The Kleiner Odenwald (“Little Odenwald”) is the southern part of the central German

hill range A mountain range or hill range is a series of mountains or hills arranged in a line and connected by high ground. A mountain system or mountain belt is a group of mountain ranges with similarity in form, structure, and alignment that have arise ...

, the Odenwald, and is up to .{{GeoQuelle, DE, BFN-Karten It is also part of the natural region of Sandstein-Odenwald in the north of the state of

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 ...

. Lying east-southeast of

Heidelberg Heidelberg (; Palatine German language, Palatine German: ''Heidlberg'') is a city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, situated on the river Neckar in south-west Germany. As of the 2016 census, its population was 159,914 ...

and south of the River Neckar, which separates the Kleiner Odenwald from the rest of the Odenwald, its landscape is shaped by the underlying

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates ...

that also dominates the northern Odenwald.

Geography

Location

The Kleiner Odenwald lies in the counties of

Rhein-Neckar The Rhine-Neckar Metropolitan Region (german: Metropolregion Rhein-Neckar, ), often referred to as Rhein-Neckar-Triangle, is a polycentric metropolitan region located in south western Germany, between the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main region to the North ...

and

Neckar-Odenwald Neckar-Odenwald-Kreis is a ''Landkreis'' (district) in the north of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Neighboring districts are (from east clockwise) Main-Tauber-Kreis, Hohenlohe-Kreis, Heilbronn, Rhein-Neckar-Kreis, Odenwaldkreis (Hesse) and Landk ...

and on the territory of the city of

. It is bounded in the north by the Neckar and the settlements of

Neckargemünd Neckargemünd ( pfl, Neggergmin) is a town in Germany, in the district of Rhein-Neckar-Kreis, state of Baden-Württemberg. It lies on the Neckar, 10 km upriver from Heidelberg at the confluence with the river Elsenz. This confluence of the t ...

and Eberbach, in the east by the Neckar and e.g. by Obrigheim, in the south by Reichartshausen, Waibstadt and Eschelbronn and in the west by

Wiesloch Wiesloch (, locally ; South Franconian: ''Wissloch''), is a town in northern Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated 13 kilometres south of Heidelberg. After Weinheim, Sinsheim and Leimen it is the fourth largest town in the Rhein-Neckar-Kre ...

, Leimen and Heidelberg on the River Neckar. Municipalities in the area are: Lobbach,

Bammental Bammental is a municipality in Rhein-Neckar Kreis of Baden-Württemberg. Geography Bammental is about 9 km southeast of Heidelberg and 13 km northwest of Sinsheim in the Elsenz valley, between Mauer and Neckargemünd. The borough of ...

, Gaiberg, Wiesenbach,

Aglasterhausen Aglasterhausen is a municipality in the district of Neckar-Odenwald-Kreis, in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. History Aglasterhausen is first mentioned in the records of the Bishop of Worms The Prince-Bishopric of Worms, was an ecclesiastical ...

, Schwarzach, Neunkirchen and Schönbrunn. The most important streams are the Elsenz, Schwarzbach and Lobbach. Somewhat east of the Kleiner Odenwaldes lies the Bauland, south of the

Kraichgau The Kraichgau () is a hilly region in Baden-Württemberg, southwestern Germany. It is bordered by the Odenwald and the Neckar to the North, the Black Forest to the South, and the Upper Rhine Plain to the West. To the east, its boundary is c ...

and west of the

Upper Rhine Plain 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 ...

. In the southeast is part of the Brunnen region.

Hills

The hills and high points of the Kleiner Odenwald include the following – sorted by height in metres (m) above

Normalhöhennull ' ("standard elevation zero") or NHN is a vertical datum used in Germany. In geographical terms, NHN is the reference plane for the normal height of a topographical eminence height above mean sea level used in the 1932 German Mean Height Refe ...

(NHN): * Königstuhl (567.8 m),east of

* Hebert (518.8 m), south of Eberbach- Neckarwimmersbach * Auerhahnenkopf (486.9 m), south of Heidelberg- Schlierbach * Hirschhornberg (461.6 m), northwest of Ober schönbrunn * Kolben (on the ''Oberen Neckarberg''; 408.9 m), north-northeast of Schönbrunn- Moosbrunn * Gaisberg (375.6 m), east of

* Neckarberge (367.5 m), south of Mückenloch- Neckarhäuserhof * Oberer Stadtwald (360.6 m), east of

* Unterer Stadtwald (325.5 m), southwest of

* Hirschberg (somewhat over 300 m), northeast of

Nußloch is a municipality in the Rhein-Neckar-Kreis (Baden-Württemberg), about 10 km south of Heidelberg. It is on a much traveled tourist route: Bergstraße ("Mountain Road") and Bertha Benz Memorial Route. The hamlet Maisbach also belongs to ...

* Neckarriedkopf (293.8 m), southwest of

in the ''Unteren Stadtwald'' * Hollmut (284.8 m), south of

* Salzberg (259.3 m), west-southwest of Lobbach- Lobenfeld * Bammertsberg (249.9 m), north of

References

Regions of Baden-Württemberg Special Areas of Conservation in Germany !