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198-725: Pfeffelbach lies in the heart of the Westrich, an historic region that encompasses areas in both Germany and France , at the edge of the Preußische Berge ("Prussian Mountains") in the Western Palatinate . Among these mountains, one within Pfeffelbach's limits, the Herzerberg, is the district's highest peak at 585 m above sea level . On this mountain are both a lookout platform, from which visitors can see as far as Kaiserslautern on

396-549: A Late Latin borrowing of the reconstructed Frankish endonym * Frank . It has been suggested that the meaning "free" was adopted because, after the conquest of Gaul , only Franks were free of taxation, or more generally because they had the status of freemen in contrast to servants or slaves. The etymology of *Frank is uncertain. It is traditionally derived from the Proto-Germanic word * frankōn , which translates as "javelin" or "lance" (the throwing axe of

594-450: A forge , fulling stocks in a fulling mill and so on. However, in corn mills rotation about a vertical axis was required to drive its stones. The horizontal rotation was converted into the vertical rotation by means of gearing, which also enabled the runner stones to turn faster than the waterwheel. The usual arrangement in British and American corn mills has been for the waterwheel to turn

792-721: A high nominal per capita income globally , and its advanced economy ranks among the largest in the world . It is a great power , being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and an official nuclear-weapon state . France is a founding and leading member of the European Union and the eurozone , as well as a member of the Group of Seven , North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and Francophonie . Originally applied to

990-475: A water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as milling (grinding) , rolling , or hammering . Such processes are needed in the production of many material goods, including flour , lumber , paper , textiles , and many metal products. These watermills may comprise gristmills , sawmills , paper mills , textile mills , hammermills , trip hammering mills, rolling mills , and wire drawing mills. One major way to classify watermills

1188-528: A 1762 copy. At the time of the French Revolution , the mill passed into state ownership and was then sold to a family named Jung, and has belonged to their descendants ever since, although the mill itself long ago ceased to function as such. The Eselsmühle ("Ass's Mill"), also called the Schwarzenborner Mühle , was a so-called Pletschmühle (one with an overshot waterwheel that could only run when

1386-814: A Christian in the event of victory against the Visigothic Kingdom , which was said to have guaranteed the battle. Clovis regained the southwest from the Visigoths and was baptised in 508. Clovis I was the first Germanic conqueror after the Fall of the Western Roman Empire to convert to Catholic Christianity; thus France was given the title "Eldest daughter of the Church" by the papacy, and French kings called "the Most Christian Kings of France". The Franks embraced

1584-425: A European counterweight between American and Soviet spheres of influence. However, he opposed any development of a supranational Europe , favouring sovereign nations . The revolt of May 1968 had an enormous social impact; it was a watershed moment when a conservative moral ideal (religion, patriotism, respect for authority) shifted to a more liberal moral ideal (secularism, individualism, sexual revolution). Although

1782-436: A clear day, and a launch point for hang gliders . The municipality lies in the broad valley of the Pfeffelbach, which rises only a few kilometres to the west. The brook flows northeastwards to the steep slopes of Castle Lichtenberg . The village spreads out mainly over the brook's right bank as an extensive clump village. On the valley's north side, the Preußische Berge rise up to heights of almost 600 m above sea level in

1980-728: A combination of social, political and economic factors, which the Ancien Régime proved unable to manage. A financial crisis and social distress led in May 1789 to the convocation of the Estates General , which was converted into a National Assembly in June. The Storming of the Bastille on 14 July led to a series of radical measures by the Assembly, among them the abolition of feudalism , state control over

2178-514: A combined area of 643,801 km (248,573 sq mi) and have a total population of 68.4 million as of January 2024 . France is a semi-presidential republic with its capital in Paris , the country's largest city and main cultural and commercial centre. Metropolitan France was settled during the Iron Age by Celtic tribes known as Gauls before Rome annexed the area in 51 BC, leading to

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2376-504: A commercial survey was undertaken, which yielded the following data: two stone quarrying businesses, three innkeepers, four traders, two bakers , two cabinetmakers, two smiths, one turner , one plumber , two butter and milk dealers, two shoemakers, three gristmills , two butchers , one insurance agent, three wheelwrights , one sculptor , one tailor, one shaver, one house painter and two midwives . Those who were not self-employed worked in crafts, business, stone quarries, Saar mines,

