Forest of Mundat

The term of Forêt of Mundat indicates two forest areas directly in the neighborhoods of the Alsatian city of Wissembourg at the Franco-German border.

Situation

The forest of Untermundat is in the east of Wissembourg in the valley of the Rhine divided at this place between the Palatinat and Alsace and it geographically forms part of the forest of Bienwald. The forest of Obermundat is in the North-West of Wissembourg and fact part of the forest of Palatinat. Its culminating point, with 561 m, is the height of Derst close to Reisdorf near Bad Bergzabern; one finds there, in addition the ruins of the castle of Guttenberg.

History

Beginnings to the second world war

To the year 760 Pépin the Brief offered to the cloister of Wissembourg a territory of approximately 320 km ² which, under the name of Mundat accepted the immunity given by the emperor Othon II. Many localities formed of it part with the immediate surroundings of Wissembourg with their fields and their forests. These forest areas and the majority of the localities remained the property of the cloister until the French revolution.

When in 1815 with the Traité of Paris was fixed the border between Bavarian France and Palatinat, all the area in the north of Lauter returned to the Bavaria which thus acquired part of the town of Wissembourg, part of the forest of Untermundat as well as the totality of the forest of Obermundat. After the Franco-German war, in 1871, Wissembourg found the parts of the city which it had lost, whereas Obermundat remained in Bavaria - up to 1945.

After the second world war

In 1946 part of Obermundat, on 7 km ², was annexed by the French administration of occupation to ensure the water provision of Wissembourg. Juridically that was confirmed by decree 212 on corrections of border of April 23rd, 1949 in which the general Kœnig, chief of the French high command in Germany, specified some provisional modifications of the Western border of Germany. This date, with truth, was quite late: what would have passed for a simple misfortune moreover in 1945, year Zero of Germany, did not seem already acceptable any more in 1949, year when reappeared the German Republic, and where the Bundestag finally joined together hastened to proclaim the intangibility of the borders.

It is that, if the question of these 7 km ² were regarded as essential in all Germany, traumatized by its territorial losses, the vast majority of the French were unaware of all of it and were not interested in it. Thus, when the negotiations of 1956 started on the return of the Saar to Germany, the problem of Obermundat was not even posed like currency of exchange; it is probable that one did not even think of it. It is only into 1962 that negotiations opened on the statute of this small area, within the framework of an general agreement which one sought between France and Germany to regulate the problems of borders. It was then understood that Obermundat would return to France, Germany obtaining exchanges of it the restitution of important land goods confiscated after the war. But as only the National Assembly accepted this compromise and that the Bundestag rejected it, the agreement could not be ratified.

For years which followed it was thus necessary to take again the negotiations. But France was in situation of weaknesses when the In spite of us, giving up their ashamed attitude, started to require to be compensated for incorporation for force during the war. The Germans then reflect like absolute precondition the retrocession of Obermundat. One managed an agreement only in 1984, the two governments agreed then in an exchange of notes which territorial sovereignty would be transferred to the Federal republic. In exchange France was to receive the land and buildings of most of Obermundat. That was not to injure the private owners of before 1949 and ruins it of Guttenberg was not either concerned.

In 1986 decree 212 was repealed after agreement of the governments British and American (it is known that the mode of occupation disappeared completely only in 1990). Since this date Obermundat is without restriction under German authority. The process was supplemented by the transfer of the property rights layer in France in 1990. At the same time of rich person vineyards of the North of Alsace were restored with their owners of pre-war period or their family.

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