History of Lorraine

Prehistory

The first traces of the presence of the man in Lorraine go back to several hundreds of thousands of years. Thanks to its giboyeuses forests and its full of fish rivers, it offers to the prehistoric man food resources in abundance but few shelters in the plain. The traces of occupation are still rather rare with the Paléolithique (plate of the Hague) and it is necessary to await the Neolithic so that the area starts to become populated as attest it the potteries and the primitive tools found on the various sites (plate of Malzéville close to Nancy, hill Holy-Cross in Metz, ridges of Vaudémont, hill of Sion, the camp of Africa of Ludres or Hérapel mount).

Protohistoire

The Lorraine develops thanks to the trade of iron and salt, this last coming from the Briquetage of the Pail and being obtained by evaporation by heating the water of certain natural sources of salt water.

Towards the IIIe century before the Christian era, three tribes Celtes settle in Lorraine.

the Trévires in the extreme north whose capital was Treverorum (Trier)
the Médiomatriques in the center whose capital was Divodurum (hill Holy-Cross of Metz),
the Leuques in the south whose capital was Nasium (oppidum of Boviolles), then Tullum (Toul).

These tribes practice the culture of cereals, the breeding, the craft industry of metals and the pottery.

In 58 before Jesus-Christ, these tribes are combined to the Romans to push back the Germains invaders, but starting from -52, they are the Romans who will take possession of the area.

Antiquity

After the Roman invasion, the area knows one period of durable peace. The emperor Auguste will integrate the area into the province of Gallia Belgica . The Romains contributed to the development of the area, by building roads, aqueducts, buildings, etc the current road alignment corresponds still partly to that of those created by the Romans. The Romans are installed in particular on banks of the Seille where they take again the exploitation of salt before initiated by the Celtes seven centuries, which ensures a great prosperity to them. The best example of this prosperity is the stele dedicated into 44 by the inhabitants of Marsal to the emperor Claude.

There exist many vestiges of sites Gallo-Roman S like the Gallo-Roman amphitheater of Grand or the European archaeological park of Bliesbruck-Reinheim.

In 451, the area is invaded by the Huns and Metz is shaven.

The Middle Ages

Starting from 482, the area is integrated into the kingdom of Clovis and in 561, Metz becomes the capital of the Austrasie. Pip of Herstal, a king austrasien becomes king of the Francs after its victory over Thierry II, king of Neustrie.

Although Lothaire was the successor of Louis the Piles, his/her brothers Charles the Bald person and Louis Germanic the imposed to him the division of the kingdom of Charlemagne by the Traité of Verdun in 843. The kingdom which resulted from it extended from Italy to the North Sea. This one was divided (Traité of Prum, 855) and a part given to Lothaire II to died of Lothaire then passed, with dead of this one in 869, under control partial of Charles the Bald person. Louis the Germanic one had indeed yielded of it to him a part at the time of the Traité of Mersen. Charles wanted to obtain total control by the force from it but it was severely demolishes. Lotharingie then became a cause of conflict between the France and the Germanie. In 911 it passed under the control of king de Francie Western Charles Simple the. In 925, it became a duchy of the Germanic Empire after Henri Ier had succeeded in rejoining the aristocracy lotharingienne with its cause and had obtained the neutrality of Charles the Simple one.

The name Lorraine is derived from the name Lotharii Regnum , which is the name of the Northern part of Lotharingie, on which reigned Lothaire II. The German name of Lorraine, Lothringen remained unchanged.

With the loss of the imperial title and the decline of the Carolingian influence, the kingdom was gradually dismembered and became a duchy, which duchy was in its turn divided between duchy of High-Lotharingie - corresponding to the ecclesiastical province of Trier - and duchy of Low-Lotharingie or Lothier .

Gerard of Alsace inherits the Duché of Lorraine in 1048 and founds the capital of its Duchy: Nancy.

