Talk:List of states in the Holy Roman Empire

message: About this article: This article was started as a pure list of states. Then the members of the Imperial Diet (Reichstag) of 1792 were added, and this list was just a minor part of the article. The entire article was moved to a new location (List of Reichstag participants (1792), but final title appears to be still under discussion). The list of states was then taken out and moved back to the original location. -- Cordyph 10:18 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)
Shouldn't this list be fully linked, i.e. all names equipped with link brackets? 
--Liveforever 22:38, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: '04 comment

message: I recently restored my edits which included Livonian states as part of the Holy Roman Empire. Those edits were recently deleted under subject line "the Livonian territories were not part of the Empire"
What is the exact definition of "the part of the Holy Roman Empire" which Livonian states are not?
Certainly the Livonian princes were repeatedly given the title of Prince of the Holy Roman Empire. The title of Prince of the Holy Roman Empire was given to Albert, Bishop of Riga by king Philipp in 1207. In 1225 the King Henry VII confirmed for Albert and his brother Bishop Hermann I von Buxhoeveden the title of Prince. 
Wikipedia articles Albert of Buxhoeveden and Prince-Bishop confirm that.
Also, very many sources say that Livonia WAS part of the Holy Roman Empire. They are too many to quote. Just make a simple Google query like "Holy Roman Empire" Riga and you see many of them easily.
I suspect the only reason Livonia is in many cases not listed as part of Holy Roman Empire is that after 16th century all connections between Germany and Livonia were lost forever. 
If there are compelling reasons why Livonia should be excluded from List of states in the Holy Roman Empire then I think a little more explanation is appropriate.
If you'll notice, nearly all of the states of the Holy Roman Empire listed are those that were there after 1648.  Perhaps this should be made clearer, but it's pretty clear.  Including the states of northern Italy (especially), the Swiss cantons, and the provinces that made up the United Provinces would be on there.  Livonia's role in the Holy Roman Empire is far more dubious.  Certainly, from the 16th century on, it was part of Poland, and after that of Sweden and Russia.  Even before the Reformation, I think the relationship between the Knights and the Empire is questionable. john k 00:20, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Dispute over Livonian states

message: So, what is the consensus then on adding pre-1648 stuff? I'd be interested in adding territories of the Kingdom of Burgundy other than the Franche-Comté (such as Provence and Forcalquier), but pretty much all of that left the Imperial orbit early on. Choess July 1, 2005 00:39 (UTC)
Hmm...perhaps we should have separate tables for Germany, Burgundy, and Italy...putting in Burgundian territories opens up the question of the Italian ones, which is even more problematic.  Was the Duchy of Parma, say, or the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, part of the Empire?  They kind of were, but only in a very nominal and theoretical sense.  We ought to be clear on what the whole thing means, I think. john k 1 July 2005 01:13 (UTC)
: What if we break out a third section underndeath "Grouped lists", called, say "Peripheral territories"? We could move the Livonian material down there, too, and have a little blurb at the top about Imperial control being variable/nominal in these areas. Choess 18:49, July 11, 2005 (UTC)
My opinion is that there could and should be separate articles for post-1648 (=organized) states of empire, and pre-1648 fiefs (= feudal dependencies). There are enormous differences between the nature of "state" in both extremes of the existence of empire, and 1648 is a good border. This would mean i.a that the present article introduces itself as from 1648, and the new article would be something like List of fiefs under Holy Roman Emperors 217.140.193.123 1 July 2005 22:17 (UTC)
:What about List of Fiefs in the Holy Roman Empire? - Nomadic1 07:29, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Early states of the HRE

