Neunkirchen am Potzberg (, ) is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Kusel district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Kusel-Altenglan, whose seat is in Kusel.
Geography
Location Neunkirchen am Potzberg lies southeast of the district seat of Kusel. The Potzberg, the “King of the Westrich” (an historic region that encompasses areas in both Germany and France) is a 562 m-high mountain in the Western Palatinate on whose southeast slope lies the village, roughly a kilometre below the peak (562.5 m above sea level). The main street runs crosswise over the slope and branching off it are a few dead-end streets both uphill and downhill. The village itself spreads out at an elevation from some 335 m above sea level to 350 m above sea level. The Limbach, a tributary to the Reichenbach (itself a tributary to the Glan) rises above the village. From the village, a wonderful view can be seen across the Reichenbach valley to the Heidenburg (castle) near Niederstaufenbach and to further mountains on the other side of the dale. The municipal area measures 501 ha, of which 137 ha is wooded. Neunkirchen also has a wildlife park, a lookout tower, a hotel and a hiking trail network.Location
Neighbouring municipalities Neunkirchen am Potzberg borders in the north on the municipality of Föckelberg, in the east on the municipality of Oberstaufenbach, in the south on the municipality of Reichenbach-Steegen, in the west on the municipality of Matzenbach and in the northwest on the municipalities of Theisbergstegen and Rutsweiler am Glan.
Constituent communities Also belonging to Neunkirchen am Potzberg are the outlying homesteads of Kreuzhof, east of the village, and Talhof, south of the village.Statistisches Landesamt Rheinland-Pfalz – Amtliches Verzeichnis der Gemeinden und Gemeindeteile , Seite 97 (PDF) These are both Aussiedlerhöfe, agricultural settlements established after the Second World War to increase food production. Standing on the road to Föckelberg are weekend houses.Constituent communities
Municipality’s layout Neunkirchen's houses, which are spread out in a rather loose manner, stand for the most part on the through road, which leads from Föckelberg to Gimsbach. The oldest buildings go back to the 19th century. A few bigger farmhouses of the Westrichhaus type are still standing. Most of the rest are smaller farmhouses and workers’ houses. To be borne in mind with regard to the farmhouses is that very few of them are actually used by farmers. The church stands in the village's southwest end near the graveyard, which is ringed by a high, old wall built in 1729 with a lovely entrance gate. Within the village once stood two schoolhouses, where today classes are no longer held. For primary school classes for the surrounding villages, a new schoolhouse was built with four classrooms for a one-stream school.Municipality’s layout
History
Antiquity It is likely that the area around what is now Neunkirchen was settled in prehistoric times, though heaps of spoil within the municipal area likelier stem from mining than ancient gravedigging. According to a report in the Westrichkalender Kusel, a stone knife was found in a garden near the church at some unspecified time in the past. From Roman times comes a Jupiter Column that was unearthed in the cadastral area known as Lanzweiler. Furthermore, an old wall found underneath the village itself might be Roman in origin.Antiquity
Middle Ages According to the old border descriptions of the Remigiusland, Neunkirchen am Potzberg lay outside this holding of the Bishopric of Reims in the Westrich, and thus in the Free Imperial Domain (Reichsland), which stretched out over a broad swath of land around Castle Lautern. Just when Neunkirchen arose as a village is very hard to determine, but it was likely founded only in the 10th century. Ernst Christmann was of the opinion that a church that Otto the Great gave the Worms Cathedral Foundation in 937 as a donation was none other than the church in Neunkirchen am Potzberg. This opinion, though, is contradicted by historians today. Researchers M. Dolch and A. Greule, for example, hold that the church in question was the one in a place called Neunkirchen southeast of Kübelberg, known as “Neuenkirchen” in contrast to “Altenkirchen” (neu and alt are German for “new” and “old” respectively). They base their thesis on the assertion that the said church appears several times in documents from the 10th century, and that its location was more thoroughly described, as in 956 when it was described as being in a forest near the Cheuilinbahc (a brook now called the Kohlbach, and also likely the old name for Kübelberg, but certainly not for Schwedelbach). Therefore, Neunkirchen am Potzberg cannot be the same place as the Neunkirchen in the 937 document as was claimed by so many historians in days gone by (Widder, Frey and Gümbel among others). As early as the 15th century, this village in what is now the southern Kusel district was given up. Furthermore, Neunkirchen am Potzberg must also be distinguished from Neunkirchen an der Nahe, which like Medard was held by the Bishops of Verdun. Any reference to this relationship that crops up in a document about “Neunkirchen” must always have to do with Neunkirchen an der Nahe. In view of all these revisions to the body of knowledge about “Neunkirchen”, Neunkirchen am Potzberg's first documentary mention must be considered to be a 1329 document kept at the Munich Main State Archive (Hauptstaatsarchiv München), which contains the wording “zu Nunkyrchen”. According to this document, Count Georg I of Veldenz delivered to Dietrich Schwinde von Rittersdorf 100 pounds in Heller to be paid out of a comital estate near Neunkirchen am Potzberg. About this estate, which was called Horreys gut, nothing further is known. The Count may have owned an estate in the still free Reichsland from which he drew