Rakvere

Rakvere is a town in northern Estonia and the capital of Lääne-Viru County, 20 km south of the Gulf of Finland of the Baltic Sea. Until early 20th century Rakvere was more widely known by its historical German name "Wesenberg(h)".
History.
The earliest signs of human settlement dating back to the 3rd–5th centuries AD have been found on the present theatre hill. Probably to protect that settlement, a wooden stronghold was built on the present Vallimägi. When it changed owners in 1220, the Danes started to erect buildings from stone. A settlement called "Tarvanpea" was first mentioned in the Chronicle of Henry of Livonia in 1226. The new Danish stronghold was called "Wesenbergh" in Middle Low German for the first time in 1252. The battle of Wesenberg between the Danish and German knights and Russians occurred nearby on 18 February 1268.
On 12 June 1302, Rakvere was granted Lübeck rights. When the Danish king sold Danish Estonia to the Livonian Order in 1346, a large castle was built on top of the previous stronghold. The Ordensburg was protected by towers and courtyards. The building of a Franciscan monastery was started in 1508.
During the Livonian War from 1558 to 1581, Rakvere was under Russian rule and was heavily damaged. Sweden, after the disastrous Siege of Wesenberg (1574), captured the town in 1581 before it passed to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1602; Poles destroyed the castle in 1605. After being returned to Swedish control in that year, a mansion was built on the ruins of the monastery. During the Great Northern War, Rakvere was burned down in 1703. With the Capitulation of Estonia and Livonia in 1710 and the subsequent Treaty of Nystad in 1721, Rakvere passed to the Russian Empire, where it remained until Estonia's independence in 1918 following World War I.
During the first period of independence, many prominent buildings were built, such as the market building, the old bank building (current SEB Eesti Ühispank), and Rakvere Gymnasium. In 1930, the town stadium was opened, during the tenure of mayor Heinrich Aviksoo. Local newspapers started to emerge, including the county paper "Virumaa Teataja", which was first published in 1925. The idea of Rakvere's own professional theatre started to take shape as well. The construction of the theatre house was completed at the end of the 1930s and it was festively opened on 24 February 1940. The theatre survived World War II and is active to this day.
Rakvere also has a professional theatre and it is believed that it is the smallest town in Europe which has a professional theatre. Its roots date back to 1882 and it is still active and very popular. The theatre of Rakvere has given Estonia many famous actors and actresses such as Volli Käro, Üllar Saaremäe, Indrek Saar, Ülle Lichtfeldt, Aarne Üksküla, etc. It also holds the biannual event "Baltoscandal", which gathers avant-garde plays and groups from all over the world.
Main landmarks.
Tarvas statue.
Rakvere is also known now for its Tarvas statue of an aurochs, which was made by the Estonian sculptor Tauno Kangro. It is thought to be the largest animal statue in the Baltic countries.
It is situated on the edge of Vallimägi hill and was erected for the town's 700th birthday. Along with the granite block it sits on, the statue is seven meters long and four meters high and weighs about seven tons.
The statue is made out of bronze. The names of the companies and private people who financed it are engraved in the granite block.
Rakvere Trinity church.
The Lutheran church of Rakvere, the Trinity church, originally dates from the 15th century and was designed to also be able to function as a stronghold in times of trouble. It was severely damaged during the Livonian War and renovation started only in 1684. During the Great Northern War, the church once more was damaged by fire twice. Renovations were carried out 1727–1730, and again during the middle of the 19th century, when the church received its present look, dominated by its neo-Gothic spire. The interior displays some fine craftsmanship, including a Baroque pulpit from 1690 made by Christian Ackermann.
Twin towns - sister cities.
Rakvere is twinned with:


Vordingborg Municipality

Vordingborg () is a municipality ("kommune") in the Sjælland Region, which is on the southeast coast of the island of Zealand ("Sjælland") in south Denmark. It was established in 2007. The municipality includes the island of Masnedø, and covers an area of 621 km². It has a total population of 46,600 (2006). Its fourth and current mayor is Mikael Smed of the Social Democrats, who was elected in 2017, replacing Michael Seiding Larsen of the agrarian-liberal Venstre party.
The municipality takes its name from the town of the same name.
Overview.
The Masnedsund Bridge connects the town of Vordingborg to the island of Masnedø. The Storstrøm Bridge connects Masnedø to the neighboring municipality of Guldborgsund on Falster near the town of Orehoved. The bridge is 3,199 meters long and supports two lanes of traffic and a single-track railway. It was inaugurated in 1937.
The Farø Bridges (The Farø High Bridge and the Farø Low Bridge) opened in 1985 and connect the two municipalities from the town of Bakkebølle Strand over Farø island (part of former Møn municipality) to Falster near the town of Sortsøgab. Bogø island is also part of the municipality.
As part of wider municipal reforms, an earlier Vordingborg municipality was merged with its neighboring municipalities of Langebæk, Møn, and Præstø on 1 January 2007, forming the enlarged Vordingborg Municipality.
Around 135 km (84 mi) east of Vordingborg municipality across the Baltic Sea is Bornholm, the easternmost municipality of Denmark, which is a part of the Capital Region of Denmark.
For the location of Vordingborg municipality relative to its neighbors, see the location diagram at the bottom of the corresponding article on Danish language Wikipedia, .
Urban areas.
The nine largest communities in the municipality are:
Politics.
Municipal council.
Vordingborg's municipal council consists of 29 members, elected every four years.
Below are the municipal councils elected since the Municipal Reform of 2007.


