Stockach

Stockach stands in the Hegau country near Lake Constance. The counts of Nellenburg founded the town on a sheltered height in the thirteenth century, above an older village at the meeting of two former Roman roads. In 1465 the town and its surrounding lordship were sold to the Habsburgs, whose officials governed the Nellenburg territory from Stockach for centuries.

Swiss forces besieged the town without success in 1499, during the Swabian War. It suffered more severely in the War of the Spanish Succession, when the Bavarian elector ordered much of it burned in 1704. Stockach remained an important junction for coaches travelling between Vienna, Paris, Zürich and other cities. In 1799 Austrian forces defeated the French near Stockach and Liptingen. Habsburg rule ended in 1805; the town passed first to Württemberg and then to Baden in 1810.