Odenbach
Odenbach 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 Lauterecken-Wolfstein.
Geography
Location
The municipality lies northeast of Lauterecken at the mouth of its eponymous river, the Odenbach, where it empties into the river Glan in the North Palatine Uplands. Odenbach also lies on Bundesstraße 420. The village lies on both sides of the Glan where the valley floor's elevation is 155 m above sea level. The valleys are squeezed somewhat into a narrow gap by various mountains. Foremost of these on the Glan's left bank are the Bennerberg and the Bornberg with its outliers stretching towards Meisenheim, while on the right bank are the Galgenberg and the Hagelkreuz. Furthermore, in the gore formed by the Glan and Odenbach is the plateau of the Hellerwald and the Streit. The municipal area measures 800 ha, of which 465 ha is farmed, 233 ha is wooded, 83 ha is settled or used for transport, 8 ha is recreational and 11 ha is open water.Neighbouring municipalities
Odenbach borders in the north on the town of Meisenheim, in the east on the municipalities of Reiffelbach and Becherbach, in the south on the municipality of Adenbach, in the southwest on the municipality of Cronenberg and in the west on the municipality of Medard.Municipality’s layout
Odenbach's appearance up until the early 19th century was characterized by its girding wall with two gates, the Obertor and the Untertor, and three defensive towers. In the village core, the mediaeval street network has remained largely preserved. With only a few exceptions, most of the village's buildings were destroyed in the great fire of 1733. The village wall was razed in 1828, and only a few bits of it remain today. Thereafter, the village spread out in the course of the 19th century beyond the former village moat along the newly built Grabenstraße, Adenbacher Straße and Glanstraße. After the Second World War, the municipality opened three new residential areas, beginning in 1953 the one in the rural cadastral areas known as “Im Schofel” and “In Kohlenstein”, a few years later the one in the rural cadastral area known as “In Burghöhl” and in the 1970s the one in the rural cadastral area known as “Am Schächerweg”. The loam- an loess-rich Glan valley floor, as well as the heights stretching towards Roth, make for outstanding conditions for agriculture. The mountain slopes on the Glan's left bank and the Odenbach's right – a rural cadastral area known as “Igelsbach” – offered the best chances for winegrowing, which was mentioned as early as 893. By the late 19th century, vineyards took up some 10% of the area within Odenbach's limits. As a result of the changes to agricultural structure, winegrowing came to an end in the 1960s. The woodlands, which still make up roughly one third of the municipal area, served the local farmers before the First World War as a further support for their endeavours. Foremost among its boons to them was of course firewood for private use, but it was also useful for tanbark harvesting, and it yielded the wood that was needed for building and woodworking. The shift to other energy sources, however, has led to a relative loss of importance for the woodlands.History
Antiquity
The earliest traces of settlement in and around Odenbach go back to the New Stone Age. Archaeological finds from the Bronze Age that followed, however, have been rather sparse, but they become richer again with the rise of the Celts. From the early Iron Age comes the burying ground that was unearthed on the Galgenberg. Furthermore, digging work in 1934 at the “Hellerwald” sporting ground brought to light another burying ground, this one from the later Iron Age, which long lay on a homestead in the cadastral area known as “Im hintern Spitzwasen”, whose foundation remnants are known. Finds of ancient coins show that there was uninterrupted settlement here in the transitional period between Celtic and Roman times. Indeed, Roman roads once ran along the heights to the Roßberg and the Ebernburg either side of the Glan. Unearthed during clearing work in the cadastral area known as “Im Neuberg” was one of the most important troves: some 150 gold coins attributed to the East Celtic tribe of the Leuker. After Julius Caesar conquered Gaul, the inhabitants adopted Roman culture. The State Museum in Speyer keeps a bronze statuette of Minerva found in Adenbach and another of Mercury found in Odenbach. During the Migration Period, between about AD 375 to 550, the Medard-Odenbach area must have been a refuge.Middle Ages