2574-559: A coup and civil war. During the May 1958 crisis , the weak Fourth Republic gave way to the Fifth Republic , which included a strengthened presidency. The war concluded with the Évian Accords in 1962 which led to Algerian independence , at a high price: between half a million and one million deaths and over 2 million internally-displaced Algerians. Around one million Pied-Noirs and Harkis fled from Algeria to France. A vestige of empire

2772-437: A dam on the river above the mill and a more elaborate millpond, sluice gate, mill race and spillway or tailrace. An inherent problem in the overshot mill is that it reverses the rotation of the wheel. If a miller wishes to convert a breastshot mill to an overshot wheel all the machinery in the mill has to be rebuilt to take account of the change in rotation. An alternative solution was the pitchback or backshot wheel. A launder

2970-718: A day. By 610 or 670 AD, the watermill was introduced to Japan via Korean Peninsula . It also became known in Tibet by at least 641 AD. According to Greek historical tradition, India received water-mills from the Roman Empire in the early 4th century AD when a certain Metrodoros introduced "water-mills and baths, unknown among them [the Brahmans] till then". Engineers under the Caliphates adopted watermill technology from former provinces of

3168-741: A distinct Gallo-Roman culture . In the Early Middle Ages , the Franks formed the Kingdom of Francia , which became the heartland of the Carolingian Empire . The Treaty of Verdun of 843 partitioned the empire, with West Francia evolving into the Kingdom of France . In the High Middle Ages , France was a powerful but decentralized feudal kingdom, but from the mid-14th to the mid-15th centuries, France

3366-452: A horizontal shaft on which is also mounted a large pit wheel . This meshes with the wallower , mounted on a vertical shaft, which turns the (larger) great spur wheel (mounted on the same shaft). This large face wheel , set with pegs, in turn, turned a smaller wheel (such as a lantern gear ) known as a stone nut, which was attached to the shaft that drove the runner stone. The number of runner stones that could be turned depended directly upon

3564-427: A horizontal water wheel on a vertical axle, and the other with a vertical wheel on a horizontal axle. The oldest of these were horizontal mills in which the force of the water, striking a simple paddle wheel set horizontally in line with the flow turned a runner stone balanced on the rynd which is atop a shaft leading directly up from the wheel. The bedstone does not turn. The problem with this type of mill arose from

3762-560: A long ridge (Teufelskopf 582 m, Spitzerberg 577 m, Herzerberg 585 m). Rising up over this mountain chain is a tall broadcast tower , which actually stands within Eckersweiler 's limits. The heights south of the village reach above 400 m above sea level (Niederberg 442 m, Pflugsturz 416 m). Cutting through the municipal area in the southwest is the Autobahn A ;62 ( Kaiserslautern – Trier ). Particularly in

3960-598: A mostly rural work process, than the ancient urban-centered literary class had been. By Carolingian times, references to watermills had become "innumerable" in Frankish records. The Domesday Book , compiled in 1086, records 5,624 watermills in England alone. Later research estimates a less conservative number of 6,082 that should be considered a minimum as the northern reaches of England were never properly recorded. In 1300, this number had risen to between 10,000 and 15,000. By

4158-437: A new building, which was used as a school until 1955. Usually, school was divided into three classes. When this new schoolhouse soon became too small, school was to be taught in shifts, but the parents put up a fight against this proposal, and won after threatening a "school strike". Now, a fourth class was to be set up, and also, the 9th school year was to be introduced. Proposals to expand the school carried on at length, until in

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4356-455: A newly selected teacher should have been hired. Nevertheless, Brill still taught, even if he was not freed of compulsory labour duty. In 1661, Johann Berthel Fischer was hired, whom the parents reproached for making the young cleverer than their elders. Later on, there were also craftsmen and farmworkers who taught any willing children to read and write , at first only in the wintertime. Further schoolteachers are listed by name, although in general

