Imperial Village
The Imperial Villages (Reichsdörfer, singular Reichsdorf) were the smallest component entities of the Holy Roman Empire.[1] They possessed imperial immediacy, having no lord but the Emperor, but were not estates, were unencircled and did not have representation in the Imperial Diet. Their inhabitants were free men.[2]
The Imperial Villages—relicts of the royal demesne during the era of the Hohenstaufen—were all located in southern and western Germany and in Alsace.[2] Originally there were 120 villages, but this was greatly reduced by the early modern period. At the time of the Reichsdeputationshauptschluss—the final imperial reform—in 1803, there were only five: Gochsheim, Sennfeld, the Free Men of Leutkirche Heide, Soden and Sulzbach. These had preserved their rights of justice and their free status for centuries without force of arms, a "testimony to the progressive 'juridification' of the Reich".[2]
Notes
- ↑ Whaley 2012, p. 44: "the most minuscule and least significant independent entities of the Reich".
- 1 2 3 Whaley 2012, p. 44.
Sources
- Kümin, Beat (2015). "Rural Autonomy and Popular Politics in Imperial Villages". German History. 33 (2): 194–213.
- Whaley, Joachim (2012). Germany and the Holy Roman Empire, Volume I: Maximilian I to the Peace of Westphalia, 1493–1648. Oxford: Oxford University Press.