message: Here's an example of a revised table layout, for your comments:
Name       	Type                                                                      	Circle	Bench	Formed 	Notes
Aachen     	Imperial City                                                             	LR    	RH   	?      	Annexed to France in 1794(?)
Arenberg   	Duchy from 1644Originally a county;then a princely county from 1576       	ER    	PR   	12th c.	
Augsburg   	Bishopric                                                                 	SW    	EC   	?      	Annexed to Bavaria in 1803
Augsburg   	Imperial City                                                             	SW    	SW   	1276   	Annexed to Bavaria in 1806
Austria    	Archduchy from 1359 or 1453Originally a margraviate;then a duchy from 1155	AU    	PR   	960    	
Baden      	Margraviate from 1112, and an electorate from 1803                        	SW    	PR   	c.960  	Divided into Baden-Baden and Baden-Durlach, 1535-1771
Baden-Baden	Margraviate                                                               	SW    	PR   	1535   	Inherited by the Baden-Durlach line in 1771
The basic changes that I'm proposing are:
*The "Type" column is moved next to the name.
*The "Type" column is colour-coded for imperial cities, ecclesiastical states, and electorates. In my example I've used the conventional red and blue for the former, and a colour chosen at random for the latter. Unfortunately, whilst highlighting the entire row might be more ideal in terms of formatting, it would interfere with link colours in other columns.
*The "Dissolution (to)" and "Notes" columns are merged, since the latter is mainly going to be used to give details of the former.
*Details of an earlier status have been italicized on a separate line in the "Type" column.
If people are happy with this, I'll go ahead and overhaul the page. I've also got a fair few additional states that can be added in as well.
I've also reformatted the structure of the table "behind the scenes", hopefully making it a little easier to edit. For anyone interested in that, I've posted it to my Talk page.
Cheers, Silverhelm 22:56, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Good work! Markussep 18:49, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

text: Nice. Although the red and blue seem a bit too bold. Could they be muted down a bit? You could colourode the states which survived the dissolution of the empire, into two categories: those which were mediatised in the ensuing years and those which were not. -- Nomadic1 22:37, 27 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, the two colours do stand out quite a lot with nothing else around to help tone them down. I'll find a gentler shade for both. As for using any other colours, I'm half-thinking of a few different ideas; the difficulty is those dratted link colours in the first column, otherwise I'd probably go with colouring the whole row. Still, there's plenty of work still to do with the rest of it, so I'm in no sort of hurry. :-) Cheers, Silverhelm 02:21, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Table layout 

message: Just done a quick back-of-the envelope calculation, and see that we're up to around 460 entities. Not bad going for just a few days' work: Good work, fellows!
I'm adding to the list by working off just my own notes (which I'm also trying to overhaul as we go along[!]); are you chaps using any standard reference works?
Silverhelm 11:01, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I find this German list of HRE states (comparison of various Reichstag attendance lists) very useful. And this one for the 1789 situation (nice maps) and history links. Markussep 11:18, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

text: I've got a nice collection of notes that I've amassed from various sources. It's not easy finding them all though, since states like Khevenhüller-Metsch, Dietrichstein, Harrach or Schlitz gennant von Görtz (which can be added to this list) don't get mentioned much. -Nomadic1 08:07, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Current state of play

message: What should we name the various subdivisions of the Duchy of Brunswick-Lüneburg? There do not seem to be generally accepted names. The problem is that Brunswick-Lüneburg already has a hyphen in its name, and so the usual convention of calling subdivisions "OriginalEntity-Division" (e.g., Hesse-Cassel) does not work well. OK, I have seen Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and Brunswick-Calenberg before, but what do you call the Lüneburg subdivision?  
It seems to me there are only two good possibilities:
1) Append the subdivision names to the *whole* name of the original duchy, e.g., Brunswick-Lüneburg-Wolfenbüttel and Brunswick-Lüneburg-Lüneburg.
2) Use two names, e.g. Principality of Wolfenbüttel of the Duchy of Brunswick-Lüneburg, Principality of Lüneburg of the Duchy of Brunswick-Lüneburg, or some such. 
Comments? --Chl 13:05, 9 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The German wikipedia entries for Brunswick-Lüneburg (:de:Herzogtum Braunschweig-Lüneburg, :de:Fürstentum Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel) and this page about the Welfs bring some clarity, though it remains complicated. About more hyphens in a name, that's no problem, see for instance Salm-Reifferscheid-Dyck. Still, Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel is not known as Brunswick-Lüneburg-Wolfenbüttel, so I wouldn't do that. The name for the Lüneburg division of BrLü should be Brunswick-Lüneburg I guess. I wouldn't choose your second option. Markussep 14:43, 9 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Names of the subdivisions of Brunswick-Lüneburg 