4554-756: A period of relative decline, in which France endured the Bourbon Restoration until the founding of the French Second Republic which was succeeded by the Second French Empire upon Napoleon III 's takeover. His empire collapsed during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. This led to the establishment of the Third French Republic , and subsequent decades saw a period of economic prosperity and cultural and scientific flourishing known as

4752-518: A planning contract being awarded to the engineering office of Schöer from Waldmohr . On 15 and 16 May 1999, the municipality of Pfeffelbach held its 875-year jubilee celebration. In May 2000, it was decided to renaturate the Oderbach. Also in 2000, plans for a new building zone, "Im Damm", were set forth. The contract for the work was awarded to the firm Adams from Halsenbach in August 2002. In December 2004,

4950-457: A shaft with a horizontal axis to one with a vertical axis. Although to date only a few dozen Roman mills are archaeologically traced, the widespread use of aqueducts in the period suggests that many remain to be discovered. Recent excavations in Roman London, for example, have uncovered what appears to be a tide mill together with a possible sequence of mills worked by an aqueduct running along

5148-420: A single waterwheel driving more than one set of stones was drawn by Henry Beighton in 1723 and published in 1744 by J. T. Desaguliers . The overshot wheel was a later innovation in waterwheels and was around two and a half times more efficient than the undershot. The undershot wheel, in which the main water wheel is simply set into the flow of the mill race, suffers from an inherent inefficiency stemming from

5346-472: A source of water, used to provide additional power to watermills and water-raising machines. Fulling mills, and steel mills may have spread from Al-Andalus to Christian Spain in the 12th century. Industrial watermills were also employed in large factory complexes built in al-Andalus between the 11th and 13th centuries. The engineers of the Islamic world used several solutions to achieve the maximum output from

5544-695: A spate of railway building. The line from Kusel to Ottweiler opened in 1935. On 16 November of the following year, the whole line from Kusel to Türkismühle opened. The stretch of the Ostertalbahn between Schwarzerden and Ottweiler followed on 15 May 1938. The 1930s also saw the rise of the Third Reich after Adolf Hitler 's seizure of power in Germany in 1933, and the outbreak of the Second World War . Upon Germany's defeat in 1945, Pfeffelbach found itself in

5742-467: A time even to Sankt Wendel . A threshing cooperative was founded in 1872, a threshing shed was built and a threshing machine was bought. In 1893, the church at Pfeffelbach acquired the organ that it still has now. On 10 May 1896, to commemorate the conclusion of a peace treaty with France that put an end to the Franco-Prussian War on 10 May 1871 – thus on the 25th anniversary of its signing –

5940-408: A vertical-waterwheel via a gear mechanism, and the other equipped with a horizontal-waterwheel without such a mechanism. The former type can be further divided, depending on where the water hits the wheel paddles, into undershot, overshot, breastshot and reverse shot waterwheel mills. The Greeks invented the two main components of watermills, the waterwheel and toothed gearing, and used, along with

6138-581: A water-powered grain-mill to have existed near the palace of king Mithradates VI Eupator at Cabira , Asia Minor , before 71 BC. The Roman engineer Vitruvius has the first technical description of a watermill, dated to 40/10 BC; the device is fitted with an undershot wheel and power is transmitted via a gearing mechanism . He also seems to indicate the existence of water-powered kneading machines. The Greek epigrammatist Antipater of Thessalonica tells of an advanced overshot wheel mill around 20 BC/10 AD. He praised for its use in grinding grain and

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6336-495: A watermill. One solution was to mount them to piers of bridges to take advantage of the increased flow. Another solution was the ship mill, a type of watermill powered by water wheels mounted on the sides of ships moored in midstream . This technique was employed along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in 10th-century Iraq , where large ship mills made of teak and iron could produce 10 tons of flour from corn every day for

6534-684: Is Kaiserslautern ( Kaiserslautern University of Technology ). Pfeffelbach today has one kindergarten and one primary school . Pfeffelbach has a multipurpose hall. Pfeffelbach lies on Landesstraße 349, which leads from Thallichtenberg by way of Pfeffelbach to the state boundary with the Saarland . Running southwest of the village, but within municipal limits, is the Autobahn A 62 ( Kaiserslautern – Trier ), with an interchange some 3 km west of Pfeffelbach. A railway between Kusel and Türkismühle by way of Pfeffelbach (the Westrichbahn )