During all Middle Ages, the geographical limits of various the marquisats, counties and other duchies are very complex and changeantes. For example, the Three bishoprices, Metz, Toul and Verdun were then temporal episcopal i.e. places where the Bishop exerted the temporal power. Metz in addition drove out its bishop to become a rich and envied commercial republic, directed by an Master-Alderman. Its influence was such as it undergoes and contained the attacks of four close princes jealous at the time of the Guerre of the four lords. On its side, the Duché of Lorraine had to face the attacks of Charles Bold the during the Bataille of Nancy.

At the 14th century, Lorraine is mentioned by Ibn Khaldoun.

Modern time

The area is devastated by the double plague of the famine and the plague. According to the historian Auguste Digot, torrential rains destroy the sowing in the year 1500, from where the food shortage followed by a very fatal contagion. The " speech of the things occurred in Lorraine" , printed with Épinal in 1617, speaks about it in these terms:

"The famine also occurred by all feed it, if estrange that the bichet of village which étoit given a few years before for less than three grounds was sold fifty then, like thus the wine tail which estoit sold only 18 large, bought 10 francs and more. Dearness not hearing before and which was followed the year according to so large pestidence, (because one is like the leaven of the other), that it carried almost one the third of people of feed, and which was so much esclaircy and strip of homes, that trade and tilling remained about it arrestez well a long time. However the Duke Rene cured rather than it little this defect by a reduction and reduction in the loads and aydes ordinary that the people supported auparavant."

Indeed, the account of 1507, for prévôté of Châtenois, speaks about the granted reduction " because of the plague which had régné" there; .

See also: the plague in Lorraine

The " bon" duke Antoine always endeavors to maintain peace with the adjoining countries and to increase the prosperity of his people. Unfortunately, the plague exerts new devastations. Lorraine is still decimated by the plague in 1522 and the following years.

In 1542, Lorraine is recognized “free and nonincorporable State” by the Traité of Nuremberg.

German Protestants, " reistres" or " lansquenets" , sometimes only sometimes with the French calvinists, invade by three times (of 1562 to 1577) Lorraine. The garrison that they establish with the castle of Vicherey, plunders and holds to ransom the neighborhoods until the day when it is driven out by it by the Duke Charles III.

The plague reappears in Lorraine in 1585.

prévôté of Châtenois is particularly tested, as the accounts of 1586 attest it, of 1593 and 1596. In ten years, Châtenois is tiny room of 900 inhabitants with 350 and Houécourt loses 100 of them out of 280. Viocourt, Balleville, Rainville, Gironcourt, Dommartin, the round of applause of Biécourt are reached in the same proportions. It remains with Auzainvilliers one conduit. The town hall of the River is completely destroyed whereas in 1560 it counted 40 conduits disseminated on the edges of Squirrel fur and Vraine, in Viocourt, Balleville, Saint Paul, Dommartin and Removille, and had suffered then already much from the devastations of Reîtres. " the houses all are almost deserted, said the receiver of Châtenois to the Room of the Accounts, it remains only 13 conduits " there; , while asking to subject them only to one very light royalty. It is not necessary for him after the passage of the plague to renew its request since it is restricted to note " that it did not lead no one there ".

In spite of the devastations of the plague in Lorraine, and in particular in prévôté of Châtenois, Charles III leaves, with his death, his duchy in a flourishing state. Its successor, his son Henri II, makes the happiness of his people by the wisdom of his administration. This era of prosperity lasts little, because the calamities which are plague, famine, and war link " to make a desert of the most beautiful country of Europe".

The plague appears the first in 1630, not the contagious disease which had struck several times and which one could circumscribe the devastations, but the terrible Eastern plague. During seven years, it prevails in Lorraine, and made there innumerable victims. To the plague comes to be added the famine, caused by bad harvests of the last years since 1626. The war which bursts shortly after (while bringing its procession of horrors) does not fail to worsen the food shortage and to activate the disease.

