HISTORY. Originally a part of Roman Gaul and inhabited by Celtic tribes, the region now known as Alsace was overrun by the Ger manic nations during the fourth and fifth •en turies, and was ultimately brought under the dominion of the Franks. The Teutonic invaders supplanted, to a great extent, the old Celtie in habitants, and by the tenth century the country had become thoroughly Germanized. After the partition of the Frankish Empire, Alsace was held by the dukes of Swabia and later by the Hapsburgs, nnder whose rule it enjoyed pros perity. Rich and powerful towns, chief among them Strassburg and Kolmar. sprang up, and attained, in the course of time, a very large degree of self-government, entering frequently into treaty relations with other cities of the empire, and partaking fully in the intellectual and spiritual life of the German people. French ambition was directed toward Lorraine as early as the fourteenth century, thom=11 no serious at tempt at conquest was made till 1552. \\lien Henry II. took possession of Metz, Toni, and Verdun. In the peace of Westphalia, in 164S, the "Hapsburgs (as rulers of Austria) ceded their territories in Alsace to France. Louis XIV. subsequently seized the numerous free cities of Alsace. Folmar was incorporated with France in 1680 and Strassburg in 1681. The Treaty of Ryswiek (1697) confirmed France in possession of Alsace.
Systematic attempts to assimilate the inhabi tants. who were mainly of Germanic stock, with the French were made by the Government, but met with no success until the Revolution, when, iu the general overthrow of feudalism, Germans and French were drawn together by the common ideal of democracy. The French spirit pene trnted deeply into the upper and middle classes, and even the mass of the population was, recon ciled to French rule. \\lien war, therefore, be tweenFranee andPrussia broke out in 1S70,those natives of Alsace who did not side zealously with France remained neutral. In Lorraine occurred some of the most decisive battles of the war, Gravelotte, and Vionville, and the siege of Metz. The surrender of Alsace and a part of Lorraine was made the principal condition of peace by Prince Bismarck. who acted in this as the expo nent of a widespread spirit in Germany, which •demanded the recovery of the ancient Germanic borderland. Alsace (with the exception of the
district of TieHort), and the part of Lorraine where the French language had not supplanted the German. became a part of the newly founded empire. and were put under the direct control of the Emperor. The attempt to win back the peo ple to German influences was greatly hampered by the vehement opposition of the Gallicized up per classes and the clergy, and the civil adminis tration was brought almost to a standstill for a number of years by the refusal of the men elected to the district and provincial councils to take the oath of loyalty and perform their functions; the representatives to the Reichsrath were. for the most part, French irreeoncilables. In 1872 the German government called upon the inhabitants to declare themselves either German citizens or French. More than one hundred and fifty thousand expressed their adherence to France. and of these nearly fifty thousand re moved across the border. On the part of the German authorities a policy of severity approach ing military rule was tried in alternation with one of mildness and concession, and for a long time both proved equally ineffective. The Ger manization of the provinces has steadily been ;timed at. however, in acts making the study of the German language compulsory in the public schools, and the use of it obligatory in the courts and legislative bodies; in the suppression of French radical newspapers, and in the estab lishment of higher schools of learning under (ler man control. After 1890 the prospect of an ul timate reconciliation became brighter: a loyalist party appeared which wielded some influence in the elections. In proportion as the spirit of revanche grew weaker in France, and the per manent retention of the provinces by Germany became more assured, the opposition of French sympathizers in Alsace-Lorraine subsided.
Consult: 11. Witte, Zer Gesrh irhle des Deutsch 1 It InS I III Elsass lilt,! im gebiet Stras4airg. 15071: ndbu•h fiir Elsa ss- Loth tin acn (Stras.burg, 1SOS) : H. Deriehsweiler, GCSCh !eh ir Will in f/C718 (IVieSbfldeu, 1901).