6732-423: Is Kirchstraße ("Church Street"), while Brunnenstraße ("Well Street") and Obereck ("Upper Corner") run to the west. Running somewhat apart from these other streets, parallel to the Pfeffelbach, is the through road, Landesstraße 349, which is partly built up towards the west on the stretch known here as St. Wendeler Straße and that to the east here called Kuseler Straße. The split between these two named stretches of

6930-460: Is a public establishment in France between local authorities and the national government covering an inhabited rural area of outstanding beauty, to protect the scenery and heritage as well as setting up sustainable economic development in the area. As of 2019 there are 54 PNRs in France. Watermill A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower . It is a structure that uses

7128-487: Is a voters' group. Pfeffelbach's mayor is Hans Blinn. The German blazon reads: Von Silber und Silber geteilt, oben ein wachsender, rotbewehrter und -bezungter, blauer Löwe, unten ein bewurzelter, brauner Baum mit grünen Blättern. The municipality's arms might in English heraldic language be described thus: Per fess argent a demilion azure armed and langued gules and argent a tree eradicated proper. The charge on

7326-653: Is by an essential trait about their location: tide mills use the movement of the tide; ship mills are water mills onboard (and constituting) a ship. Watermills impact the river dynamics of the watercourses where they are installed. During the time watermills operate channels tend to sedimentate , particularly backwater . Also in the backwater area, inundation events and sedimentation of adjacent floodplains increase. Over time however these effects are cancelled by river banks becoming higher. Where mills have been removed, river incision increases and channels deepen. There are two basic types of watermills, one powered by

7524-420: Is by wheel orientation (vertical or horizontal), one powered by a vertical waterwheel through a gear mechanism, and the other equipped with a horizontal waterwheel without such a mechanism. The former type can be further subdivided, depending on where the water hits the wheel paddles, into undershot, overshot, breastshot and pitchback (backshot or reverse shot) waterwheel mills. Another way to classify water mills

7722-775: Is carried out in the UK at Daniels Mill , Little Salkeld Mill and Redbournbury Mill . This was boosted to overcome flour shortages during the Covid pandemic. Some old mills are being upgraded with modern hydropower technology, such as those worked on by the South Somerset Hydropower Group in the UK. In some developing countries, watermills are still widely used for processing grain. For example, there are thought to be 25,000 operating in Nepal, and 200,000 in India. Many of these are still of

7920-441: Is put together from the word Bach ( German for "brook") and an old German personal name, then Pfeffelbach must originally have been a settlement of a man named "Paffilo", and thus "Paffilo's Brook". In the 1124 first documentary mention, the village is called Peflembach . Among other names that the village has had are Peffellembach (1138), Peffebach (1305), Peffelnbach (1328), Pfeffelnbach (1347) and Pfeffelbach (1588). Even

8118-558: Is the French overseas departments and territories . During the Cold War , de Gaulle pursued a policy of "national independence" towards the Western and Eastern blocs . He withdrew from NATO's military-integrated command (while remaining within the alliance), launched a nuclear development programme and made France the fourth nuclear power . He restored cordial Franco-German relations to create

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8316-504: Is the church building with its spolia from Roman times that was mentioned in the 1124 document, but which is nonetheless likely much older and might not be Pfeffelbach's very first church building. According to the 1124 document, Pfeffelbach was, along with Konken and Altenglan , one of three chapels of ease of the Church of Kusel, and was said to be held by the Abbey of Saint-Remi but belonged with regard to ecclesiastical organization to

8514-428: Is the tide mill . This mill might be of any kind, undershot, overshot or horizontal but it does not employ a river for its power source. Instead a mole or causeway is built across the mouth of a small bay. At low tide, gates in the mole are opened allowing the bay to fill with the incoming tide. At high tide the gates are closed, trapping the water inside. At a certain point a sluice gate in the mole can be opened allowing

