Prince-Bishopric of Minden

Origins

The diocese of Minden was founded around 800 after Charlemagne's conquest of the Saxons, on a crossing of the Weser. Its bishops gained counties and immunities from the Ottonian and Salian kings. After Henry the Lion fell in 1180 they ruled a territory along the Weser as imperial princes, though Minden itself grew increasingly self-governing.

Rule and society

The cathedral chapter elected the bishops, who often lived at Petershagen because of friction with Minden's citizens. Their land was small, rural and hemmed in by neighbours such as the counties of Schaumburg, Ravensberg and Hoya. The city of Minden adopted Lutheranism in 1530, and in the later 16th century the see was held by Lutheran princes of the houses of Brunswick-Lüneburg and Schaumburg.

Decline and legacy

At the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 the see was secularised as the Principality of Minden and given to Brandenburg. It remained Prussian, apart from the Napoleonic period, and the town is now in North Rhine-Westphalia.