Bornholm

Bornholm (; ) is a Danish island in the Baltic Sea, to the east of the rest of Denmark, south of Sweden, northeast of Germany and north of Poland. Occupying an area of , the island had a total population of 39,439 on 1 April 2020.
Among Bornholm's chief industrial activities are dairy farming and arts and crafts industries such as glass production and pottery using locally worked clay. Tourism is also important during the summer months. The island is home to many of Denmark's round churches.
The island is known as "solskinsøen" ("Sunshine Island") because of its weather and "klippeøen" ("Rock Island") because of its geology, which consists of granite, except along the southern coast. The heat from the summer is stored in the rock formations and the weather is quite warm until October. As a result of the climate, a local variety of the common fig, known as "Bornholm's Diamond", can grow locally on the island. The island's topography consists of dramatic rock formations in the north (unlike the rest of Denmark, which is mostly gentle rolling hills) sloping down towards pine and deciduous forests (greatly affected by storms in the 1950s), farmland in the middle and sandy beaches in the south.
Strategically located in the Baltic Sea, Bornholm has been fought over for centuries. Usually it had been ruled by Denmark, but also by Sweden and Lübeck, Germany. The ruin of Hammershus, at the northwestern tip of the island, is the largest medieval fortress in northern Europe, testament to the importance of its location. This island and Ertholmene is what remains in Denmark of Skåneland east of Øresund, having been surrendered to Sweden in 1658 but with Bornholm after a local revolt later regained in 1660.
History.
Medieval.
In Old Norse the island was known as "tisseØ", and in ancient Danish especially the island's name was "Borghand" or "Borghund"; these names were related to Old Norse "borg" "height" and "bjarg/berg" "mountain, rock", as it is an island that rises high from the sea. Other names known for the island include "Burgendaland" (9th century), "Hulmo" / "Holmus" ("Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum"), "Burgundehulm" (1145), and "Borghandæholm" (14th century). The Old English translation of Orosius uses the form "Burgenda land". Some scholars believe that the Burgundians are named after Bornholm; the Burgundians were Germanic peoples who moved west when the Western Roman Empire collapsed and occupied and named Burgundy in France.
Bornholm formed part of the historical Lands of Denmark when the nation united out of a series of petty chiefdoms. It was originally administratively part of the province of Scania and was administered by the Scanian Law after this was codified in the 13th century. Control over the island evolved into a long-raging dispute between the See of Lund and the Danish crown culminating in several battles. The first fortress on the island was "Gamleborg" which was replaced by "Lilleborg", built by the king in 1150. In 1149, the king accepted the transfer of three of the island's four herreder (districts) to the archbishop. In 1250, the archbishop constructed his own fortress, Hammershus. A campaign launched from it in 1259 conquered the remaining part of the island including Lilleborg. The island's status remained a matter of dispute for an additional 200 years.
Modern.
Bornholm was pawned to Lübeck for 50 years starting in 1525. Its first militia, Bornholms Milits, was formed in 1624.
Swedish forces conquered the island in 1645, but returned the island to Denmark in the following peace settlement. After the war in 1658, Denmark ceded the island to Sweden under the Treaty of Roskilde along with the rest of the Skåneland, Bohuslän and Trøndelag, and it was occupied by Swedish forces.
A revolt broke out the same year, culminating in Villum Clausen's shooting of the Swedish commander Johan Printzensköld on 8 December 1658. Following the revolt, a deputation of islanders presented the island as a gift to King Frederick III on the condition that the island would never be ceded again. This status was confirmed in the Treaty of Copenhagen in 1660.
Swedes, notably from Småland and Scania, emigrated to the island during the 19th century, seeking work and better conditions. Most of the migrants did not remain.
Bornholm also attracted many famous artists at the beginning of the 20th century, forming a group now known as the Bornholm school of painters. In addition to Oluf Høst, they include Karl Isaksson (1878–1922), from Sweden, and the Danes Edvard Weie (1879–1943), Olaf Rude (1886–1957), Niels Lergaard (1893–1982), and Kræsten Iversen (1886–1955).
German occupation (1940–1945).
Bornholm, as a part of Denmark, was captured by Germany on 10 April 1940, and served as a lookout post and listening station during the war, as it was a part of the Eastern Front. The island's perfect central position in the Baltic Sea meant that it was an important "natural fortress" between Germany and Sweden, effectively keeping submarines and destroyers away from Nazi-occupied waters. Several concrete coastal installations were built during the war, and several coastal batteries, which had tremendous range. However, none of them were ever used, and only a single test shot was fired during the occupation. These remnants of Nazi rule have since fallen into disrepair and are mostly regarded today as historical curiosities. Many tourists visit the ruins each year, however, providing supplemental income to the tourist industry.
On 22 August 1942 a V-1 flying bomb (numbered V83, probably launched from a Heinkel He 111) crashed on Bornholm during a test – the warhead was a dummy made of concrete. This was photographed or sketched by the Danish Naval Officer-in-Charge on Bornholm, Lieutenant Commander Hasager Christiansen. This was one of the first signs British Intelligence saw of Germany's aspirations to develop flying bombs and rockets which were to become known as V-1.
Soviet occupation (1945–1946).
Bornholm was heavily bombarded by the Soviet Air Force in May 1945, as it was a part of the Eastern Front. The German garrison commander, German Navy Captain Gerhard von Kamptz (1902–1998), refused to surrender to the Soviets, as his orders were to surrender to the Western Allies. The Germans sent several telegrams to Copenhagen requesting that at least one British soldier should be transferred to Bornholm, so that the Germans could surrender to the Western Allied forces instead of the Soviets. When von Kamptz failed to provide a written capitulation as demanded by the Soviet commanders, Soviet aircraft relentlessly bombed and destroyed more than 800 civilian houses in Rønne and Nexø and seriously damaged roughly 3,000 more on 7–8 May 1945. The population had been forewarned of the bombardments, and the towns were evacuated, but 10 local people were killed. Soldiers were also killed and wounded. Some of them were conscripts from the occupied Baltic states fighting in German ranks against the Soviets.
During the Soviet bombing of the two main towns on 7 and 8 May, Danish radio was not allowed to broadcast the news because it was thought it would spoil the liberation festivities in Denmark. On 9 May Soviet troops landed on the island, and after a short fight, the German garrison (about 12,000 strong) surrendered. Soviet forces left the island on 5 April 1946 as part of the post-war division of interests of the Soviet Union and the Western Allies. Denmark was to be Western aligned, and in return the Baltic states were to be kept in the Soviet sphere of influence.
Cold War.
After the evacuation of their forces from Bornholm, the Soviets took the position that the stationing of foreign troops on Bornholm would be considered a declaration of war against the Soviet Union, and that Denmark should keep troops on it at all times to protect it from such foreign aggression. This policy remained in force after NATO was formed, with Denmark as a founding member. The Soviets accepted the stationing there of Danish troops, which were part of NATO but viewed as militarily inferior elements of the alliance, but they strongly objected to the presence of other NATO troops on Bornholm, US troops in particular.
On 5 March 1953, the day of Stalin's death, Polish pilot Franciszek Jarecki defected from the Eastern Bloc and landed a MiG-15 fighter on the island. He was later granted asylum and rewarded for providing Western intelligence with the then-newest Soviet jet fighter.
In 2017, Denmark's Defence Intelligence Service decided to build a listening tower near Østermarie, almost the size of the Statue of Liberty, to intercept radio communications across the Baltic Sea and in parts of Russia.
Municipality.

