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Stephenson:Neal:Quicksilver:839:The Saarland (DaMe)

From the Quicksilver Metaweb.

A page for a parcel of land grabbed by the Sun King

Stephensonia

Jacob the Coiner has a boss who understood real estate.

Authored entries

Saarland

Plan for Saarlouis
The Building Plan for Saarlouis The name Saarland is actually an anachronism. The term was used for the first time after World War II, when the region became a French Protectorate until it returned to Germany in 1957. Since the region really was fragmented into tiny principalities during most of its history, there was no political entity at the end of the 17th century. However, the events that are described in Quicksilver had some influence on the history of what was later called the Saarland.

After the Peace of Nijmegen 1679 which ended the Franco-Dutch war mentioned in Quicksilver, France got control over the Western parts of that region. In 1680, a fortress was build by Vauban, Louis` famous military engineer, on the banks of the river Saar (in French: Sarre). In honour of Louis XIV, who even visited the fortress in 1683, it was named Sarrelouis.

The Saarland lies between France and the Palatinate, and so the French armies marched through on their way to the Rhine, so it really would have been perilous for anyone like Eliza to take that way in order to reach the Dutch Republic.

After the Napoleonic Wars, the region came to Prussia and later to the German Empire. Vauban`s fortress is now a small town called Saarlouis. Though many of the fortifications have been dismantled in peace times, there are still many buildings, places and even part of the fortress walls left from the time of the Sun King.