County of Waldeck

Initially, Waldeck was a fief of the Electorate of Mainz. In 1379, it became the County of Reichslehen.^[2] After the death of Count Henry VI in 1397, the family split into two lines: the senior Landau line founded by Adolph III and the junior Waldeck line founded by Henry VII, which sometimes feuded with one another. The two lines came under the sovereignty of the Landgraviate of Hesse in 1431 and 1438 respectively, due to financial difficulties and the final victory of the Landgraviate over Mainz in 1427, which led to the transfer of the County of Ziegenhain [de] to Hesse. The Landgraves levied tribute on the Counts of Waldeck in exchange for forgiving their debts to them and taking on all their debts to others.^[3]

After the death of Henry VIII in 1486, the Waldeck line split once more, into the Waldeck-Wildungen and Waldeck-Eisenberg lines. The senior Landau line ended with the death of Otto IV in 1495 and its possessions passed to the Wildungen and Eisenberg lines. In 1526 and 1529, Philip IV of Waldeck-Wildungen and Philip III of Waldeck-Eisenberg converted their respective principalities to Lutheranism. Several partitions led to the creation of further lines, but these were reunited by the new Wildung line in 1692.

In 1626, the family also inherited the County of Pyrmont [de] and thereafter called themselves "Counts of Waldeck and Pyrmont." The two counties of Waldeck and Pyrmont were physically separated and were not united into a single legal entity until the 19th century.

In 1639, Count Philip Dietrich of Waldeck from the new Eisenberg line, inherited the County of Culemborg in Gelderland along with the counties of Werth (Isselburg) [de] in Münsterland, Pallandt [de], and Wittem. The Lordship of Tonna in Thüringen, a fief of the Dukes of Saxe-Altenburg was inherited by Waldeck-Pyrmont in 1640, but sold to Duke Frederick I of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg in 1677. Waldeck remained the main residence of the county until 1655, when the residence was shifted from Waldeck to Arolsen. Philip Dietrich was succeeded in 1664 by his brother Count George Frederick, whose full title was "Count and Lord of Waldeck, Pyrmont, and Cuylenburg, Lord of Tonna, Paland, Wittem, Werth." In 1682, he was promoted by Emperor Leopold I to the status of "Prince of Waldeck", with Imperial immediacy. His four sons all predeceased him, so on 12 June 1685, he made a contract with his cousin, Christian Louis of the new Wildung line, to transfer the whole Waldeck patrimony to him and for it to be inherited by primogeniture thereafter. This agreement was confirmed by Emperor Leopold in 1697. After George Frederick's death in 1692, Christian Louis became the sole ruler of the entire principality.

The County of Cuylenburg and the Lordship of Werth were lost in 1714, owing to the marriage of George Frederick's second daughter, Sophia Henriette (1662-1702) to Ernest of Saxe-Hildeburghausen.

Principality of Waldeck (1712-1848)

On 6 January 1712, Frederick Anthony Ulrich of Waldeck and Pyrmont was elevated to prince by Emperor Charles VI. During the American War of Independence from 1775 to 1783, Prince Frederick Carl Augustus provided three regiments to the British for the war in America in exchange for payment. A total of 1,225 Waldeck soldiers fought in America.

The principality was caught up in the Napoleonic Wars and in 1807 it joined the Confederation of the Rhine,^[4] but not the Napoleonic Kingdom of Westphalia. Waldeck was required to guarantee equal rights of worship to its Catholic citizens and supply 400 soldiers in case of a campaign. For a brief period, from 1806 until 1812, Pyrmont was a separate principality as a result of the partition of the territory between the brothers Frederick and George, but the territories were reunited after Frederick's death.

The independence of the principality was confirmed in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna, and Waldeck and Pyrmont became a member of the German Confederation. In 1832 it joined the Zollverein. In 1847, on Prussian initiative, the sovereignty of Hesse-Kassel over Waldeck (and Schaumburg-Lippe) was finally revoked by the Federal Convention of the Confederation. This had been the case defacto since Waldeck joined the Confederation of the Rhine in 1807, but the ruling meant that Hesse-Kassel lost the right to claim the territory in escheat.

Principality of Waldeck-Pyrmont (1849-1918)

Since 1645, Waldeck had been in a personal union with the County (later Principality) of Pyrmont [de]. Beginning in 1813, the prince strove to unite the two territories legally into the Principality of Waldeck-Pyrmont. However, political opposition meant that this did not take place until 1849. Even after the unification, Pyrmont retained its own tiny Landtag for budgetary matters until 1863/64. In 1849-1850, Waldeck was divided into three districts: the District of the Eder [de], the of Eisenberg [de] and the District of the Twiste [de].

