Westphalian

Westphalians are a Low German people between the Rhine and Weser. In Roman times they belonged to the Saxon confederation; the AD 9 Teutoburg Forest battle was near Osnabrück. The 772–804 Saxon Wars broke Widukind's resistance, planted the bishoprics of Münster and Osnabrück and made Westphalia one of four Saxon duchy districts.

After Barbarossa deposed Henry the Lion in 1180, the Duchy of Westphalia went to Cologne archbishops, the rest into prince-bishoprics, Lippe and lordships of the Lower Rhenish–Westphalian Circle; Münster and Soest grew rich as Hanseatic cities. The Reformation split it between Catholics and Lutherans, and in 1534–1535 Anabaptists seized Münster, setting up a communal kingdom until the prince-bishop stormed it.

Westphalia suffered in the Thirty Years' War but gave its name to the 1648 Peace of Westphalia, signed at Münster and Osnabrück, its sovereign-state principle called Westphalian sovereignty. Napoleon made a short-lived Kingdom of Westphalia in 1807–1813; in 1815 the region joined the Prussian Province of Westphalia.