Selters is a village in the district

Limburg-Weilburg Limburg-Weilburg is a Kreis (district) in the west of Hesse, Germany. Neighboring districts are Lahn-Dill, Hochtaunuskreis, Rheingau-Taunus, Rhein-Lahn, Westerwaldkreis. History *1867 the ''Oberlahnkreis'', capital Weilburg was created *1886 t ...

Hesse Hesse or Hessen ( ), officially the State of Hesse (), is a States of Germany, state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt, which is also the country's principal financial centre. Two other major hist ...

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 ...

. It is situated at the Taunus side of the river

Lahn The Lahn () is a , right (or eastern) tributary of the Rhine in Germany. Its course passes through the States of Germany, federal states of North Rhine-Westphalia (23.0 km), Hesse (165.6 km), and Rhineland-Palatinate (57.0 km). ...

and belongs to the municipality

Löhnberg Löhnberg is a municipality north of Weilburg in Limburg-Weilburg district in Hesse, Germany. Geography Location Löhnberg lies between Wetzlar and the district seat of Limburg an der Lahn. Neighbouring communities Löhnberg borders in the ...

. The village has a total population of 319. The village is famous for its natural springs of

carbonated Carbonation is the chemical reaction of carbon dioxide to give carbonates, bicarbonates, and carbonic acid. In chemistry, the term is sometimes used in place of carboxylation, which refers to the formation of carboxylic acids. In inorganic che ...

mineral water Mineral water is water from a mineral spring that contains various minerals, such as salts and sulfur compounds. It is usually still, but may be sparkling ( carbonated/ effervescent). Traditionally, mineral waters were used or consumed at t ...

, which is sold as Selters water.

Location

Löhnberg-Selters lies near

Wiesbaden Wiesbaden (; ) is the capital of the German state of Hesse, and the second-largest Hessian city after Frankfurt am Main. With around 283,000 inhabitants, it is List of cities in Germany by population, Germany's 24th-largest city. Wiesbaden form ...

in direction to the

Taunus The Taunus () is a mountain range in Hesse and Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, located north west of Frankfurt and north of Wiesbaden. The tallest peak in the range is '' Großer Feldberg'' at 878 m; other notable peaks are '' Kleiner Feldberg' ...

mountains, near the river

, and between

Wetzlar Wetzlar () is a city in the state of Hesse, Germany. It is the twelfth largest city in Hesse with currently 55,371 inhabitants at the beginning of 2019 (including second homes). As an important cultural, industrial and commercial center, the un ...

and Limburg in the state of

History and etymology

The ancient Romans (who occupied Germany between 50 B.C. and 475 AD) called the places where water emerged from underground (Latin for 'dancing water'). This name was applied to the town and then borrowed into German as .

Franks file:Frankish arms.JPG, Aristocratic Frankish burial items from the Merovingian dynasty The Franks ( or ; ; ) were originally a group of Germanic peoples who lived near the Rhine river, Rhine-river military border of Germania Inferior, which wa ...

formally settled in the area as early as 500 AD, and was mentioned by writing for the first time in 1317 as . The , built in the capital of the Löhnberg region, was constructed by John, Count of Nassau-Dillenburg between 1321 and 1324. The castle ruins are unusual in surviving, as most buildings burned down in a fire in 1538. Selters later received a parish in 1694, led by pastor Johann Bosen. Being made out of wood, the church was later damaged during another fire in 1706, leading pastor J. G. Haybach to build a new church, which began construction in 1731 by carpenter J. A. Klöckner. In 1815, the town straddled the border of the

Duchy of Nassau The Duchy of Nassau (German language, German: ''Herzogtum Nassau'') was an independent state between 1806 and 1866, located in what became the Germany, German states of Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. It was a States of the Confederation of th ...

and 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 ...

. The town was part of the in Prussia and bordered

Braunfels Braunfels () is a town in the Lahn-Dill-Kreis in Hesse, Germany. It is located on the German Timber-Frame Road. Geography Location The climatic spa of Braunfels lies at a height of some 100 m above the Lahn valley. It is 9 km southwes ...

in the neighboring

Rhine Province The Rhine Province (), also known as Rhenish Prussia () or synonymous with the Rhineland (), was the westernmost Provinces of Prussia, province of the Kingdom of Prussia and the Free State of Prussia, within the German Reich, from 1822 to 1946. ...

until 1932, when borders in Germany were redrawn. In 1974, municipal reform in Hesse required that Selters join the Löhnberg municipality. For the most part, the population of Selters has stagnated throughout

early modern history The early modern period is a historical period that is defined either as part of or as immediately preceding the modern period, with divisions based primarily on the history of Europe and the broader concept of modernity. There is no exact date ...

