Leitzweiler
Encyclopedia
Leitzweiler is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality
belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde
, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld
district
in Rhineland-Palatinate
, Germany
. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Baumholder
, whose seat is in the like-named town
.
, roughly 3 km southeast of Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
and 9 km west of Baumholder. The municipal area measures 3.02 km², of which 30% is wooded.
.
; the lion in the upper half of the escutcheon is drawn from the arms formerly borne by the Counts of Veldenz. Leitzweiler – older forms of the name were Leideßweiler, Leydesweiler or Laitzweiler – was certainly very small at this time, not so much a village as a farm, and with few inhabitants. In 1444, the tiny centre passed by inheritance to the Duchy of Palatinate-Zweibrücken
, and within this was assigned to the Oberamt of Lichtenberg. In 1533, the Lords of Oberstein were enfeoffed with Leitzweiler, along with Mettweiler
, Fohren and Linden
. A 1539 agreement between the Oberamt of Lichtenberg and the Lords of Oberstein set forth clearly that authority in civil, personal and practical matters lay with the Duchy of Palatinate-Zweibrücken. The Lordship of Oberstein, however, did not hold with the arrangement very long, for it was out of force by 1559, and thereafter Leitzweiler was a fief held by the Lordship of Wertenstein. At first, the Lordship comprised Leitzweiler, Heimbach
, Weiersbach
, Namborn
, Ellweiler
and Bleiderdingen
. Near the last-named place stood the Wertensteiner Schloss, the Lordship’s seat. In 1570, Leitzweiler burnt down utterly, although by 1587, Laitsweiler der Hof (Hof means “farm” in German
) once again boasted four houses.
In 1620, a new agreement between Palatinate-Zweibrücken and Wertenstein came into force. This one set forth that authority in civil, personal and practical matters lay with the Lordship of Wertenstein, but high jurisdiction
was reserved to Palatinate-Zweibrücken. Among other things dealt with in the agreement was the question of appearances at the weekly market in Baumholder by the villagers of Leitzweiler. These were compulsory, and failure to show up there on market day was punished, even if the villagers were bound to do compulsory labour in Wertenstein that same day. The new agreement rectified this, and after it came into force, failure to appear at Baumholder Market was no longer punishable, as long as a Wertenstein official could show a certificate indicating that there was compulsory labour to be done that day.
The Thirty Years' War
(1618-1648) brought plundering, devastation and destruction to Leitzweiler and its surrounding area. In their wake came hunger and sickness and the resulting unending decimation of the population. In 1635, Leitzweiler and Heimbach burnt down utterly. According to one account, people from Leitzweiler fled to Castle Birkenfeld. It was 1664 before there were once again inhabitants in either Leitzweiler or Heimbach – two each. The man in Leitzweiler, according to an oft-told story, was not even German, but rather a French
soldier named Werle, and indeed, the first families listed in the Hoppstädten-Weiersbach Family Book with the surname Werle were all in Leitzweiler. Since then, the name has spread, so that there is now hardly a village in the local area in which the name Werle is not amply represented.
The new village that sprang up after the Thirty Years' War was built on Leitzweiler’s current site, but the village had thereby shifted its location somewhat from where the old one had been. It is believed that the old Leitzweiler lay some 100 or 200 m nearer Heimbach
.
In 1667, Lorraine finally managed to gain control over the Lordship of Wertenstein, thus ending the centuries-long squabbles with Oberstein or Palatinate-Zweibrücken. Under Lorraine, Leitzweiler was grouped into the Upper Amt of Schaumburg.
The last Lord of Castle Wertenstein died in 1745. In the years that followed (1748 to 1754), his offspring sold the lordship to Tholey Abbey
, which thus acquired the tithing rights. Moreover, the Abbey exercised low jurisdiction, while high jurisdiction, as had been so before, lay with the Duke of Lorraine. Appeal
s, therefore, had to be heard in Lorraine’s capital, Nancy. In 1766, the last Duke of Lorraine died, and France came into the Duke’s inheritance. Only a few years later, though, the Duke of Zweibrücken brokered a deal with France whereby Zweibrücken traded certain places in Alsace
for the villages of Freisen
, Heimbach, Weiersbach, Bleiderdingen and Leitzweiler. The Duke thereby managed to fill some of the territorial gaps in his holdings in 1783.
