Grosselfingen is a town in the

Zollernalbkreis The Zollernalbkreis () is a ''Landkreis'' (district) in the middle of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The district is located in the Swabian Alb, and contains the second highest elevation of this range, the high '' Oberhohenberg''. In the south-e ...

district, in

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg ( ; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a states of Germany, German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million i ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

History

In the first half of the 14th century, the village of Grosselfingen was a possession of the Lordship of Haimburg, a fief of the County of Hohenberg and then the County of Zollern. The Lordship, and by extension the village, was from 1428 to 1522 ruled by the . In 1850, the Zollern was taken over by the

Kingdom of Prussia The Kingdom of Prussia (, ) was a German state that existed from 1701 to 1918.Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. Rev. ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1946. It played a signif ...

, whose government assigned Grosselfingen to , reorganized in 1925 as . Grosselfingen, which was agrarian before

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, industrialized after the war. Beginning in 1950, it grew to the north-west and south-east. The district of Balingen was dissolved by the and Grosselfingen was assigned to a new district,

. Continued growth in the 1980s and 1990s spread Grosselfingen further south.

Geography

The municipality ('' Gemeinde'') of Grosselfingen covers of the Zollernalb district of

, one of the 16

States State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...

of the

Federal Republic of Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen constituent states have a total population of over 84 ...

. It is physically located between the rivers Starzel and Eyach, in the foothills of the

Swabian Jura The Swabian Jura ( , more rarely ), sometimes also named Swabian Alps in English, is a mountain range in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, extending from southwest to northeast and in width. It is named after the region of Swabia. It is part of th ...

. Elevation above sea level in the municipal area ranges from a high of

Normalnull ("standard zero") or (short N. N. or NN) is an outdated official vertical datum used in Germany. Elevations using this reference system were to be marked (“meters above standard zero”). has been replaced by (NHN). History In 187 ...

(NN) on the Owinger Berg to a low of .

Coat of arms

Grosselfingen's municipal

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...

is divided ''party per cross'' into four pieces, two

black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

and two

white White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

. This pattern is the coat of arms of the County of Zollern, but imposed on it are symbols in the white quarters. In the upper left quarter are two zig-zag

red Red is the color at the long wavelength end of the visible spectrum of light, next to orange and opposite violet. It has a dominant wavelength of approximately 625–750 nanometres. It is a primary color in the RGB color model and a seconda ...

lines, from the coat of arms of the House of Bubenhofen. In the lower right is a

blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB color model, RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB color model, RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between Violet (color), violet and cyan on the optical spe ...

bird seated on a blue nest. Called the "summer bird" (''Sommervogel''), this is a reference to the Honourable Court of Fools of Grosselfingen (''ehrsame Narrengericht zu Grosselfingen''), a local Fastnacht tradition that traces its origin to the rule of the Bubenhofens. The coat of arms was approved by the provisional

Württemberg-Hohenzollern Württemberg-Hohenzollern was a West Germany, West German state created in 1945 as part of the French Allied Occupation Zones in Germany, post-World War II occupation zone. Its capital was Tübingen. In 1952, it was merged into the newly founded ...

government on 13 January 1949. A corresponding flag was issued by the Zollernalb district office on 30 June 1982.

History

Geography

Coat of arms

Transportation

Citations

External links