. In 1824, Selters an der Lahn had a population of 136 people, and grew to 235 inhabitants by 1880. The population has only grown by ~35% in the past 140 years. The name ''Selters'' is the etymology for the modern word ''

Seltzer Carbonated water is water containing dissolved carbon dioxide gas, either artificially injected under pressure, or occurring due to natural geological processes. Carbonation causes small bubbles to form, giving the water an effervescence, effer ...

''.

Administrative timeline:

* Before 1806:

Holy Roman Empire The Holy Roman Empire, also known as the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation after 1512, was a polity in Central and Western Europe, usually headed by the Holy Roman Emperor. It developed in the Early Middle Ages, and lasted for a millennium ...

, Principality of

Nassau-Weilburg The House of Nassau-Weilburg, a branch of the House of Nassau, ruled a division of the County of Nassau, which was a state in what is now Germany, then part of the Holy Roman Empire, from 1344 to 1806. On 17 July 1806, upon the dissolution of t ...

, * 1806-1849:

, Amt Weilburg * 1849-1854:

German Confederation The German Confederation ( ) was an association of 39 predominantly German-speaking sovereign states in Central Europe. It was created by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 as a replacement of the former Holy Roman Empire, which had been dissolved ...

, Duchy of Nassau, * 1854-1867: German Confederation, Duchy of Nassau Amt Weilburg * 1867-1871:

North German Confederation The North German Confederation () was initially a German military alliance established in August 1866 under the leadership of the Kingdom of Prussia, which was transformed in the subsequent year into a confederated state (a ''de facto'' feder ...

Hesse-Nassau The Province of Hesse-Nassau () was a Provinces of Prussia, province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1868 to 1918, then a province of the Free State of Prussia until 1944. Hesse-Nassau was created as a consequence of the Austro-Prussian War of ...

, * 1871-1918:

German Empire The German Empire (),; ; World Book, Inc. ''The World Book dictionary, Volume 1''. World Book, Inc., 2003. p. 572. States that Deutsches Reich translates as "German Realm" and was a former official name of Germany. also referred to as Imperia ...

, Kingdom of Prussia, Province of Hesse-Nassau, Wiesbaden, Oberlahn district * 1918-1944: German Empire,

Free State of Prussia The Free State of Prussia (, ) was one of the States of the Weimar Republic, constituent states of Weimar Republic, Germany from 1918 to 1947. The successor to the Kingdom of Prussia after the defeat of the German Empire in World War I, it cont ...

, Province of Hesse-Nassau, Wiesbaden, Oberlahn district * 1944-1945: German Empire, Free State of Prussia, Province of Nassau, Oberlahn district * 1945-1946: American occupation zone,

Greater Hesse Greater Hesse () was the provisional name given for a section of German territory created by the United States military administration in at the end of World War II. It was formed by the Allied Control Council on 19 September 1945 and became the ...

, Wiesbaden administrative district, Oberlahn district * 1946-1949: American occupation zone,

, Wiesbaden administrative district, Oberlahn district * 1949-1968:

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 ...

, Hesse, Wiesbaden, Oberlahn district * 1968-1974: Federal Republic of Germany, Hesse,

Darmstadt Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it the ...

, Oberlahn district * 1974-1981: Federal Republic of Germany, Hesse, Darmstadt,

municipality * 1981–present: Federal Republic of Germany, Hesse,

Giessen Giessen, spelled in German (), is a town in the Germany, German States of Germany, state () of Hesse, capital of both the Giessen (district), district of Giessen and the Giessen (region), administrative region of Giessen. The population is appro ...

, Limburg-Weilburg, Löhnberg municipality

Culture

Selters is under the jurisdiction of the Limburg-Weilburg fire department, with a local branch in Löhnberg. The village celebrates its local kermis in August. The local parish has a congregation of 187 people (60% of the total population). It also celebrates an annual () in November with various local foods and cuisines available.

Sources

* Ina-Maria Greverus: ''Das hessische Dorf''. Insel Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1982, ISBN 3-458-04782-0

References

External links

Löhnberg-Selters Website
{{Authority control Towns in Hesse