Bornholm Regional Municipality is the local authority (Danish, "kommune") covering the entire island. It is the of the five former (1 April 1970 until 2002) municipalities on the island (Allinge-Gudhjem, Hasle, Nexø, Rønne and Aakirkeby) and the former Bornholm County. Bornholm Regional Municipality was also a county in its own right during its first four years from 1 January 2003 until 31 December 2006. From 1 January 2007 all counties were abolished, and Bornholm became part of the Capital Region of Denmark whose main responsibility is the health service. The municipality still retains its name Bornholm "Regional" Municipality. The island had 21 municipalities until March 1970, of which 6 were market towns and 15 parishes. In addition to supervising parish municipalities, which was the responsibility of the counties in "all" of Denmark, the market town municipalities of Bornholm were supervised by Bornholm County as well and not by the Interior Ministry as was the case in the rest of Denmark. The seat of the municipal council is the island's main town, Rønne. The voters decided to merge the county with the municipalities in a referendum 29 May 2001, effective from 1 January 2003. The question on the ballot was, "Do you want the six municipal entities of Bornholm to be joined to form one municipal entity as of 1 January 2003?" 73.9% voted in favour. The lowest percentage for the merger was in Nexø municipality (966 more people voting "Yes" than "No"), whose mayor, Annelise Molin, a Social Democrat, spoke out against the merger. It was required that each municipality had more "Yes" votes than "No" votes. Otherwise the merger would have to be abandoned altogether. The six municipal entities had up to 122 councillors (of which county clls were 18, from 1998 15), reduced to 89 in the municipalities from the 1990s, in the 1970s and the new regional municipality would have 27 councillors from the start. They were reduced to 23 from 1 January 2018 (election November 2017). The merger was approved in a law by the Folketing 19 (and signature by the Queen 25) March 2002, transferring the tasks of the abolished county and old municipalities to the new "Bornholm Regional Municipality". The first regional mayor in the first three years from 2003 until 2005 was Thomas Thors (born 28 July 1949), a physician and member of the Social Democrats and previously the last mayor of Rønne Municipality for five years from 1998 until 2002. He became a mayor again in 2021. Bjarne Kristiansen, who was the last mayor of Hasle years from the summer of 2000 until 2002, representing the local Borgerlisten political party, served as mayor for four years from 1 January 2006 until 2009. From 1 January 2007, Bornholm became a part of the Capital Region of Denmark. From 1 January 2010 until 31 December 2020 the mayor was Winni Grosbøll, a high school teacher and a member of the Social Democrats ("Socialdemokratiet") political party. The deputy mayor Morten Riis was mayor for a short interlude from 1 January until 4 January 2021. He is from the Red-Green Alliance. Thomas Thors, who was elected again in 2017, became mayor again from 4 January 2021.
Municipal council.
Bornholm's municipal council today consists of 23 members, elected every four years. In the first four local elections in the newly created municipality there were 27 members elected to the municipal council. The 2002 local election only took place on Bornholm. From the election in 2017 the number of councillors elected was reduced to 23 members, serving their term of office from 1 January 2018 until 31 December 2021.
Below are the election results to the new merged municipal council beginning with the first election 29 May 2002.
Transport.
Ferry services connect Rønne to Świnoujście (Poland), Sassnitz (Germany), Køge, by road ( as the crow flies) south of Copenhagen, Denmark; the destination to Køge replaced the nighttime route directly to and from Copenhagen (for both cargo and passengers) from 1 October 2004; and catamaran services to Ystad (Sweden). Simrishamn (Sweden) has a ferry connection during the summer. There are also regular catamaran services between Nexø and the Polish ports of Kołobrzeg, Łeba and Ustka. There are direct bus connections Ystad-Copenhagen, coordinated with the catamaran. There are also flights from Bornholm Airport to Copenhagen and other locations.
Because of its remote location Bornholm Regional Municipality has its own traffic company, BAT, and is its own employment region, and also performs other tasks normally carried out by the regions in the rest of Denmark. In some respects the municipality forms a region of its own.
Bornholm Regional Municipality was not merged with other municipalities on 1 January 2007 in the nationwide Municipal Reform of 2007.
Towns and villages.
The larger towns on the island are located on the coast and have harbours. There is however one exception, centrally placed Aakirkeby, which was also the name of the municipality from 1970 until 2002, which did, however, include the harbor, Boderne, to the south. The largest town is Rønne, the seat, in the southwest on the westernmost point of the island. The other main towns (clockwise round the island) are Hasle, Sandvig, Allinge, Gudhjem, Svaneke and Nexø. Monday morning 22 September 2014 it was documented by "Folkeregistret" in the municipality that the number of people living in the municipality that day were 39,922, the lowest number in over 100 years.
, Statistics Denmark gave the populations as follows:
The "town" of Rønne after the merger of the island's administrative entities 1 January 2003 reached a low point of 13,568 inhabitants 1 January 2014. 15,957 people in 1965 (date unknown;number not registerbased) lived in the two parishes that would become Rønne municipality from 1 April 1970. In the table, numbers for Rønne are for the parish of Rønne, Rønne Sogn, alone. Year unknown, but between 2000 and 2005. It does not include Knudsker Sogn, which was also a part of Rønne Municipality. Other localities (with approximate populations, not updated) include Aarsballe (86), Arnager (151), Olsker (67), Rutsker (64), Rø (181), Stenseby (?) and Vang (92). In 2010 and 2018 10,297 and 9,111 respectively lived in rural districts, and 88 and 71 had no fixed address. A rural district is defined by Statistics Denmark as a settlement with less than 200 inhabitants.
Demography.
Population of parishes.
Year: Beginning with 2007; 2018;
Population numbers are from 1 January. Christiansø Parish (which encompasses Ertholmene) is not a part of Bornholm Regional Municipality. It is included because Danmarks Statistik includes it as parish number 7568. Bornholm has 21 parishes (2018) that before 1 April 1970 were parish (15) or market city (6) municipalities themselves. There are 2,163 parishes (November 2019) in the Church of Denmark.
Source:Statistikbanken.dk/Befolkning og valg/(table)FODIE (births);FOD207 (deaths);BEV107 (births;deaths;birth surplus);KM1 (parishes).
On 22 September 2014 population numbers showed fewer than 40,000 inhabitants on the island for the first time in over 100 years. The "Folkeregister" in the municipality could document 39,922 inhabitants in the municipality on that date.
Language.
Many inhabitants speak the Bornholmsk dialect, which is officially a dialect of Danish. Bornholmsk retains three grammatical genders, like Faroese, Icelandic and most dialects of Norwegian, but unlike standard Danish. Its phonology includes archaisms (unstressed and internal , where other dialects have and ) and innovations ( for before and after front-tongue vowels). This makes the dialect difficult to understand for some Danish speakers. However, Swedish speakers often consider Bornholmian to be easier to understand than standard Danish. The intonation resembles the dialects spoken in nearby Scania, Blekinge and Halland the southernmost provinces of Sweden.
Religion.
Most inhabitants are members of the Lutheran Church of Denmark ("Folkekirken"). Various Christian denominations have become established on the island, most during the 19th century.
Sights and landmarks.
On the surface of Bornholm older geological formations can be seen better than in the rest of Denmark. "Stubbeløkken" – which is still operating (Danish "i drift") – and "Klippeløkken" granite quarries in Knudsker parish just east of central Rønne – and statistically a part of the town – are among the few remaining quarries of what was once many active quarries on the island. The island's varied geography and seascapes attract visitors to its many beauty spots from the Hammeren promontory in the northwest to the Almindingen forest in the centre and the Dueodde beaches in the southeast. Of special interest are the rocky sea cliffs at Jons Kapel and Helligdomsklipperne, the varied topography of Paradisbakkerne and rift valleys such as Ekkodalen and Døndalen. Bornholm's numerous windmills include the post mill of Egeby and the well-kept Dutch mill at Aarsdale. The lighthouse at Dueodde is Denmark's tallest, while Hammeren Lighthouse stands at a height of above sea level and Rønne Lighthouse rises over the waterfront.
Examples of roads that have (very) steep climbs and descents are: (inland) Simblegårdsvej in Klemensker, which begins by the village inn Klemens Kro, and Slamrebjergvej just outside Nexø extending northward from the main road from Rønne. Along the coast there are several steep roads, which is also the case in some parts of Denmark as a whole, for instance in and around Vejle.
The island hosts examples of 19th- and early-20th-century architecture, and about 300 wooden houses in Rønne and Nexø, donated by Sweden after World War II, when the island was repairing damage caused by the war.
The island is home to 15 medieval churches, four of which are round churches with unique artwork and architecture. The ancient site of Rispebjerg has remains of sun temples from the Neolithic and earthworks from the Iron Age.
There are 14 European bison near Åkirkeby, attracting 100,000 visitors a year.
Education.
Because of the dilapidated state of their buildings, all secondary educational facilities in Rønne, including adult evening classes, are being transferred to new facilities at Campus Bornholm in 2018. Campus Bornholm is a merger formed in June 2010 consisting of Bornholms Erhvervsskole (youth and adults), Bornholm High School (youth) and VUC Bornholm (adults), then occupying separate addresses. Learning institutions not part of this formalised collaboration will also be housed at Minervavej in Rønne. The building costs were over 300 million DKK (US$46.9 million (29 June 2018)). The A.P. Møller Foundation contributed a sum of 56 million DKK (US$8.76 million (29 June 2018)) to the project.
Economy.
Jensen-Group, an industrial washing and folding machine company, was founded on the island and has a factory in Rønne. It is headquartered in Belgium.
Electricity supply.
Bornholm is connected to the Swedish electricity grid by a submarine 60 kV AC cable, which is among the longest AC cables in Europe. This cable is capable of delivering all the electrical energy consumed on Bornholm. However Bornholm also generates its own electricity at small thermal power plants and especially wind turbines.
Bornholm is also home to a large internationally funded demonstration project to test the viability of novel energy market mechanisms to regulate energy networks with a high prevalence of renewables (such as wind turbines and photovoltaics). 50% of the project is EU-funded, with the remainder coming mainly from large corporations. See http://www.eu-ecogrid.net/ecogrid-eu for more.
Climate.
Bornholm has an oceanic climate relatively similar to southern Sweden and mainland Denmark, whose summer highs and winter lows are heavily moderated by its maritime and isolated position. Even though heat is rare, the climate is sunny during summers and rainfall is generally sparse for a climate of this type. The winter (November–December) 2010 – (January–April) 2011 was exceptionally extreme with snow depth reaching at least 146 cm, 2 inches short of 5 feet (snowdrifts 6 meters, almost 20 feet) the highest in Northern Europe. Military assistance was needed. The DMI estimated the weight of snow to be 100 million ton.
Sports.
Bornholm's geography as an island and moderate climate makes Bornholm an ideal location for sailing and other water-based sports. Bornholm has also become an internationally recognised venue for 'match racing', a sailing sport where two identical yachts are raced in one-on-one events on the water. The Danish Open event was held in Bornholm in September 2010 at the port town of Rønne on the western coast of Bornholm. The five-day Danish Open is a key event in the World Match Racing Tour calendar which is one of only 3 events awarded 'special event' status by the International Sailing Federation. The Tour is the world's leading professional 'match racing' series and features a nine-event calendar which crosses three continents during the series. Points accrued during the Danish Open contribute directly to the World Match Racing Tour championship with the winner of the season finale at the Monsoon Cup in Malaysia claiming the ultimate match racing title ISAF World Match Racing Champion.
There are two small stadiums: Nexø Stadion, in Nexø, where NB Bornholm association football club play; and the slightly larger multi-use stadium Rønne Stadion Nord in Rønne, which serves the Bornholm national football team, multi-section club most well known for athletics IK Viking, and several local football clubs. The DBU Bornholm is the local branch governing football on the island.


List of French regions and overseas departments by GRP per capita

This article is about the gross regional product (GRP) per capita of French regions and overseas departments in nominal values. Values are shown in EUR€. For easy comparison, all the GRP figures are converted into US$ according to annual average exchange rates. All values are rounded to the nearest hundred.


