Altlußheim is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg (; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million inhabitants across a ...

and belongs to

Rhein-Neckar-Kreis The Rhein-Neckar-Kreis is a district in the northwest of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The administrative headquarters are based in the city Heidelberg, which is a district-free city. As of 2019, the district is the most populous in Baden-Württe ...

. Altlußheim sits in the

Rhine rift The Upper Rhine Plain, Rhine Rift Valley or Upper Rhine Graben (German: ''Oberrheinische Tiefebene'', ''Oberrheinisches Tiefland'' or ''Oberrheingraben'', French: ''Vallée du Rhin'') is a major rift, about and on average , between Basel in the s ...

directly on the right bank of a

meander A meander is one of a series of regular sinuous curves in the channel of a river or other watercourse. It is produced as a watercourse erodes the sediments of an outer, concave bank ( cut bank) and deposits sediments on an inner, convex ba ...

ing of the Rhine, where the Kriegbach flows into the

Rhine ), Surselva, Graubünden, Switzerland , source1_coordinates= , source1_elevation = , source2 = Rein Posteriur/Hinterrhein , source2_location = Paradies Glacier, Graubünden, Switzerland , source2_coordinates= , so ...

. West of the municipality, on the opposite side of the Rhine in the

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; german: link=no, Rheinland-Pfalz ; lb, Rheinland-Pfalz ; pfl, Rhoilond-Palz) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the ...

is the city of

Speyer Speyer (, older spelling ''Speier'', French: ''Spire,'' historical English: ''Spires''; pfl, Schbaija) is a city in Rhineland-Palatinate in Germany with approximately 50,000 inhabitants. Located on the left bank of the river Rhine, Speyer li ...

. Altlußheim is connected to Speyer by federal highway (''

Bundesstraße ''Bundesstraße'' (German for "federal highway"), abbreviated ''B'', is the denotation for German and Austrian national highways. Germany Germany's ''Bundesstraßen'' network has a total length of about 40,000 km. German ''Bundesstraßen'' ...

'') B 39. Less than a kilometer to the East lies Neulußheim. To the South is Oberhausen-Rheinhausen. To the North-East Altlußheim borders on

Hockenheim Hockenheim () is a town in northwest Baden-Württemberg, Germany, about 20 km south of Mannheim and 10 km west of Walldorf. It is located in the Upper Rhine valley on the tourist theme routes "Baden Asparagus Route" () and Bertha Benz M ...

History

Over the centuries, the name of the village has changed often. You can find the following documented: ''Lossa'', ''Locze'', ''Loszem'', ''Lossem'', ''Lozsheim'', ''Lussem'', ''Luzheim'', and later ''Lußheim''. Lußheim was originally a fishing settlement on the Roman road. The residents lived from fishing in the waters of the

ings of the Rhine. At the highest point in the village, there was a heathen temple. Later a church was built on the same ground. In the year 496/497, the

Franks The Franks ( la, Franci or ) were a group of Germanic peoples whose name was first mentioned in 3rd-century Roman sources, and associated with tribes between the Lower Rhine and the Ems River, on the edge of the Roman Empire.H. Schutz: Tools, ...

attacked the local ruling Allemanni and drove them back to the Murg. Lußheim is without a doubt a Frankish settlement. Proof lies in ''-heim'' in the name of the community, as well as the typically Frankish homesteads which still exist to this day, namely the homesteads at Rheinhäuser Straße 8 and Hauptstraße 74. Also the row graves that have been found also suggest the beginnings of the

Ripuarian Franks Ripuarian or Rhineland Franks (Latin: ''Ripuarii'' or ''Ribuarii'') were one of the two main groupings of early Frankish people, and specifically it was the name eventually applied to the tribes who settled in the old Roman territory of the Ubii, ...

. Geographically speaking, Altlußheim is in the middle of ripuarian-Frankish territory, a subdivision of Greater Franconia of the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...

. Politically, ''Loszem'' (the name of Lußheim at that time) belonged to the duchy of the ripuarian Franks. Lußheim was first mentioned in documents in 946, in which Lußheim was given to bishop Reginald I of Speyer from duke Konrad, in order to found Maulbronn Abbey. The Maulbronn Abbey had full rights over all ''Schultheiß'' ( sheriff or reeve), citizens, and serfs. The abbey was entitled to the greater

tithe A tithe (; from Old English: ''teogoþa'' "tenth") is a one-tenth part of something, paid as a contribution to a religious organization or compulsory tax to government. Today, tithes are normally voluntary and paid in cash or cheques or more ...

on parish and town incomes. In 1353 Lußheim came under the control of the

Electorate of the Palatinate The Electoral Palatinate (german: Kurpfalz) or the Palatinate (), officially the Electorate of the Palatinate (), was a state that was part of the Holy Roman Empire. The electorate had its origins under the rulership of the Counts Palatine of ...

. Because of the extremes between the count palantine Fredrick I and the lord of the Maulbronn Abbey,

Ulrich, duke of Württemberg Duke Ulrich of Württemberg (8 February 14876 November 1550) succeeded his kinsman Eberhard II as Duke of Württemberg in 1498. He was declared of age in 1503. His volatile personality made him infamous, being called the "Swabian Henry VIII" by ...

