Elze

Elze
Coat of arms of Elze Coat of arms
Elze
Location of Elze within Hildesheim district
Coordinates:
Country	Germany
State	Lower Saxony
District	Hildesheim
Government
• Mayor	Pfeiffer
Area
• Total	47.71 km2 (18.42 sq mi)
Population (2013-12-31)
• Total	8,838
• Density	190/km2 (480/sq mi)
Time zone	CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2)
Postal codes	31008
Dialling codes	05068
Vehicle registration	HI
Website	www.elze.de

Elze is a town in the district of Hildesheim, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated on the river Leine, approximately 15 km (9.3 mi) west of Hildesheim. The municipality of Elze also comprises the villages of Esbeck, Mehle, Sehlde, Sorsum, Wittenburg and Wülfingen.

File:Peter und Paul-Kirche in Elze.jpg

St Peter and Paul

File:Elze Rathaus.jpg

Town hall

Elze is one of the oldest settlement in the area, as its name stems from Latin: aula caesaris, a castle of Charlemagne which he had established about 800 in the Saxon estates after his victory over duke Widukind in the Saxon Wars. The emperor also founded a missionary diocese here, dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul which became the origin of the Bishopric of Hildesheim. King Louis the Pious relocated the episcopal see to Hildesheim in 815, however the Lutheran parish church is still devoted to Peter and Paul and the saints are also depicted in the town's coat of arms.

The village of Wittenburg is the site of a former Augustininan canons regular monastery, established in the 14th century in the place of a former castle, maybe erected by members of the Billung dynasty as early as 805. The abbey decayed in the course of the Protestant Reformation, while the Gothic monastery church is preserved.

In 1856 the Kingdom of Hanover opened the Hanoverian Southern Railway (Hannöversche Südbahn) from Hanover to Kassel with a station in Elze. After the annexation by Prussia in 1866, the town became an important railway junction with the building of the Elze–Löhne railway (Weserbahn) to Löhne in Westphalia by entrepreneur Bethel Henry Strousberg, finished in 1875. Elze is also the junction of the Bundesstraße 1 and Bundesstraße 3 federal highways.

Notable people

• Philipp Furtwängler, mathematician, born April 21, 1869 in Elze, died May 19, 1940 in Vienna
• Johann Heinrich Louis Krüger, mathematician, born September 21, 1857 in Elze, died June 1, 1923 in Elze.
• Adriana C. F. Alvim, systems programmer, professor, born September 21, 1968 in Elze, proudly mentions her birthland in every computer science class taught.

Twin town

• Écouché, France since 1972