History of Uri

Uri is a Swiss "Talschaft" and canton in the upper Reuss valley.
First mentioned in the 8th century, it gained strategic importance with the opening of the Gotthard Pass in the 13th century and was a founding member of the Old Swiss Confederacy in the late medieval period.
Prehistory.
The oldest traces of humans in the Canton of Uri are from around 2200 BC and include a quartz production site and flint arrowheads at Hospental-Rossplatten and Gotthardmätteli. There are Bronze Age graves at Bürglen and possibly also some at Jagdmatt that are from 1300–900 BC. The earliest traces of a settlement were discovered at Amsteg and date from the Middle Bronze Age (1450–1200 BC). This village was located in a protected valley along a route into the Reuss and was near quartz, copper and iron deposits. An Iron Age village was built in the same spot around 500–450 BC. Pottery from the Bronze and Iron Ages show that these villages traded with surrounding villages and even crossed the alpine passes to trade with Quinto in Ticino and the alpine Rhine valley.
The large Celtic treasure trove at Erstfeld, now generally interpreted as a votive offering to a mountain deity, indicates that there was a large, prosperous population in central alps during the 4th century BC.
Early history.
During the Roman era, Uri remained mostly isolated from the Roman Empire. An analysis of the place names along the shores of Lake Lucerne show a Gallo-Roman influence, while in the mountain valleys Raetian names are more common. When the Roman Empire withdrew from the Alps, the lake side villages looked north to the towns along the lake for support, while the alpine villages in the valley called Urseren banded together.
During the 7th century, Alemannic German speaking settlers from the Kingdom of the Franks began to move into the narrow plains around the southern end of Lake Lucerne. In a process that took about three centuries they spread into the alpine valleys. The number of place names with either German or Latin roots next to each other indicates that this migration was generally peaceful. The Alemanni grave at the church of St. Martin in Altdorf (660–680) shows the political and religious leadership roll that the Alemanni had in the upper Reuss valley.
Uri is first mentioned in 732 as the place of banishment of Eto, the abbot of Reichenau, by the duke of Alamannia. In 853 it was given to the nunnery at Zürich by Louis the German, which he had founded for his daughter Hildegard. It is unclear whether the gift included the entire Reuss valley or just certain settlements. The abbess appointed a vogt to manage the lands, but ruled the lands with a light hand. Many of the surrounding villages became tenants of the abbey or obtained similar privileges. Under the abbess, the villages of the valley began to develop a sort of local government.
In contrast, the Urseren remained more isolated, though they had some connections to the Leventina valley. Some of the villages in the Urseren were settled by Disentis Abbey and were part of the Diocese of Chur. By the 10th century, there were settlements of Romansh speakers from Disentis in the high valleys.
Between approximately 920 and 976 the Duke of Swabia was the vogt under the abbess in Zurich. They were followed by the Lenzburgs from 976 to 1173 and then the Zähringens. In 1218, the Zähringens died out, and the bailiwick was given to the Habsburgs. According to Aegidius Tschudi's history, in 1231 King Henry of Germany, the son of Emperor Frederick II, bought Uri from the Habsburgs and granted it imperial immediacy. During the 13th century, the St. Gotthard Pass opened, which brought ever increasing trade and wealth to Uri. With the growing wealth, the towns and villages along the Gotthard route became increasing independent. As early as 1243 Uri had a district seal, and in 1274, Rudolph of Habsburg, who was now the Holy Roman Emperor, confirmed its historic privileges.
In Urseren, Disentis Abbey appointed a vogt, though in 1239–40 Emperor Frederick II changed the vogt's office into a secular, imperial office. He appointed Count Rudolf of Rapperswil as his vogt. When the Rapperswil male line died out in 1283 the vogt office in Urseren also fell to the Habsburgs.
Old Swiss Confederacy.
Formation of the Confederacy.
A treaty of mutual recognition and assistance with Schwyz, possibly concluded in 1291 and certainly by 1309, would come to be regarded as the foundational act of the Old Swiss Confederacy or "Eidgenossenschaft". The Battle of Morgarten in 1315, while of limited strategic importance, was the first instance of the Confererates defeating the Habsburgs in the field.
A few months after the victory at Morgarten, the three Forest Cantons met at Brunnen to reaffirm their alliance in the Pact of Brunnen. Over the following decades, the Confederacy expanded into the Acht Orte, now representing a regional power with the potential to challenge Habsburg hegemony. The Confederacy decisively defeated Habsburg in the Battle of Sempach 1386, opening the way to further territorial expansion.
In the traditional history of the Eternal Alliance, the Habsburgs had appointed a tyrannical vogt named Albrecht Gessler to rule over Uri from his castle in Altdorf. According to Tschudi's version of the events (recorded in the 16th century) Gessler raised a pole in the village's central square, hung his hat on top of it, and demanded that all the townsfolk bow before the hat. On 18 November 1307, William Tell visited Altdorf with his young son and passed by Gessler's hat, publicly refusing to bow to it, and so was arrested. Gessler – intrigued by Tell's famed marksmanship, yet resentful of his defiance – devised a cruel punishment: Tell and his son would be executed, but he could redeem his life by shooting an apple off the head of his son, Walter, in a single attempt. Tell split the apple with a bolt from his crossbow. However, Gessler noticed that Tell had drawn two bolts and discovered that Tell had planned to kill him if the first bolt had killed Tell's son. Gessler took Tell captive, but Tell was able to escape. Tell then ran cross-country to Küssnacht where he assassinated Gessler with the second crossbow bolt. Tell's assassination sparked a rebellion, which led to the Rütlischwur, a further alliance between Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden.
While the historicity of William Tell and specific events are questioned by modern historians, the cantons around Lake Lucerne and other nearby lakes had a long history of alliances. For example, in 1291, Uri, Schwyz and Zürich entered into a three-year defensive alliance. In 1309, Emperor Henry VII combined Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden into the "Waldstätte" or "Forest Cantons".
In 1314, Duke Louis IV of Bavaria (who would become Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor) and Frederick the Handsome, a Habsburg prince, each claimed the crown of the Holy Roman Emperor. The Confederates supported Louis IV because they feared the Habsburgs would annex their countries as Habsburg property — as they already had tried to do in the late 13th century.
War broke out over a dispute between the Confederates of Schwyz and the Habsburg-protected monastery of Einsiedeln regarding some pastures, and eventually the Confederates of Schwyz conducted a raid on the monastery. The Habsburg response to the raid, led to the Battle of Morgarten in 1315 where the Confederate army, including some troops from Uri, destroyed the Habsburg army. A few months after the victory at Morgarten, the three Forest Cantons met at Brunnen to reaffirm their alliance in the Pact of Brunnen. In the following forty years, the alliance expanded as other cantons (Lucerne in 1332 and Zürich in 1351, Glarus and Zug in 1352 and Bern in 1353) joined the alliance.
In 1386 Uri participated in the victory over the Austrians at the Battle of Sempach. Following the victory at Sempach, Uri began a program of territorial expansion to allow them to control the entire Gotthard route. As a first step, Uri annexed the lands of "Urseren" in 1410. The Urseren was allowed to retain its own mayor and assembly, and its own courts under those of Uri. It was not fully incorporated till 1888. In 1403, with the help of Obwalden, it won the Leventina valley from the duke of Milan, but lost it in 1422. Though in 1440 Uri alone reconquered it and kept it until 1798. Between 1410 and 1418, Uri occupied the Val d' Ossola in Italy. In 1419, with Obwalden, Uri conquered Bellinzona, but lost it at the Battle of Arbedo in 1422. In 1478, Uri marched into the Leventina valley, south of the Gotthard pass. The citizens of the valley welcomed Uri's troops as liberators from the Duke of Milan. They then attempted to besiege Bellinzona, but gave up after 14 days, when the Duke sent 10,000 troops to drive them out. About 600 men of the Confederate rear guard defeated the Milanese army at the Battle of Giornico and drove Milan out of the Leventina valley but did not take Bellinzona. In 1500, with Schwyz and Nidwalden, it captured Bellinzona again and held it until 1798. By 1503, Uri, Nidwalden and Schwyz jointly controlled the bailiwicks of Blenio, Bellinzona and Riviera. In 1512 Uri shared in the conquest of Lugano with the rest of the Confederation. Together with the rest of the Confederation, Uri shared in the conquest and rule over a number of subject territories under the administration of several cantons including; 1415–1712 Baden, 1460–1798 Thurgau, 1482–1798 Sargans, 1491–1798 Rheintal, 1512–1798 Locarno, the Maggia valley, Lugano and Mendrisio and 1532–1712 the Freiamt including the Upper Freiamt between 1712–98.
Reformation and early modern era.
The region resisted the Protestant Reformation and remained Roman Catholic. In 1524–25 the Landammann Beroldingen of Josue asked the cantonal scribe Valentin Compar to write a polemic against the reformer Huldrych Zwingli, which was read to the cantonal congress and approved. As the Reformation spread through the Swiss Confederation, the five central, catholic cantons felt increasingly isolated and they began to search for allies. After two months of negotiations, the Five Cantons formed "die Christliche Vereinigung" (the Christian Alliance) with Ferdinand of Austria on 22 April 1529. Tensions continued to rise between the Protestant and Catholic cantons. After numerous minor incidents and provocations from both sides, a Catholic priest was executed in the Thurgau in May 1528, and the Protestant pastor J. Keyser was burned at the stake in Schwyz in 1529. The last straw was the installation of a Catholic reeve at Baden, and Zürich declared war on 8 June, occupied the Thurgau and the territories of the Abbey of St. Gall and marched to Kappel at the border to Zug.
By mediation of the Federal "Tagsatzung", bloodshed in what was known as the First War of Kappel was barely avoided. The peace agreement ("Erster Landfriede") was not exactly favourable for the Catholic party, who had to dissolve its alliance with the Austrian Habsburgs. The Protestant cantons also demanded that the catholic cantons allow Protestant preachers into them, and imposed a trade embargo to try to force them to agree. In late September 1531, about 8,000 soldiers from the Five Cantons (including Uri) marched against Zurich and Zwingli to lift this embargo. When they met Zwingli's forces on 11 October 1531 at the Second War of Kappel, the catholic forces were victorious and Zwingli was killed. The peace treaty after the Second War of Kappel established that each canton could choose which religion to follow, and Uri remained Catholic.
During the early modern era, the population of Uri increased slowly. The limited arable land in mountain valleys, disease and crop failures all reduced population growth. The plague broke out in the canton in 1348–49, 1517–18, 1574–75 and 1629. In 1742–43 and again 1770–71, crop failures combined with cattle diseases led to starvation and mass emigration. The consequences for the population were severe, in 1743 Uri had 9,828 inhabitants, but by the end of the 18th Century there were only 9,464 people.
Modern history.
Napoleonic period.
The government of Uri spoke out against the ideals of the French Revolution and opposed any attempt to institute changes in Switzerland. In 1797, pro-revolutionary propaganda from France was intercepted and burned in Uri. In January 1798, French revolutionary forces invaded Switzerland. On 28 January 1798, Uri sent troops to support Bern against the invaders. However, in early March it advised the Bernese authorities to make concessions to the French government. Then on 4 and 5 March, Uri's troops refused to join the battle and instead withdrew. At the conference in Brunnen on 11 March Uri, Schwyz, Nidwalden, Glarus and Zug decided to negotiate a separate peace with General Guillaume Brune. In preparation for these talks the council dissolved their protectorate over the Leventina valley on 14 March. In the following days, the negotiations fell through because the French insisted on creating an indivisible Swiss republic. On 11 April the victorious French announced the creation of the Helvetic Republic and gave the cantons twelve days to accept the new constitution. On 20 April, the council voted to defend the traditional constitution and to join the rebellious cantons of Schwyz, Nidwalden, Glarus and Zug. The uprising was quickly suppressed and on 5 May Uri agreed to accept the Helvetic Republic. The cantonal army was disarmed in September and the canton was occupied by French troops in October.
During the Helvetic Republic, Uri was part of the Canton of Waldstätten, along with Zug, Obwalden, Nidwalden and the inner portions of Schwyz. The Leventina valley was given to the Canton of Ticino, which stripped Uri of its lands south of the Gotthard pass. Uri was divided into two districts, Andermatt and Altdorf. The government of Andermatt district supported the new, liberal constitution, while the government and people of Altdorf district opposed it. In April and May 1799, Franz Vincenz Schmid led an uprising against the occupying French army. This revolt, which gained support from the Leventina and Valais valleys, failed because they were unable to coordinate simultaneous uprisings in the other alpine cantons. After the uprising was put down, the victorious General Nicolas Jean-de-Dieu Soult granted the people of Uri clemency for the rebellion.
From June until the end of September 1799, troops of the Second Coalition fought the French in Uri. In connection with the uprising, Austrian troops invaded the Urseren and Reuss Valleys in late May and early June. The Austrians, together with a Capuchin friar named Paul Styger, attempted to restore the old cantonal government. However, in August the French position in the war began to improve. With the defeat of the Russian general Alexander Korsakov at the Second Battle of Zurich, the only other Coalition army, under Alexander Suvorov, was forced to retreat out of Switzerland though the alps in winter, a feat unheard of since the time of Hannibal. While he is considered a folk hero in Switzerland, his army stripped the villages of Uri bare of food and cattle. The damage from fighting, Suvorov's retreat and other disasters (including a fire that destroyed much of Altdorf in 1799) caused a famine in Uri. Although the government commissioner, Heinrich Zschokke, organized a relief effort to prevent starvation, it took years for Uri to repair the damage to the villages and towns.
In October 1801, a new government came to power in the Helvetic Republic and in early November the Canton of Waldstätten was dissolved and Uri became a canton again. The governor, Josef Anton von Beroldingen, attempted unsuccessfully to bring the Leventina valley back into Uri. Half a year later, on 17 April 1802, the Unitarian party took power back in the Republic and revised the constitution once again. In early June, Uri rejected the newest constitution while at the same time French troops withdrew from Switzerland. Without the French army to suppress them, Uri and other rural populations successfully rebelled against the government in the Stecklikrieg. In response to the collapse of the Helvetic Republic, Napoleon issued the Act of Mediation in 1803. As part of the Act of Mediation, Uri regained its independence and all attempts towards religious or constitutional reform were resisted.
Toward the federal state.
After the invasion of the Sixth Coalition into Switzerland on 29 December 1813, the Act of Mediation lost its power. While the neighbouring cantons of Schwyz and Nidwalden wanted to return to the organization of the Old Swiss Confederation, Uri was part of the Zurich-led party, which sought to reorganize the 19 cantons created by the Act. Uri also attempted, unsuccessful, to reincorporate the Leventina valley, but was only able to receive the rights to one-half of the taxes on all trade over Monte Piottino into the Leventina. On 5 May 1815 the "Landsgemeinde" approved the federal constitution. Uri then mediated between the Tagsatzung and Nidwalden, which had refused to recognize the treaty.
Uri remained without an official constitution until 1820. The document included only six principles that were based on traditional practice and existing state laws. The government remained deeply conservative during the Restoration period. Discontent with the cantonal government collected until 1834 when a reform party demanded a number of liberal constitutional changes. The Landsgemeinde, however, rejected these calls for reform. In the 1840s, urban, Protestant liberals gained the majority in the Tagsatzung and proposed a new constitution. To protect their traditional religion and power structure, the seven conservative, catholic cantons formed a separate alliance or "Sonderbund" in 1843. In 1847, the Sonderbund broke with the Federal Government and the Sonderbund War broke out. During the conflict, Uri sent troops to participate in the fighting along the Reuss-Emme defensive line as well as on the foray over the Gotthard into Ticino. After the defeat of the Sonderbund troops in Gisikon on 23 November 1847 Uri withdrew from the alliance and surrendered on 28 November 1847. Two days later federal troops moved into Uri.
Within modern Switzerland.
After the defeat of the Sonderbund, Uri supported the new Swiss Federal Constitution. They established a cantonal constitution that included some liberal changes including; the abolition of lifetime alderman positions, eliminating the privy council and secret council meetings and the establishment of a provisional executive council. The "Landsgemeinde" was the supreme sovereign power. The Cantonal Council, which included the presiding government councils and the Cantonal Court President, and the eleven-member Executive Council formed the legislative and executive branches. Ecclesiastical and school matters were under the Diocesan and Education Committees. The Catholic Church continued to enjoy privileges, but freedom of worship was now available for other faiths. The overall structure of the state remained cumbersome, because of the numerous commissions and the poor separation of powers.
The new Federal Constitution of 1874, which was rejected by the voters of Uri, led to a total revision of the cantonal constitution in 1888. The new constitution streamlined the government and addressed many of the issues of the 1848 cantonal constitution. The "Landsgemeinde" continued to meet on a local level until the last one was held in Bötzlingen in the municipality of Schattdorf on 6 May 1928. The Christian Democratic Party (CVP) and the Free Democratic Party (FDP) have dominated politics in Uri during the 20th Century.


