Lippe

Lippe was a lordship on the river of the same name, with Lippstadt among its towns. In 1337 Simon I ruled the territory; acquisitions from Schwalenberg between 1332 and 1358 extended it north to the Weser.

Simon's death in 1344 brought partition and a feud with Tecklenburg over Rheda, settled in 1401. Lippe became an imperial county in 1528. Simon VI adopted Calvinism in 1605, provoking a dispute with Lutheran Lemgo that ended in 1617; Lippe under the Detmold line became a principality in 1789.