In November 1792, three years after the French Revolution
, French Revolutionary troops
descended on the Leitzweiler area. The French burnt Leitzweiler down, but this might have been a case of “mistaken identity”. It seems that the French soldiers were to have burnt Eitzweiler, another village a few kilometres away, today a constituent community of Freisen in the Saarland. To offset Leitzweiler’s loss, Eitzweiler was ordered to deliver to Leitzweiler oakwood so that the mistakenly burnt village could rise from its ashes. This, however, was not what Leitzweiler got. Instead, the wood delivered to the village was ash, which was not as popular as oak, for house borers
found it quite appetizing. With the Treaty of Campo Formio
in October 1797, the Rhine’s left bank was ceded
to France. All lordly holdings were seized by the state and French law was imposed. Leitzweiler was part of the Department of Sarre and in the canton
of Birkenfeld.
The French campaign went further, putting an end to the thousand-year-old Holy Roman Empire
in 1806. It was only in 1813 that Napoleon actually suffered a decisive defeat in the Battle of Leipzig
(“the Battle of the Nations”), which sent the French army fleeing to Paris
, with the Prussia
ns right behind them all the way. The Rhine’s left bank was thus freed of French rule, and by a treaty concluded in May 1814, it was placed under a joint Imperial-Royal Austrian
and Royal Bavarian
“State Administrative Commission” (Landesverwaltungskommission). Leitzweiler lay in the Birkenfeld district in the canton of Baumholder in the Amtsbezirk of Berschweiler.
Representatives from Europe’s powers gathered in 1814 and 1815 at the Congress of Vienna
to decide the Continent’s political shape in the post-Napoleonic era. In April 1815, great parts of the now leaderless lands out of which the French had been driven passed to Prussia. The newly formed cantons of Sankt Wendel, Grumbach and Baumholder – within which lay Leitzweiler – were, however, given by the concluding act of the Congress to the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld
as compensation for having helped the allies in the Napoleonic Wars.
In September 1816, Saxe-Coburg took charge of its new territory with its 25,000 souls and area of 8.25 square miles. Beginning in 1819, this territory, which went by the name Principality of Lichtenberg
, had its seat of government in Sankt Wendel
. Meanwhile, Weiersbach
, which lay (and still lies) to Leitzweiler’s north, was, along with great parts of today’s Birkenfeld district, assigned to the Principality of Birkenfeld, an exclave of the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg, most of whose territory was in what is now northwest Germany, with a coastline on the North Sea
. Leitzweiler thereby became a border village between these two principalities.
In 1832, the Hambach Festival was held, attended by 20,000 people who demonstrated for freedom, democracy
, and national unity. At the same time, riot
s broke out in Sankt Wendel, leading the Duke to decide to sell the Principality of Lichtenberg to Prussia. The agreed price was 2,100,000 Thaler
, and thus, in 1834, Leitzweiler remained a border village, but now in Prussian territory, while the Weiersbach side was, as it had been before, the Principality of Birkenfeld in the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg. Prussia grouped the new acquisition as the Sankt Wendel district into the Regierungsbezirk
of Trier. Even today, an old border stone stands as a reminder of this time. The great stone bears the letters “KP” (for Königreich Preußen – “Kingdom of Prussia”) on the Leitzweiler side, and “GO” (for Großherzogtum Oldenburg – “Grand Duchy of Oldenburg”) on the Weiersbach side.
As a result of Germany’s defeat in the First World War and the subsequent 1919 Treaty of Versailles
, the Sankt Wendel district was split: 26 of the 94 municipalities within it were grouped into the Saar
, a League of Nations mandate
. Leitzweiler was excluded from this cession – by a couple of kilometres – and thenceforth formed along with the other 67 excluded municipalities the “Restkreis St. Wendel-Baumholder”, with the first syllable of Restkreis having the same meaning as in English, in the sense of “left over”. The “leftover” district’s seat was in Baumholder.