Vavila, Metropolitan of Zeta

Vavila (before 1485 – 1520) was the Metropolitan of Zeta from c. 1494 to 1504.
Biography.
The first mention of Vavila dates to January 4, 1485, in the charter issued by Ivan Crnojević (r. 1465–1490); the Old Cetinje Monastery was built in 1484–85, at which time the Metropolitan of Zeta was Visarion, while Vavila was mentioned as his vicar bishop (1485). Vavila succeeded Visarion, though it is not known when exactly this would have taken place, as the oldest found source mentions Vavila as such in 1494.
Vavila blessed Hieromonk Makarije's "Cetinje Octoechos", printed at the Crnojević printing house in 1494, in which he was mentioned as the Metropolitan of Zeta. In 1496, Prince Đurađ IV Crnojević of Zeta (r. 1489–1496) abdicated the rule to Stefan II Crnojević, an Ottoman vassal, and Zeta then became part of the Sanjak of Scutari of the Ottoman Empire in 1499.
In 1504, Roman is mentioned as the Metropolitan of Zeta. In 1514, Zeta was separated from the Sanjak of Scutari and established as the separate Sanjak of Montenegro, under the rule of Skenderbeg Crnojević. In 1516, Vavila was elected as ruler of Montenegro by its clans. This event marked the foundation of the Prince-Bishopric of Montenegro.
Vavila died in 1520.


Michail Papageorgiou

Michail Papageorgiou (; 1727–1796) was a Greek philosopher.
He was born in Siatista in 1727. He studied philosophy in the Maroutsaia School of Ioannina under Eugenios Voulgaris. Later he visited Germany where he studied philosophy and medicine. He taught in his birthplace Siatista, and also in Selitsa, Meleniko, Vienna and Budapest. He died in Vienna on 1796.


Kalec

Kalec is a former village in the Plzeň-North District, Czech Republic. The village was the site of several important events in the history of Bohemia, and is situated in the west of the Czech Republic under the statutes of Žihle municipality.
History.
Kalec's origins begin in the 13th century, it was a modest establishment with a bunker, inhabited by families of the low nobility formed during the middle age. Kalecs steps to be a part of the Monastery of Plasy caused disputes between several feudal entities until 1346. In the 14th century the monastery began to acquire properties in this establishment. During the period of the Battle of White Mountain in the 30 Years War against Sweden, Kalec was occupied several times, including by Emperor Frediand II.
Evzen Tyttl, in 1710–16, allowed the construction of a mansion in the "baroco" style. A small chapel was built for "Holy Daisy", after much negligence, Abbot Fortunato Hartmann rebuilt and designed the chapel after the Czech Italian architect Jan Santini Aichel's influence. The Inn at Kalec underwent a total rehabilitation and modernization in 1769.
In 1785, Kalec, after the approval from the Church, went to the dominions of "Manetin" and for the beginning of the 19th century it became part of Rabstejn. However, in 1787, the property was acquired by the Lazanský family.
Kalec had great relevance during the Second World War due to its location, which is at a crucial part of the Edge of Sudetes Mountain or Sudetenland. The Sudetenland, along with the Sudetes Mountain was first taken by Hitler, after the war it restored by the Decrees of Edvard Beneš. With the formation of the Czechoslovakia state in 1918, the property was expropriated, and put under an agrarian reform which was put into the hands of a cooperative. In 1934, the property was acquired by Jaroslav Brček an industrialist from Plzeň.
The precise location of the buildings in rhombus, plus the complexity of the wooden structures and the vaulted buildings, constituted substantial reason for the admiration and studying of the students at the time. The most important structure is largely regarded as the castle, which is characterized as having five floors with leaned wings. In 1973, Dvůr Kalec had been declared a National Heritage. At the moment Kalec is having repairs done to the facade.
The property is made up on a total of of earth, between fields of culture, meadows, lakes and forests.


Dean of Kilmacduagh

 The Dean of Kilmacduagh was the priest in charge of the Diocese's Cathedral, Kilmacduagh monastery.