message: I am a little bewildered by the entries of Inner Austria and Lower Austria (presumably not meaning the modern province, but the Archduchy of Austria as opposed to Inner Austria and Upper Austria (again not the modern province, but Tyrol and Further Austria)) as states fo the HRE. My (non-historian) understanding is that the original duchies and counties (Carinthia, Styria, Tyrol etc.) continued to exist as formally independent polities with separate Landtage and so on up to the 19th century. After all, the Habsburgs were still using the titles then. Inner Austria etc. just indicates by which branch of the Habsburg family the respective territories were ruled, so I would suggest removing those entries from the list. Martg76 12:17, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Inner Austria, Lower Austria

message: Gentlemen, what was the status of the Princes of Ligne (They are not mentioned in the 'table.')?--Anglius 02:21, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I appreciate your information, sir.--Anglius 19:58, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Ligne

message: Would it have been possible to devalue a state(e.g. from a principality to county) following the extinction of the family possessed it(it being devalued whenever was bestowed to someone who subsequently would receive a lower title with name of the state)?--Anglius 01:31, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes and no. It is more complicated than that. Generally, if one family inherited the lands of another, they would keep their original title (Baron, Count, Prince, etc.). Every territory though had a title associated with it (eg: Principality of Anhalt; Princely County of Edelstetten; Duchy of Bavaria; Lordship of Myllendonk; etc.) and that title would remain unchanged through inheritance. Eg: if the Lord of Gooperspoopers inherited the Barony of Herethere after the Counts of Faaaarnsworth became extinct, they would be the Lord of Gooperspoopers. They wouldn't necessarily become a Count though just because Faaaarnsworth was one. I don't know if this answers what you were asking though - Nomadic1 08:21, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I appreciate your reply, sir. I think that you sufficiently answered my question.--Anglius 03:32, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Devaluation of a state

message: The page us so long now it is hard to edit and view. Suggest splitting; maybe into A - M and N - S for starters.
I agree.  A listing of the States of the Holy Roman Empire will necessarily be long.  The actual total number of States throughout the HRE's thousand years has never been definitely established (even in German sources).  Some scholars have estimated the number to be 1800 estates/States.  Even excluding the 600 or so knightly estates which do not comply with the qualities of State (see references at end of article), the list will eventually encompass over a thousand entries (even excluding again the "appanage" lines of HRE dynasties/families many of which are not considered States).
Splitting the article into sub-sections will ease the navigation as the data is grossly incomplete and needs to be expanded as more research is done.  I have not seen a comprehensive list of States (in English or other language source on the Internet) so this Wikipedia article will perhaps set the standard.  Even the Wikipedia articles on the individual States are so lacking in information about the origin, growth, decline and successes or failures of the States and their ruling families.  There is a dearth of Internet materials on the States so I have had to search sources in English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, etc. using Google's translation service.  Reading them could be a challenge but the materials are much, much richer than English ones.
I would like to suggest deleting the "Date Formed" in the table and just add the data to the "Notes" section to expand the space for the latter.  The "Notes" should be used for adding data on the dynastic, territorial and political history of the States.  While indicating the divisions and partitions through the years, there is a need to supplement the information with, for example, modes of transmission of rights and "sovereignty" (purchase, conquest, marriage, inheritance, treaties, etc.).  It is also helpful to indicate the post-1806 (HRE dissolution) developments of the States so we can relate them to current geo-political realities such as the post-Germany unification (1871), -WWI and -WWII eras.  Let us always remember that the HRE was a feudal institution so the basis for transmission of rights was based on a ruling family's or individual's "blood" or marriage connections.  Territories, people and other properties and goods (including "virgins") were transferred from one State to another in accordance with feudal law.
We should keep the list alphabetically ordered to help in navigation, viewing and editing.  I also suggest using the English spellings of the States (sans diacritical marks and umlauts) because they are a barrier to navigation.  After all, this is an English article and using German "special" spellings do not really belong here.
I hope a Wikipedian (contributor or editor) will take the cudgels and split this article to make it easier to navigate and edit.  I am too new to Wikipedia to know how to do it.  And I'm not really computer savvy in the first place.
* I can split the page very easily enough. It is just fiddly. Deleting columns is a very fiddly business though, moreso on a really long page like this. One problem with removing appanage lines is that many ceased to be only appanage lines; when the real state lines became extinct the apanage lines inherited them. An example of this occuring is in the Fürstenberg partitions. Another problem is that for many states it is hard to discover which were appanages and which weren't. As for umlauts and everything, we should keep them as articles such as Fürstenberg and Öttingen-Spielberg use them. But we should definately use Anglicisations of any names (eg: Brunswick instead of Braunschweig (sp?), and Saxony (and Saxe) instead of Sachsen) - Nomadic1 23:00, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Splitting the page