Oldenburg and Prussia still existed in one form or another right through Imperial
and Weimar
times, but the Third Reich
put an end to the former in 1937 by merging it with the latter. Together with the Restkreis, a new Prussian Birkenfeld district was established, to which Leitzweiler belongs to this day.
Prussia itself was abolished as any kind of political entity after the Second World War with the onset of Allied
occupation. Since 1946, Leitzweiler has been part of the then newly founded state
of Rhineland-Palatinate
.
Ecclesiastically, Leitzweiler was long part of the Catholic parish of Bleiderdingen. Until 1932, Leitzweiler’s dead were even buried in Bleiderdingen. Only then did Leitzweiler get its own graveyard. In 1947, the municipality was transferred from the parish of Bleiderdingen to the parish of Rückweiler. The inhabitants undertook a campaign to collect signatures, but to no avail. Many villagers registered their protest by attending church in Bleiderdingen; some even went to Heimbach.
at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairman.
The municipality’s arms
might in English heraldic
language be described thus: Per fess argent a demilion azure armed and langued gules, and azure a garb of rye Or.
The lion is a reference to the village’s former allegiance to the County of Veldenz. The ryesheaf (“garb of rye”) symbolizes the village’s former agricultural
character. It may be worth noting, though, that nowadays there is not even one farmer in Leitzweiler.
(Kaiserslautern
–Trier
) through either the Freisen
or the Birkenfeld
interchange
.
, where almost all trains that call are Regionalbahn
services. Regular rail connections, however, are available at Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
in the outlying centre of Neubrücke.
is roughly an hour’s drive away. The next nearest airport
is Saarbrücken Airport
.
Municipalities of Germany
Municipalities are the lowest level of territorial division in Germany. This may be the fourth level of territorial division in Germany, apart from those states which include Regierungsbezirke , where municipalities then become the fifth level.-Overview:With more than 3,400,000 inhabitants, the...
belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde
Verbandsgemeinde
A Verbandsgemeinde is an administrative unit in the German Bundesländer of Rhineland-Palatinate and Saxony-Anhalt.-Rhineland-Palatinate:...
, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld
Birkenfeld (district)
Birkenfeld is a district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is bounded by the districts of Sankt Wendel , Trier-Saarburg, Bernkastel-Wittlich, Rhein-Hunsrück, Bad Kreuznach and Kusel.- History :...
district
Districts of Germany
The districts of Germany are known as , except in the states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein where they are known simply as ....
in Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz. English speakers also commonly refer to the state by its German name, Rheinland-Pfalz ....
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Baumholder
Baumholder (Verbandsgemeinde)
Baumholder is a Verbandsgemeinde in the district of Birkenfeld, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. The seat of the Verbandsgemeinde is in Baumholder....
, whose seat is in the like-named town
Baumholder
Baumholder is a town in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, in the Westrich, an historic region that encompasses areas in both Germany and France...
.
Location
Leitzweiler lies near the state boundary with the SaarlandSaarland
Saarland is one of the sixteen states of Germany. The capital is Saarbrücken. It has an area of 2570 km² and 1,045,000 inhabitants. In both area and population, it is the smallest state in Germany other than the city-states...
, roughly 3 km southeast of Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
and 9 km west of Baumholder. The municipal area measures 3.02 km², of which 30% is wooded.
Municipality’s name
Leitzweiler was founded in the 8th or 9th century by nobility. At that time, all the places ending in —weiler were founded as a result of the growth in population. In Leitzweiler’s case, the leading syllable would give a clue as to the founder’s name. It was likely Leudoin, for this was a very common name in the Early Middle AgesEarly Middle Ages
The Early Middle Ages was the period of European history lasting from the 5th century to approximately 1000. The Early Middle Ages followed the decline of the Western Roman Empire and preceded the High Middle Ages...
.