On 1 August 1862, Waldeck-Pyrmont concluded a military convention with Prussia. As a result, Waldeck-Pyrmont fought on the Prussian side in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 and thus avoided annexation at the war's end - unlike the neighbouring Electorate of Hesse. However, the small, cash-strapped principality could not afford to pay its contributions to the new North German Confederation, so the principality's Landtag unanimously voted to reject the North German Constitution in order to pressure the prince into signing an accession treaty Prussia. Bismarck had previously ruled out unification with Prussia on grounds of prestige. Therefore, under the treaty that Waldeck-Pyrmont and Prussia signed in October 1867, the principality remained nominally independent and retained its legislative sovereignty, but from 1 January 1868 Prussian took control of the principality's state deficit, internal administration, judiciary, and schools. Thereafter, Prussia appointed a State Director formally with the agreement of the prince. Appellate jurisdiction for Waldeck was exercised by the Prussian state court (Landgericht) in Kassel and for Pyrmont by the state court in Hannover. The prince retained control over the administration of the church, the prerogative of mercy, and the right of veto over new laws. He also continued to receive the income from his domains.^[5] Prussian administration served to reduce administrative costs for the small state and was based on a ten-year contract that was repeatedly renewed for the duration of its existence. The situation continued in 1871, when the principality became a constituent state of the new German Empire. In 1905, Waldeck and Pyrmont had an area of 1121 km² and a population of 59,000.

The princely house of Waldeck and Pyrmont is closely related to the royal family of the Netherlands. The last ruling prince, Frederick, was the brother of Queen Consort Emma of the Netherlands.

Free State of Waldeck-Pyrmont (1919-1929)

On 13 November 1918, at the end of World War I, during the German Revolution that resulted in the fall of all the German monarchies, a representative of the revolutionary workers' and soldiers' council of Kassel came to Waldeck and declared that the monarchy was abolished. The principality became the Free State of Waldeck-Pyrmont within the Weimar Republic. However, no new constitution was produced, so the monarchical constitution of 1849/1852 remained in force de jure until 1929.^[6] The terms of the treaty with Prussia also remained in force. Following a referendum, Pyrmont was separated from Waldeck on 30 November 1921 and joined Prussia, becoming part of the new Hameln-Pyrmont district of the Province of Hanover.^[7] After this, the territory was simply the Free State of Waldeck.

The remaining territory continued to be governed according to the 1867 treaty with Prussia until it was cancelled in 1926. On 9 April 1927, the federal Financial Equalisation act (Finanzausgleichsgesetz) was amended. For Waldeck, this meant that its allocation of federal tax income was reduced by almost 600,000 Reichsmarks. Without a massive rise in local taxes, the Free State was no longer financially viable. Therefore on 1 April 1929, the state was abolished and became part of the Prussian province of Hesse-Nassau. This marked the end of Waldeck's existence as a sovereign state.

Developments since 1929

When Waldeck joined Prussia in 1929, the three districts into which Waldeck had been divided in 1849-1850 (Eder, Eisenberg, and Twiste) were initially retained. Additionally, Höringhausen and Eimelrod, which had been exclaves of Prussia surrounded by Waldeck since 1866, were joined to Eisenberg district. In 1932, the federal government merged Eder and Eisenberg districts. The district of the Twiste was to be merged with the neighbouring district of Wolfhagen on 1 April 1934, but this was delayed after the Nazi seizure of power in 1933. A law of 28 February 1934 reversed the merger of Eder and Eisenberg and definitively cancelled the planned merger of Twiste and Wolfhagen.

On 1 February 1942, the three districts of Waldeck were merged into the new Waldeck district [de], which had its capital at Korbach. This new district had roughly the same borders as the old Free State. It was made part of Greater Hesse in 1945, which became the state of Hesse in the modern Federal Republic of Germany in 1946. On 1 August 1972, the city of Volkmarsen was separated from the district of Wolfhagen and reassigned to Waldeck. During the reform of the districts of Hesse in 1974, Waldeck was merged with the neighbouring district of Frankeberg to from the new district of Waldeck-Frankenberg, while the city of Züschen became a suburb of Fritzlar in Schwalm-Eder-Kreis.

Partitions of Waldeck under Waldeck rule

Table of rulers