Königsfeld is a community in the Upper Franconian district of Bamberg and a member of the administrative community (Verwaltungsgemeinschaft) of Steinfeld. Geography Königsfeld lies in the Upper Franconia-West region between the cities of Bamberg and Bayreuth at the source of the river Aufseß in the Franconian Jura, on the edge of the “Franconian Switzerland”. Constituent communities To the community of Königsfeld belong the following Ortsteile: Neighbouring communities Litzendorf (in the west) Scheßlitz (in the northwest) Stadelhofen (in the north) Hollfeld (in the east) Heiligenstadt (in the north) Verwaltungsgemeinschaft Steinfeld The community of Königsfeld belongs to the administrative community (Verwaltungsgemeinschaft) of Steinfeld, to which the communities of Wattendorf and Stadelhofen also belong. The administrative community's seat is Steinfeld, a constituent community of Stadelhofen. Coat of arms The community of Königsfeld has borne its current arms since municipal reform in 1973. They might heraldically be described thus: Gules, two flails argent per saltire, thereover a coronet Or and thereunder a scallop reversed Or. The crown stands for the community's name (Königsfeld in German means “king’s field”). The two flails come from the coat of arms borne by the Lords of Königsfeld, ministeriales from Bamberg in the service of the Counts of Truhendingen. The scallop refers to the Catholic parish church's patron, St. Jacob the Elder. History Middle Ages As a Carolingian royal court, the place was known in the 8th century as Chunigeshofen in montibus versus Bohemiam (“King’s court in the mountains towards Bohemia”) and had its first documentary mention in 741 in a donation document to the Bishopric of Würzburg. The Carolingians had built a royal court at the source of the river Aufseß whose fortifications served to safeguard the road network in a border region with the Frankish Empire. Emperor Charlemagne wanted to control the weapons trade in 805 with the Slavic regions lying to the east, and to that end he put commissaries to work in both Hallstadt and Scheßlitz. The Imperial forest of Hauptsmoorwald reached to Königsfeld's outlying rural area as late as the 16th century. The economic estate lay on the community's western edge. Another settlement centre was found right on the Aufseß in the community's east. Slavic ceramic finds have been unearthed here. Iron ore was mined and smelted around Königsfeld since prehistoric times and likely had economic importance for the royal court. Today, exploratory diggings, slagheaps and field names, such as Arzberg (which would be