Dorsheim

Dorsheim is an "Ortsgemeinde" – a municipality belonging to a "Verbandsgemeinde", a kind of collective municipality – in the Bad Kreuznach district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the "Verbandsgemeinde" Langenlonsheim-Stromberg, whose seat is in Langenlonsheim. Dorsheim is a winegrowing centre.
Geography.
Location.
Dorsheim lies on a slope in the Trollbach valley, west of the Nahe, shortly before it empties into the Rhine. The Trollbach valley is a place with extensive vineyards and marked hiking trails, and above it is the "Naheblick", a lookout point that affords the visitor an outstanding view of the surrounding geography: Rhenish Hesse’s plains, the Rhine and the uplands beyond, namely the Taunus and the Hunsrück, and also the Donnersberg. To Dorsheim’s south lies Bad Kreuznach, while to the north lies Bingen am Rhein.
Neighbouring municipalities.
Clockwise from the north, Dorsheim’s neighbours are the municipalities of Münster-Sarmsheim, Laubenheim, Langenlonsheim, Waldlaubersheim and Rümmelsheim. All but the first lie in the Bad Kreuznach district. Münster-Sarmsheim lies within the neighbouring Mainz-Bingen district.
History.
As archaeological finds show, the lands around what is now Dorsheim were settled quite early on. From the Old Stone Age (100,000–10,000 BC) comes a whole series of various artefacts, which are now in private ownership. Known to be from the New Stone Age (4000–1800 BC) are a great many small hatchets and points, the 12 flint blades from the hoard on the street “Am Rebstock” and Rössen finds (ceramic) from the countryside lying east of Dorsheim. Unearthed from the Hallstatt times that followed have been all kinds of bronze rings from former barrows on the Dorsheim Heath, as well as ceramics from not only the Hallstatt culture but also the Urnfield culture and the Hunsrück-Eifel culture, once again in the countryside lying east of Dorsheim. Roman finds (3rd century AD) have come to light at two sites in the municipality. Various archaeological objects that have been found are now in museums in Bad Kreuznach, Mainz, Bonn and Berlin, although many are in private ownership. It can be said with certainty that Dorsheim was one of the villages founded in Frankish times (500–750), bearing witness to which are finds from Merovingian graves unearthed right near the community centre. On 30 March 1349, Dorsheim had its first documentary mention in a document issued by Count Palatine Ruprecht. For almost 650 years, Dorsheim was a Comital-Palatine or Electoral Palatinate village. It is therefore not surprising that the main charge in the municipality’s coat of arms is the Palatine lion. From 1796 to 1814, the village lay under French rule, first Revolutionary French, and later Napoleonic. Dorsheim lay within the Department of Rhin-et-Moselle. After the Napoleonic Wars and the Congress of Vienna, the region passed to the Kingdom of Prussia in 1815. After the municipality had celebrated its 600th anniversary in 1986 based on the first mention of Dorsheim in documents from 1386, Dorsheim citizen Herrmann Gellweiler delved deeper into the local history and discovered that Dorsheim had already been mentioned in previous documentation from a few decades earlier, in 1349. Too late, the erratum was put to the commemorative plate made for the “600th anniversary” that depicted Count Palatine Ruprecht making a gift of a vineyard in the “Dorsheimer Berg” to his daughter Else. After the new information came to light, Dorsheim was able to mark its 650th anniversary in 1999 based on the now oldest documentation only 13 years after the 600th anniversary.
Municipality’s name.
Nobody can say where the name Dorsheim comes from. Over the ages, the name has appeared in so many different forms, such as "Dunrsheim" and "Donrsheim", that working out a derivation has proved impossible.
Population development.
Dorsheim’s population development since Napoleonic times is shown in the table below. The figures for the years from 1871 to 1987 are drawn from census data:
Religion.
As at 31 August 2013, there are 730 full-time residents in Dorsheim, and of those, 226 are Evangelical (30.959%), 268 are Catholic (36.712%), 15 (2.055%) belong to other religious groups and 221 (30.274%) either have no religion or will not reveal their religious affiliation.
Politics.
Municipal council.
The council is made up of 12 council members, who were elected by proportional representation at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairwoman. In the 2004 elections, council members were elected by majority vote. No parties vied for seats in the municipal election, but rather two voters’ groups. The municipal election held on 7 June 2009 yielded the following results:
The official figures for the 2004 municipal election rather unhelpfully lumped all voters’ groups’ results together into a single sum. Since they were the only bodies that fielded candidates in Dorsheim, the results simply show an uninformative figure of 100% and a seat count of 12. The two voters’ groups active in Dorsheim are the ULD ("Unabhängige Liste Dorsheim e.V."), headed by mayor Marlene Hölz, and the FWAD ("Freie Wählergemeinschaft Aktives Dorsheim e.V."), headed by council member Udo Wirth.
Mayor.
Dorsheim’s mayor is Marlene Hölz, and her deputies are Rainer Nies, Rositha Mutter and Harald Schröder.
Coat of arms.
The municipality’s arms might be described thus: Sable a lion rampant with tail fourché Or armed, langued and crowned gules, in his sinister paw a bunch of grapes of the second, in his dexter paw an inescutcheon of the same charged with the Dorsheim court seal symbol of the first.
The main charge is the Palatine Lion, the heraldic device once borne by Electoral Palatinate, which ruled Dorsheim up until French Revolutionary troops occupied the region in the late 18th century. The grapes represent Dorsheim’s winegrowing tradition, and the inescutcheon bears a symbol that once appeared in Dorsheim’s court seal, dating from 1653. The arms have been borne since 1974.
Culture and sightseeing.
Buildings.
The following are listed buildings or sites in Rhineland-Palatinate’s Directory of Cultural Monuments:
More about the church.
Standing in the middle of Dorsheim is the village church, which was originally a pilgrimage church. The church had its first documentary mention in 1481 in the Stromberg taxation register. After the Thirty Years' War, there is no further record of it. The old church ruin became municipal property in 1820. In 1833 and 1834, the municipality used the rubble and stones that were lying there to build a building containing two schoolrooms and a prayer room. The cost was 3,400 Reichsthaler. Since Evangelical fellow villagers had contributed to the funds to cover the building cost, they too were allowed the use of the prayer room. Nevertheless, time and again there was friction between them and the Catholics, leading to a governmental decision to declare a simultaneum at the village church. To this day, a wall down the middle of the nave cleaves it into two naves: one Catholic and the other Evangelical. The church is under monumental protection. Still found in the Catholic section are pews and carvings from the 17th century. The church stands on Weinbergstraße.
Municipal hall.
The "Bürgerhaus" – the municipal hall – is housed in the building that was once used as the local Catholic school. The schoolroom was on the ground floor, and accommodated all grade levels up to year 8, while upstairs was the teacher’s dwelling. In 1915, the school got electric lighting, and in 1950 it was renovated, although there was no longer any money to pay for a furnace. In 1966, the school was dissolved, whereafter the schoolroom was used for events, singing rehearsals and municipal council meetings. In 1990 and 1991, a big event hall was built onto the old schoolhouse and this is now used for various public and private events. It is built in such a way that the old schoolroom has now become the stage, but this can be walled off with a retractable partition so that it can also be used for municipal council meetings and other meetings held by various boards, as well as such things as choir practice, theatrical productions, preschool play groups and flute instruction. The upper floor, where the teacher once lived, now houses the mayor’s office and rooms for clubs. The "Bürgerhaus" stands at the corner of Weinbergstraße and Lindenstraße, and indeed is called "An den Linden".
Natural monuments.
Several “bizarre” crags stand in the Trollbach valley.
Regular events.
Each year in Dorsheim at the Feast of the Assumption of Mary (15 August), the mixed choir holds the "Lindenfest". The kermis (church consecration festival) is always held on the second weekend in August. The event "Von Tal zu Tal" (“From Dale to Dale”) is a cycling event open to all in the "Verbandsgemeinde" of Langenlonsheim. It is held on the last Sunday in August. On the third Thursday of each month, a seniors’ coffeehouse ("Seniorenkaffee") is held at 1530, with venue and theme announced beforehand.
Clubs.
The following clubs are active in Dorsheim:
Economy and infrastructure.
Winegrowing.
Dorsheim belongs to the “Nahetal Winegrowing Area” within the Nahe wine region. In business in the village are seven winegrowing operations, and the area of vineyard planted is 71 ha. Some 83% of the wine grown here (as at 2007) is white wine varieties. In 1979, there were still 24 winegrowing operations, and the vineyard area was slightly greater at 80 ha.
Public institutions.
Dorsheim does not have its own daycare, but the centre in neighbouring Laubenheim is intended for children from both villages. Found in Dorsheim itself are a village square with an oversize chess set, a playground, a football pitch and an outdoor basketball court. Paragliding is common at the "Naheblick", the local lookout point from the cliffs. The municipal hall (see above) is used for various events.
Transport.
Dorsheim lies right near the Autobahn A 61 and has its own Autobahn interchange. The noise pollution rates an arithmetic mean according to measurements of roughly 63 dB/24 h.


Robert Squires

Vice Admiral Robert Risley Squires DL (11 February 1927 – 30 June 2016) was a Royal Navy officer who became Flag Officer, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Naval career.
Squires joined the Royal Navy as a Sub-lieutenant in 1946. He was given command of the frigate HMS "Hermione" in 1971 and of the destroyer HMS "Bristol" in 1975. He went on to be Commanding Officer of the frigate HMS "Ajax" as well as Captain of the 8th Frigate Squadron in 1976, Flag Officer First Flotilla in 1977 and Flag Officer Submarines in 1978. After that he became Flag Officer, Scotland and Northern Ireland in 1982 before retiring in 1983.
He lived at Seaview, Isle of Wight and became Deputy Lieutenant of the Isle of Wight. He died on 30 June 2016 at the age of 89.
Family.
He was married to Sue.


Sanjak of Pljevlja


Editha von Rahden

Editha von Rahden (1823-1885) was a Baltic-German philanthropist in the Russian Empire.
She was the daughter of the courtier Ferdinand von Rahden and Wilhelmine von Keyserling. She was a maid of honor to Helene Pavlovna of Russia and later to Empress Maria Fedorovna. In Russia, she hosted a literary salon. Among her guests were the poet Leskov.
During her employment of Helene Pavlovna, she became a member of her charitable nursing organisation in 1854. After this, she became engaged in several charitable organisations with focus on medical care and female education. She was an assistant of the Empress Maria in several of her projects.


