Mengerskirchen - History

History

Mengerskirchen had its first documentary mention in a document from the St. Lubentius Monastery in Dietkirchen an der Lahn in 1279. The outlying community of Winkels had already been mentioned in 1243, Waldernbach in 1296, Probbach in 1299 and Dillhausen in 1307. Mengerskirchen was described in 1307 as an “oppidum”. Town rights are documentarily confirmed only on 18 February 1321. In 1481 came market rights, too.

Near Mengerskirchen ran the hill fort wall Rentmauer, affording the community dwellers at that time some protection. There is proof that the community had its own priest and that it also served as the centre of the Calenberg tithing area in 1313, in which year it is believed building work began on Mengerskirchen Castle. Together with the courts of Beilstein, Haimau (today Löhnberg) and Nenderoth, a tithing court was kept on the Kalenbergskopf, a high ridge between Arborn, Mengerskirchen and Nenderoth. In 1481 Friedrich III conferred the privilege for a yearly fair to be held on 14 September near Mengerskirchen.

From 1343 to 1561, Mengerskirchen lay under Nassau-Beilstein rule, then passing along with all Nassau-Beilstein’s holdings back to Nassau-Dillenburg. Count Otto II of Nassau-Dillenburg bequeathed Mengerskirchen to his wife, Adelheid von Vianden as a widow’s seat.

At the crossroads where the two old trade roads, the Hohe Straße (“High Road”) from Herborn to Limburg, and the Rheinstraße from Cologne to Frankfurt, meet, an important customs place was built. Its territory comprised Almenrod, Arborn, Cödlingen, Dillhausen, Helmenrod, Nenderoth, Nieder- and Oberprobbach (today simply Probbach), Obershausen, Odersberg and Winkels, thereby making Mengerskirchen bigger than the actual Residence of Beilstein. The castle in Mengerskirchen housed the Amt of Mengerskirchen with many interruptions until 1816. The last Amtmann retired in this year and the Amt was united with the Amt of Weilburg.

In 1867, Prussia created through a new ordering of the Duchy of Nassau, which it had annexed the year before this, among others, the district of Oberlahnkreis to which Mengerskirchen thereafter belonged. In the administrative reform in Hesse in 1974, it was grouped into the district of Limburg-Weilburg. On 1 January 1971, the market town of Mengerskirchen became the administrative seat of the like-named greater community.