County Laois

County Laois ( ; ) is a county in Ireland. It is located in the south of the Midlands Region and in the province of Leinster. It was formerly known as Queen's County. The modern county takes its name from Loígis, a medieval kingdom. Historically, it has also been known as County Leix.
Laois County Council is the local authority for the county. At the 2016 census, the population of the county was 84,697, an increase of 26% since the 2006 census.
History.
Prehistoric.
The first people in Laois were bands of hunters and gatherers who passed through the county about 8,500 years ago. They hunted in the forests that covered Laois and fished in its rivers, gathering nuts and berries to supplement their diets.
Next came Ireland's first farmers. These people of the Neolithic period (4000 to 2500 BC) cleared forests and planted crops. Their burial mounds remain in Clonaslee and Cuffsborough.
Starting around 2500 BC, the people of the Bronze Age lived in Laois. They produced weapons, tools and golden objects. Visitors to the county can see a stone circle they left behind at Monamonry, as well as the remains of their hill forts at Clopook and Monelly. Skirk, near Borris-in-Ossory, has a Bronze Age standing stone and ring fort. The body of Cashel Man indicates that ritual killing took place around 2000 BC.
The next stage is known as the pre-Christian Celtic Iron Age. For the first time, iron appeared in Ireland, showing up in the weapons used by factions who fought bloody battles for control of the land. At Ballydavis, archaeologists have discovered ring barrows that date from this time period.
The county name derives from Loígis, of which the modern county is only a part. In the 11th century, its dynastic rulers adopted the surname Ua/Ó Mórdha. They claimed descent from a member of the Red Branch Knights.
By the first century AD, the western third of Laois was part of the Kingdom of Ossory. The eastern part was divided roughly into seven parts, which were ruled by the Seven Septs of Loígis: O’More (O’Moore), O’Lalor, O’Doran, O’Dowling, O’Devoy (O’Deevy), O’Kelly and McEvoy.
Introduction of Christianity.
When Ireland was Christianised, holy men and women founded religious communities in Loígis. St. Ciarán of Saighir (called "The Elder" to distinguish him from the younger St. Ciarán of Clonmacnoise) founded his monastic habitation in the western Slieve Bloom Mountains as the first bishop of Ossory, reputedly before St. Patrick. His mother Liadán had an early convent nearby at what is now Killyon. Between 550 and 600, St. Canice founded Aghaboe Abbey and St. Mochua founded a religious community at Timahoe. An early Christian community lived at Dun Masc or Masc's fort, on the Rock of Dunamase.
The Synod of Rathbreasail that established the Irish dioceses was held near Mountrath in 1111, moving the Church away from its monastic base. As religious orders with strong ties to Rome replaced older religious communities, the wooden buildings of the early Christian churches in Laois gave way to stone monasteries. The Augustinians and Dominicans established themselves at Aghaboe Abbey, while the Cistercians took over an older religious community at Abbeyleix.
Norman invasion.
The Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169–71 affected Laois as it was a part of the Kingdom of Leinster. In Laois, the fortress on the Rock of Dunamase was part of the dowry of the Irish princess Aoife, who was given in marriage in 1170 to the Norman warrior Strongbow. Advancing Normans surveyed the county from wooden towers built on top of earthen mounds, known as mottes. They also built stone fortresses, such as Lea Castle, just outside Portarlington. Several of the county's towns were first established as Norman boroughs, including Castletown, Durrow and Timahoe.
From 1175 until about 1325, Normans controlled the best land in the county, while Gaelic society retreated to the bogs, forests and the Slieve Bloom Mountains. The early 14th century saw a Gaelic revival, as the chieftains of Loígis caused the Normans to withdraw. The Dempseys seized Lea Castle, while Dunamase came into the ownership of the O’Mores. Examples of tower houses built by the Irish Mac Giolla Phádraig chieftains are found at Ballaghmore and Cullahill Castle, both decorated with Sheela na gigs.
In 1548, the English confiscated the lands of the O’Mores, and built "Campa", known as the Fort of Leix, today's Portlaoise.
16th century colony and County status.
It was shired in 1556 by Queen Mary as Queen's County, covering the "countries" of Leix (Loígis), Slewmarge, Irry, and that part of Glimnaliry on the southwest side of the River Barrow. Laois received its present Irish language name following the Irish War of Independence. Laois was also sometimes spelt "Leix". Portlaoise (previously Maryborough) is the main town of the county.
Loígis was the subject of two Plantations or colonisations by English settlers. The first occurred in 1556, when Thomas Radclyffe, 3rd Earl of Sussex dispossessed the O'Moore clan and attempted to replace them with English settlers. However, this only led to a long drawn-out guerilla war in the county and left a small English colonist community clustered around garrisons. There was a more successful plantation in the county in the 17th century, which expanded the existing Scottish and English settlement with more landowners and tenants from both Scotland and England. Neither plantation was fully successful due to a lack of tenants and because of continuous raids and attacks by the O'Moores.
In 1659, a group of Quakers led by William Edmundson, settled in Mountmellick, while a group of Huguenots were given refuge in Portarlington in 1666 after their service to William of Orange in the Williamite War in Ireland.
What followed was a period of relative calm. Anglo-Irish landowners enclosed the land and built fine houses, including Durrow Castle, Heywood House and Emo Court. In 1836, a branch of the Grand Canal stretched to Mountmellick, further stimulating industry in that town.
The Great Famine of 1845–49 devastated the county. The county's workhouses could not cope with the number of destitute people seeking shelter. By the time the workhouse opened at Donaghmore in 1853, many of the poorest had emigrated or died.
The county was formerly known as Queen's County () until its name was informally changed on establishment of the Irish Free State in 1922. The county's name was formerly spelt as "Laoighis" and "Leix". Despite the county's name being upheld as Laois through the 2001 Local Government Act, no legislation was ever enacted after independence explicitly changing the name from Queen's County, the name formally established under the 1898 Local Government Act which continued to have legal effect. When land is sold in the county the relevant title deeds are still updated as being in "Queen's County".
Geography and political subdivisions.
Laois is the 23rd largest of Ireland's 32 counties in area and also has the 23rd largest population. It is the seventh largest of Leinster's 12 counties in size and tenth largest in population. The county is landlocked and, uniquely, does not border any other county which touches the coast. This is known as being doubly landlocked. It is therefore considered to be "the most landlocked county in Ireland".
Baronies.
The county was formerly divided into nine baronies:
Climate.
For climatological information please visit: durrow.ie for averages and extremes.
The weather station at east Durrow was set up in May 2008. The equipment used is a Davis Vantage Pro II that measures temperature, humidity, wind speed, wind direction, rainfall and barometric pressure. This data is transmitted every 2 seconds to a website where the data can be freely accessed. The station also reports to the Irish Weather Network which displays live weather data from similar stations all around Ireland.
In addition, a Met Éireann climatological station (Number: 472) was installed in September 2010 and the data collected is sent to headquarters in Glasnevin, Dublin on a monthly basis. The climatological station measures rainfall in a manual gauge, soil temperatures at 5 cm, 10 cm and 20 cm depths, air temperature including wet-bulb, daily maximum and daily minimum temperatures. The climatological station is a project that is envisaged to last thirty years and collect a climate profile for Durrow and Laois in general.
Government.
National parliament.
In the Irish parliament, Dáil Éireann, Laois is traditionally included in the Laois–Offaly constituency. However, for one election, in 2016, Laois had its own 3 seat constituency (which included six electoral divisions from Kildare South). Since 2020, Laois–Offaly became a 5-seat constituency again.
Local government.
Local matters are dealt with by Laois County Council which elects 19 members. For the purpose of elections it is divided into three local electoral areas: Borris-in-Ossory-Mountmellick (6), Portlaoise (7), Graiguecullen-Portarlington (6). Due to major local government reform implemented by Minister Phil Hogan town councils in Mountmellick and Portlaoise were abolished in 2014.
Places of interest.
Also County Laois has a mixture of castles, mansions, forts and old structures that are now in ruins but are still worth visiting.
Demography.
The population of County Laois is expanding, given its easy commute to the employment centres of Kildare and Dublin, and affordable housing. Laois's population growth during the period 2002–2006 (14%) was stronger than the national average (8.2%), as follows:
As of the 2016 census, ethnically Laois was 84% white Irish, 8% other white, 2% black, 1% Asian, 1% 'other', with 3% not stated.
Economy.
Over 1500 people work in the industrial sector in the county. Industrial parks are located in Portlaoise, Portarlington and Mountmellick. The county receives EU funding as it is part of the cluster of three regions (Border, Midland and West), colloquially known as "BMW", that qualifies for special funding aid.
Agricultural activities occupy approximately 70% of the land area of the county (). However agriculture's share of income in the "BMW" region has declined sharply in the past decade, and represented only approximately 3.9% of annual income (GVA) in 2005 Central Statistics Office. There are over 230,000 cattle in the county – three for every person. The remaining area includes considerable stretches of raised bog and the Slieve Bloom mountains, which are partially covered by coniferous forest.
Culture.
Performing arts.
The county's largest theatre is the Dunamaise Theatre in Portlaoise which opened in 1999.
There are many festivals held in Laois each year including:
Railways.
Iarnród Éireann train services along the Dublin-Cork line connects the county between Heuston station and Cork, Limerick, travel through the county, with railway stations at Portarlington, Portlaoise and Ballybrophy. From Portarlington trains run on the Dublin-Galway/Westport/Ballina line to Athlone as well as Galway, Westport and Ballina. From Ballybrophy trains run on the Ballybrophy line to Nenagh and Limerick direct.
Road transport.
The M7 road runs through County Laois. This is one of the busiest roadways in Ireland connecting Dublin and Limerick and acts as a trunk route for the M8 which connects Cork to Dublin. The M8 joins the M7 to the south of Portlaoise. Road infrastructure has improved greatly in the county over the past decade. Most major interurban routes through Laois have now been upgraded to motorway standard. All major traffic bottlenecks in Laois such as Abbeyleix and Mountrath have been bypassed following the opening of the M7/M8 tolled motorway project in May 2010. Both towns were major intercity bottlenecks for motorists especially Abbeyleix where delays of up to 30 minutes or more were common.
Bus Éireann provides regular intercity bus services in the county. The Dublin to Limerick service runs every hour through towns and villages on the old N7 road (now R445) while the Dublin to Cork inter city bus service runs every two hours through towns in the county.
Sport.
Laois has a strong tradition of Gaelic games, enjoying success at both Gaelic football and hurling. Laois are one of few counties to contest an All-Ireland final in both Gaelic football and hurling. In recent times Laois have been more successful footballers than hurlers. Laois minors have had considerable success over the past two decades, and the Laois senior footballers reached the Leinster final in 2003 (victorious), 2004, and 2005. Laois hurlers currently compete in the Liam MacCarthy Cup, a competition reserved for the premiere hurling counties while the footballers compete in the Sam Maguire Cup. Laois play home games at O'Moore Park, the county's largest sporting venue, which is often used for hurling Championship games because of its central location.
In Rugby football, Portlaoise RFC and Portarlington RFC compete in Division 2A of the Leinster League.
Twin towns.
County Laois is a participant in the Twin Towns program and has a relationship with the following municipalities:


Hesse

Hesse (, , ) or Hessia (, ; ), officially the State of Hessen (), is a state of the Federal Republic of Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt. With an area of 21,000 square kilometers and a population of just over six million it ranks seventh and fifth respectively among the sixteen German states. Frankfurt Rhine-Main, Germany's second-largest metropolitan area (after Rhine-Ruhr), is mainly located in Hesse.
As a cultural region, Hessen also includes the area known as Rhenish Hesse (Rheinhessen) in the neighbouring state of Rhineland-Palatinate.
Name.
The German name "Hessen", like the names of other German regions ("Schwaben" "Swabia", "Franken" "Franconia", "Bayern" "Bavaria", "Sachsen" "Saxony") derives from the dative plural form of the name of the inhabitants or eponymous tribe, the Hessians ("Hessen", singular "Hesse"). The geographical name represents a short equivalent of the older compound name "Hessenland" ("land of the Hessians"). The Old High German form of the name is recorded as "Hessun" (dative plural of "Hessi"), in Middle Latin it appears as "Hassia", "Hessia", "Hassonia". The name of the Hessians ultimately continues the tribal name of the "Chatti".
The ancient name "Chatti" by the 7th century is recorded as "Chassi", and from the 8th century as "Hassi" or "Hessi".
An inhabitant of Hesse is called a "Hessian" (German: "Hesse" (masculine) or "Hessin" (feminine), plural "Hessen").
The American English term "Hessian" for 18th-century British auxiliary troops originates with Landgrave Frederick II of Hesse-Kassel hiring out regular army units to the government of Great Britain to fight in the American Revolutionary War.
The English form "Hesse" was in common use by the 18th century, first in the hyphenated names of the states of "Hesse-Cassel" and "Hesse-Darmstadt", but the latinate form "Hessia" remained in common English usage well into the 19th century.
The European Commission uses the German form "Hessen", even in English-language contexts, due to the policy of leaving regional names untranslated.
The synthetic element hassium, number 108 on the periodic table, was named after the state of Hesse in 1997, following a proposal of 1992.
History.
The territory of Hesse was delineated only in 1945, as Greater Hesse, under American occupation. It corresponds only loosely to the medieval Landgraviate of Hesse.
In the 19th century, prior to the unification of Germany, the territory of what is now Hesse comprised the territories of Grand Duchy of Hesse, the Duchy of Nassau, the free city of Frankfurt and the Electorate of Hesse (also known as Hesse-Cassel).
Early history.
The Central Hessian region was inhabited in the Upper Paleolithic.
Finds of tools in southern Hesse in Rüsselsheim suggest the presence of Pleistocene hunters about 13,000 years ago. A fossil hominid skull that was found in northern Hesse, just outside the village of Rhünda, has been dated at 12,000 years ago.
The Züschen tomb (German: Steinkammergrab von Züschen, sometimes also Lohne-Züschen) is a prehistoric burial monument, located between Lohne and Züschen, near Fritzlar, Hesse, Germany. Classified as a gallery grave or a Hessian-Westphalian stone cist ("hessisch-westfälische Steinkiste"), it is one of the most important megalithic monuments in Central Europe. Dating to c. 3000 BC, it belongs to the Late Neolithic Wartberg culture.
An early Celtic presence in what is now Hesse is indicated by a mid-5th-century BC La Tène-style burial uncovered at Glauberg. The region was later settled by the Germanic Chatti tribe around the 1st century BC, and the name "Hesse" is a continuation of that tribal name.
The ancient Romans had a military camp in Dorlar, and in Waldgirmes directly on the eastern outskirts of Wetzlar was a civil settlement under construction. Presumably, the provincial government for the occupied territories of the right bank of Germania was planned at this location. The governor of Germania, at least temporarily, likely had resided here. The settlement appears to have been abandoned by the Romans after the devastating Battle of the Teutoburg Forest failed in the year AD 9. The Chatti were also involved in the Revolt of the Batavi in AD 69.
Hessia, from the early 7th century on, served as a buffer between areas dominated by the Saxons (to the north) and the Franks, who brought the area to the south under their control in the early sixth century and occupied Thuringia (to the east) in 531. Hessia occupies the northwestern part of the modern German state of Hesse; its borders were not clearly delineated. Its geographic center is Fritzlar; it extends in the southeast to Hersfeld on the Fulda River, in the north to past Kassel and up to the rivers Diemel and Weser. To the west, it occupies the valleys of the Rivers Eder and Lahn (the latter until it turns south). It measured roughly 90 kilometers north–south, and 80 north-west.
The area around Fritzlar shows evidence of significant pagan belief from the 1st century on. Geismar was a particular focus of such activity; it was continuously occupied from the Roman period on, with a settlement from the Roman period, which itself had a predecessor from the 5th century BC. Excavations have produced a horse burial and bronze artifacts. A possible religious cult may have centered on a natural spring in Geismar, called "Heilgenbron"; the name "Geismar" (possibly "energetic pool") itself may be derived from that spring.
The village of , now a part of Gudensberg near Fritzlar and less than ten miles from Geismar, was likely an ancient religious center; the basaltic outcrop of Gudensberg is named after Wodan, and a two-meter tall quartzite megalith called the "Wotanstein" is at the center of the village.
By the mid-7th century, the Franks had established themselves as overlords, which is suggested by archeological evidence of burials, and they built fortifications in various places, including Christenberg. By 690, they took direct control over Hessia, apparently to counteract expansion by the Saxons, who built fortifications in Gaulskopf and Eresburg across the River Diemel, the northern boundary of Hessia. The Büraburg (which already had a Frankish settlement in the sixth century) was one of the places the Franks fortified to resist the Saxon pressure, and according to John-Henry Clay, the Büraburg was "probably the largest man-made construction seen in Hessia for at least seven hundred years". Walls and trenches totaling one kilometer in length were made, and they enclosed "8 hectares of a spur that offered a commanding view over Fritzlar and the densely-populated heart of Hessia".
Following Saxon incursions into Chattish territory in the 7th century, two "gaue" had been established; a Frankish one, comprising an area around Fritzlar and Kassel, and a Saxonian one. In the 9th century, the Saxon Hessengau also came under the rule of the Franconians.
Holy Roman Empire.
In the 12th century, Hessengau was passed to Thuringia.
In the War of the Thuringian Succession (1247–1264), Hesse gained independence and became a Landgraviate within the Holy Roman Empire. It shortly rose to primary importance under Landgrave Philip the Magnanimous, who was one of the leaders of German Protestantism. After Philip's death in 1567, the territory was divided among his four sons from his first marriage (Philip was a bigamist) into four lines: Hesse-Kassel (or Hesse-Cassel), Hesse-Darmstadt, Hesse-Rheinfels, and the also previously existing Hesse-Marburg. As the latter two lines died out quite soon (1583 and 1605, respectively), Hesse-Kassel and Hesse-Darmstadt were the two core states within the Hessian lands. Several collateral lines split off during the centuries, such as in 1622, when Hesse-Homburg split off from Hesse-Darmstadt. In the late 16th century, Kassel adopted Calvinism, while Darmstadt remained Lutheran and subsequently the two lines often found themselves on different sides of a conflict, most notably in the disputes over Hesse-Marburg and in the Thirty Years' War, when Darmstadt fought on the side of the Emperor, while Kassel sided with Sweden and France.
The Landgrave Frederick II (1720–1785) ruled as a benevolent despot, from 1760 to 1785. He combined Enlightenment ideas with Christian values, cameralist plans for central control of the economy, and a militaristic approach toward diplomacy. He funded the depleted treasury of the poor government by loaning 19,000 soldiers in complete military formations to Great Britain to fight in North America during the American Revolutionary War, 1776–1783. These soldiers, commonly known as Hessians, fought under the British flag. The British used the Hessians in several conflicts, including in the Irish Rebellion of 1798. For further revenue, the soldiers were loaned to other places as well. Most were conscripted, with their pay going to the Landgrave.
Modern history.
The ruler of Hesse-Kassel was elevated to the status of Prince-Elector in 1803, but this remained without effect, as the Holy Roman Empire was disbanded in 1806. The territory was annexed by Napoleon to the Kingdom of Westphalia in 1806, but restored to the Elector in 1813. While other Electors had gained other titles, becoming either Kings or Grand Dukes, the Elector of Hesse-Kassel alone retained the anachronistic title. The name survived in the term "Kurhessen", denoting the region around Kassel. In 1866, it was annexed by Prussia, together with the Free City of Frankfurt, the small Landgraviate of Hesse-Homburg, and the Duchy of Nassau, which were then combined into the province of Hesse-Nassau.
Hesse-Darmstadt was elevated by Napoleon to the status of a Grand Duchy in 1806, becoming the Grand Duchy of Hesse. In the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, it fought on the side of Austria against Prussia, but retained its autonomy in defeat because a greater part of the country was situated south of the Main River and Prussia did not dare to expand beyond the Main line, as this might have provoked France. However, the parts of Hesse-Darmstadt north of the Main (the region around the town of Gießen, commonly called "Oberhessen") were incorporated in the Norddeutscher Bund, a tight federation of German states, established by Prussia in 1867. In 1871, after France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, the rest of the Grand Duchy joined the German Empire. Around the turn of the 20th century, Darmstadt was one of the centres of the Jugendstil. Until 1907, the Grand Duchy of Hesse used the Hessian red and white lion as its coat-of-arms.
The revolution of 1918 transformed Hesse-Darmstadt from a monarchy to a republic, which officially renamed itself "Volksstaat Hessen" (People's State of Hesse). The parts of Hesse-Darmstadt on the western banks of the Rhine (province Rheinhessen) were occupied by French troops until 1930 under the terms of the Versailles peace treaty that officially ended World War I in 1919. In 1929 the Principality of Waldeck was dissolved and incorporated into Hesse-Nassau.
After World War II, the Hessian territory west of the Rhine was again occupied by France, whereas the rest of the region was part of the US occupation zone. The French separated their part of Hesse from the rest of the region and incorporated it into the newly founded state of Rhineland-Palatinate (Rheinland-Pfalz). The United States, on the other side, proclaimed the state of Greater Hesse ("Groß-Hessen") on 19 September 1945, out of Hesse-Darmstadt and most of the former Prussian province of Hesse-Nassau.
On 4 December 1946, Greater Hesse was officially renamed Hessen.
Hesse in the 1940s received more than a million displaced ethnic Germans.
Due to its proximity to the Inner German border, Hesse became an important location of NATO installations in the 1950s, especially military bases of the US V Corps and United States Army Europe.
The first elected minister president of Hesse was Christian Stock, followed by Georg-August Zinn (both Social Democrats). The German Social Democrats gained an absolute majority in 1962 and pursued progressive policies with the so-called "Großer Hessenplan". The CDU gained a relative majority in the 1974 elections, but the Social Democrats continued to govern in a coalition with the FDP. Hesse was first governed by the CDU under Walter Wallmann during 1987–1991, replaced by a SPD-Greens coalition under Hans Eichel during 1991–1999. From 1999, Hesse was governed by the CDU under Roland Koch (retired 2010) and Volker Bouffier (incumbent as of 2020).
Frankfurt during the 1960s to 1990s developed into one of the major cities of West Germany. As of 2016, 12% of the total population of Hesse lived in the city of Frankfurt.
Geography.
Situated in west-central Germany, the state of Hesse borders the German states of Lower Saxony, Thuringia, Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate, and North Rhine-Westphalia (starting in the north and proceeding clockwise).
Most of the population of Hesse lives in the southern part, in the Rhine Main Area. The principal cities of the area include Frankfurt am Main, Wiesbaden, Darmstadt, Offenbach, Hanau, Gießen, Wetzlar, and Limburg. Other major towns in Hesse are Fulda in the east, and Kassel and Marburg an der Lahn in the north. The densely populated Rhine-Main region is much better developed than the rural areas in the middle and northern parts of Hesse.
The most important rivers in Hesse are the Fulda and Eder Rivers in the north, the Lahn in the central part of Hesse, and the Main and Rhine in the south. The countryside is hilly and the numerous mountain ranges include the Rhön, the Westerwald, the Taunus, the Vogelsberg, the Knüll and the Spessart.
The Rhine borders Hesse on the southwest without running through the state, only one oxbow lake—the so-called Alt-Rhein—runs through Hesse. The mountain range between the Main and the Neckar Rivers is called the Odenwald. The plain between the rivers Main, Rhine, and Neckar, and the Odenwald Mountains is called the Ried.
Hesse is the greenest state in Germany, as forest covers 42% of the state.
Administration.
Hesse is a unitary state governed directly by the Hessian government in the capital city Wiesbaden, partially through regional vicarious authorities called "Regierungspräsidien". Municipal parliaments are, however, elected independently from the state government by the Hessian people. Local municipalities enjoy a considerable degree of home rule.
