Battenberg (Eder) is a small town in
Waldeck-Frankenberg district, the state of
Hesse, Germany. The town is noted for giving its name to the
Battenberg family, a
morganatic branch of the ruling
House of Hesse-Darmstadt, and through it, the name
Mountbatten used by members of the
British royal family, a literal translation of Battenberg.
Geography
Location
The centre of Battenberg lies in the ''Ederbergland'', or Eder Highland, to which the Burgwald abutting the town to the east also belongs, on the southern edge of the
Sauerland
The Sauerland () is a rural, hilly area spreading across most of the south-eastern part of North Rhine-Westphalia, in parts heavily forested and, apart from the major valleys, sparsely inhabited.
The Sauerland is the largest tourist region in ...
and the
Rothaargebirge
The Rothaar Mountains (german: Rothaargebirge, , also ''Rotlagergebirge''), or Rothaar, is a low mountain range reaching heights of up to 843.1 m in North Rhine-Westphalia and Hesse, Germany.
It is believed that its name must once have been ...
. Lying between 320 and 650 m above
sea level, the town is also crossed by the river
Eder Eder may refer to:
People
* Eder (surname)
* Éder (given name), a Portuguese or Spanish given name
*Éder (footballer, born 1986), Brazilian footballer Éder Citadin Martins
*Eder (footballer, born 1987), Portuguese footballer from Guinea-Bissau E ...
.
Neighbouring communities
Battenberg borders in the north on the community of
Bromskirchen, in the northeast on the community of
Allendorf, in the southeast on the community of
Burgwald (all three in Waldeck-Frankenberg), in the south on the community of
Münchhausen am Christenberg (
Marburg-Biedenkopf), and in the west on the towns of
Hatzfeld (Waldeck-Frankenberg) and
Bad Berleburg (
Siegen-Wittgenstein in
North Rhine-Westphalia).
Constituent communities
Battenberg includes the following centres:
* Berghofen
* Dodenau
* Frohnhausen
* Laisa
History
In 778 fighting took place near Laisa and Battenfeld as part of
Charlemagne's
Saxon Wars
The Saxon Wars were the campaigns and insurrections of the thirty-three years from 772, when Charlemagne first entered Saxony with the intent to conquer, to 804, when the last rebellion of tribesmen was defeated. In all, 18 campaigns were fought ...
. A branch of the Wittgenstein noble family began calling themselves the "Counts of Battenberg" in 1214 – compare
Sayn-Wittgenstein. In 1232, Battenberg had its first documentary mention, and two years later it was granted town rights. The early-
Gothic
Gothic or Gothics may refer to:
People and languages
*Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes
**Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths
**Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...
church dates from 1249. In 1297, the town's ownership was transferred to the Archbishops of
Mainz. In 1464, the ''
Amt'' of Battenberg passed to Hesse. In 1932, Battenberg became part of the
Frankenberg/Eder district. As part of municipal reform in 1974, the districts of Frankenberg (including Battenberg) and Waldeck united to form the district of Waldeck-Frankenberg.
The dynasty of the counts of Battenberg ceased to exist in 1314, their castle was demolished throughout the following centuries. When
Prince Alexander von Hessen-Darmstadt, the brother of the grand duke of Hesse, married
Julia von Hauke, the orphaned daughter of the former Deputy Minister of War
of
Congress Poland
Congress Poland, Congress Kingdom of Poland, or Russian Poland, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland, was a polity created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna as a semi-autonomous Polish state, a successor to Napoleon's Duchy of Warsaw. It w ...
, their liaison was not considered befitting of his rank. Therefore her brother-in-law made her countess of Battenberg in 1851 and princess of Battenberg in 1858. With her husband, who agreed to carry the same title and name, she lived near Seeheim-Jugenheim at "
Schloss Heiligenberg", a re-modelled manor. Her sons Ludwig Alexander and Heinrich Moritz both served the British empire, their families anglicized their name to
Mountbatten (''Berg'' means "mountain, hill" in
German) in 1917.
Population development
Politics
Town council
Municipal elections held on 6 March 2016 apportioned the town council's 31 seats thus:
Note: ''Bürgerlisten'' are "citizens' lists", not actual political parties.
Coat of arms
Battenberg's civic
coat of arms might heraldically be described thus: Per pale sable and argent.
The
tinctures come from the arms borne by the town's old overlords, the Counts of Battenberg(a branch of the Counts of Wittgenstein). Battenberg's arms have their roots in the 13th century, putting them among Hesse's oldest municipal coats of arms.
Various other
charges have appeared in the arms over the centuries, however. Sometimes it was a tower, the
Count of Battenberg
Count (feminine: countess) is a historical title of nobility in certain European countries, varying in relative status, generally of middling rank in the hierarchy of nobility. Pine, L. G. ''Titles: How the King Became His Majesty''. New Yor ...
and the
Archbishop of Mainz
The Elector of Mainz was one of the seven Prince-electors of the Holy Roman Empire. As both the Archbishop of Mainz and the ruling prince of the Electorate of Mainz, the Elector of Mainz held a powerful position during the Middle Ages. The Archb ...
, the Archbishop by himself, or the
Wheel of Mainz. One version even showed the same simple composition seen here, but with gules (red) instead of sable (black). This would have made the arms identical to those currently borne by
Buchloe in
Bavariabr>
Town partnerships
*
Senonches
Senonches () is a commune in Eure-et-Loir, Centre-Val de Loire, France.
Geography
Senonches is located northwest of the department of Eure-et-Loir and the northeastern boundary of the Regional Natural Park of the Perche, at a crossroads betwe ...
, France
*
Romsey
Romsey ( ) is a historic market town in the county of Hampshire, England. Romsey was home to the 17th-century philosopher and economist William Petty and the 19th-century British prime minister, Lord Palmerston, whose statue has stood in the t ...
, United Kingdom
*
Litvínov, Czech Republic
*
Horní Jiřetín
Horní Jiřetín (; german: Obergeorgenthal) is a town in Most District in the Ústí nad Labem Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 2,200 inhabitants.
Administrative parts
Horní Jiřetín consists of Černice, Dolní Jiřetín, Horní J ...
, Czech Republic
*
Loon op Zand, Netherlands
Adoption
* In 1954, Battenberg "adopted" Sudeten Germans who had been
driven out of the community of Obergeorgenthal (Horní Jiřetín) in the Brüx district.
Notable people
*
Andreas Steinhöfel
Andreas Steinhöfel (; born 14 January 1962) is a German author for children and young adult books, and a translator.
Biography
Andreas Steinhöfel grew up with two brothers in the Middle Hesse small town Biedenkopf, and did his GCE Advanced ...
(born 1962), writer and translator
*
Leonie Schwertmann (born 1994), volleyball player
References
External links
*
Laisa*
{{Authority control
Waldeck-Frankenberg