message: Congratulations, this is currently the longest page on Wikipedia (Species:Longpages) ;) I like it!
Some suggestions:
# Remove the long "State of the Empire (Reichsstand)" quote which isn't part of the list
# Move "Definition of Terms" and "Notes" sections to the end
# Add a key for the colouring
# Move all text from the Formed column to Notes. It currently wastes too much space, making the Notes column too crowded and vertically long.
# Similarly, dates in the Type column could go into Notes.
# Remove aliases or persons from the Name column (eg: in case of Solms-Braunfels or Württemberg). They can go into the article or a separate list.
I'll try to do some of these, depending on your comments Eug 13:03, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  More layout, Longest Page 

message: (from User talk:Sadi Carnot)
Sadi, I'm sorry to point this out, but I made the same mistake a long time ago: article space is not supposed to have sub-pages. It's probably written out somewhere, but I don't have time to look for it. Just to warn you that the sub pages of the Roman list may get deleted fairly soon. I'm sure a better solution can be found. You may wish to submit this as a question on one of the notice boards. Regards, Samsara (talk • contribs) 13:03, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, I didn't know that. I'll check into it.  I was curious as to why the back-links didn't work like they do on user subpages. --Sadi Carnot 13:20, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I will now fix this by using a different (non-subpage) name per each page. --Sadi Carnot 12:21, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  No sub pages in article space 

message: The pages are all divided.  What do people think, do we like the present version or the all-in-one version?  This question is really addressed to all lists in general, not just this one.  In other words, should lists be left alone to grow indefinitely or should they be divided up after a certain point?  Thanks: --Sadi Carnot 12:51, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Like or Don’t Like?

message: Per the discussion above. The styles currently listed in the Name column take up too much space, and are not very closely related to the purpose of this list. Other reasons they should be on their own page:
* The styles really belong to specific ruling houses, and not the states themselves;
* The styles represent a specific point in time (looks like near the end of the Empire), while this list is supposed to cover the whole period the Empire existed.
Comments? Chl 14:41, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposal: move styles to [[List of styles of rulers in the Holy Roman Empire]]

message: "Table of states
Whilst any such list could never be truly definitive, nevertheless the list below attempts to be as comprehensive as possible."
I've scrolled down and back up and can't find the list. Is it a work in progress coming later? Thanks--65.92.189.27 (talk) 16:14, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: That was an outdated sentence, I just changed it. The list has been split into 24 lists (by alphabet), that are accessible through the template at the top of the article. Markussep Talk 10:35, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  help - where is the list? 

message: As things are, Imperial Cities and Valleys are shown in orange, Church states are shown in blue. I am proposing making several changes to this:
#Make all the colours less bright. Nomadic1 wrote above "the red and blue seem a bit too bold. Could they be muted down a bit?", and Silverhelm replied "Yes, the two colours do stand out quite a lot with nothing else around to help tone them down. I'll find a gentler shade for both". But they haven't been changed.
#Use purple, rather than blue, for church states. This is customary on maps.
#Distinguish abbacies from bishoprics, by choice of colour. I'm not at all sure about this, and will welcome advice.
#Use a colour to denote electorates, as proposed in the table layout above. I think the yellow in the sample above (or a muted version of it) is a good choice - we could say that it represents gold, as only electors had the right to exploit gold mines within their territories. This idea was abandoned by Silverhelm because "some of the ecclesiastical states would then have to get two different colours". I would propose colouring archbishop-electorates with the electorate colour, and putting in the yellow table cell a purple emblem of their archiepiscopal status.
I am sceptical about "Imperial Valleys", of which Glarus, Schwyz, Unterwalden, Uri and Zug are orange, while Harmersbach is white. Was there really such a status? Do they warrant the same colouring as Imperial free cities? 
 
