Kartan visar dagens regionsindelning. På dessa har jag lagt (ungefärliga positioner) ett antal ortsnamn.
Bra kortfattad historiebeskrivning om Pfalz (från karolingerna till ca 1700)
http://www.cob-net.org/pietism.htm
Mkt bra om miljön i tyskland (och nassau)
Pietismen knyter an till bl a Gottfried Arnold
Politisk bakgrund
Bakgrund till emigration från Nassau, Pfalz, Rheinland på 1600-talets andra hälft
Källa
Klipp:
In the latter part of the Seventeenth Century the fertile lands of the Palatinate were made the scene of devastation, spoliation and ruin. Louis XIV suddently precipitated eighty thousand troops on these people within the short period of seven weeks, and changed that Paradise into a desert. Heidelberg, Mannheim and Worms were looted and partly burned, twelve hundred villages were razed to the ground and 40,000 inhabitants robbed of all they had. For example, during the last night of a French commander's stay in one of these towns, he caused it to be so completely and methodically plundered, that he had himself nothing but straw to sleep on; and the next day this bedding was employed in setting fire to the town, which was presently reduced to ashes. Since the day of the Huns, Europe beheld no such devastation. The Emperor of Germany who should have protected the Palatinate, had his hands full with the Turks just then, and could do nothing to help them....
In February, 1689, . . . [General] Melac, blew up the walls of Heidelberg and its castle towers, and laid half the city in ashes. . . . Such of the inhabitants as tried to rescue their goods were slain. Every where were found the corpses of wretched men frozen to death. The citizens of Manheim were compelled to assist in destroying their fortifications, and were then driven out, hungry and naked, into the winter cold, and their city was burned. . . ."
...
Prior to the peace of Ryswick (1697) and the succeeding peace of Utrecht (1713) the people were denied every opportunity to recover. Congregations had to worship in the open air, and thousands were compelled to flee from their homes. The district of Sinsheim, in which the Spenglers"(And SWOPES) "resided, was scourged and devastated. In 1674 Turenne invaded it, the German forces being under the command of the Duke of Lorraine. In 1689 the city of Sinsheim was utterly destroyed by the French and the inhabitants exiled. Immense multitudes went down the Rhine. They arrived at Holland, many utterly destitute, and encamped by thousands in the environs of Amsterdam and Rotterdam, where the Dutch did all they could to help them, their persecuted brethren in faith. It was from the latter point that the Swiss, Palatines , and refugee Huguenots sailed to find an asylum on our hospitable shores. Thus began that great influx of Germans whose numbers and character greatly affrighted the English of Pennsylvania as to their supremacy, and to prevent their political ascendancy denied them for many years the privileges of citizenship. "
