Left Bank of the Rhine

As a Left bank of the Rhine (French Rive gauche du Rhin ), the area in western Germany called, which had been conquered during the First Coalition War and annexed by France. Since the attempt to create a Cisrhenanischen Republic failed, the left bank of the Rhine were reorganized along French lines in departments. After the Allied victory over Napoleon in 1814 these territories were provisionally administered by the central government department. From a part of the territory in 1816, the Bavarian Rhine circle (Rhine Palatinate ) and the Hessian province Rheinhessen were formed, the areas north of it lie came to Prussia and first among the provinces Jülich -Cleves -Berg and the Grand Duchy of the Lower Rhine, from which you 1822 the Rhine Province was. The south left of the Rhine, which had fallen to France in the 17th and 18th centuries, however, came only in 1871 as an imperial country Alsace and Lorraine under German administration.

Administrative structure

Already in late autumn 1794, the French revolutionary armies had occupied the left bank of the Rhine. The annexation was prepared in the preliminary peace of Leoben (1797 ) and regulated by the Treaty of Campo Formio (1797 ) and the Peace of Luneville (1801 ) concluded.

1798, the administration of the territory was reorganized after the French model, thereby taking over the department division. The Board instructed the Alsatian Franz -Josef (François -Joseph ) Rudler with this task and appointed him " General Government Commissioner all conquered lands between the Meuse and the Rhine and the Rhine and Mosel ." Rudler was previously a judge at the Court of Cassation in Paris. Its division into four departments held until the end of the French period and partly beyond stock:

• Département de la Roer, Rur Territory ( with capital of Aachen )
• Département de la Sarre, Saar Territory ( with capital of Trier )
• Département de Rhin -et -Moselle, Rhine-Moselle department ( with main town of Koblenz )
• Département du Mont- Tonnerre, department Thunder Mountain ( with capital Mainz).

An area in the southern Palatinate was the

• Department Bas -Rhin ( with capital Strasbourg) slammed.

Political changes

In addition to the centralization of management on the French model, the remaining applicable in France, legislation has been introduced. For this purpose, the abolition of all feudal privileges, the production of civic equality, the establishment of a new court order and the introduction of the code was civil. The spiritual possessions were secularized. This was associated with a fundamental restructuring of the entire property and assets. Benefited mainly the middle class. Less successful was the area of education policy. Instead of reforming the universities put the French administration on the establishment of specialized schools.

Criticism came from church- influenced circles, but the time of Napoleon and of former German Jacobins. While some complained about the secularization, criticized the other hand, the suppression of freedom. In the entire population of the displeasure with the military service was widespread.

Language relics of the French period

In the French time many French dialect words flowed with the colloquial one, as Plümo ( duvet ), Filou, Monnie (money), Drottewaar ( sidewalk ). In Koblenz the term Schängel which was derived from the French name Jean and (actually derogatory ) descended from the French children of German mothers designated arose.