Districts.
The state is divided into three administrative provinces ("Regierungsbezirke"): Kassel in the north and east, Gießen in the centre, and Darmstadt in the south, the latter being the most populous region with the Frankfurt Rhine-Main agglomeration in its central area. The administrative regions have no legislature of their own, but are executive agencies of the state government.
Hesse is divided into 21 districts (Kreise) and five independent cities, each with their own local governments. They are, shown with abbreviations as used on vehicle number plates:
Independent cities:
Rhenish Hesse.
The term "Rhenish Hesse" () refers to the part of the former Grand Duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt located west of the Rhine. It has not been part of the State of Hesse since 1946 due to divisions in the aftermath of World War II. This province is now part of the State of Rhineland-Palatinate. It is a hilly countryside largely devoted to vineyards; therefore, it is also called the "land of the thousand hills". Its larger towns include Mainz, Worms, Bingen, Alzey, Nieder-Olm, and Ingelheim. Many inhabitants commute to work in Mainz, Wiesbaden, or Frankfurt.
State symbols and politics.
Hesse has been a parliamentary republic since 1918, except during Nazi rule (1933–1945). The German federal system has elements of exclusive federal competences, shared competences, and exclusive competences of the states. Hesse is famous for having a rather brisk style in its politics with the ruling parties being either the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) or the center-left Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). Due to the Hessian electoral laws, the biggest party normally needs a smaller coalition partner.
Head of state.
As Hesse is a partly sovereign federated state, its constitution combines the offices of the head of state and head of government in one office called the Minister-President (German: "Ministerpräsident") which is comparable to the office of a prime minister.
Most recent state election.
In the 2018 state elections the two leading parties, CDU and SPD, lost 11.3% (7 seats) and 10.9% (8 seats) of the vote respectively. The Green party, a member of Hesse's previous governing coalition with CDU, gained 8.7% (16 seats). The largest gains during the election were made by Alternative for Germany (AfD) at 13.1%. As AfD had not passed the 5% threshold in the 2013 state election, this marked its first entry into the Hessian parliament ("Hessischer Landtag"). The two other parties also made gains. The major losses of the two leading parties (whose coalition made up the federal cabinet during the election) closely mirrors the results of the 2018 state elections in Bavaria. In the current parliament the conservative CDU holds 40 seats, the centre-left SPD and the leftist Green party each hold 29 seats, the right-wing AfD holds 19 seats, the liberal FDP party holds 11 seats and the socialist party Die Linke holds 9 seats.
Foreign affairs.
As a member state of the German federation, Hesse does not have a diplomatic service of its own. However, Hesse operates representation offices in such foreign countries as the United States, China, Hungary, Cuba, Russia, Poland, and Iran. These offices are mostly used to represent Hessian interests in cultural and economic affairs. Hesse has also permanent representation offices in Berlin at the federal government of Germany and in Brussels at the institutions of the European Union.
Flag and anthem.
The flag colors of Hesse are red and white. The Hessian coat of arms shows a lion rampant striped with red and white. The official anthem of Hesse is called "Hessenlied" ("Song of Hesse") and was written by Albrecht Brede (music) and Carl Preser (lyrics).
Demographics.
Hesse has a population of over 6 million, nearly 4 million of which is concentrated in the Rhein-Main region (German: "Rhein-Main Gebiet") in the south of the state, an area that includes the most populous city, Frankfurt am Main, the capital Wiesbaden, and Darmstadt and Offenbach. The population of Hesse is predicted to shrink by 4.3% by 2030, with the biggest falls in the north of the state, especially in the area around the city of Kassel. Frankfurt is the fastest growing city with a predicted rise in population of 4.8% by 2030. Frankfurt's growth is driven by its importance as a financial centre and it receives immigrants from all over the world: in 2015 over half of the city's population had an immigrant background.
Vital statistics.
Source:
Language.
German is the official language, but many Hessian people also speak a Rhine Franconian dialect known as "Hessisch".
Education.
The Hessian government has overall responsibility for the education within the state. Hesse has several universities, including Technische Universität Darmstadt, Goethe University Frankfurt, and the University of Marburg, one of the oldest universities in Germany. There are many international schools in Hesse, primarily centred in and around Frankfurt.
Religion.
In 2016 Christianity was the most widespread religion in the state (63%). 40% of Hessians belonged to the Protestant Church in Hesse and Nassau or Evangelical Church of Hesse Electorate-Waldeck (members of the Evangelical Church in Germany), 25% adhered to the Roman Catholic Church, while other Christians constituted some 3%, the third most common religion of the Hessian population is Islam with 7% of the population.
Culture.
Hesse has a rich and varied cultural history, with many important cultural and historical centres and several UNESCO world-heritage sites.
Architecture, art, literature and music.
Darmstadt has a rich cultural heritage as the former seat of the Landgraves and Grand Dukes of Hesse. It is known as centre of the art nouveau Jugendstil and modern architecture and there are also several important examples of 19th century architecture influenced by British and Russian imperial architecture due to close family ties of the Grand Duke's family to the reigning dynasties in London and Saint Petersburg in the Grand Duchy period. Darmstadt is an important centre for music, home of the Darmstädter Ferienkurse for contemporary music and the Jazz Institute Darmstadt, Europe's largest public jazz archive.
Frankfurt am Main is a major international cultural centre. Over 2 million people visit the city's approximately 60 exhibition centres every year. Amongst its most famous art galleries are the Schirn Kunsthalle, a major centre for international modern art, and the Städel, whose large collections include over 3000 paintings, 4000 photographs, and 100,000 drawings including works by Picasso, Monet, Rembrandt and Dürer. Goethe was born in Frankfurt and there is a museum in his birthplace. Frankfurt has many music venues, including an award-winning opera house, the Alte Oper, and the Jahrhunderthalle. Its several theatres include the English Theatre, the largest English-speaking theatre on the European continent.
Kassel has many palaces and parks, including Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe, a Baroque landscape park and UNESCO World Heritage site. The Brothers Grimm lived and worked in Kassel for 30 years and the recently opened Grimmwelt museum explores their lives, works and influence and features their personal copies of the Children's and Household Tales, which are on the UNESCO World Heritage "Memory of the World" Document register. The Fridericianum, built in 1779, is one of the oldest public museums in Europe. Kassel is also home to the "documenta", a large modern art exhibition that has taken place every five years since the 1950s.
The Hessian Ministry of the Arts supports numerous independent cultural initiatives, organisations, and associations as well as artists from many fields including music, literature, theatre and dance, cinema and the new media, graphic art, and exhibitions. International cultural projects aim to further relations with European partners.
UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Hesse has several UNESCO World Heritage sites. These include:
Sports.
Frankfurt hosts the following professional sports teams or clubs:
Frankfurt is host to the classic cycle race Eschborn-Frankfurt City Loop (known as "Rund um den Henninger-Turm" from 1961 to 2008). The city hosts also the annual Frankfurt Marathon and the Ironman Germany.
Outside Frankfurt, notable professional sports teams include SV Darmstadt 98, Marburg Mercenaries, Gießen 46ers, MT Melsungen, VfB Friedberg, and the Kassel Huskies.
TV and radio stations.
The Hessian state broadcasting corporation is called HR (Hessischer Rundfunk). HR is a member of the federal ARD broadcasting association. HR provides a statewide TV channel as well as a range of regional radio stations (HR 1, HR 2, HR 3, HR 4, you fm and HR info). Besides the state run HR, privately run TV stations exist and are an important line of commerce. Among the commercial radio stations that are active in Hesse, Hit Radio FFH, Planet Radio, Harmony FM, Radio BOB and Antenne Frankfurt are the most popular.
Economy.
With Hesse's largest city Frankfurt am Main being home of the European Central Bank (ECB), the German Bundesbank and the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Hesse is home to the financial capital of mainland Europe. Furthermore, Hesse has always been one of the largest and healthiest economies in Germany. Its GDP in 2013 exceeded €236 billion (about US$316 billion). This makes Hesse itself one of the largest economies in Europe and the 38th largest in the world. According to GDP-per-capita figures, Hesse is the wealthiest state (after the city-states Hamburg and Bremen) in Germany with approx. US$52,500.
The Rhine-Main Region has the second largest industrial density in Germany after the Ruhr area. The main economic fields of importance are the chemical and pharmaceutical industries with Sanofi, Merck, Heraeus, Messer Griesheim and Degussa. In the mechanical and automotive engineering field Opel in Rüsselsheim is worth mentioning. Frankfurt is crucial as a financial center, with both the European Central Bank and the Deutsche Bundesbank's headquarters located there. Numerous smaller banks and Deutsche Bank, DZ Bank, KfW Bank, Commerzbank are also headquartered in Frankfurt, with the offices of several international banks also being housed there. Frankfurt is also the location of the most important German stock exchange, the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. Insurance companies have settled mostly in Wiesbaden. The city's largest private employer is the R+V Versicherung, with about 3,900 employees, other major employers are DBV-Winterthur, the SV SparkassenVersicherung and the Delta Lloyd Group. The leather industry is predominantly settled in Offenbach. The company operating Frankfurt Airport is one of the largest employers in Hesse with nearly 22.000 employees. Companies with an international reputation are located outside the Rhine-Main region in Wetzlar. There is the center of the optical, electrical and precision engineering industries, Leitz, Leica, Minox, Hensoldt (Zeiss), Buderus and Brita with several plants in central Hesse. In east Fulda there is the rubber plant (Fulda Reifen). In northern Hesse, in Baunatal, Volkswagen AG has a large factory that manufactures spare parts. Bombardier has a large plant that manufactures Locomotives in Kassel.
The Hochtaunuskreis has the lowest unemployment rate at 3.8% while the independent city of Kassel has the highest rate nationally at 12.1%. In October 2018 the unemployment rate stood at 4.4% and was lower than the national average.
Traffic and public transportation.
Many trans-European and German motorways, high-speed rail lines, and waterways cross Hesse. Frankfurt Airport is Germany's largest and Europe's third-largest airport (after London Heathrow and Paris-Charles de Gaulle). Frankfurt (Main) Hauptbahnhof is Germany's second-busiest railway station by passengers but the busiest in terms of traffic.
Road transport.
Hesse has a dense highway network with a total of 24 motorways. The internationally important motorway routes through Hesse are the A3, A5, and A7. Close to Frankfurt Airport is the Frankfurter Kreuz, Germany's busiest and one of Europe's busiest motorway junctions, where the motorways A3 (Arnhem-Cologne-Frankfurt-Nuremberg-Passau) and A5 (Hattenbach-Frankfurt-Karlsruhe-Basel) intersect. The A5 becomes as wide as four lanes in each direction near the city of Frankfurt am Main, and during the rush-hour, it is possible to use the emergency lanes on the A3 and A5 motorway in the Rhine-Main Region, adding additional lanes. Other major leading Hesse highways are the A4, the A44, the A45, the Federal Highway A66 and the A67. There are also a number of smaller motorways and major trunk roads, some of which are dual carriageways.
Railway transport.
Hesse is accessed by many major rail lines, including the high-speed lines Cologne–Frankfurt and Hanover–Würzburg. Other north-south connections traverse major east–west routes from Wiesbaden and Mainz to Frankfurt and from Hanau and Aschaffenburg to Fulda and Kassel. The Frankfurt Central Station is the most important hub for German trains, with over 1,100 trains per day.
The region around Frankfurt has an extensive S-Bahn network, the S-Bahn Rhein-Main, which is complemented by many regional train connections. In the rest of the country, the rail network is less extensive. Since 2007, the region around Kassel has been served by the RegioTram, a tram-train-concept similar to the Karlsruhe model.
Air transport.
Frankfurt Airport is by far the largest airport in Germany with more than 57 million passengers each year, is and among the world's ten largest. Frankfurt Egelsbach Airport lies to the south, and is frequented by general aviation and private planes. Kassel Airport offers a few flights to holiday destinations, but has struggled to compete. There are also a number of sports airfields. Low-cost airlines, especially Ryanair, use Frankfurt-Hahn Airport as a major base, although the airport is actually located about 100 km from Frankfurt in the neighbouring state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The DFS (German air traffic control) has its headquarters in Langen.


