Gudensberg () is a small town in northern Hesse, Germany. Since the municipal reform in 1974, the nearby villages of Deute, Dissen, Dorla, Gleichen, Maden and Obervorschütz have become parts of the municipality. Geography Gudensberg is situated in the district of Schwalm-Eder-Kreis, Hesse, Germany, at the southeasternmost edge of the Habichtswald Nature Park, about south of Kassel and northeast of Fritzlar. The town's municipal area borders to the north and northeast on Edermünde, to the east on constituent communities of Felsberg which lie along the lower reaches of the river Eder. South and southeast of the river Ems lie further parts of Felsberg. To the south, southwest, and west are constituent communities of Fritzlar. To the northwest, Gudensberg's community of Gleichen abuts Niedenstein; in this direction, behind the Odenberg (elevation = ), rise the Langenberge, (a low mountain range), that belong to the Habichtswald Nature Park. History Gudensberg In the area around Gudensberg, many prehistoric and early historic finds have shown that the area was inhabited by people now known as the Chatti. On the Lamsberg, finds from the Rössen culture have been unearthed. In 1938, between the Odenberg and Gudensberg, a Linear Pottery culture settlement from about 4000 BC and an Iron Age settlement were discovered. At the Kassler Kreuz, a graveyard with cremated remains from about 1000 BC was discovered when a railway was built in 1899. In the 10th Century, the Hof Wodensberg, a farm in Gudensberg, was run using three-field crop rotation. Gudensberg itself had its first mention in documents in 1121. The town's name is presumably derived from an older form, Wotansberg, after the god Wōdanaz, who was worshiped as the highest god by the Chatti in Old Germanic times. In the Middle Ages, a castle was built on the hill and was named the Obernburg. It was the seat of Hessian regional counts (Gaugrafen). From 1122 to 1247, Gudensberg belonged to the Landgraves of Thuringia, and the place experienced its heyday, with its first town wall built between 1170 and 1180, and its first mention as a town in 1254 with a town constitution at the turn of the 13th Century. With the partition of Thuringia, Gudensberg fell to the Landgraviate of Hesse, and in 1277, Henry I was proclaimed the first Landgrave of Hesse on the Mader Heide (heath) near Gudensberg. In 1300, Landgrave Henry I moved his residence from Gudensberg to Kassel