of two large slightly swampy grassy terrains bordering the mountains of Petrópolis with nine houses. The municipality has a natural source of water which, together with the income from the rentals of the houses that make up the property, are the municipality's largest source of income. As the owner of the lands forming Lehen and Tussen are the same, and the latter has a mostly-dormant economy, part of the income from Lehen is allocated to the maintenance of Tussen in a single and unbreakable arrangement between these municipal governments. , included in the organic laws of both municipalities.

Etimology

The name "Lehen" is the literal German for "fief". The name was adopted based on the German-Brazilian cultural origins of Ebenthal and the characteristics of the municipality similar to a feudal state, that is, possession of a single family that employs part of the resident population, some of whom work in exchange of the residence.