To be themselves allied in England and Germany, and to have attracted in his States the Duke of Orleans, Charles IV causes the anger of Richelieu, which besides sought only one occasion to seize Lorraine. The French occupy it in 1633 and cause great devastations there. To be avenged for Henri de Bouzey, who had wanted to prevent them from approaching of Mothe, they destroy his castle and plunder the village and the surroundings. The Swedes, their allies, which they call in Lorraine, complete the work of devastation, at the point to leave, after three centuries, with the populations the memory of their cruelties. On their side, the Hungarians and the Croats (who were with the service of Charles IV) do not miss the occasion to plunder and hold to ransom the country which they have mission of defending. Lastly, of Lorraine themselves, pushed by their extreme misery, take the party of living armed robberies and increasing confusion.

The inhabitants are established in wood and the wolves come in the villages. The corn résal, which was sold 4 or 5 FR., goes up to 56 FR. and sometimes higher. The majority nourish grasses, roots, fruits wild or die of hunger. It does without the terrible things then. Mothers eat their own children (as that which was condemned to Mirecourt), of the children (as in Ubexy) the corpses of their parents devour. Whole villages are destroyed, such Surcelle on the territory of Auzainvilliers, the others lose the three quarters of their population.

By the treaty of Saint-Germain in 1641, Louis XIII returns Lorraine to Charles IV, whose imprudences relight the war at once. The same year, the French seize one second time the country, from which the last fortress, Mothe, falls between their hands only in 1645. This second French occupation is less testing that the first: disappeared plague, famine attenuated thanks to some good harvests, plunderers fewer since the demolition of approximately two hundred castle-forts (ordered by Louis XIII, and being used perfectly its policy by weakening for the future the force as resistance of the country). In addition, the minister of Louis XIV still child, Mazarin, has to fight the Sling, and the armies of Charles IV (ordered by Philippe Emmanuel de Ligniville, lord of Houécourt), do not fight without success against France. Lorraine thus finds some peace, but it is always also deserted.

Following the treaty of the Pyrenees, the convention of Vincennes (1661) returns to Lorraine its independence and Charles IV takes again the government of his States

In addition to the “laic” possessions (Duchies), Lorraine includes/understands the territories concerned with the Three bishoprices (Toul, Metz and Verdun) annexed in France under Louis XIV by the Traité of Westphalia, and occupied in fact as of 1552 by Henri II.

The duchies of Lorraine and Bar undergo long occupations by the French Armies during the majority of the wars of 18th and the beginning of the 18th century.

In 1670, new rupture with France which seizes third once Lorraine. It is in vain that Charles IV fights to reconquer his States. He dies in 1675. Its nephew Charles V continues the war with the head of Imperial, it dies even in 1690, leaving him the purely honorary title of Duke of Lorraine to his Léopold son.

The third French occupation was less disastrous still than the second. Louis XIV, who controlled then by him even, visited our country; he saw how much he was poor and deserted, and he solved to cure it. To this end, it granted favors to the communities, it encouraged agriculture, industry, the trade, it invited the foreigners to be established there.

The treaty of Ryswick (1697), which finished the war between the Empire and France, removed Lorraine with Louis XIV and restored it with its legitimate Duke, Léopold, wire of Charles V. the Lorraine ones, whose long French occupation had not been able to cool patriotism, accommodated their sovereign with enthusiasm. The hopes which they had based on him were not to be misled. Eager above all to repopulate its States, Léopold multiplied its efforts to point out those of its subjects which were expatriates and to attract the foreigners. Everywhere where waste lands were, one gave up them to them with the help of a certain royalty. At the same time privileges were granted to Lorraine which married in Lorraine.

Léopold obtained the result which it wished. Statistics of 1711 reveal that the population in Lorraine had doubled since its return. And to these people which he loved, Léopold endeavoured throughout all its reign to get abundance and peace. Voltaire made of him this beautiful praise in " The century of Louis XIV" :

"One of the smallest sovereigns of Europe was that which made the most good with its people, Léopold found Lorraine sorry and deserted, it repopulated it and it enriches it. It always preserved it in peace while the rest of Europe was devastated by the war. It got for its people the abundance which they did not know any more. I would leave my sovereignty tomorrow, said it, if I could not make good. Also it tasted happiness to be liked, and I saw a long time after his subjects pouring tears by pronouncing his nom."