History
In 1440, Leitzweiler belonged to the County of Veldenz, and the Counts of Dhaun held it as a fief. This time is recalled in Leitzweiler’s civic coat of armsCoat of arms
A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...
; the lion in the upper half of the escutcheon is drawn from the arms formerly borne by the Counts of Veldenz. Leitzweiler – older forms of the name were Leideßweiler, Leydesweiler or Laitzweiler – was certainly very small at this time, not so much a village as a farm, and with few inhabitants. In 1444, the tiny centre passed by inheritance to the Duchy of Palatinate-Zweibrücken
Palatinate-Zweibrücken
Palatinate-Zweibrücken is a former state of the Holy Roman Empire. Its capital was Zweibrücken.-Overview:→ History before 1394 see main article County of Zweibrücken→ History before 1444 see main article County of Veldenz...
, and within this was assigned to the Oberamt of Lichtenberg. In 1533, the Lords of Oberstein were enfeoffed with Leitzweiler, along with Mettweiler
Mettweiler
Mettweiler is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, Fohren and Linden
Fohren-Linden
Fohren-Linden is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
. A 1539 agreement between the Oberamt of Lichtenberg and the Lords of Oberstein set forth clearly that authority in civil, personal and practical matters lay with the Duchy of Palatinate-Zweibrücken. The Lordship of Oberstein, however, did not hold with the arrangement very long, for it was out of force by 1559, and thereafter Leitzweiler was a fief held by the Lordship of Wertenstein. At first, the Lordship comprised Leitzweiler, Heimbach
Heimbach, Rhineland-Palatinate
Heimbach is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, Namborn
Namborn
Namborn is a municipality in the district of Sankt Wendel, in Saarland, Germany. It is situated approx. 7 km north of Sankt Wendel, and 25 km southwest of Idar-Oberstein....
, Ellweiler
Ellweiler
Ellweiler is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
and Bleiderdingen
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
. Near the last-named place stood the Wertensteiner Schloss, the Lordship’s seat. In 1570, Leitzweiler burnt down utterly, although by 1587, Laitsweiler der Hof (Hof means “farm” in German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
) once again boasted four houses.
In 1620, a new agreement between Palatinate-Zweibrücken and Wertenstein came into force. This one set forth that authority in civil, personal and practical matters lay with the Lordship of Wertenstein, but high jurisdiction
Blood court
Blood Court or high justice in the Holy Roman Empire referred to the right of a Vogt to hold a criminal court inflicting bodily punishment, including the death penalty.Not every Vogt held the blood court...
was reserved to Palatinate-Zweibrücken. Among other things dealt with in the agreement was the question of appearances at the weekly market in Baumholder by the villagers of Leitzweiler. These were compulsory, and failure to show up there on market day was punished, even if the villagers were bound to do compulsory labour in Wertenstein that same day. The new agreement rectified this, and after it came into force, failure to appear at Baumholder Market was no longer punishable, as long as a Wertenstein official could show a certificate indicating that there was compulsory labour to be done that day.
The Thirty Years' War
Thirty Years' War
The Thirty Years' War was fought primarily in what is now Germany, and at various points involved most countries in Europe. It was one of the most destructive conflicts in European history....
(1618-1648) brought plundering, devastation and destruction to Leitzweiler and its surrounding area. In their wake came hunger and sickness and the resulting unending decimation of the population. In 1635, Leitzweiler and Heimbach burnt down utterly. According to one account, people from Leitzweiler fled to Castle Birkenfeld. It was 1664 before there were once again inhabitants in either Leitzweiler or Heimbach – two each. The man in Leitzweiler, according to an oft-told story, was not even German, but rather a French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
soldier named Werle, and indeed, the first families listed in the Hoppstädten-Weiersbach Family Book with the surname Werle were all in Leitzweiler. Since then, the name has spread, so that there is now hardly a village in the local area in which the name Werle is not amply represented.