Stade (region)

The Stade Region emerged in 1823 by an administrative reorganisation of the dominions of the Kingdom of Hanover, a sovereign state, whose then territory is almost completely part of today's German federal state of Lower Saxony. Until 1837 the "Kingdom of Hanover" was ruled in personal union by the Kings of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
The official title of the Region was "High-Bailiwick of Stade" (1823–1885; ) and then "Governorate of Stade" (1885–1978; ). The "High-Bailiwick of Stade", being a mere administrative unit of the integrated "Kingdom of Hanover", was named after and seated in Stade, Bremen-Verden's former capital, taking over its staff, installations and buildings. The territory of the "Stade Region" was combined by the territories of the Land of Hadeln, the Duchies of Bremen and Verden (), all Hanoverian dominions, which were collectively administered. The territory belonging to the "Stade Region" covered about the triangular area between the mouths of the rivers Elbe and Weser to the North Sea and today's German federal states of Hamburg and Bremen. This area included about today's "Lower Saxon" counties ( or ) of Cuxhaven (southernly), Osterholz, Rotenburg upon Wümme, Stade and Verden as well as of the Bremian exclave of the city of Bremerhaven.
History.
Before the establishment of the "High-Bailiwick of Stade".
The collectively administered Land of Hadeln, the "Duchy of Bremen" and the "Duchy of Verden" were therefore colloquially referred to as the Duchies of Bremen-Verden or simply "Bremen-Verden". The latter two emerged in 1648 by the transformation of the Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen, then "Duchy of Bremen", and the Prince-Bishopric of Verden, then "Duchy of Verden".
 The "Kingdom of Hanover's" predecessor the Prince-Electorate of Brunswick and Lunenburg (or, colloquially called after its capital "Electorate of Hanover"; , or ) purchased "Bremen-Verden" from its Danish occupants de facto in 1715 (and again from its legitimate owner Sweden in 1719 (Treaty of Stockholm) for rixdollars [Rtlr] 1 million). De jure this acquisition had to be legitimised by imperial feoffment. It took Elector George II Augustus until 1733 to get Charles VI to enfeoff him with the Duchy of Bremen and Verden.
In 1728 Emperor "Charles VI" enfeoffed Elector "George II Augustus", who in 1727 had succeeded his father George I Louis, with the reverted fief of Saxe-Lauenburg. By a redeployment of Hanoverian territories in 1731 "Bremen-Verden" was conveyed the administration of the neighboured Land of Hadeln (at the Northern tip of "Bremen-Verden"), since 1180 an exclave, first of the "younger Duchy of Saxony", from 1296 on of the "Duchy of Saxe-Lauenburg", one of the former's successors.
At both feoffments "George II Augustus" swore that he would respect the existing privileges and constitutions of the "Estates" of "Bremen-Verden" and of "Hadeln", thus confirming 400-year-old traditions of Estate participation in government. The small "Land of Hadeln" maintained until 1885 as to its legislation a certain level of internal autonomy () but as to the executive power "Hadeln" was administered by neighboured "Bremen-Verden's" provincial government.
Being a Prince-Elector of the Holy Roman Empire and represented in its Diet by virtue of his "Electorate of Hanover", "George II Augustus" didn't bother about "Bremen-Verden's" status of Imperial immediacy. Since "Bremen-Verden" had turned Hanoverian it never again sent its own representatives to a "Diet" .
The "Stade Region" as part of the state of "Hanover" in the years from 1813 to 1866.
After the Napoleonic Wars, which brought changing occupations and annexations of the "Duchies of Bremen and Verden" (for more details see Bremen-Verden), Bremen-Verden was restored in 1813 to the "Electorate of Hanover", which transformed into the Kingdom of Hanover in 1814. Even though "Bremen-Verden's" status as a territory of imperial immediacy had become void with the end of the "Holy Roman Empire" in 1806, the Duchies were not right away incorporated in real union into the Hanoverian state. Since the Hanoverian monarchs had moved to London, "Hanover" had become a state of very conservative and backwarded rule, with a local government recruited from local aristocrats adding up much to the preservation of outdated structures.
The real union with "Hanover" only followed in 1823, when an administrative reform united "Bremen-Verden" and "Hadeln" to form the "High-Bailiwick of Stade", administered according to unitarian modern standards, thereby doing away with various traditional Bremian government forms. "Hadeln" kept part of its traditional autonomy until 1852, its Estates continued to function with restricted authority until 1884. In 1823 the high-bailiwick consisted of 7,025 square kilometres with 208,251 inhabitants.
On 1 May 1827 a small section of the lower Weser shore in the West of the "High-Bailiwick of Stade", forming the nucleus of the future city of Bremerhaven, was transferred to the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen, as agreed upon earlier that year in a contract by the Hanoveran minister Friedrich Franz Dieterich von Bremer and "Bremen's" Burgomaster Johann Smidt. "Bremerhaven" (literally English: "Bremian Harbour") was founded to be a haven for "Bremen's" merchant marine, with that city located upstream the Weser being more and more disconnected from the sea, due to that river's silting up. "Bremerhaven" also became the home port of the German Confederation's Navy under Karl Rudolf Brommy.
Reorganisation of religious bodies in the "Stade" region.
Two Lutheran consistories, one for the "Land of Hadeln" in Otterndorf (founded by "Hadeln's" Estates in 1535, integrated into Stade's consistory in 1885) and one in Stade (founded by Swedish Bremen-Verden's government in 1650) for the rest of the High-Bailiwick supervised the Lutheran cult and clergy. A general superintendent chaired each consistory. Lutherans made up by far the majority of the population. Among Lutherans revivalism played a major role in the 1850s. In 1848 the Lutheran parishes were democratised by the introduction of presbyteries (parish councils), elected by all major male parishioners and chairing each parish in co-operation with the pastor, being before the sole chairman. This introduction of presbyteries was somewhat revolutionary in the rather hierarchically structured Lutheran church.
The Lutheran church was the state church of the Kingdom of Hanover with the king being (Supreme Governor of the Lutheran Church). In 1864 , Hanoverian minister of education, cultural and religious affairs (1862–1865), persuaded the to pass a new law as to the constitution of the Lutheran church. The constitution provided a state synod (parishioners' parliament, ). But its first session only materialised in 1869, when after the Prussian annexation of the Kingdom of Hanover (1866) the Hanoverian Lutherans desired a representative body separate from Prussian rule, though it was restricted to Lutheran matters only.
After the Prussian conquest in 1866, on 19 September 1866, the day before the official Prussian annexation took place and with the last king, George V of Hanover, in exile, the Kingdom's six consistories joined to form the still existing Lutheran State Church of Hanover. An all-Hanoverian consistory, the "Landeskonsistorium" (state consistory), was formed with representatives from the regional consistories. The Lutheran state church became a stronghold of Hanoverian separatism and therefore somewhat politicised. It opposed the Evangelical State Church in Prussia, comprising the Protestant parishes in the Prussian territory prior the 1866 annexations, not only for its being a stronghold of Prussian patriotism, but for being a united church of formerly Lutheran and Calvinist parishes, with a preponderance of Calvinism because the Calvinist Hohenzollern dynasty wielded its influence in the unification of Lutherans and Calvinists in then Prussia in 1817. The Hanoverian Lutherans managed to maintain their independence and the "Evangelical State Church in Prussia" stayed abreast of the changes and renamed in 1875 into Evangelical State Church of Prussia's older Provinces.
The Calvinist communities were in a somewhat sorry state. They emerged in the 1590s, when the Calvinist city of Bremen actually possessed some area around Bederkesa and Lehe (a part of today's Bremerhaven) at the lower Weser stream. In 1654, after the First Bremian War, the city ceded the area to Swedish "Bremen-Verden", which subjected the Calvinists there to supervision by the Lutheran consistory. Under Lutheran pressure only six congregations stood fast to Calvinism. In the municipalities, where they were located, Calvinists made up the majority of the population, later Lutheran migration outweighed the Calvinist preponderance. The rest of the Stade Region was and is a Calvinist diaspora.
In 1848 Hanoverian law also provided for presbyteries in the Calvinist parishes in the Stade Region, which exactly fit the presbyterian structure of Calvinism. But only in 1882 – long after the Prussian annexation of Hanover – the inappropriate supervision by Lutheran consistorials ended, when King William I of Prussia decreed the creation of the Evangelical Reformed Church of the Province of Hanover comprising all the Calvinist communities in the prevailingly Lutheran Province of Hanover. The simultaneously Lutheran and Calvinist consistory in Aurich was made the consistory of that church body, becoming an exclusively Calvinist body only in 1922, following the constitutional reorganisation of the church bodies after the Weimar Constitution had decreed the separation of church and state in 1919.
After the forcefully wielded attempts of reCatholicisation in 1628–1632, which ended with the reconquest by the legitimate Lutheran Administrator regnant of the Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen, John Frederick, no Catholic communities existed and missionary and pastoral activities were supervised by the Roman Catholic Vicariate Apostolic of the Nordic Missions, but widely hindered by "Bremen-Verden's" government. By annexations after the Napoléonic Wars, the Kingdom of Hanover had become a state of three Christian denominations. In 1824 Hanover and the Holy See thus agreed upon to integrate the territory comprising the "Stade Region" into the neighboured Roman Catholic Diocese of Hildesheim, with the "Vicariate Apostolic's" competence ending there. In 1859 (in , 170 Catholics) and in 1872 (in Verden upon Aller) the first Catholic parishes were founded (after 1632), with all the Stade Region being a Catholic diaspora.
Jews left scarce archival traces in the mediaeval Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen. In 1611 the city of Stade signed a contract with Sephardic Jews, allowing the foundation of a community. In 1613 Administrator "John Frederick" followed by settling Ashkenazzi Jews in the city, but during the turmoil of Catholic conquest and Lutheran reconquest the last archival traces of Jews date from 1630. Only by the end of the 17th century Jews reappear in Bremen-Verden. At the beginning of the 19th century some 30 Jewish families lived dispersedly over the region, under precarious legal status, and without Jewish institutions. By the Westphalian and French annexations in 1807 and 1810 the Jews in the Stade Region had been emancipated and thus naturalised, only to lose their French citizenship again by France's defeat in 1813, falling back into a status of toleration or mere indigenousness without political rights in restituted Bremen-Verden.
In 1842 the Kingdom of Hanover granted equal rights to Jews and promoted to build up Jewish communities and a regional superstructure (Rabbinate) within a nationwide scope. The Jews in the Stade Region regarded this a progress and a burden alike, because prior they hadn't employed any rabbi and religion teacher, opened hardly a synagogue or school due to the implied financial burden. In 1845 – according to the new law – a , under land-rabbi Joseph Heilbut, was established, serving 16 Jewish communities, which were founded over the years, with altogether 1,250 Jews in 1864 (highest number ever reached). The local authorities now requested, that the Jewish communities establish synagogues and Jewish education for the pupils. Synagogues existed in Neuhaus upon Oste and in Osten (both early 19th century), in Horneburg (opened 1831) and in Stade (opened 1849, closed due to financial restrictions in 1908). And a teacher for Jewish religion and Hebrew was employed (after 1890 Stade's community couldn't afford a teacher any more). From 1903 on the Jewish community of Stade was granted public subsidies to continue functioning. The land-rabbins simultaneously fulfilled religious and state functions, like supervising Jewish elementary schools and the teaching of Jewish religion in all schools. The Kingdom of Hanover was thus one of the few states within the German Confederation, where rabbis held a similar semi-state authoritative position as to Jews as did, e.g., Lutheran clergy towards Lutherans.
After the Prussian annexation the constitution of Hanover's four land-rabbinates came under threat to be abolished, because in Prussia proper the government hindered as much as possible the establishment of nationwide Jewish organisations, let alone such which it would grant official recognition. In the end Prussia respected the existing Hanoverian land-rabbinate constitution, which continued to exist – modified according to the separation of state and religion in 1919 by the Weimar constitution – until the Nazi Reich's government de facto abolished the constitution in 1938. The communities in urban Lehe (28 families, after 1924 part of Wesermünde: 300 community members in 1928), Scharmbeck (20 families) and Verden upon Aller were the biggest by membership, while rural communities vanished. The Stade Region stayed a Jewish diaspora, and from 1860 on Stade's land-rabbinate was never staffed again, but served alternately by one of the other three Hanoverian land-rabbinates. Labour migration and emigration to urban centres outside the Stade Region and Jewish demography rather lead to a reduction of the number of Jews in the "Stade Region" (786 in 1913, 716 in 1928).
The "Stade Region" as an administrative unit of Prussia (1866-1945/1947).
After the Prussian annexation of the Kingdom of Hanover in 1866, the kingdom was transformed into the Prussian Province of Hanover. The adaptation to other Prussian administrative structures took only place in 1885, when the high-bailiwick was redesigned according to Prussian law as the "Governorate of Stade" (). The Hanoverian subsections of a high-bailiwick (, plural: ), were redeployed into 14 bigger Prussian style counties (, plural: ). At the time of its redeployment the high-bailiwick's population amounted to 300,000. In 1905 the population amounted to 403,302 with an area of , which made up a density of 59 persons per square kilometre. The "Governorate of Stade" weathered the following wars and constitutional changes.
"Bremerhaven" was several times enlarged at the expense of the "Governorate of Stade"´s territory. But on the latter's territory several suburbs grew and in 1924 were united to form the urban county of Wesermünde. In 1932 by an administrative reform the number of the governorate's 13 rural counties was reduced to a mere seven. In 1932 in the Great Depression the Lutheran Church of the State of Hanover opened a camp for formerly workless singles, employed in public works (roadworks, amelioration) in Sandbostel.
In 1933 the Nazis seized the power in Germany (Machtergreifung). On the Reich's and the level of the states gradually all resistance was decapitated. Anti-Semitic discriminations were imposed onto Jewish Germans and Germans of Jewish descent. In 1932 Franz von Papen's Reich's government had overthrown the last democratic Prussian government under Otto Braun (Prussian Coup). So the "Governorate of Stade", being a part of the Free State of Prussia, one of the most stable and democratised German states, came fast under Nazi influence. The governor resigned under pressure of Gauleiter Otto Telschow. The Nazis' rule enforcement was characterised by installing Nazi-loyal parallel structures, which would interfere with existing public administration and bring it to dictatorial lines. The "Governorate of Stade" came under ever increasing interference of the Nazi party's regional subsection Gau Eastern Hanover under Gauleiter Otto Telschow, especially after 1935, when the Nazi-party Gaue replaced the functions of the streamlined German states.
The new Nazi Reich's government – "provisionally" ruling Prussia – had direct rule over the Prussian police, with police being an institution of the respective German states. The ordinary police had to guard together with S.A. men, the Prussian "Criminal Police Department" in charge for the "Governorate of Stade" was seated in its biggest city Wesermünde. In March/April 1933 the "Criminal Police" was transformed into the new , directly subordinated to the new Geheime Staatspolizei (GeStapo, secret state police), circumventing all prior existing Prussian administrative structures, to which the former "Criminal Police" had been subjected and reporting before. At first Wesermünde's "Stapo Department" persecuted all political enemies of Nazism and later persons involved in all kinds of disobediences, such as strikes, absenteeism, black marketing, circumventions of ordered dues to be delivered, which all became an ever-growing phenomenon with the increasing weariness in the long duration of the war. The "Stapo" had its special eye on forced labourers in the governorate, abducted from all over German occupied Europe.
In 1939 the Sandbostel camp, meanwhile usurped by the Nazi trade union Reichsarbeitsdienst, was converted into the prisoner-of-war camp Stalag X-B and a camp of internment for civilian enemy aliens. Until 1945 about a million inmates passed through the camp, with about 46,000 perished.
As to territorial changes the Reich's Nazi government decreed by the Greater Hamburg Act (1937) to incorporate the Hamburgian exclave of Cuxhaven into the "Governorate of Stade", forming then an urban county. While at the most eastern end of the governorate some municipalities were integrated into the state of Hamburg. Two years later the Reich's Nazi government decreed to incorporate some municipalities of the counties of Osterholz and Verden into the city of Bremen and in return to disentangle "Bremerhaven" from the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen and to incorporate it into "Wesermünde". But that redeployment didn't last long.
The "Governorate of Stade" as part of the British and U.S. Zone of Occupation (1945–1949).
From 1945 on the occupational U.S. forces in defeated Germany used the harbours of Bremen and Wesermünde as their "Port of Embarkation". Being actually located in the British Zone of Occupation the Control Commission for Germany - British Element and the Office of Military Government for Germany, U.S. (OMGUS) agreed in 1947 to constitute the cities of "Bremen" and "Wesermünde" as a German state named Free Hanseatic City of Bremen, becoming at that occasion an exclave of the American Zone of Occupation within the "British zone". Radio AFN (American Forces Network), based in rechristened "Bremerhaven", became popular for its transmissions of jazz and rock music.
After this territorial toing and froing the "Governorate of Stade" belonged to Lower Saxony, the state newly founded in 1946 by the "Control Commission for Germany – British Element" (Cf. Ordinance No. 46), even before in 1947 the Allies officially dissolved the Free State of Prussia.
The "Governorate of Stade" as an administrative unit of the state of "Lower Saxony" (1946–1978).
From 1973 to 1977 the number of Lower Saxon counties has been reduced by uniting counties. The urban county of Cuxhaven and the neighboured counties of the Land of Hadeln and Wesermünde were united to form the new County of Cuxhaven. The county of Bremervörde was integrated into the County of Rotenburg upon Wümme. Thus the governorate consisted only of a mere five counties: Cuxhaven, Osterholz, Rotenburg (Wümme), Stade and Verden. In 1977 the governorate's population amounted to almost 700,000.
The "Governorate of Stade" continued to exist until 31 January 1978. The next day it was incorporated into the neighbouring Governorate of Lunenburg (), with the complete dissolution of all "Lower Saxon" governorates following in 2004.
Today no single administrative entity covers the territory of the former Bremen-Verden. Today's efforts and activities in the field of culture in the region are covered by the (Engl. about: "landscape union of the former duchies of Bremen and Verden", or short "Landschaftsverband Stade").
List of High-Bailiffs and Governors.
Bearing the title: High-Bailiff (, plural: )
Bearing the title: Governor (, plural: )
Vital Statistics 1890–1980.
Source
Notable people from the Stade Region as from 1823 on.
A list of interesting people whose birth, death, residence or activity took place in the Stade Region.