Under the reign of François III who succeeded Léopold, in 1729, Lorraine continued to be flourishing. One of the causes of this prosperity in Lorraine was indisputably the introduction of potato. As it was of poor quality, it was used initially only for food of the animals.

"This fruit, says an ordinance of 1715, brought bottom of the Indies, which seems rather intended for the food of the animals that with that of the men, became strong commun run in all Vôge, especially in the unhappy time which one comes from essuyer."

The prosperity of Lorraine could only more excite covetousnesses of France, and what the force of the weapons had not been able to ensure to him, it was going to obtain it by a skilful policy. In 1735, whereas the duke François must marry the archduchess Marie-Therese of Austria, heiress of the Habsbourg, France refuses to see Lorraine and Barrois, quasi wedged in its territory (Alsace was gradually annexed during the reign of Louis XIV), to pass between the hands of a foreign great power. The Austria and France conclude a market in virtue of which François gives up Lorraine in exchange of the Toscane and France accepts the Pragmatic Sanction. In order to spare susceptibilities, the duchies are not immediately annexed in France but given, on a purely basis for life, the father-in-law of Louis XV, the ex-king of Poland Stanislas Leszczyński which, starting from 1733, is the last sovereign duke. In 1737, the Duke François III left his subjects éplorés to marry the archduchess of Austria, and to become soon Empereur of Germany. At the same time the treaty of Vienna gave Lorraine to Stanislas, king détrôné of Poland, with no protest clause to France after its death. Stanislas was good, unfortunately, it was not free to follow the inspirations of his heart. In fact, at the beginning of its reign (1737) Lorraine is controlled in fact by a chancellor named by France. Louis XV his son-in-law, assumed indeed at once the right to raise subsidies there, to incorporate Lorraine militia in the French Army, to appoint the civils servant including the Prime Minister, and Stanislas did not have firmness to resist.

Soon the French regiments remained in Lorraine, and they had to be nourished. Then it was the war of succession of Austria which removed with the agriculture of the thousands of Lorraine of which much perished, they were bad harvests, being added to the ceaseless requisitions, the residences of troops, the new taxes. The population regretted then more highly than ever its former dukes and their independence.

The Seven Year old war brought new liftings of men and new requisitions; fortunately harvests were more abundant. Hardly this war was it finished, that the Duke Stanislas died, in 1766: Lorraine and Barrois are joined together in France and are reorganized.

Contemporary time

In 1790, Lorraine gave rise to four French Départements: the Meurthe, the Meuse, the the Moselle and the the Vosges. In 1793, the last nonFrench enclaves were annexed, the Principauté of Salm, centered with Senones in the the Vosges, and the Comté of Créhange in the the Moselle.

The treaty of Frankfurt

Following the war of 1870, part of Lorraine was, with the Alsace, annexed by Germany at the time of the Traité of Frankfurt (1871). This part made up of almost all the the Moselle, except for the extreme west of the department (Briey, Longwy), of the north-eastern fraction of the Meurthe (Castle-Saline, Sarrebourg), and of some communes of the the Vosges (canton of Schirmeck and Eastern half of the canton of Saales). The remainder of the Meurthe and the the Moselle constituted, in 1871, the Département of Meurthe-et-Moselle. The whole of the annexed territories formed, under the German administration, the Reichsland of Alsace-Lorraine ( Elsaß-Lothringen ), with for capital Strasbourg.

Within the Alsace and the Moselle, the populations had the possibility of choosing to leave their area to join France. These people, called choosing , were estimated with the number of 50 000 (including 11200 in Lorraine), and part of enters settled in French Lorraine, and more precisely with Nancy, so much so that the report/ratio of the populations between Metz and Nancy was reversed, passing from 2:1 to 1:2. This arrival of populations for the majority easy and cultivated was an element which supported the dynamism of Nancy during this period, taking part in particular in the development of the Art nouveau (pluri-artistic movement of the École of Nancy) and a very fast urban development. During this time the Germans give a very Germanic architecture to the new districts of many annexed cities, whereas the old frame, remained property of choosing, was degraded. The station and the central post office of Metz are good examples of this germanisation of the buildings.

