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Altenburger Land
District
FlagCoat of arms
Country	Germany
State	Thuringia
Capital	Altenburg
Government
• District admin.	Uwe Melzer (CDU)
Area
• Total	569.41 km (219.85 sq mi)
Population
• Total	88,787
• Density	160/km (400/sq mi)
Time zone	UTC+01:00 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+02:00 (CEST)
Vehicle registration	ABG, SLN
Website	altenburgerland.de

Altenburger Land is a district in Thuringia, Germany. It is bounded by (from the west and clockwise) the district of Greiz, the Burgenlandkreis (Saxony-Anhalt), and the districts Leipzig, Mittelsachsen and Zwickau in Saxony. The district is a member of the Central German Metropolitan Region.

Geography

Altenburger Land is the easternmost district of Thuringia. It is largely agricultural with three quarters of the total area being used for agriculture. In contrast, forests make up only around 10% of the area, especially in the south of the district there are only few forests. This can be explained by a high soil fertility with a Loess-layer of up to 3.5 meters.

The main river is the Pleiße, a tributary of the White Elster, crossing the district from south to north. The hilly Osterland constituting the northernmost foothills of the Ore Mountains slopes gently away to the plains of eastern Saxony-Anhalt.

History

The region on the Pleiße River was part of a huge forest, where the Thuringii formed the Thuringian Kingdom. After this, the Kingdom was in 531 taken over by the Franks, Slavic people were also moving in. Thuringians reestablished independent rule. The castle of Altenburg already existed in the 10th century, it became an imperial seat. In the following centuries German settlers from other parts moved in. It was part of the Margravate of Meissen in the 14th century. At this time most of the forests were cleared.

The town of Altenburg and the surrounding lands were the tiny Duchy of Saxe-Altenburg from 1826 to 1918; afterwards it was a state within the Weimar Republic for a short time, before it was dissolved in 1922 in order to join the Free State of Thuringia.

The district in its present borders was established in 1922 under the name "Altenburg". In 1952 there was an administrative reform splitting the districts into two smaller units, called "Altenburg" and "Schmölln". They were merged again in 1994 under the name Altenburger Land.

Historical Population

Source: from 1994 Thüringer Landesamt für Statistik – values from 31st December

Politics

District Council

The 46 seats in the district council are distributed between the parties as follows since the Regional Elections in Thüringia 26th May 2024:

Coat of arms

The coat of arms displays:

• The red rose stands for the Burgraviate of Altenburg and is also part of the coat of arms of the city of Altenburg
• The lion, which was the symbol of the reeves of Plauen; they had great power in the region during the 14th and 15th centuries
• The black and gold stripes with the green ring was the coat of arms of the Saxon Wettin dynasty
• The red acorn symbolises the skat game, which was invented in Altenburg in 1813

Partnerschaften

• Enzkreis (since 1991)
• Hickory, North Carolina, (USA, since 1997)

Towns and municipalities

References

1. "Bevölkerung der Gemeinden, erfüllenden Gemeinden und Verwaltungsgemeinschaften in Thüringen Gebietsstand: 31.12.2022" (in German). Thüringer Landesamt für Statistik. June 2023.
2. "Thüringisches Landesamt für Umwelt und Geologie". Archived from the original on 2017-09-09. Retrieved 2020-08-11.
3. "Thüringer Landesamt für Statistik, Bevölkerung nach Geschlecht, Landkreis Altenburger Land". Retrieved 2023-09-23.

External links

• Official website (German, English)

v t e Urban and rural districts in the Free State of Thuringia in Germany
Urban districts	Erfurt Gera Jena Suhl Weimar
Rural districts	Altenburger Land Eichsfeld Gotha Greiz Hildburghausen Ilm-Kreis Kyffhäuserkreis Nordhausen Saale-Holzland-Kreis Saale-Orla-Kreis Saalfeld-Rudolstadt Schmalkalden-Meiningen Sömmerda Sonneberg Unstrut-Hainich-Kreis Wartburgkreis Weimarer Land
Districts of German states (Full list) Baden-Württemberg Bavaria Brandenburg Bremen Hesse Lower Saxony Mecklenburg-Vorpommern North Rhine-Westphalia Rhineland-Palatinate Saarland Saxony Saxony-Anhalt Schleswig-Holstein Thuringia

51°0′N 12°25′E / 51.000°N 12.417°E / 51.000; 12.417

• Districts of Thuringia
• Altenburger Land