Eckenroth

Eckenroth is an "Ortsgemeinde" – a municipality belonging to a "Verbandsgemeinde", a kind of collective municipality – in the Bad Kreuznach district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the "Verbandsgemeinde" Langenlonsheim-Stromberg, whose seat is in Langenlonsheim.
Geography.
Location.
Eckenroth lies below Schindeldorf, an outlying centre of Stromberg, on the opposite side of the dale from the Steyerberg. Bingen am Rhein lies roughly 10 km to the east-northeast, while Bad Kreuznach lies some 12 km to the south-southeast.
Neighbouring municipalities.
Clockwise from the north, Eckenroth's neighbours are the town of Stromberg and the municipality of Schweppenhausen. Also lying right nearby, but not bordering on Eckenroth, is the municipality of Schöneberg to the west.
History.
Just when Eckenroth, the smallest village in the "Verbandsgemeinde", came into being cannot be determined with any accuracy. It is assumed, however, that this happened about the year 900, when it was built on ruins left behind by the Romans after their centuries in the region. In 1156, it was one of the forest villages held by the counts palatine, and in 1190, it said in the directory of fiefs kept by the House of Bolanden that "Ogelrode", as the village was then known, was a branch of the parish of "Leibersheim" (Waldlaubersheim), and that it was there that the villagers had to send their tithes. The parish itself was held by Count Werner of Bolanden as a fief from Count Lon. A half share of the right of patronage and a part of his tithes from the cropfields and vineyards were transferred by Werner of Bolanden in 1282 to the knight Sir Emilrich of Schonenburg as an enfeoffment. Repeatedly, the village's name has changed in spelling. One archaic spelling has already been mentioned, but then there were two – "Ockenrait" and "Oeckenrod" – in the Stromberg taxation register.
Population development.
Eckenroth's population development since Napoleonic times is shown in the table below. The figures for the years from 1871 to 1987 are drawn from census data:
Religion.
As at 31 August 2013, there are 234 full-time residents in Eckenroth, and of those, 81 are Evangelical (34.615%), 86 are Catholic (36.752%), 1 is Lutheran (0.427%), 3 (1.282%) belong to other religious groups and 63 (26.923%) either have no religion or will not reveal their religious affiliation.
Politics.
Municipal council.
The council is made up of 6 council members, who were elected by majority vote at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairman.
Mayor.
Eckenroth's mayor is Frank Seckler, and his deputies are Rainer Kraus and Joachim Schödder.
Coat of arms.
The municipality's arms might be described thus: Sable a clearing hoe and a cramp in saltire Or.
The cramp, or crampon – a charge called a "Doppelhaken" (“double hook”) or "Wolfsangel" (“wolf hook”) in German – is an ancient market town symbol, and in German heraldry it is also a symbol for forestry. The other charge, the hoe, as a kind of tool for clearing land can be called a "Rodhacke" in German, thus making it canting for the last syllable in the village's name (both the D in the word for the tool and the last two letters in “Eckenroth” are pronounced [t]). The hoe, however, also stands for the village's traditional winegrowing. The tinctures, sable and Or (black and gold), are those formerly borne by the Electorate of the Palatinate, to which Eckenroth belonged for quite a long time. Municipal council chose the two charges with Eckenroth's traditional industries, forestry and winegrowing, in mind. The municipal banner also bears the municipal arms on a background of two vertical stripes of red and gold.
Culture and sightseeing.
Buildings.
The following are listed buildings or sites in Rhineland-Palatinate’s Directory of Cultural Monuments:
The old 19th-century schoolhouse still stands in the village, but it is no longer used as such, having been converted into an inn, the "Gasthaus “Zur Linde”" (“Inn at the Limetree”). It has a community hall that can be hired for occasions and events.
Regular events.
The traditional kermis (church consecration festival, locally known as the "Kirmesfest") falls on the last Sunday in August and is held on the square before the old school, now an inn called "Zur Linde".
Economy and infrastructure.
Transport.
Currently, no railway serves Eckenroth or any of its neighbours, although the now disused "Hunsrückquerbahn" once served neighbouring Schweppenhausen and Stromberg. There is, however, talk of reactivating this railway as a quick transport link for Frankfurt-Hahn Airport, a former NATO military facility, Hahn Air Base, most of whose military functions ceased on 30 September 1993. However, as it stands, the nearest railway is the Nahe Valley Railway (Bingen–Saarbrücken) with stations in Bingen, Münster-Sarmsheim, Laubenheim, Langenlonsheim, Bretzenheim and Bad Kreuznach, all lying roughly to Eckenroth's east. Also running by Eckenroth to the east is the Autobahn A 61. The nearest interchange is in Waldlaubersheim.