Michalovce District

Michalovce District ("okres Michalovce") is a district in
the Košice Region of eastern Slovakia.
Until 1918, the district was split between the county of Kingdom of Hungary of Zemplín (in the west) and Uh (in the east).


Ettrick Hills

The Ettrick Hills are a range of hills, part of the Southern Uplands of Scotland. They are neighboured to the northwest by the Moffat Hills and are located mainly within the Scottish Borders, however the Dumfries and Galloway border covers the south and southwesterly flanks.
The Hills.
Not strictly defined, the hills form a lightly curving southwest–northeast shape and cover a considerable area. The Ettrick valley to the east separates them from the Craik Forest and the western border follows the A708 road. The large area west of Hawick, southwest of Selkirk and south of Yarrow Water could also be said to be part of the range as well as part of the historic Ettrick Forest. The hills are relatively low-lying for the counties in which they lie, with the highest summit, Ettrick Pen, being 692m, however, unlike other nearby ranges, could be said to follow a definitive direction. The highest hills are on the western extremity of the area.
In a roughly southwest–northeast direction, the hills in the range over 2000 ft are:
Other Information.
The area is renowned for its history, being part of the enormous Ettrick Forest, being the birthplace and frequent literary subject of the 'Ettrick Shepherd', James Hogg as well as the birthplace and workplace of Tibbie Shiel, among other things.
Etymology.
The area has a predominantly early Scots influence. 'Ettrick' is thought by W. F. H. Nicolaisen to be Proto-Indo-European, in reference to the Ettrick Water from where the hills and settlements take their name. Ettrick Pen was known to have different names at the same time, known as "The Penn of Ettrick" and "Hill of Penn of Esdaile Moore" from Tweedsdale and Eskdale respectively.


