Altleiningen

Altleiningen is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Bad Dürkheim district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.GeographyLocationThe municipality lies at an elevation of 300 m above sea level in the northeast Palatinate Forest in the valley of the Eckbach, a 39 km-long brook that empties into the Rhine. Altleiningen belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Hettenleidelheim, whose seat is in the like-named municipality.HistoryNameAltleiningen, originally Leiningen, had its first documentary mention in 780 when the 50 km-distant Lorsch Abbey’s catalogue of holdings listed a woodland holding in linunga marca (Latin for “in the Leiningen area”). The naming referred to the Leinbaum, a name used locally at the time mostly for the Norway Maple, but sometimes also for the large-leaved linden. Since both trees were often found growing alongside the Eckbach, the brook at this time also went by the name Leinbach.From the municipality’s name also sprang the noble family Leiningen’s name. This family held the so-called Leiningerland for centuries.