, the residents of Lußheim suffered greatly. When it came to open war between the two princes, the village was completely destroyed. Lußheim was left to its fate for years under the friction between the patrons of Württemberg and the bishops of Speyer. Only after 1504 did things return to normal, when the duke of Württemberg defeated the Palantines. Lußheim became part of Württemberg again. At this time, a large proportion of the population were serfs of the Maulbronn Abbey. This was the case until the middle of the 18th century. According to one document, the time between 1689 and 1692 was quite turbulent. The village was plundered and put to the torch by enemy soldiers many times. In 1692 the village had 18 burghers, 13 widows, and 28 orphans. Two thirds of the villages and the Schultheiß Johann Konrad Zeitern were murdered by enemy soldiers. The church, the pastor's house, the city hall, and most of the houses and barns were burned to the ground. At the time of the construction of the

Speyer Cathedral , native_name_lang = German , image = Speyer_dom_11.jpg , imagesize = 280px , imagelink = , imagealt = , landscape = , caption = , pushpin ma ...

in 1774, Lußheim was required to quarry, bake, and deliver 200,000 bricks. From 1804 to 1882, as the Rhine levee was built to Speyer and the green drainage was carried out, a lot of land could be made farmable. Many large farms were created. At this time, they began clearing the land where Neulußheim was to be. In 1803, after taking away the area that was to be Neulußheim, Altlußheim had 2133

morgen A morgen was a unit of measurement of land area in Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Lithuania and the Dutch colonies, including South Africa and Taiwan. The size of a morgen varies from . It was also used in Old Prussia, in the Balkans, Norw ...

of land, 903 morgen of fields (about three quarters of which for planting and another quarter for grazing), 205 morgen of community forest, 100 morgen of Rhine forest, and 925 morgen of private forest. Through the treaty that formed the

Confederation of the Rhine The Confederated States of the Rhine, simply known as the Confederation of the Rhine, also known as Napoleonic Germany, was a confederation of German client states established at the behest of Napoleon some months after he defeated Austria an ...

, ''Rheinbundakte'', Lußheim became a part of the newly formed

grand duchy A grand duchy is a country or territory whose official head of state or ruler is a monarch bearing the title of grand duke or grand duchess. Relatively rare until the abolition of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, the term was often used in the o ...

Baden Baden (; ) is a historical territory in South Germany, in earlier times on both sides of the Upper Rhine but since the Napoleonic Wars only East of the Rhine. History The margraves of Baden originated from the House of Zähringen. Baden i ...

. In 1821 the settlement Neulußheim became independent. To avoid confusion Lußheim was renamed Altlußheim. The original fishing village, Lußheim, became important due to the establishment of a ferry. Lußheim had the right to appoint the ferry master (called ''Fergenmeister'') for Lußheim and

Ketsch Ketsch () is a municipality in the district of Rhein-Neckar-Kreis, in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, located on Bertha Benz Memorial Route. It is situated on the right bank of the Rhine, 14 km south of Heidelberg Heidelberg (; Palatine G ...

. At that time, running the ferry crossing had economic value for the people in Altlußheim. In 1840 a

pontoon bridge A pontoon bridge (or ponton bridge), also known as a floating bridge, uses floats or shallow-draft boats to support a continuous deck for pedestrian and vehicle travel. The buoyancy of the supports limits the maximum load that they can carry. ...

was erected, which was replaced in 1938 with a rail and road bridge. This bridge was blown up in 1945 at the end of the Second World War. 1955 the Salier-Brücke (Salian Bridge) was built at the same location. This road bridge connects to Speyer. In the 1970s, north of Speyer, a pylon bridge was built for the A 61. Until 31 December 1972, Altlußheim belonged to

Mannheim Mannheim (; Palatine German: or ), officially the University City of Mannheim (german: Universitätsstadt Mannheim), is the second-largest city in the German state of Baden-Württemberg after the state capital of Stuttgart, and Germany's ...

. Since then Altlußheim is part of the Rhein-Neckar-Kreis.

Government

The community is a member of a communal government with the city of

Municipal council

Coat of arms

The blazon is sable with a lion or with claws and tongue gules rampant behind a base trio of hill vert and grasping a leafed-staff or. The coat of arms is based on a mistake. Altlußheim never belonged to the Palatinate of the Rhine, which is symbolized by the lion. A seal from some time after 1513 shows the rump of an ass. This indicates the fealty to Maulbronn Abbey and therewith to the duchy of Württemberg. The confusion arose from a poor quality colored stamp which the community used in the 19th century. On the recommendation of the general archive of the state, Altlußheim adopted the current coat of arms in 1900. The flag is yellow and black and was awarded by the Ministry of the Interior on 16 May 1959.

Museums

Museum Autovision Museum Autovision is a museum for cars, motorcycles, bicycles (most of which were built by NSU Motorenwerke AG) and alternative propulsion in Altlußheim, a small town in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The exhibits include the original equipmen ...

— A museum about the past and future trends in automobile design. * Schnuteputzer's Friseurmuseum — A public-private hair salon museum.

Education

Albert-Schweitzer-Schule, Primary and secondary schoole with trade school.

Notable natives

Emil Frommel Emil Frommel (1828–1896) was a German pastor and author, born at Karlsruhe. He studied at Halle upon Saale, Erlangen, and Heidelberg, held several pastorates, served as army chaplain in the Franco-German War of 1870–1871 and in 1872 was appoin ...

(1828-1896), military chaplain and writer * Heinz Hoppe (1924-1993),

Kammersänger Kammersänger (male) or Kammersängerin (female), abbreviated Ks. or KS, is a German honorific title for distinguished singers of opera and classical music. It literally means "chamber singer". Historically, the title was bestowed by princes or ...