SAVOY, HOUSE OF, an ancient royal house of Europe (represented now by the king of Italy), whose territorial possessions were constituted a county of the empire in the 12th century under the name Savoy; was created a duchy in the 15th century.  By the treaty of Utrecht (1713) the island of Sicily was ceded to Savoy and the title of king bestowed upon the duke; in 1720 Victor Amadeus II. was forced to cede Sicily to Austria in exchange for Sardinia, which with Savoy and Piedmont, &c., constituted the kingdom of Sardinia till its dissolution in 1860, when Savoy was ceded to France and the remaining portion merged in the new Italian kingdom under Victor Emmanuel.

SAVOY, THE, a district of the Strand, London, in which a palace was built in 1245 called of the Savoy, in which John of France was confined after his capture at Poitiers; was burnt at the time of the Wat Tyler insurrection, but rebuilt in 1505 as a hospital; it included a chapel, which was damaged by fire in 1864, but restored by the Queen.

SAXE, MAURICE, marshal of France, natural son of Augustus II., king of POLAND (q. v.) distinguished himself under various war captains, Marlborough and Prince Eugene in particular, and eventually entered the service of France; commanding in the War of the Austrian Succession he took Prague and Egra, and was made a marshal, and appointed to the command of the army of Flanders, in which he gained victories and captured fortresses, and was thereafter loaded with honours by Louis XV.; was one of the strongest and most dissolute men of his age; died of dropsy, the result of his debaucheries (1698-1750).

SAXE-COBURG, DUKE OF, second son of the Queen, Duke of Edinburgh; married a daughter of Alexander II., czar of Russia; succeeded to the dukedom in 1893; retains his annuity as an English prince of L10,000; b. 1844.

SAXE-WEIMAR, AMALIA, DUCHESS OF, was of the Guelph family, and married to the duke, and in two years was left a widow and in government of the duchy, attracting to her court all the literary notabilities of the day, Goethe the chief, till in 1775 she resigned her authority to her son, who followed in her footsteps (1739-1807).

SAXO GRAMMATICUS, a Danish chronicler who flourished in the 12th century; wrote “Gesta Danorum,” which brings the history of Denmark down to the year 1158, and is in the later sections of great value.

SAXON SWITZERLAND, name given to a mountainous region in Saxony, SE. of Dresden.

SAXONS, a people of the Teutonic stock who settled early on the estuary of the Elbe and the adjoining islands, who in their piratical excursions infested and finally settled in Britain and part of Gaul, and who, under the name of Anglo-Saxons, now hold sovereign sway over large sections of the globe.