Sanjak of Pakrac

The Sanjak of Pakrac or Sanjak of Čazma or Sanjak of Cernica was one of the sanjaks of the Ottoman Empire whose capital was first Zaçasna and then Pakrac and Cernik in Ottoman Slavonia. It was established after the Ottomans captured Slavonia in the mid 16th century.
Background.
The Ottomans captured Pakrac in 1543. Its territory was not immediately established as separate sanjak. Until 1544 it first belonged to the Kobašu kadiluk of Bosnian sanjak by 1544. In 1544 the Ottomans established kadiluk in Velika to which this territory was ceded. Only in second half of the 16th century they established a kadiluk in Pakrac.
History.
The Sanjak of Pakrac was established in 1552 or 1557. Its first capital was Čazma. In 1559 Čazma was destroyed and seat of this sanjak was moved to Pakrac. The earliest document which refer to this sanjak as Sanjak of Pakrac is defter from 1565. The first sanjakbey of this sanjak was Ferhad-beg Desisalić-Vuković from Herzegovina. The Sanjak of Pakrac belonged first to Rumelia Eyalet and since 1580 to Bosnia Eyalet. Initially, its western frontier was river Česma. In 1591 the frontier moved and stabilized more eastward.Toward Croatian and Slavonian border the Ottomans populated numerous Christian Vlachs, who either already lived there or who were brought from Turkish (Serbian) territories, to live between their border garrisons Because of the substantial number of Vlachs, parts of the Sanjak of Pakrac and Sanjak of Požega were referred to as "Mala Vlaška" (). Ottomans settled Pakrac and its surroundings with Vlachs from Bosnia in the middle of the 16th century while in Pakrac mainly lived Croatian and Bosnian Muslims. Many of Muslim settlers were ethnic Turks, but also they were and islamized south Slavs and Albanians.
According to one defter of second half of the 16th century, this sanjak had 13 nahiyahs. There were 15 defters of the Sanjak of Pakrac, all in the second half of the 16th century. In the defter of 1563 it is mentioned that captain of the region around river Sava was Husein, a son of Malkoč-beg. In 1586 forces under command of Ali-beg, sanjakbey of the Sanjak of Pakrac and brother of Ferhad Pasha Sokolović. were defeated near Ivanić Grad. In 1593 the Ottoman forces from the Sanjak of Pakrac under command of its sanjakbey Džafer-beg participated in the Battle of Sisak. Centre of Pakrac Sanjak was moved to Çernik in 1601. Sanjak of Pakrac existed till Austrian capture in 1691 (nominally to 1699). Finally Austrian conquest was finalized with Treaty of Karlowitz and existence of it was ended in 1699.


Albert III, Duke of Austria

Albert III of Austria (9 September 1349 – 29 August 1395), known as Albert with the Braid (Pigtail) (), a member of the House of Habsburg, was Duke of Austria from 1365 until his death.
Life.
Albert III was born in the ducal residence of Vienna, the third son of the Habsburg duke Albert II of Austria and his wife Joanna of Pfirt. Even though his father had determined a house law, whereby the four sons were obliged to rule jointly and equally, the eldest brother Rudolf IV assumed the reins of government after his father's death in 1358. He reaffirmed his supremacy issuing the "Privilegium Maius". However, as his marriage remained childless he again had to share his power with his younger brothers. In 1365 Rudolf IV, Albert III, and Leopold III together signed the foundation certificate of the Vienna University ("Alma Mater Rudolphina Vindobonensis"); Rudolf died a few months later at the age of 25.
Divided rule.
Albert, then the eldest surviving brother (the second-born son Frederick III had already died in 1362), inherited the rule and shared it with his younger brother Leopold III. Both were formally enfeoffed with the Duchy of Austria, Duchy of Styria, Duchy of Carinthia, and Duchy of Carniola by Emperor Charles IV. In 1369 the Habsburg dukes succeeded the late Meinhard III, Count of Gorizia-Tyrol in the County of Tyrol, when after a drawn-out conflict the Wittelsbach Duke Stephen II of Bavaria finally renounced his rights.
In 1368 the Habsburg brothers purchased the Swabian city of Freiburg. But their attempt to gain control over the Adriatic port of Trieste failed in an armed conflict with the Republic of Venice in 1369/70. Trieste was not won until 1382, when the citizens sought protection from Venice by subjecting themselves to Austrian rule. In 1374 the Austrian dukes inherited large territories in the Windic March and Istria from the late Albert III, Count of Gorizia, which they attached to the Duchy of Carniola. The next year they acquired the Swabian lordship of Feldkirch from the Counts of Montfort, the nucleus of the Habsburg possessions in later Vorarlberg.
Tension developed between the brothers, and in 1379 Albert and Leopold, by the Treaty of Neuberg divided the extended Habsburg territories. Albert received Austria proper ("Austria Inferior"), while Leopold get Styria, Carinthia and Carniola ("Austria Interior"), Tyrol ("Austria Superior") and the dynasty's original possessions in Swabia ("Austria Anterior"). The division of the Habsburgs into the Albertinian Line and Leopoldian line was a significant disadvantage in competition with the rival Wittelsbach and Luxembourg dynasties. It persisted until 1490, when Archduke Sigismund of Tyrol and Further Austria handed over his estates to his cousin King Maximilian I.
Politics.
In 1377, Albert went on a crusade in Prussia against pagan Baltic Lithuanian and Samogitian tribes.
Meanwhile, the expansion of the Habsburg dukes in Swabia collided with the growth of the Old Swiss Confederacy and sparked armed revolts. In 1386 Duke Leopold III and numerous Austrian nobles were killed in a disastrous defeat at the 1386 Battle of Sempach, whereafter Albert once again became sole ruler over the Albertinian and Leopoldian lands, acting as regent for his minor nephews. Another attempt to restore Habsburg rule in Swabia failed, when Albert's knights were again defeated by the Swiss pike squares in the 1388 Battle of Näfels and the duke had to call for an armistice.
In the Austrian lands, his government was beneficial to the realm, as he supported the arts and sciences. Albert was an apt scholar himself, particularly as a mathematician and astrologer. The eldest preserved book of the Austrian National Library, a 1386 Evangelion, comes from his personal property. The duke expanded the University of Vienna and, during the Western Schism, reached the consent of Pope Urban VI to establish a theological faculty. He continued the building of St. Stephen's Cathedral and attempted to refurbish Vienna modelled on Emperor Charles' residence in Prague. Albert's nickname refers to his particular hairstyle, part of the vestments of a short-lived chivalric order ("Zopforden") he had established and which dissolved upon his death.
By the end of his reign, Albert had established a firm princely rule over the Austrian duchy, stretching along the Danube from the Hungarian border on the Leitha River in the east to the Hausruck range in the west. In the conflict over the succession upon the death of Emperor Charles IV in 1378, Albert joined the forces of the Luxembourg heirs Jobst of Moravia and Sigismund against the incapable king Wenceslaus and seemed a likely candidate for the German throne himself. However, he died in August 1395 while staying in his Laxenburg hunting lodge, during the preparations of a military campaign to achieve Wenceslaus' deposition which took place in 1400. He is buried in the Ducal Crypt in the Stephansdom cathedral in Vienna.
Family and children.
Albert III was married twice. The first marriage, after 19 March 1366, was with Elisabeth of Bohemia, a daughter of the Luxembourg emperor Charles IV. This marriage was childless; his wife died at age fifteen. Afterwards, he married Beatrix of Nuremberg, a daughter of the Hohenzollern burgrave Frederick V of Nuremberg and his wife Elisabeth of Meissen, a member of the House of Wettin and a descendant of the extinct Babenberg dukes of Austria.
Beatrix gave him his only son, Albert IV, who succeeded him but soon had to cede the rule over the Inner Austrian, Tyrolean and Further Austrian possessions to his Leopoldian cousins William and Leopold IV. The Albertinian line became extinct with the death of Ladislaus the Posthumous in 1457.