Merseyside

Merseyside ( ) is a metropolitan and ceremonial county in North West England, with a population of 1.38 million. It encompasses the metropolitan area centred on both banks of the lower reaches of the Mersey Estuary and comprises five metropolitan boroughs: Knowsley, St Helens, Sefton, Wirral and the city of Liverpool. Merseyside, which was created on 1 April 1974 as a result of the Local Government Act 1972, takes its name from the River Mersey.
Merseyside spans of land. It sits within the historic counties of Lancashire and Cheshire, bordering the ceremonial counties of Lancashire (to the north-east), Greater Manchester (to the east), Cheshire (to the south and south-east) and the Irish Sea to the west. North Wales is across the Dee Estuary. There is a mix of high density urban areas, suburbs, semi-rural and rural locations in Merseyside, but overwhelmingly the land use is urban. It has a focused central business district, formed by Liverpool City Centre, but Merseyside is also a polycentric county with five metropolitan districts, each of which has at least one major town centre and outlying suburbs. The Liverpool Urban Area is the fifth most populous conurbation in England and dominates the geographic centre of the county, while the Birkenhead Urban Area dominates the Wirral Peninsula in the south.
In the 12 years following 1974, the county had a two-tier system of local government; district councils shared power with the Merseyside County Council. The county council was abolished in 1986 and so its districts (the metropolitan boroughs) are now effectively unitary authority areas. However, the metropolitan county continues to exist in law and as a geographic frame of reference, and several county-wide services are co-ordinated by authorities and joint-boards, such as Merseytravel (for public transport), Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service and the Merseyside Police (for law-enforcement); as a ceremonial county, Merseyside has a Lord Lieutenant and a High Sheriff. As the Lancashire county palatine boundaries remain the same as the historic boundaries, the High Sheriff of Merseyside, along with those of Lancashire and Greater Manchester are appointed "within the Duchy and County Palatine of Lancaster".
The boroughs of Merseyside are joined by the neighbouring borough of Halton in Cheshire to form the Liverpool City Region, which is a local enterprise partnership and combined authority area.
Merseyside is an amalgamation of 22 former local government districts from the former administrative counties of Lancashire, Cheshire and six autonomous county boroughs centred on Birkenhead, Bootle, Liverpool, Southport, St Helens and Wallasey.
History.
Merseyside was designated as a "Special Review" area in the Local Government Act 1958, and the Local Government Commission for England started a review of this area in 1962, based around the core county boroughs of Liverpool, Bootle, Birkenhead and Wallasey. Further areas, including Widnes and Runcorn, were added to the Special Review Area by Order in 1965. Draft proposals were published in 1965, but the commission never completed its final proposals as it was abolished in 1966.
Instead, a Royal Commission was set up to review English local government entirely, and its report (known as the Redcliffe-Maud Report) proposed a much wider Merseyside metropolitan area covering southwest Lancashire and northwest Cheshire, extending as far south as Chester and as far north as the River Ribble. This would have included four districts: Southport/Crosby, Liverpool/Bootle, St Helens/Widnes and Wirral/Chester. In 1970 the Merseyside Passenger Transport Executive (which operates today under the "Merseytravel" brand) was set up, covering Liverpool, Sefton, Wirral and Knowsley, but excluding Southport and St Helens.
The Redcliffe-Maud Report was rejected by the incoming Conservative Party government, but the concept of a two-tier metropolitan area based on the Mersey area was retained. A White Paper was published in 1971. The Local Government Bill presented to Parliament involved a substantial trimming from the White Paper, excluding the northern and southern fringes of the area, excluding Chester, Ellesmere Port (and, unusually, including Southport, whose council had requested to be included). Further alterations took place in Parliament, with Skelmersdale being removed from the area, and a proposed district including St Helens and Huyton being subdivided into what are now the metropolitan boroughs of St Helens and Knowsley.
Merseyside was created on 1 April 1974 from areas previously parts of the administrative counties of Lancashire and Cheshire, along with the county boroughs of Birkenhead, Wallasey, Liverpool, Bootle, and St Helens. Following the creation of Merseyside, Merseytravel expanded to take in St Helens and Southport.
Between 1974 and 1986 the county had a two-tier system of local government with the five boroughs sharing power with the Merseyside County Council. However, in 1986 the government of Margaret Thatcher abolished the county council along with all other metropolitan county councils, and so its boroughs are now effectively unitary authorities.
Geography.
Merseyside is divided into two parts by the Mersey Estuary; the Wirral is located on the west side of the estuary, upon the Wirral Peninsula and the rest of the county is located on the east side of the estuary. The eastern part of Merseyside borders onto Lancashire to the north, Greater Manchester to the east, with both parts of the county bordering Cheshire to the south. The territory comprising the county of Merseyside previously formed part of the administrative counties of Lancashire (east of the River Mersey) and Cheshire (west of the River Mersey). The two parts are linked by the two Mersey Tunnels, the Wirral Line of Merseyrail, and the Mersey Ferry.
Green belt.
Merseyside contains green belt interspersed throughout the county, surrounding the Liverpool urban area, as well as across the Mersey in the Wirral area, with further pockets extending towards and surrounding Southport, as part of the western edge of the North West Green Belt. It was first drawn up from the 1950s. All the county's districts contain some portion of belt.
Identity.
Ipsos MORI polls in the boroughs of Sefton and Wirral in the 2000s showed that in general, residents of these boroughs identified slightly more strongly to Merseyside than to Lancashire or Cheshire respectively, but their affinity to Merseyside was more likely to be "fairly strong" than "very strong".
The towns and suburbs of Bootle, Kirkby, Maghull, Speke and Southport are referenced in the in the 1991 song, It's Grim Up North by the band. KLF.
Local government.
Metropolitan boroughs.
Merseyside comprises the metropolitan boroughs of Liverpool, Knowsley, Sefton, St Helens and Wirral.
County-level functions.
Following the abolition of the county council some local services are run by joint-boards of the five metropolitan boroughs; these include the:
Liverpool City Region.
The Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, which includes the five boroughs and the Borough of Halton headed by a mayor, Steve Rotheram, elected in May 2017.
Economy.
This is a chart of trend of regional gross value added of Merseyside at current basic prices published (pp. 240–253) by "Office for National Statistics" with figures in millions of British Pounds Sterling.
Transport.
Transport in Merseyside consists of travel by roads, rail, air and water. Motorways serving Merseyside include M53 motorway in Wirral, M57 motorway, M58 motorway and M62 motorway. Rail travel is provided by Merseyrail, Network Rail and Wirral Tramway (since 1995) with major stations at Liverpool Lime Street, Liverpool Central, Liverpool James Street and Birkenhead Hamilton Square.
"Merseyrail commuter lines"
Aviation and air travel is provided by Liverpool John Lennon Airport, the oldest provincial airport in the United Kingdom. Major cycling routes on the National Cycle Network (such as National Cycle Route 56 and National Cycle Route 62) pass through the region too such as New Brighton and the Wirral Way. Major bus companies are Stagecoach Merseyside and Arriva North West. Liverpool One bus station serves as a terminus for national coach travel.
Maritime.
Liverpool Cruise Terminal provides long distance passenger cruises, Fred. Olsen Cruise Lines and Cruise & Maritime Voyages using the terminal to depart to Iceland, France, Spain and Norway.
Ferries.
Prince's Landing Stage, Pier Head, Liverpool serves Isle of Man Steam Packet Company summer service to the Isle of Man (and Mersey Ferries).
Twelve Quays, Birkenhead ferry port serves winter Isle of Man ferry service and Stena Line to Belfast, Ireland.
Commercial.
The Port of Liverpool handles most commercial shipping, but several other ports on the Wirral peninsula, such as Great Float and Queen Elizabeth II Dock, operate too.
River and Canal.
The Mersey Ferry has operated since the 1200s, currently between Seacombe, Woodside and Liverpool Pier Head. Leeds and Liverpool Canal and Manchester Ship Canal are the main canal systems.
Sport.
Merseyside is host to several football league football clubs including Liverpool F.C., Everton F.C., Tranmere Rovers F.C. and Southport F.C.. Golf courses include Royal Liverpool Golf Club, Royal Birkdale Golf Club and Southport and Ainsdale Golf Club. Cricket clubs include the historic Aigburth Cricket Ground, Liverpool. Aintree Motor Racing Circuit hosted the British Grand Prix. Aintree Racecourse hosts the Grand National and there is also Haydock Park Racecourse. Totally Wicked Stadium hosts Rugby League and Hoylake hosts sailing (such as Southport 24 Hour Race) and is Britain's premier location for sand yachting. A ski slope facility is found at The Oval (Wirral).