Falkenstein

Falkenstein was a lordship of the Bolanden-Falkenstein family, whose lands included Offenbach in the Wetterau. The family held estates around the Taunus as well as in the Palatinate.

In 1372 the Falkensteins pledged Offenbach to Frankfurt for a thousand gulden. Count Werner III became Archbishop of Trier in 1388; when he died in 1418, the Hessian line ended. The Palatine lordship was sold in 1456 and raised to a county in 1518; it passed to Lorraine in 1667 and was ceded to France in 1801.