income to pay his vassals. The free Reichsland was then, in the earlier half of the 14th century, pledged to various regional lords. Neunkirchen am Potzberg thus passed in 1345 along with all the villages in the Amt of Reichenbach as an Imperial pledge to the Counts of Veldenz. While it is still not quite certain as to whether the 1329 document indeed deals with Neunkirchen am Potzberg when it refers to Horreys gut, it can be so assumed with certainty by what appears in a further documentary mention. This deals with a 1393 letter granting a widow's estate from Count Friedrich of Veldenz, which is reprinted in the Acta Academiae Theodoro-Palatinae. Yet another mention of Neunkirchen from late in Veldenz times is to be found in a 1430 document, according to which Siegfried Blick von Lichtenberg bequeathed to his wife Katharina money from, among other places, Neunkirchen in the amount of 2 pounds in Heller. It is clear that this means Neunkirchen am Potzberg from the addition of the phrase “in dem Konigrych” – “in the kingdom”. The Reichsland still existed, even if the king had pledged it. In 1444, the County of Veldenz met its end when Count Friedrich III of Veldenz died without a male heir. His daughter Anna wed King Ruprecht's son Count Palatine Stephan. By uniting his own Palatine holdings with the now otherwise heirless County of Veldenz – his wife had inherited the county, but not her father's title – and by redeeming the hitherto pledged County of Zweibrücken, Stephan founded a new County Palatine, as whose comital residence he chose the town of Zweibrücken: the County Palatine – later Duchy – of Palatinate-Zweibrücken. It is likely that throughout the Middle Ages, only a few houses stood around the church, only the rectory and the estate with various outbuildings. Likely more heavily settled was the now vanished village of Lanzweiler, lying somewhat lower down than Neunkirchen.Middle Ages
Modern times In 1543, Count Palatine and later Duke Wolfgang of Zweibrücken transferred to his uncle Ruprecht lands for the founding of his own county palatine. Belonging to it were Veldenz on the Moselle, Lauterecken and later also the County of Veldenz-Lützelstein in Alsace. The Imperial pledged domains of the Ämter of Reichenbach and Jettenbach and also the Remigiusberg hill in the Remigiusland were grouped into this new county palatine, and along with them, the village of Neunkirchen. The County Palatine of Veldenz-Lauterecken-Lützelstein met its end in the late 17th century when the last Count Palatine died. Then, a years-long dispute arose between the Electorate of the Palatinate and the Duchy of Palatinate-Zweibrücken, who both claimed the right of succession in Palatinate-Veldenz. The dispute was settled in 1733 with the Veldenz Succession Treaty of Mannheim, under whose terms the Ämter of Veldenz and Lauterecken passed wholly to the Electorate of the Palatinate, and the former Palatine-Veldenz Amt of Lauterecken was permanently given the status of an Electorate of the Palatinate Oberamt, after it had already been occupied by the Electorate of the Palatinate troops in 1697 anyway. Neunkirchen am Potzberg thus became an Electorate of the Palatinate holding. Towards the end of the old feudal age, the Electorate of the Palatinate geographer and historiographer Johann Goswin Widder wrote the following about the village of Neunkirchen am Potzberg: “Neunkirchen, a handsome village lying three quarters of an hour westwards from Reichenbach on the Potzberg, is held to be the Nuninchirichaa (archaic name form for Neunkirchen) where King Otto donated a main church … as early as the year 936 to the Worms Cathedral Foundation. About Nuinchiricha, however, two other places that bear the name Nunkirch, and which also belong to the Nahegau must be considered … Now, this village has two churches, 63 houses, which are occupied by 63 families. The municipal area is made up of 880 Morgen of cropland, 186 Morgen of meadows, 326 Morgen of forest.”Modern times
Recent times During the time of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era that followed, the German lands on the Rhine’s left bank were annexed by France. With the new political arrangement and within the new boundaries, Neunkirchen am Potzberg found itself in the Mairie (“Mayoralty”) of Neunkirchen, the Canton of Wolfstein, the Arrondissement of Kaiserslautern and the Department of Mont-Tonnerre (or Donnersberg in German) whose seat was at Mainz. After French rule, the Congress of Vienna drew new boundaries yet again. After a transitional time, Neunkirchen am Potzberg was grouped into the bayerischer Rheinkreis, later known as Rheinpfalz (“Rhenish Palatinate”), an exclave of the Kingdom of Bavaria in 1816, where it was the seat of a Bürgermeisterei (“mayoralty”) at first within the Landcommissariat (today Landkreis or district) of Kusel and the Canton of Wolfstein. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, the Nazi Party (NSDAP) became quite popular in Neunkirchen am Potzberg. In the 1928 Reichstag elections, none of the local votes went to Adolf Hitler’s party, but by the 1930 Reichstag elections, this had grown to 7.4%. By the time of the 1933 Reichstag elections, after Hitler had already seized power, local support for the Nazis had swollen to 43.3%. Hitler’s success in these elections paved the way for his Enabling Act of 1933 (Ermächtigungsgesetz), thus starting the Third Reich in earnest. The Bürgermeisterei remained in force until administrative and regional reform in 1968. Belonging to this mayoralty were, besides Neunkirchen itself, the villages of Föckelberg and Oberstaufenbach, and until 1825 Mühlbach, too. Since 2018, Neunkirchen am Potzberg has been an Ortsgemeinde within the Verbandsgemeinde of Kusel-Altenglan.Recent times The municipality marked its 675-year jubilee (since the 1329 first documentary mention) in 2004.
Population development