Trier

The Electorate of Trier was an ecclesiastical principality on the Moselle, ruled by an archbishop who was also an imperial elector. In 1337 the archbishop was Baldwin of Luxembourg, brother of Emperor Henry VII.

Trier gained a university in 1473, and the Imperial Diet organized the Imperial Circles there in 1512. Witch trials scarred the territory from 1581 to 1593; French destruction in 1688 and 1689 left the city without walls. French troops captured Trier in 1794, France annexed its left-bank lands in 1801, and the remainder passed to Nassau-Weilburg in 1803.