I have also noted quite a few inconsistencies in the list. 
*Some states are listed more than once, e.g. Nassau-Orange, Nassau-Orange, Orange-Nassau; Salm-Salm, Salm-Salm.
*Some states are listed as "RA" (reichsabtei), and some as "Imperial Abbey". These should all be listed the same way. Moreover some RAs and some Imperial Abbeys are coloured blue, some of each are left white.
*Oberried and Odenheim are both listed as "Provostry", one is blue, one is white.
I will, eventually, check and correct such things.
Maproom (talk) 13:07, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed changes to colour scheme 

message: I did some fixes on the Palatine territories. Looking at these territories, I noted two points:
* In some cases the list exhibits the coats of arms of the modern cities, not the coats of the historical territories.
* In some cases the list traces the history of the governing house, in other cases the history of the territory.
Both points are extremely difficult to fix. --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 11:27, 13 November 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Palatinate 

message: This article is way too messy, erratic and unfocussed. Plus, if you include anything (lordships or "sous-fiefs", etc.) then we might be talking of tens of thousands of units over a nearly 1000-year period. We will never know...
:It's not intended as an article. It is, as the title implies, a list. Maproom (talk) 09:47, 10 October 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Messy and unfocussed 

message: I could not make out what this article is about. It begins with a generic understanding of what a state is but later in the other half the article moves into concepts of Nazism etc. There is no link between the two. I am not sure if the article is about Philosophy or history or an amalgamation of both. If the latter is true then please split the article in two for history and philosophy both.-Wikishagnik (talk) 02:58, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: What do you mean by "concepts of Nazism"? I'm not finding it. —Tamfang (talk) 03:43, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
replies: text:  Wikishagnik asked this question on the help desk.  I have tried to answer it there.  I'm also removing the "multiple issues tag" since I don't think most of them apply here.  --Jayron32 04:53, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Multiple issues tag 

message: The tag has hidden text: "Unclear context, is this article about the Historic Rome of Ceaser or some Philosophical Rome?"
: As the title implies, it's about the Holy Roman Empire.  If only there were some convenient way for the reader to find out what the Holy Roman Empire was! —Tamfang (talk) 05:58, 10 October 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  about those tags 

message: I see that Wikishagnik has added an infobox at the top of the article "to give some more context to this article". This will help those who start reading the article without knowing what the Holy Roman Empire was. But it will confuse those who start reading it thinking it will be an informative article about the constituent states, describing their constitutions, the relationships between them, etc. I would prefer to make it as clear as possible that this is not an article intended to be read, but a list to be used for reference purposes. The less content not directly related to the list, the better.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Maproom (talk • contribs) 
:I've removed the infobox, as I agree that it didn't belong here.  People wanting more information have the option to click blue links to get it.  I have, however, returned the map itself so that there's some visual context.  --Jayron32 16:37, 10 October 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  The infobox 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: From what I've gathered, the German title "Freiherr" translates literally into "free lord", and is usually taken to correspond in rank to the English title "baron".  However, there are states on this list that are designated as "lordships", and states that are designated as "baronies".  Since the English term "lord" can refer to any member of the nobility (from barons to dukes), to which specific rank did the rulers of "lordships" correspond?  Would I be correct in guessing that "lordships" are "baronies"?  ZFT (talk) 03:20, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Baron is specifically for Freiherr. Lord is being used for the lower ranked titles such as Herr (strictly accurate) and Ritter (more accurately translated to Knight). Lordship is also used for the Edelherren, the untitled aristocracy of the early Empire which lacks an English-language equivalent but are sometimes translated as Noble Lord.  Nomadic1 (talk) 05:57, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lordship vs. barony 

message: This sucks. Provide a single list somewhere. — LlywelynII 21:14, 30 April 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: In response to an earlier question

message: I have looked in every category multiple times and cannot see a list. The article is just full of unnecessary clarifications and should probably be deleted. Bigbrain132 (talk) 16:43, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  No list 

message: I’ve spent around 8 straight minutes looking through this article and I still cannot find any sources. 165.234.101.96 (talk) 15:50, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sources? 

message: The links to each article need to be fixed 2603:7080:A33B:5CEE:708F:485C:2C83:150 (talk) 20:18, 18 May 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Links