The new village that sprang up after the Thirty Years' War was built on Leitzweiler’s current site, but the village had thereby shifted its location somewhat from where the old one had been. It is believed that the old Leitzweiler lay some 100 or 200 m nearer Heimbach
Heimbach, Rhineland-Palatinate
Heimbach is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
.
In 1667, Lorraine finally managed to gain control over the Lordship of Wertenstein, thus ending the centuries-long squabbles with Oberstein or Palatinate-Zweibrücken. Under Lorraine, Leitzweiler was grouped into the Upper Amt of Schaumburg.
The last Lord of Castle Wertenstein died in 1745. In the years that followed (1748 to 1754), his offspring sold the lordship to Tholey Abbey
Tholey Abbey
Tholey Abbey in Tholey, in the district of Sankt Wendel in Saarland, is a Benedictine monastery dedicated to Saint Maurice. It is part of the Beuronese Congregation within the Benedictine Confederation.-History:...
, which thus acquired the tithing rights. Moreover, the Abbey exercised low jurisdiction, while high jurisdiction, as had been so before, lay with the Duke of Lorraine. Appeal
Appeal
An appeal is a petition for review of a case that has been decided by a court of law. The petition is made to a higher court for the purpose of overturning the lower court's decision....
s, therefore, had to be heard in Lorraine’s capital, Nancy. In 1766, the last Duke of Lorraine died, and France came into the Duke’s inheritance. Only a few years later, though, the Duke of Zweibrücken brokered a deal with France whereby Zweibrücken traded certain places in Alsace
Alsace
Alsace is the fifth-smallest of the 27 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the seventh-most densely populated region in France and third most densely populated region in metropolitan France, with ca. 220 inhabitants per km²...
for the villages of Freisen
Freisen
Freisen is a municipality in the district of Sankt Wendel , in Saarland, Germany. It is situated approx. 12 km northeast of Sankt Wendel, and 20 km southwest of Idar-Oberstein. The greater Freisen/Oberkirchen area is noted for its Turkish Cuisine, particularly the Donner Kebab...
, Heimbach, Weiersbach, Bleiderdingen and Leitzweiler. The Duke thereby managed to fill some of the territorial gaps in his holdings in 1783.
In November 1792, three years after the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
, French Revolutionary troops
French Revolutionary Wars
The French Revolutionary Wars were a series of major conflicts, from 1792 until 1802, fought between the French Revolutionary government and several European states...
descended on the Leitzweiler area. The French burnt Leitzweiler down, but this might have been a case of “mistaken identity”. It seems that the French soldiers were to have burnt Eitzweiler, another village a few kilometres away, today a constituent community of Freisen in the Saarland. To offset Leitzweiler’s loss, Eitzweiler was ordered to deliver to Leitzweiler oakwood so that the mistakenly burnt village could rise from its ashes. This, however, was not what Leitzweiler got. Instead, the wood delivered to the village was ash, which was not as popular as oak, for house borers
Common furniture beetle
The common furniture beetle or common house borer is a woodboring beetle. In the larval stage it bores in wood and feeds upon it. Adult Anobium punctatum measure 2.7–4.5 mm in length. They have brown ellipsodial bodies with a pronotum resembling a monk's cowl .-Life cycle:Adults do not...
found it quite appetizing. With the Treaty of Campo Formio
Treaty of Campo Formio
The Treaty of Campo Formio was signed on 18 October 1797 by Napoleon Bonaparte and Count Philipp von Cobenzl as representatives of revolutionary France and the Austrian monarchy...
in October 1797, the Rhine’s left bank was ceded
Cession
The act of Cession, or to cede, is the assignment of property to another entity. In international law it commonly refers to land transferred by treaty...
to France. All lordly holdings were seized by the state and French law was imposed. Leitzweiler was part of the Department of Sarre and in the canton
Cantons of France
The cantons of France are territorial subdivisions of the French Republic's 342 arrondissements and 101 departments.Apart from their role as organizational units in certain aspects of the administration of public services and justice, the chief purpose of the cantons today is to serve as...
of Birkenfeld.
The French campaign went further, putting an end to the thousand-year-old Holy Roman Empire
Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire was a realm that existed from 962 to 1806 in Central Europe.It was ruled by the Holy Roman Emperor. Its character changed during the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period, when the power of the emperor gradually weakened in favour of the princes...
in 1806. It was only in 1813 that Napoleon actually suffered a decisive defeat in the Battle of Leipzig
Battle of Leipzig
The Battle of Leipzig or Battle of the Nations, on 16–19 October 1813, was fought by the coalition armies of Russia, Prussia, Austria and Sweden against the French army of Napoleon. Napoleon's army also contained Polish and Italian troops as well as Germans from the Confederation of the Rhine...
(“the Battle of the Nations”), which sent the French army fleeing to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, with the Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
ns right behind them all the way. The Rhine’s left bank was thus freed of French rule, and by a treaty concluded in May 1814, it was placed under a joint Imperial-Royal Austrian
Habsburg Monarchy
The Habsburg Monarchy covered the territories ruled by the junior Austrian branch of the House of Habsburg , and then by the successor House of Habsburg-Lorraine , between 1526 and 1867/1918. The Imperial capital was Vienna, except from 1583 to 1611, when it was moved to Prague...
and Royal Bavarian
Kingdom of Bavaria
The Kingdom of Bavaria was a German state that existed from 1806 to 1918. The Bavarian Elector Maximilian IV Joseph of the House of Wittelsbach became the first King of Bavaria in 1806 as Maximilian I Joseph. The monarchy would remain held by the Wittelsbachs until the kingdom's dissolution in 1918...
“State Administrative Commission” (Landesverwaltungskommission). Leitzweiler lay in the Birkenfeld district in the canton of Baumholder in the Amtsbezirk of Berschweiler.
Representatives from Europe’s powers gathered in 1814 and 1815 at the Congress of Vienna
Congress of Vienna
The Congress of Vienna was a conference of ambassadors of European states chaired by Klemens Wenzel von Metternich, and held in Vienna from September, 1814 to June, 1815. The objective of the Congress was to settle the many issues arising from the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars,...
to decide the Continent’s political shape in the post-Napoleonic era. In April 1815, great parts of the now leaderless lands out of which the French had been driven passed to Prussia. The newly formed cantons of Sankt Wendel, Grumbach and Baumholder – within which lay Leitzweiler – were, however, given by the concluding act of the Congress to the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld
Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld
The Duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld was one of the Saxon Duchies held by the Ernestine line of the Wettin Dynasty. Established in the 17th century, the Saxe-Coburg-Saalfield line lasted until the reshuffle of Ernestine territories that occurred following the extinction of the Saxe-Gotha line in...
as compensation for having helped the allies in the Napoleonic Wars.
In September 1816, Saxe-Coburg took charge of its new territory with its 25,000 souls and area of 8.25 square miles. Beginning in 1819, this territory, which went by the name Principality of Lichtenberg
Principality of Lichtenberg
The Principality of Lichtenberg was a small state of the German Confederation owned by a branch of the Saxe-Coburgs which was sold to Prussia and incorporated into the Rhine Province in 1834...
, had its seat of government in Sankt Wendel
Sankt Wendel
St. Wendel is a municipality in northeastern Saarland. It is situated on the river Blies 36 km northeast of Saarbrücken, the capital of Saarland, and is named after Saint Wendelin of Trier.- Geography :...
. Meanwhile, Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, which lay (and still lies) to Leitzweiler’s north, was, along with great parts of today’s Birkenfeld district, assigned to the Principality of Birkenfeld, an exclave of the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg, most of whose territory was in what is now northwest Germany, with a coastline on the North Sea
North Sea
In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean. In the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively...
. Leitzweiler thereby became a border village between these two principalities.
In 1832, the Hambach Festival was held, attended by 20,000 people who demonstrated for freedom, democracy
Democracy
Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...