After the Franks had finished taking the land, a Merovingian prince donated the lordship over St. Medard to the Bishopric of Verdun on the Meuse sometime about the year 600. While the Church of St. Medard was the hub for local missionary efforts, Odenbach was the administrative hub. On 20 May 841, Odenbach itself had its first documentary mention. Out of the lordship's Vogtei grew bit by bit the Gericht of Odenbach, the same as the territory later known as the Ämter of Odenbach and Lauterecken. After the Frankish Imperial partitions in 843 and in 870, the Bishopric of Verdun found that it was somewhat less than straightforward to hold onto East Frankish holdings. Upon the accession of Bishop of Verdun Albert I of Marcey in 1156, Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor, guaranteed Verdun's rights. To strengthen the claim to the lordship, a moated castle was built on the gore of land at the Odenbach's mouth in the same century, although its buildings were torn down in the Thirty Years' War by Spanish occupiers. By the mid 19th century, most of what was left had fallen into ruin. One remnant still stands today, however, the ruin of a tower known as the Weiherturm. Remnants of other old buildings, too, still bear witness to the village's centuries-long history. The castle belonged to the St. Medard estate, which itself belonged to the Bishop of Verdun. It later became the seat of the Barons of Fürstenwächter. The Verdun holding around Medard and Odenbach eventually formed along with those around Baumholder and Wolfersweiler, the Remigiusland and the Amt of Veldenz on the Moselle the County of Veldenz. 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 of the House of Wittelsbach. 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. This state in turn met its end in 1798 after French Revolutionary troops had occupied the German lands on the Rhine’s left bank. Odenbach had already become the seat of a Schultheiß by 1387.Modern times
freed the villagers of Odenbach and a few of the outlying villages from serfdom in 1579. In 1596, they were also granted market rights.Recent times
In 1798, French Revolutionary troops annexed the land. Administratively, Odenbach formed together with Adenbach, Ginsweiler, Reiffelbach and Schmittweiler a mairie belonging to the Canton of Lauterecken, the Arrondissement of Kaiserslautern and the Department of Mont-Tonnerre. After French rule, once Napoleon had been driven out of the country, the Congress of Vienna drew new boundaries yet again. After a transitional time, Odenbach was grouped into the bayerischer Rheinkreis, later known as Rheinpfalz, an exclave of the Kingdom of Bavaria in 1816 with the rank of Bürgermeisterei. In the 1870s, three coal pits were opened and almost 500 miners were employed. In the course of administrative restructuring in Rhineland-Palatinate, the 1,000-year-old administrative entity of Odenbach was dissolved in 1970, and the municipality was grouped into the Verbandsgemeinde of Lauterecken.Population development
In 1566, there were 69 families registered at Odenbach, while in 1609 there were 62. In the latter case, they were broken down as follows: one innkeeper, twelve craftsmen, fourteen farmers, eleven winegrowers, five day labourers, two herdsmen and two gatekeepers. The events of the Thirty Years' War led to considerable loss of life and property. In 1656, only 23 families were left in Odenbach. On the occasion of the 1719 census, it was noted that there were 344 souls, of whom 30 were Catholic, 243 were Reformed and 71 were Lutheran. There were also four Jewish families. A huge demographic shift came about somewhat more than 120 years later that saw the village's population rise threefold. In 1843, 1,079 souls were counted, of whom 110 were Jewish. Besides the odd swing, either up or down, this population level has remained steady until the present day. This level was held steady only by the outflow of people, both to German cities and industrial centres and overseas, mainly to the United States. Until the Second World War ended, roughly one third of the inhabitants were farmers, each with a plot of between 5 and 20 ha, while another third worked in trades. The remaining third of the population was made up of both people in learned professions and day labourers. Today, only 12 commercial concerns can still be found in the village, mainly family businesses and small businesses. Most Odenbach inhabitants in the workforce work elsewhere. As for farms, only two now remain.The following table shows population development since early Bavarian times for Odenbach, with some figures broken down by religious denomination: