Alsfeld written!Town constitution of Alsfeld

In the last two decades of the 14th century, Landgrave Hermann II had a castle built in Alsfeld and granted the growing guilds in the city the right to annually “elect four men from among them to participate in the decisions of the council, and even to monitor them.”

This early form of civic self-government naturally displeased the long-established and previously ruling patrician families, whose influence had been curtailed. After Landgrave Hermann’s death in 1413, they joined forces with knights, castle men, and anti-citizen nobles to influence the noble guardian of the still youthful Ludwig (the Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg) to abolish the “Right of the Four” and thus roll back the influence of the guilds and the citizenry.

This period of restoration lasted 15 years before the now-adult Landgrave Ludwig I, known as “the Peaceful,” issued a citizen-friendly city constitution in Alsfeld on January 24, 1429, with the so-called “Korebrief.” This constitution remained valid for almost 400 years (until 1821) and restored the established opportunities for co-determination of the citizenry. (MNic)