Groß-Rohrheim is a municipality in the Bergstraße district in

Hesse Hesse or Hessen ( ), officially the State of Hesse (), is a States of Germany, state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt, which is also the country's principal financial centre. Two other major hist ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

Geography

Location

The community lies 3 km east of the

Rhine The Rhine ( ) is one of the List of rivers of Europe, major rivers in Europe. The river begins in the Swiss canton of Graubünden in the southeastern Swiss Alps. It forms part of the Swiss-Liechtenstein border, then part of the Austria–Swit ...

in the middle of the ''Hessisches Ried'' north of

Biblis Biblis is a municipality in the Kreis Bergstraße, Bergstraße district in southern Hesse, Hesse, Germany. Geography Location The municipality lies in the Rhine rift west of the Odenwald between Darmstadt to the north and Mannheim to the south; ...

Neighbouring communities

Groß-Rohrheim borders in the north on the town of

Gernsheim Gernsheim () is a town in Groß-Gerau district and Darmstadt region in Hesse, Germany, lying on the Rhine. Geography Location The ''Schöfferstadt Gernsheim'', as Gernsheim may officially call itself – it was Peter Schöffer's birthplace – ...

( Groß-Gerau district), in the east on the community of Einhausen, in the south on the community of

and in the west on the district-free city of

Worms The World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) is a taxonomic database that aims to provide an authoritative and comprehensive catalogue and list of names of marine organisms. Content The content of the registry is edited and maintained by scien ...

(

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; ; ; ) 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 sixteen states. Mainz is the capital and largest city. Other cities are ...

) and the community of

Hamm am Rhein Hamm am Rhein is an ''Ortsgemeinde'' – a municipality belonging to a ''Verbandsgemeinde'', a kind of collective municipality – in the Alzey-Worms district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Geography Location The municipality lies in Rheni ...

( Alzey-Worms district in Rhineland-Palatinate).

Constituent communities

Groß-Rohrheim has two ''

Ortsteil A village is a human settlement or Residential community, community, larger than a hamlet (place), hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located ...

e'', or quarters, split by the railway right-of-way running between Frankfurt and Mannheim, the older, original centre west of the tracks and a new town development on the east side.

History

In 782, Groß-Rohrheim had its first documentary mention in the

Lorsch Codex The Lorsch Codex (Chronicon Laureshamense, Lorscher Codex, Codex Laureshamensis) is an important historical document created between about 1175 to 1195 AD in the Lorsch Abbey, Monastery of Saint Nazarius in Lorsch, Germany. The codex is handwrit ...

. Names for the community changed over the centuries from ''Rohrheim superior'' to ''villa Rorheim'' to ''Ober Rorheim'' and then to Groß-Rohrheim, the name it has borne since 1689 (''groß'' means “great” in

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

). In the

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

, the

Lorsch Abbey Lorsch Abbey, otherwise the Imperial Abbey of Lorsch (; or ''Laurissa''), is a former Imperial abbey in Lorsch, Germany, about east of Worms, Germany, Worms. It was one of the most important monasteries of the Carolingian Empire. Even in its ru ...

was the

feudal Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was a combination of legal, economic, military, cultural, and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe from the 9th to 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a way of struc ...

overlord; later it was the Lords of Bickenbach, the Counts of Erbach and the House of Katzenelnbogen or their successors, the Landgraves of Hesse. The Erbach family’s share was sold off as early as 1714 to Hesse-Darmstadt. The

Thirty Years' War The Thirty Years' War, fought primarily in Central Europe between 1618 and 1648, was one of the most destructive conflicts in History of Europe, European history. An estimated 4.5 to 8 million soldiers and civilians died from battle, famine ...

and later, French raids took a heavy toll on the community. In 1659, Landgrave Georg II of Hesse conferred upon “his loyal subjects in the market town of Groß-Rohrheim” a free and open market, the ''Maimarkt'', still in existence now. Over the last 50 years only 15 of the original agricultural operations at that time have survived.

Politics

Community council

The municipal election held on 26 March 2006 yielded the following results:

Mayors

At the mayoral election in 2008, Rainer Bersch was victorious. He was re-elected in 2014 and 2020. From 1990 until 2008, Heinz Roos (SPD) had been Groß-Rohrheim’s mayor.

Town partnerships

Mouzon, Ardennes Mouzon () is a commune in the Ardennes department in northern France. It is situated on the river Meuse. On 1 January 2016, the former commune Amblimont was merged into Mouzon.France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

since 1989

Culture and sightseeing

* Historic

timber-frame Timber framing () and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large wooden pegs. If the struc ...

houses near the

Evangelical Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide, interdenominational movement within Protestantism, Protestant Christianity that emphasizes evangelism, or the preaching and spreading of th ...

church from 1688 to 1723, as well as the ceiling paintings in the church * Memorial to the planner of the Rhine channel, Claus Kröncke.