Wales in the Roman era

The history of Wales in the Roman era began in 48 AD with a military invasion by the imperial governor of Roman Britain. The conquest was completed by 78, and Roman rule endured until the region was abandoned in AD 383.
Roman rule in Wales was a military occupation, except for the southern coastal region of South Wales east of the Gower Peninsula, where there is a legacy of Romanisation, and some southern sites such as Carmarthen. The only town in Wales founded by the Romans, Caerwent, is located in South Wales. Wales was a rich source of mineral wealth, and the Romans used their engineering technology to extract large amounts of gold, copper, and lead, as well as modest amounts of some other metals such as zinc and silver.
It is the Roman campaigns of conquest that are most widely known, due to the spirited but unsuccessful defence of their homelands by two native tribes, the Silures and the Ordovices. Aside from the many Roman-related finds along the southern coast, Roman archaeological remains in Wales consist almost entirely of military roads and fortifications.
Wales Before the Roman Conquest..
Archaeologists generally agree that the majority of the British Isles were inhabited by Celts before the Roman invasion. The Romans did not distinguish between the Welsh tribes and all of the other British tribes.
Northern Wales and southern Wales have some notable cultural differences before the Roman invasion, and should not be considered one entity. Southern Wales was advancing along with the rest of Britain throughout the Iron Age, whereas the Northern parts of Wales were conservative and slower to advance. Along with their technological advancement, from the fifth to the first century BC, southern Wales became more heavily and densely populated. Southern Wales had more in common with the north than it did with the rest of Britain, and they saw little outside influence up until the Roman conquest.
Hill forts are one of the most common sites found throughout Iron-Age Wales, and this is what archaeologists mostly rely on for most of their evidence. Nevertheless, due to the relative lack of archaeological activity, survey groupings of these forts throughout Wales can be uneven or misleading. Modern scholars theorize that Wales before the Roman conquest was similar to the rest of Iron Age Britain, however, this is still debated due to the sparsity of evidence. For the most part, the regions' archaeological legacy consists of burials and hill forts, Wales (along with more distant parts of Britain) gradually stopped making pottery throughout the Iron Age (which usually helps archaeologists explore the distant past). However, this is not to say that there was no trade within the region; evidenced by archaeological assemblages (such as the Wilburton complex) suggest that there was trade throughout all of Britain, connecting with Ireland and Northern France.
Britain in AD 47.
On the eve of the Roman invasion of Wales, the Roman military under Governor Aulus Plautius was in control of all of southeastern Britain as well as Dumnonia, perhaps including the lowland English Midlands as far as the Dee Estuary and the River Mersey, and having an understanding with the Brigantes to the north. They controlled most of the island's centers of wealth, as well as much of its trade and resources.
In Wales the known tribes (the list may be incomplete) included the Ordovices and Deceangli in the north, and the Silures and Demetae in the south. Archaeology combined with ancient Greek and Roman accounts have shown that there was exploitation of natural resources, such as copper, gold, tin, lead and silver at multiple locations in Britain, including in Wales. Apart from this we have little knowledge of the Welsh tribes of this era.
Invasion and conquest.
There is uncertainty regarding which parts of Wales were invaded by the Romans prior to the conquest of Anglesey in 60AD. This uncertainty stems from a lack of written source material, with Tacitus as the only written source documenting this period.
Tacitus records that a tribe had attacked a Roman ally in Britain. According to Tacitus, the tribe that was responsible for this incursion was the 'Decangi', scholars associate this tribe with the Welsh Deceangli. The Romans responded swiftly, imposing restrictions upon all of the suspected tribes, then they began to move against the Deceangli. The Roman conquest of this tribe is predicted to have been between the years AD 48 or 49.
Shortly following this, the Romans campaigned against the Silures tribe of south-eastern Wales which must have had previous encounters with the Roman army. Due to the Silures' ferocity and insubordination, the Romans built a legionary fortress to suppress them. The Silures (and later the Ordovices) were led by Caratacus, a king who fled South-eastern England.  Under Caratacus' rule, the Welsh fought the Romans in a pitched battle which resulted in the loss of all the Ordovician territory. This defeat was not crushing, and Caratacus continued to fight the Romans, defeating two auxiliary cohorts. Caratacus fled to the Queen of the Brigantes. Queen Cartimandua was loyal to the Romans and handed Caratacus over to Roman forces 51 AD. While dealing with all of these problems, in 52 AD, Scapula died. This death gave the Silures some time before Scapula's successor, Didius Gallus, would arrive. In that time, the Silures defeated a Roman legion led by Manlius Valens.
In AD 54, emperor Claudius died and was succeeded by Nero. This caused the situation in Britain to change, and Rome began to focus more on consolidating their power in Britain instead of expanding their territory. This is evidenced from the archaeological record, which finds vexillation fortresses (small Roman forts) at the time of Nero's succession.
After a short period of relative inaction, Quintus Veranius became governor of Britain and decided it was time to conquer the rest of the British Isles. Veranius began to campaign against the Silures, but in 58 AD he died, one year after he was appointed to Britain. Suetonius Paulinus was his successor, and it would seem that Veranius had some success in his campaigns because Paulinus began to shift north (suggesting that there was no notable opposition in the south). Paulinus was quite successful in his conquest of northern Wales, and it would seem by 60 AD that he had pushed all the way to the Irish Sea because he was preparing for a conquest of Anglesey.
Anglesey was swelling with migrants fleeing from the Romans, and it had become a stronghold for the Druids. Despite the Romans initial fear and superstition of Anglesey, they were able to achieve victory and subdue the Welsh tribes. However, this victory was short lived and a massive British rebellion led by Boudica erupted in the east and interrupted the consolidation of Wales.
It was not until 74 AD that Julius Frontinus resumed the campaigns against Wales. By the end of his term in 77 AD, he had subdued most of Wales.
Only one tribe was left mostly intact throughout the conquest - the Demetae. This tribe did not oppose Rome, and developed peacefully, isolated from its neighbors and the Roman Empire. The Demetae were the only pre-Roman Welsh tribe to emerge from Roman rule with their tribal name intact.
Wales in Roman Society.
Mining.
The mineral wealth of Britain was well-known prior to the Roman invasion and was one of the expected benefits of conquest. All mineral extractions were state-sponsored and under military control, as mineral rights belonged to the emperor. His agents soon found substantial deposits of gold, copper, and lead in Wales, along with some zinc and silver. Gold was mined at Dolaucothi prior to the invasion, but Roman engineering would be applied to greatly increase the amount extracted, and to extract huge amounts of the other metals. This continued until the process was no longer practical or profitable, at which time the mine was abandoned.
Modern scholars have made efforts to quantify the value of these extracted metals to the Roman economy, and to determine the point at which the Roman occupation of Britain was "profitable" to the Empire. While these efforts have not produced deterministic results, the benefits to Rome were substantial. The gold production at Dolaucothi alone may have been of economic significance.
Industrial production.
The production of goods for trade and export in Roman Britain was concentrated in the south and east, with virtually none situated in Wales.
This was largely due to circumstance, with iron forges located near iron supplies, pewter (tin with some lead or copper) moulds located near the tin supplies and suitable soil (for the moulds), clusters of pottery kilns located near suitable clayey soil, grain-drying ovens located in agricultural areas where sheep raising (for wool) was also located, and salt production concentrated in its historical pre-Roman locations. Glass-making sites were located in or near urban centres.
In Wales none of the needed materials were available in suitable combination, and the forested, mountainous countryside was not amenable to this kind of industrialisation.
Clusters of tileries, both large and small, were at first operated by the Roman military to meet their own needs, and so there were temporary sites wherever the army went and could find suitable soil. This included a few places in Wales. However, as Roman influence grew, the army was able to obtain tiles from civilian sources who located their kilns in the lowland areas containing good soil, and then shipped the tiles to wherever they were needed.
Romanisation.
The Romans occupied the whole of the area now known as Wales, where they built Roman roads and "castra", mined gold at Luentinum and conducted commerce, but their interest in the area was limited because of the difficult geography and shortage of flat agricultural land. Most of the Roman remains in Wales are military in nature. Sarn Helen, a major highway, linked the North with South Wales.
The area was controlled by Roman legionary bases at Deva Victrix (modern Chester) and Isca Augusta (Caerleon), two of the three such bases in Roman Britain, with roads linking these bases to auxiliaries' forts such as Segontium (Caernarfon) and Moridunum (Carmarthen).
Furthermore, South-east Wales was the most Romanised part of the country. It is possible that Roman estates in the area survived as recognisable units into the eighth century: the kingdom of Gwent is likely to have been founded by direct descendants of the (romanised) Silurian ruling class '
The best indicators of Romanising acculturation is the presence of urban sites (areas with towns, "coloniae", and tribal "civitates") and "villas" in the countryside. In Wales, this can be said only of the southeasternmost coastal region of South Wales. The only "civitates" in Wales were at Carmarthen and Caerwent. There were three small urban sites near Caerwent, and these and Roman Monmouth were the only other "urbanised" sites in Wales.
In the southwestern homeland of the Demetae, several sites have been classified as "villas" in the past, but excavation of these and examination of sites as yet unexcavated suggest that they are pre-Roman family homesteads, sometimes updated through Roman technology (such as stone masonry), but having a native character quite different than the true Roman-derived "villas" that are found to the east, such as in Oxfordshire.
Perhaps surprisingly, the presence of Roman-era Latin inscriptions is not suggestive of full Romanisation. They are most numerous at military sites, and their occurrence elsewhere depended on access to suitable stone and the presence of stonemasons, as well as patronage. The Roman fort complex at Tomen y Mur near the coast of northwestern Wales has produced more inscriptions than either Segontium (near modern Caernarfon) or Noviomagus Reginorum (Chichester).
Hill forts.
In areas of civil control, such as the territories of a "civitas", the fortification and occupation of hill forts was banned as a matter of Roman policy. However, further inland and northward, a number of pre-Roman hill forts continued to be used in the Roman Era, while others were abandoned during the Roman Era, and still others were newly occupied. The inference is that local leaders who were willing to accommodate Roman interests were encouraged and allowed to continue, providing local leadership under local law and custom.
Religion.
There is virtually no evidence to shed light on the practice of religion in Wales during the Roman era, save the anecdotal account of the strange appearance and bloodthirsty customs of the druids of Anglesey by Tacitus during the conquest of Wales. It is fortunate for Rome's reputation that Tacitus described the druids as horrible, else it would be a story of the Roman massacre of defenceless, unarmed men and women. The likelihood of partisan propaganda and an appeal to salacious interests combine to suggest that the account merits suspicion.
The Welsh region of Britain was not significant to the Romanisation of the island and contains almost no buildings related to religious practice, save where the Roman military was located, and these reflect the practices of non-native soldiers. Any native religious sites would have been constructed of wood that has not survived and so are difficult to locate anywhere in Britain, let alone in mountainous, forest-covered Wales.
The time of the arrival of Christianity to Wales is unknown. Archaeology suggests that it came to Roman Britain slowly, gaining adherents among coastal merchants and in the upper classes first, and never becoming widespread outside of the southeast in the Roman Era. There is also evidence of a preference for non-Christian devotion in parts of Britain, such as in the upper regions of the Severn Estuary in the 4th century, from the Forest of Dean east of the River Wye continuously around the coast of the estuary, up to and including Somerset.
In the "De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae", written c. 540, Gildas provides a story of the martyrdom of Saint Alban at Verulamium, and of Julius and Aaron at "Legionum Urbis", the 'City of the Legion', saying that this occurred during a persecution of Christians at a time when 'decrees' against them were issued. Bede repeats the story in his "Ecclesiastical History", written c. 731. The otherwise unspecified 'City of the Legion' is arguably Caerleon, Welsh "Caerllion", the 'Fortress of the Legion', and the only candidate with a long and continuous military presence that lay within a Romanised region of Britain, with nearby towns and a Roman "civitas". Other candidates are Chester and Carlisle, though both were located far from the Romanised area of Britain and had a transitory, more military-oriented history.
A parenthetical note concerns Saint Patrick, a patron saint of Ireland. He was a Briton born c. 387 in "Banna Venta Berniae", a location that is unknown due to the transcription errors in surviving manuscripts. His home is a matter of conjecture, with sites near Carlisle favoured by some, while coastal South Wales is favoured by others.
Irish settlement.
By the middle of the 4th century the Roman presence in Britain was no longer vigorous. Once-unfortified towns were now being surrounded by defensive walls, including both Carmarthen and Caerwent. Political control finally collapsed and a number of alien tribes then took advantage of the situation, raiding widely throughout the island, joined by Roman soldiers who had deserted and by elements of the native Britons themselves. Order was restored in 369, but Roman Britain would not recover.
It was at this time that Wales received an infusion of settlers from southern Ireland, the Uí Liatháin, Laigin, and possibly Déisi, the last no longer seen as certain, with only the first two verified by reliable sources and place-name evidence. The Irish were concentrated along the southern and western coasts, in Anglesey and Gwynedd (excepting the cantrefi of Arfon and Arllechwedd), and in the territory of the Demetae.
The circumstances of their arrival are unknown, and theories include categorising them as "raiders", as "invaders" who established a hegemony, and as "foederati" invited by the Romans. It might as easily have been the consequence of a depopulation in Wales caused by plague or famine, both of which were usually ignored by ancient chroniclers.
What is known is that their characteristically Irish circular huts are found where they settled; that the inscription stones found in Wales, whether in Latin or ogham or both, are characteristically Irish; that when both Latin and ogham are present on a stone, the name in the Latin text is given in Brittonic form while the same name is given in Irish form in ogham; and that medieval Welsh royal genealogies include Irish-named ancestors who also appear in the native Irish narrative "The Expulsion of the Déisi". This phenomenon may however be the result of later influences and again only the presence of the Uí Liatháin and Laigin in Wales has been verified.
End of the Roman era.
Historical accounts tell of the upheavals in the Roman Empire during the 3rd and 4th centuries, with notice of the withdrawal of troops from Roman Britain in support of the imperial ambitions of Roman generals stationed there. In much of Wales, where Roman troops were the only indication of Roman rule, that rule ended when troops left and did not return. The end came to different regions at different times.
Tradition holds that Roman customs held on for several years in southern Wales, lasting into the end of the 5th century and early 6th century, and that is true in part. Caerwent continued to be occupied after the Roman departure, while Carmarthen was probably abandoned in the late 4th century. In addition, southwestern Wales was the tribal territory of the Demetae, who had never become thoroughly Romanised. The entire region of southwestern Wales had been settled by Irish newcomers in the late 4th century, and it seems far-fetched to suggest that they were ever fully Romanised.
However, in the southeast Wales, following the withdrawal of the Roman legions from Britain, the town of Venta Silurum (Caerwent) remained occupied by Romano-Britons until at least the early sixth century: Early Christian worship was still established in the town, that might have had a bishop with a monastery in the second half of that century.
Magnus Maximus
In Welsh literary tradition, Magnus Maximus is the central figure in the emergence of a free Britain in the post-Roman era. Royal and religious genealogies compiled in the Middle Ages have him as the ancestor of kings and saints. In the Welsh story of "Breuddwyd Macsen Wledig" ("The Dream of Emperor Maximus"), he is Emperor of Rome and marries a wondrous British woman, telling her that she may name her desires, to be received as a wedding portion. She asks that her father be given sovereignty over Britain, thus formalising the transfer of authority from Rome back to the Britons themselves.
Historically Magnus Maximus was a Roman general who served in Britain in the late 4th century, launching his successful bid for imperial power from Britain in 383. This is the last date for any evidence of a Roman military presence in Wales, the western Pennines, and Deva (i.e., the entire non-Romanised region of Britain south of Hadrian's Wall). Coins dated later than 383 have been excavated along the Wall, suggesting that troops were not stripped from it, as was once thought. In the "De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae" written c. 540, Gildas says that Maximus left Britain not only with all of its Roman troops, but also with all of its armed bands, governors, and the flower of its youth, never to return. Having left with the troops and senior administrators, and planning to continue as the ruler of Britain, his practical course was to transfer local authority to local rulers. Welsh legend provides a mythic story that says he did exactly that.
After he became emperor of the Western Roman Empire, Maximus would return to Britain to campaign against the Picts and Scots (i.e., Irish), probably in support of Rome's long-standing allies the Damnonii, Votadini, and Novantae (all located in modern Scotland). While there he likely made similar arrangements for a formal transfer of authority to local chiefs: the later rulers of Galloway, home to the Novantae, would claim Maximus as the founder of their line, the same as did the Welsh kings.
Maximus would rule the Roman West until he was killed in 388. A succession of governors would rule southeastern Britain until 407, but there is nothing to suggest that any Roman effort was made to regain control of the west or north after 383, and that year would be the definitive end of the Roman era in Wales.
Legacy.
Wendy Davies has argued that the later medieval Welsh approach to property and estates was a Roman legacy, but this issue and others related to legacy are not yet resolved. For example, Leslie Alcock has argued that that approach to property and estates cannot pre-date the 6th century and is thus post-Roman.
There was little Latin linguistic heritage left to the Welsh language, only a number of borrowings from the Latin lexicon. With the absence of early written Welsh sources there is no way of knowing when these borrowings were incorporated into Welsh, and may date from a later post-Roman era when the language of literacy was still Latin. Borrowings include a few common words and word forms. For example, Welsh "ffenestr" is from Latin "fenestra", 'window'; "llyfr" is from "liber", 'book'; "ysgrif" is from "scribo", 'scribe'; and the suffix "-wys" found in Welsh folk names is derived from the Latin suffix "-ēnsēs". There are a few military terms, such as "caer" from Latin "castra", 'fortress'. "Eglwys", meaning 'church', is ultimately derived from the Greek "klēros".
Welsh kings would later use the authority of Magnus Maximus as the basis of their inherited political legitimacy. While imperial Roman entries in Welsh royal genealogies lack any historical foundation, they serve to illustrate the belief that legitimate royal authority began with Magnus Maximus. As told in "The Dream of Emperor Maximus", Maximus married a Briton, and their supposed children are given in genealogies as the ancestors of kings. Tracing ancestries back further, Roman emperors are listed as the sons of earlier Roman emperors, thus incorporating many famous Romans (e.g., Constantine the Great) into the royal genealogies.
The kings of medieval Gwynedd trace their origins to the northern British kingdom of Manaw Gododdin (located in modern Scotland), and they also claim a connection to Roman authority in their genealogies ("Eternus son of Paternus son of Tacitus"). This claim may be either an independent one, or was perhaps an invention intended to rival the legitimacy of kings claiming descent from the historical Maximus.
Gwyn A. Williams argues that even at the time of the erection of Offa's Dyke (that divided Wales from medieval England) the people to its west saw themselves as "Roman", citing the number of Latin inscriptions still being made into the 8th century.


