Hello and welcome to the History of the Germans.

Episode 189, the Count Pelatinate on the Rhine, which is also episode 5 of season 11, the

Empire in the 15th century.

Now this week it's back to the political landscape of the Empire.

We will travel upriver from Mainz via Worms and the not-yet-existent cities of

Mannheim and Ludwigshafen to Heidelberg, my old hometown.

And there we will meet the man, who held one of the empire's most confusing titles,

the Count Palatinate on the Rhine,

elector and high steward of the empire.

This elector we want to talk about is called Friedrich, Friedrich de Siegreche, Frederick the victorious,

and being victorious is barely half of what is interesting about him.

Now, I would normally at this point place another appeal to support the podcast, but quite

frankly, as I'm looking at my Bloomberg screen, I think we are all best served to hold on tight

and see where things are going. Which is why we should be even more grateful to Arna Thur Pedersen, Bruce Godmanson, Arthur S, Christian M, I, U.Y, Sam from Rhode Island, and C.J., who've not only signed up on History of the Germans.com

slash support, but have stayed the course.com slash support, but I've stayed the course.

And with that, back to the show.

Last week, we discussed how printing had changed the world,

and if you've missed it, listen to it.

Even if I say so myself, I think that was a pretty good one.

But this week, we will leave Mr. Gutenberg in his workshop busy printing Bibles and set off again on our tour of the Empire.

Our journey will take us south, which in the 15th century meant we needed to travel by boat,

on the Rhine, upriver.

...