Rhenish Palatinate

The Rhenish Palatinate (German: Rheinpfalz) or Lower Palatinate (Niederpfalz) occupies rather more than a quarter of the German Bundesland (federal state) of Rhineland-Palatinate Rheinland-Pfalz) and contains the towns of Ludwigshafen, Kaiserslautern, Neustadt an der Weinstrasse, Pirmasens, Landau, and Speyer.

Related Topics:
German - German - Bundesland - Rhineland-Palatinate - Ludwigshafen - Kaiserslautern - Neustadt an der Weinstrasse - Pirmasens - Landau - Speyer

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Ruled by counts of the Wittelsbach dynasty from 1214 on (apart from almost 20 years of annexation by France after 1795), the area was devastated during the Thirty Years' War (1618-48) and by French invasion in 1689 during the Nine Years War. In 1816, the Rhenish Palatine passed to the Wittelsbach family's Bavarian line; although it was geographically separate from Bavaria, the two were ruled as a single state for the next 130 years. The union persisted after Bavaria became part of the German Empire in 1871, and after the Wittelsbach dynasty was deposed and Bavaria became a revolutionary state in 1918 and then a Land of the Weimar Republic. The union with Bavaria was finally dissolved in the reorganization of German states after World War II: the Rhenish Palatine became part of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate in 1946.

Related Topics:
Wittelsbach - 1214 - France - 1795 - Thirty Years' War - 1618 - 48 - 1689 - Nine Years War - 1816 - Bavaria - German Empire - 1871 - Revolutionary - 1918 - Weimar Republic - World War II - Rhineland-Palatinate - 1946

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Historical rulers of the Palatinate included:

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• Rupert, King of the Germans (1398-1410)
• Frederick V, Elector Palatine (1596 - 1632)
• Charles I Louis, Elector Palatine (1617-1680)

See also Palatinate

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