, and national unity. At the same time, riot
Riot
A riot is a form of civil disorder characterized often by what is thought of as disorganized groups lashing out in a sudden and intense rash of violence against authority, property or people. While individuals may attempt to lead or control a riot, riots are thought to be typically chaotic and...
s broke out in Sankt Wendel, leading the Duke to decide to sell the Principality of Lichtenberg to Prussia. The agreed price was 2,100,000 Thaler
Thaler
The Thaler was a silver coin used throughout Europe for almost four hundred years. Its name lives on in various currencies as the dollar or tolar. Etymologically, "Thaler" is an abbreviation of "Joachimsthaler", a coin type from the city of Joachimsthal in Bohemia, where some of the first such...
, and thus, in 1834, Leitzweiler remained a border village, but now in Prussian territory, while the Weiersbach side was, as it had been before, the Principality of Birkenfeld in the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg. Prussia grouped the new acquisition as the Sankt Wendel district into the Regierungsbezirk
Regierungsbezirk
In Germany, a Government District, in German: Regierungsbezirk – is a subdivision of certain federal states .They are above the Kreise, Landkreise, and kreisfreie Städte...
of Trier. Even today, an old border stone stands as a reminder of this time. The great stone bears the letters “KP” (for Königreich Preußen – “Kingdom of Prussia”) on the Leitzweiler side, and “GO” (for Großherzogtum Oldenburg – “Grand Duchy of Oldenburg”) on the Weiersbach side.
As a result of Germany’s defeat in the First World War and the subsequent 1919 Treaty of Versailles
Treaty of Versailles
The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...
, the Sankt Wendel district was split: 26 of the 94 municipalities within it were grouped into the Saar
Saar (League of Nations)
The Territory of the Saar Basin , also referred as the Saar or Saargebiet, was a region of Germany that was occupied and governed by Britain and France from 1920 to 1935 under a League of Nations mandate, with the occupation originally being under the auspices of the Treaty of Versailles...
, a League of Nations mandate
League of Nations mandate
A League of Nations mandate was a legal status for certain territories transferred from the control of one country to another following World War I, or the legal instruments that contained the internationally agreed-upon terms for administering the territory on behalf of the League...
. Leitzweiler was excluded from this cession – by a couple of kilometres – and thenceforth formed along with the other 67 excluded municipalities the “Restkreis St. Wendel-Baumholder”, with the first syllable of Restkreis having the same meaning as in English, in the sense of “left over”. The “leftover” district’s seat was in Baumholder.
Oldenburg and Prussia still existed in one form or another right through Imperial
German Empire
The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...
and Weimar
Weimar Republic
The Weimar Republic is the name given by historians to the parliamentary republic established in 1919 in Germany to replace the imperial form of government...
times, but the Third Reich
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
put an end to the former in 1937 by merging it with the latter. Together with the Restkreis, a new Prussian Birkenfeld district was established, to which Leitzweiler belongs to this day.
Prussia itself was abolished as any kind of political entity after the Second World War with the onset of Allied
Allies of World War II
The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...
occupation. Since 1946, Leitzweiler has been part of the then newly founded state
States of Germany
Germany is made up of sixteen which are partly sovereign constituent states of the Federal Republic of Germany. Land literally translates as "country", and constitutionally speaking, they are constituent countries...
of Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz. English speakers also commonly refer to the state by its German name, Rheinland-Pfalz ....
.
Ecclesiastically, Leitzweiler was long part of the Catholic parish of Bleiderdingen. Until 1932, Leitzweiler’s dead were even buried in Bleiderdingen. Only then did Leitzweiler get its own graveyard. In 1947, the municipality was transferred from the parish of Bleiderdingen to the parish of Rückweiler. The inhabitants undertook a campaign to collect signatures, but to no avail. Many villagers registered their protest by attending church in Bleiderdingen; some even went to Heimbach.
