Coordinates: 50°07′N 8°41′E / 50.117°N 8.683°E
Confederated States of the Rhine Rheinische Bundesstaaten (German) États confédérés du Rhin (French) | |||||||||
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1806–1813 | |||||||||
The Confederation of the Rhine in 1812 | |||||||||
Status | Client state of the French Empire | ||||||||
Capital | Frankfurt | ||||||||
Common languages | German, French | ||||||||
Religion | |||||||||
Demonym(s) | Rhenish | ||||||||
Government | Confederated French client states | ||||||||
Protector | |||||||||
• 1806–1813 | Napoleon I | ||||||||
Prince-Primate | |||||||||
• 1806–1813 | Karl von Dalberg | ||||||||
• 1813 | E. de Beauharnais | ||||||||
Legislature | Diet of the Confederation | ||||||||
Historical era | Napoleonic Wars | ||||||||
• Treaty of the Confederation of the Rhine | 12 July 1806 | ||||||||
• Holy Roman Empire dissolved | 6 August 1806 | ||||||||
• Dissolved after Battle of Leipzig | 4 November 1813 | ||||||||
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Today part of | Germany Liechtenstein Austria |
The Confederated States of the Rhine,[a] simply known as the Confederation of the Rhine,[b] also known as Napoleonic Germany, was a confederation of German client states established at the behest of Napoleon some months after he defeated Austria and Russia at the Battle of Austerlitz. Its creation brought about the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire shortly afterward. The Confederation of the Rhine lasted from 1806 to 1813.[1]
The founding members of the confederation were German princes of the Holy Roman Empire. They were later joined by 19 others, altogether ruling a total of over 15 million subjects. This granted a significant strategic advantage to the French Empire on its eastern frontier by providing a buffer between France and the two largest German states, Prussia and Austria (which also controlled substantial non-German lands).
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History of Germany |
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On 12 July 1806, on signing the Treaty of the Confederation of the Rhine (German: Rheinbundakte) in Paris, 16 German states joined together in a confederation (the treaty called it the états confédérés du Rhinelande, with a precursor in the League of the Rhine).[2] The "Protector of the Confederation" was a hereditary office of the Emperor of the French, Napoleon. On 1 August, the members of the confederation formally seceded from the Holy Roman Empire, and on 6 August, following an ultimatum by Napoleon, Francis II declared the Holy Roman Empire dissolved. Francis and his Habsburg dynasty continued as emperors of Austria.
According to the treaty, the confederation was to be run by common constitutional bodies, but the individual states (in particular the larger ones) wanted unlimited sovereignty.[1] Instead of a monarchical head of state, as the Holy Roman Emperor had had, its highest office was held by Karl Theodor von Dalberg, the former Arch Chancellor, who now bore the title of a Prince-Primate of the confederation. As such, he was President of the College of Kings and presided over the Diet of the Confederation, designed to be a parliament-like body although it never actually assembled.[1] The President of the Council of the Princes was the Prince of Nassau-Usingen.
In return for their support of Napoleon, some rulers were given higher statuses: Baden, Hesse, Cleves, and Berg were made into grand duchies, and Württemberg and Bavaria became kingdoms. Several member states were also enlarged with the absorption of the territories of Imperial counts and knights who were mediatized at that time. They had to pay a very high price for their new status, however. The Confederation was above all a military alliance; the member states had to maintain substantial armies for mutual defense and supply France with large numbers of military personnel. As events played out, the members of the confederation found themselves more subordinated to Napoleon than they had been to the Habsburgs when they were within the Holy Roman Empire.[3]
After Prussia lost to France in 1806, Napoleon cajoled most of the secondary states of Germany into the Confederation of the Rhine. Eventually, an additional 23 German states joined the Confederation. It was at its largest in 1808, when it included 36 states—four kingdoms, five grand duchies, 13 duchies, seventeen principalities, and the Free Hansa towns of Hamburg, Lübeck, and Bremen.[1] The west bank of the Rhine and the Principality of Erfurt had been annexed outright by the French Empire. Thus, as either emperor of the French or protector of the Confederation of the Rhine, Napoleon was now the overlord of all of Germany except Austria, Prussia, Danish Holstein, and Swedish Pomerania, plus previously independent Switzerland, which were not included in the Confederation.
In 1810 large parts of what is now northwest Germany were quickly annexed to France in order to better monitor the trade embargo with Great Britain, the Continental System.
The Confederation of the Rhine collapsed in 1813, in the aftermath of Napoleon's failed invasion of the Russian Empire. Many of its members changed sides after the Battle of Leipzig, when it became apparent Napoleon would lose the War of the Sixth Coalition.
Both French influence and internal autonomy varied greatly throughout the confederations' existence. There was also a great variation between the power and influence of the individual states. There are three basic types:
The following table shows the members of the confederation, with their date of joining, as well as the number of troops provided, listed in parentheses.[7]
Member monarchy | Year joined | Notes |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; former margraviate-electorate (8,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; former duchy-electorate (30,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; absorbed Cleves, both formerly Duchies (5,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; former landgraviate-electorate (4,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; formerly Prince-Archbishopric and Electorate; after 1810 the ![]() |
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11 Dec 1806 | Former duchy-electorate (20,000) |
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15 Nov 1807 | Napoleonic creation (25,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; former duchy-electorate (12,000) |
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23 Sep 1806 | Napoleonic creation (2,000) for former Grand duke of Tuscany and Elector of Salzburg |
Member monarchy | Year joined | Notes |
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11 Apr 1807 | (700) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (700) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (700) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; mediatized 13 December 1810 (379 of 4,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder (97 of 4,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder (193 of 4,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder (291 of 4,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; former countship or graviate (29 of 4,000) |
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12 Jul 1806 | Co-founder (40 of 4,000) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (650) |
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22 Mar 1808 | (1,900) |
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18 Feb 1808 | (400) |
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12 Jul 1806* | Union of ![]() ![]() |
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14 Oct 1808 | annexed by France 13 December 1810 (800) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (400) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (400) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (400) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (400) |
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25 Jul 1806 | Co-founder; annexed by France 13 December 1810 (323 of 4,000) |
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15 Dec 1806 | (Saxon duchies total 2,000) |
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15 Dec 1806 | |
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15 Dec 1806 | |
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15 Dec 1806 | |
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15 Dec 1806 | |
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11 Apr 1807 | (650) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (650) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (650) |
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11 Apr 1807 | (400) |
The allies opposing Napoleon dissolved the Confederation of the Rhine on 4 November 1813. After its demise, the only attempt at political coordination in Germany until the creation on 8 June 1815 of the German Confederation was a body called the Central Administration Council (German: Zentralverwaltungsrat); its President was Heinrich Friedrich Karl Reichsfreiherr vom und zum Stein (1757–1831). It was dissolved on 20 June 1815.
On 30 May 1814 the Treaty of Paris declared the German states independent.
In 1814–1815, the Congress of Vienna redrew the continent's political map. Napoleonic creations such as the huge Kingdom of Westphalia, the Grand Duchy of Berg and the Duchy of Würzburg were abolished; suppressed states, including Hanover, the Brunswick duchies, Hesse-Kassel and Oldenburg, were reinstated. On the other hand, most members of the Confederation of the Rhine located in central and southern Germany survived with minor border changes. They, along with the reinstated states, Prussia, and Austria, formed the German Confederation.[8]