Prüm

Prüm grew around a Benedictine abbey founded in 721 by Bertrada and her son Charibert. Favoured by the Carolingian dynasty, it received extensive lands and relics, including sandals revered as those of Christ. Emperor Lothair I entered the monastery in 855 and was buried here. The abbot came to rule a substantial territory and held a prince's seat in the Imperial Diet.

After a period of decline, the archbishops of Trier sought to incorporate the abbey. The abbots resisted for generations, even fighting the archbishop in 1511, but after the death of Abbot Christopher in 1576 the electors of Trier became its perpetual administrators. French revolutionary troops occupied Prüm in 1794; the abbey was secularized and its estates sold. In 1815 the town passed to Prussia.