Population development
The following table shows Leitzweiler’s population figures for selected dates since 1609:| Year | Population |
| 1609 | 37 |
| 1623 | 28 |
| 1635-1663 | 0 |
| 1664 | 2 |
| 1816 | 93 |
| 1819 | 105 |
| 1843 | 111 |
| 1861 | 118 |
| 1871 | 153 |
| 1895 | 130 |
| 1926 | 153 |
| 1950 | 180 |
| 1958 | 174 |
| 1961 | 166 |
| 1978 | 132 |
| 1990 | 110 |
| 1992 | 124 |
| 2004 | 130 |
| present | ≈115 |
Municipal council
The council is made up of 6 council members, who were elected by majority votePlurality voting system
The plurality voting system is a single-winner voting system often used to elect executive officers or to elect members of a legislative assembly which is based on single-member constituencies...
at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairman.
Coat of arms
The German blazon reads: In geteiltem Schild oben in Silber ein blauer, rotgezungter und -bewehrter wachsender Löwe, unten in Blau eine goldene, aufrechtstehende Roggengarbe.The municipality’s arms
Coat of arms
A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...
might in English heraldic
Heraldry
Heraldry is the profession, study, or art of creating, granting, and blazoning arms and ruling on questions of rank or protocol, as exercised by an officer of arms. Heraldry comes from Anglo-Norman herald, from the Germanic compound harja-waldaz, "army commander"...
language be described thus: Per fess argent a demilion azure armed and langued gules, and azure a garb of rye Or.
The lion is a reference to the village’s former allegiance to the County of Veldenz. The ryesheaf (“garb of rye”) symbolizes the village’s former agricultural
Agriculture
Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...
character. It may be worth noting, though, that nowadays there is not even one farmer in Leitzweiler.
Road
Leitzweiler can be reached on the Autobahn A 62Bundesautobahn 62
is an autobahn in southwestern Germany, connecting the A 1 with the A 6. It also connects numerous communities throughout the central Hunsrück mountains...
(Kaiserslautern
Kaiserslautern
Kaiserslautern is a city in southwest Germany, located in the Bundesland of Rhineland-Palatinate at the edge of the Palatinate forest . The historic centre dates to the 9th century. It is from Paris, from Frankfurt am Main, and from Luxembourg.Kaiserslautern is home to 99,469 people...
–Trier
Trier
Trier, historically called in English Treves is a city in Germany on the banks of the Moselle. It is the oldest city in Germany, founded in or before 16 BC....
) through either the Freisen
Freisen
Freisen is a municipality in the district of Sankt Wendel , in Saarland, Germany. It is situated approx. 12 km northeast of Sankt Wendel, and 20 km southwest of Idar-Oberstein. The greater Freisen/Oberkirchen area is noted for its Turkish Cuisine, particularly the Donner Kebab...
or the Birkenfeld
Birkenfeld
Birkenfeld is a town and the district seat of the Birkenfeld district in southwest Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is also the seat of the like-named Verbandsgemeinde.-Location:...
interchange
Interchange (road)
In the field of road transport, an interchange is a road junction that typically uses grade separation, and one or more ramps, to permit traffic on at least one highway to pass through the junction without directly crossing any other traffic stream. It differs from a standard intersection, at which...
.
Rail
The nearest railway station is HeimbachHeimbach, Rhineland-Palatinate
Heimbach is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, where almost all trains that call are Regionalbahn
RegionalBahn
The Regionalbahn is a type of local passenger train in Germany.-Service:Regionalbahn trains usually call at all stations on a given line, with the exception of RB trains within S-Bahn networks, these may only call at selected stations...
services. Regular rail connections, however, are available at Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach
Hoppstädten-Weiersbach is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
in the outlying centre of Neubrücke.
Air
Frankfurt-Hahn AirportFrankfurt-Hahn Airport
-Cargo airlines:-Other facilities:AirIT Services AG, a subsidiary of Fraport, has its head office in Building 663 at Hahn Airport.-References:*Active Air Force Bases Within the United States of America on 17 September 1982 USAF Reference Series, Office of Air Force History, United States Air Force,...
is roughly an hour’s drive away. The next nearest airport
Airport
An airport is a location where aircraft such as fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters, and blimps take off and land. Aircraft may be stored or maintained at an airport...
is Saarbrücken Airport
Saarbrücken Airport
-External links:*...
.