Bishop of Sodor and Man

The Bishop of Sodor and Man is the Ordinary of the Diocese of Sodor and Man (Manx Gaelic: "Sodor as Mannin") in the Province of York in the Church of England. The diocese only covers the Isle of Man. The Cathedral Church of St German where the bishop's seat is located, is in the town of Peel. St German's was elevated to cathedral status on 1 November 1980.
The bishop is an "ex officio" member of the Legislative Council of the Isle of Man (the upper house of Tynwald, the parliament of the Isle of Man) and of Tynwald Court. The bishop's residence is Thie yn Aspick (Bishop's House), Douglas.
The right to appoint the Bishop of Sodor and Man is vested in the British crown; the Monarch acts, perhaps somewhat anomalously (in view of Man's status as a Crown Dependency), on the advice of the Prime Minister. However, unlike diocesan bishops in England, who are formally elected by the canons of the cathedral church in accordance with the monarch's "congé d'elire", the Bishop of Sodor and Man is appointed directly by the monarch by letters patent.
Peter Eagles was appointed Bishop of Sodor and Man, and was installed at the Cathedral Church of St German at Peel on 30 September 2017.
Diocese.
The name "Sodor and Man" is from an earlier diocese which included not only the Isle of Man but also the Hebrides. The name for this whole area in the original Norse was "Suðreyjar" ("Sudreys" or "southern isles"). In Latin, the corresponding adjective was "Sodorensis", later abbreviated in the English title as Sodor.
In the Middle Ages, the diocese was considered part of Scotland, and was under the control of neither the Archbishop of York nor the Archbishop of Canterbury. During the Great Schism, the Pope created a different line of bishops in the southern part of the diocese which became part of the Church of England. An Act of Parliament in 1542, during the reign of King Henry VIII, included the diocese in the Province of York. The termination "and Man" appears to have been added in the 17th century, as later generations did not realise that "Sodor" originally included the Isle of Man. The designation "Sodor and Man" had become a fixture by 1684.
Tables.
List of Bishops of Mann and the Isles.
The bishops of Mann and the Isles () were also styled bishops of Sodor (Old Norse: "Suðreyjar"; ; meaning Southern Isles, which comprised the Hebrides, the islands of the Firth of Clyde and the Isle of Man).
Assistant bishops.
In contrast with mainland dioceses, the Manx diocese seldom (if ever) has assistant bishops, whether full- or part-time, stipendiary or retired.
In fiction.
The Bishop of Sodor and Man is mentioned in the song "If you Want a Receipt for that Popular Mystery" sung by Colonel Calverley in the operetta "Patience" (1881) by Gilbert and Sullivan. The song lists the elements of a Heavy Dragoon, including "Style of the Bishop of Sodor and Man". The reference is to Rowley Hill (Bishop 1877-1887).
The fictional Isle of Sodor, home to Thomas the Tank Engine, is named after the diocese. In addition, the Sudrian Locale known popularly as Rolf's Castle is named after Roolwer.


Merchant Royal

Merchant Royal, also known as "Royal Merchant", was a 17th-century English merchant ship that was lost at sea off of Land's End in rough weather on 23 September 1641.
On board were at least 100,000 pounds of gold (over US$1.5 billion in today's money), 400 bars of Mexican silver (another 1 million) and nearly 500,000 pieces of eight and other coins, making it one of the most valuable wrecks of all time.
The "Merchant Royal" spent two years trading with Spanish colonies in the West Indies from 1637 to 1640. England was at peace with Spain at this time. The "Merchant Royal" and her sister-ship, the "Dover Merchant", called into Cadiz on their way home to London. By all accounts she was leaking badly after her long voyage.
When a Spanish ship in Cadiz at the same time caught fire just before she was due to carry treasure to convert into pay for Spain's 30,000 soldiers in Flanders, the "Merchant Royal"'s Captain Limbrey saw his chance to make a little more cash for his owners. He volunteered to carry the treasure to Antwerp on his way home.
The "Merchant Royal kept leaking after she and her sister-ship left Cadiz and, when the pumps broke down, she sank off Land's End in rough weather on 23 September 1641.
Eighteen men drowned in the sinking. Captain Limbrey and 40 of his crew got away in boats and were picked up by "Dover Merchant". It is not likely that the treasure was taken aboard the "Dover Merchant".
Search for the wreck.
The Odyssey Marine Exploration company has tried for several years to locate the wreck but has been unsuccessful thus far.
In 2007 the team announced the Black Swan Project, the name given by Odyssey Marine Exploration for its discovery and recovery of an estimated US$500 million (£363 million) worth of silver and gold coins, from a shipwreck, was originally rumored in the press to be from the "Merchant Royal". The Odyssey team is still uncertain as to the identity of the wreck, but now believe it may be the "Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes", a Spanish vessel sunk in 1804.
The team continued to search for the ship on the 2009 Discovery Channel television show, "Treasure Quest", but were unsuccessful once again.
In March 2019 an anchor, which was subsequently identified as the Merchant Royal’s, was brought up in the net of a fishing vessel. However the vessel had trawled for a considerable distance before hauling up its net. Nevertheless, records were kept by the vessel, and so the search area is now (2021) very considerably narrowed.