Gloria von Thurn und Taxis auctioned the family treasures and handed 2,200 objects to Bavaria to settle her husband's estate

The Thurn und Taxis fortune came from the mail. Leonhard I von Taxis was Postmaster General of the Holy Roman Empire in 1595, and in 1615 the office became hereditary in the family. The family ran the imperial post until 1806 and its own postal service until 1867, when it handed the system to Prussia for 3 million thaler^†. Prince Johannes von Thurn und Taxis died in Munich on 14 December 1990 after two heart transplants in two days. His heir, Albert, was 7. Vanity Fair reported debts of $500 million, run up buying companies. His widow Gloria ran the estate as Albert's trustee. The inheritance tax was about 45 million DM^†. On 17 November 1992 Sotheby's Geneva sold family jewels. In October 1993 Sotheby's held a nine-day sale of about 7,600 lots in the riding stables of Schloss St. Emmeram in Regensburg, including 75,000 bottles of wine. It raised more than $19 million, which went to the inheritance taxes. In 1993 the Bavarian National Museum also acquired more than 2,200 objects from the house, taken in place of tax at a value of almost 44 million DM^†. Bavaria opened them in 1998 as a branch museum inside the palace. The family sold its bank in 1992 and its brewery in 1996. In 2026 Albert heads the house, the family is Germany's largest private forest owner, and the state's Thurn und Taxis treasury is still on show in Regensburg.