However, rancour that the grounds lost by France within the population and of its political community nourished was one of the causes which involved it in a new conflict with Germany, at the time of the First World War.

During this war, Lorraine was directly touched by the engagements. One of the longest battles and most fatal was held there, in 1916 around Verdun. Several villages were entirely destroyed, ever rebuilt since. One calls this devastated area the red zone . Important memorials were set up there, like that of the ossuary of Douaumont.

After the First World War, France recovered its territories lost in 1871, at the time of the Traité of Versailles (1919). The territories taken at the origin with the Meurthe and the the Moselle formed only one department, the the Moselle, within limits which are thus appreciably different from those of the homonymous department before 1871. The Meurthe-et-Moselle, construction temporary in the beginning, remained unchanged, leaving a memory of the old border. Finally the communes which had been taken with the the Vosges remained Alsatian, attached to the the Low-Rhine.

The mining resources of Lorraine are then almost intact:

the extraction of coal was not profitable for the Germans who have simpler resources of access in the basin of the the Saar.
the iron ore is exploited only since the beginning of the century because it contains an important rate of Phosphore which makes the cast iron breakable. will have to be awaited 1878 so that the English engineer Thomas Gilchrist invents a process allowing to eliminate this impurity.

Between the two world wars, the border zone of Lorraine was one of the places of deployment of the Ligne Maginot, strengthened work intended to prevent a new German invasion: this line in fact was circumvented, the armies of IIIe Reich choosing to pass by the Belgo-French solid mass of the Ardennes, which one regarded as impracticable for the armor-plated weapon.

The Second world war

Lorraine was again occupied during the Second world war of 1940 with 1944. For this period the department of the the Moselle was again annexed by the Germany, just as the Alsace. Most of Lorraine was taken again from September to December 1944 in particular by the army of the general Patton. But the German offensives of the Bataille of the Ardennes then of the operation Nordwind in the north of Alsace delayed the release of the area of Forbach and Bitche in March 1945. Following this Battle of Lorraine, the area accommodates the largest American cemetery of Europe, with Saint-Avold.

Except during the Second world war, the industrial production will not cease growing until in 1960 where:

the production of coal exceeds the 15 million tons, that is to say 24% of the French production of coal. This industry employs more 40 000 minors who, with 3 tons extracted by man and day have an output roughly twice higher than the French average.
the iron mines produce 46 million tons per annum, that is to say 90% of the French production and employ 25 000 minors. France is then the third world steel producer.
the iron and steel industry employs 100 000 people of which 70 000 workmen and produces 11 million tons of cast iron, 12 million steel and 9 million end products, is roughly 70% of the French production.
textile industry represents more than 25% of the French production and employs more 60 000 people.
in parallel, the agro-alimentary one employs approximately 110 000 people, the building 100 000, wood and paper 22 000, chemistry 10 000

This strong demand in labor implies an important migratory flux, at the same time of other French areas and abroad, mainly of Italy and Poland. The population increased by 500 000 inhabitants in 30 years. That implies a considerable tension on the market of the real estate. In 1965, one estimates that it still misses several tens of thousands of residences and that approximately 30% of Lorraine suffer from overpopulation.

Lorraine is then, after the Île-de-France and the Nord-Pas-de-Calais, the third economic pole of France.

Starting from the Years 1970, coal is gradually replaced by gas, oil then nuclear energy. The development of the maritime transport makes it possible new countries to export their production of iron and coal, often coming from layers much more profitable than the Lorraine mines. The iron and steel industry then is competed with more and more by the harbor factories, then by the new installations of the exporting ore countries. At the same time, textile industry must it also face the competition of new countries with low costs of labor.

See too

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