8712-498: Is the preeminent role of France in the introduction of new innovative uses of waterpower. However, he has drawn attention to the dearth of studies of the subject in several other countries. The waterwheel was found in China from 30 AD onwards, when it was used to power trip hammers , the bellows in smelting iron , and in one case, to mechanically rotate an armillary sphere for astronomical observation (see Zhang Heng ). Although

8910-512: The 1973 oil crisis , which now accounts for 75 per cent of its electricity production and results in less pollution. According to the 2020 Environmental Performance Index conducted by Yale and Columbia , France was the fifth most environmentally conscious country in the world. Like all European Union state members, France agreed to cut carbon emissions by at least 20% of 1990 levels by 2020. As of 2009 , French carbon dioxide emissions per capita were lower than that of China. The country

9108-609: The 1995 public transport bombings , France has been targeted by Islamist organisations, notably the Charlie Hebdo attack in 2015 which provoked the largest public rallies in French history, gathering 4.4 million people, the November 2015 Paris attacks which resulted in 130 deaths, the deadliest attack on French soil since World War II and the deadliest in the European Union since

9306-764: The Amt of Burglichtenberg. As part of this state, Pfeffelbach passed in 1834 by sale – the price was 2,100,000 Thalers – to the Kingdom of Prussia , which made this area into the Sankt Wendel district in the Rhine Province . More locally, Pfeffelbach lay within the Bürgermeisterei ("Mayoralty") and later Amt of Burglichtenberg. Later, after the First World War , the Treaty of Versailles stipulated, among other things, that 26 of

9504-629: The Archbishopric of Mainz . After several conversions, only the churchtower was still preserved. Beyond that, little is known about the Church of Pfeffelbach in Middle Ages. In 1534, the Dukes of Zweibrücken introduced the Reformation . The last Catholic priest was Nikolaus Becker. The first Lutheran pastor was said to be Johannes Gelanus, while towards the end of the century, Pastor Heinrich Gossenberger

9702-550: The Armistice ; 54 soldiers from Pfeffelbach had fallen in the Great War. A memorial to them was dedicated on 18 September 1921. The autumn of 1919 was very dry , so dry that the brooks all stopped running, forcing the miller to suspend the pursuit of his craft. The potato harvest was bad, but on the other hand, there was quite an ample fruit harvest. The dry autumn was followed by a very wet winter when on 17 January 1920, Pfeffelbach and

9900-469: The Aurelian walls in the late 3rd century. A breastshot wheel mill dating to the late 2nd century AD was excavated at Les Martres-de-Veyre , France. The 3rd century AD Hierapolis water-powered stone sawmill is the earliest known machine to incorporate the mechanism of a crank and connecting rod . Further sawmills, also powered by crank and connecting rod mechanisms, are archaeologically attested for

10098-642: The Battle of Hastings in 1066, William the Conqueror added "King of England" to his titles, becoming vassal and the equal of the king of France, creating recurring tensions. The Carolingian dynasty ruled France until 987, when Hugh Capet was crowned king of the Franks . His descendants unified the country through wars and inheritance. From 1190, the Capetian rulers began to be referred as "kings of France" rather than "kings of

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10296-573: The Belle Époque . France was one of the major participants of World War I , from which it emerged victorious at great human and economic cost. It was among the Allies of World War II , but it surrendered and was occupied in 1940. Following its liberation in 1944 , the short-lived Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the defeat in the Algerian War . The current Fifth Republic

10494-574: The British Isles and Switzerland . The wars were ended by Henry IV 's Edict of Nantes , which granted some freedom of religion to the Huguenots. Spanish troops, assisted the Catholics from 1589 to 1594 and invaded France in 1597. Spain and France returned to all-out war between 1635 and 1659. The war cost France 300,000 casualties. Under Louis XIII , Cardinal Richelieu promoted centralisation of

10692-522: The Byzantine Empire , having been applied for centuries in those provinces prior to the Muslim conquests , including modern-day Syria , Jordan , Israel , Algeria , Tunisia , Morocco , and Spain (see List of ancient watermills ). The industrial uses of watermills in the Islamic world date back to the 7th century, while horizontal-wheeled and vertical-wheeled watermills were both in widespread use by

10890-417: The Catholic Church in France , and a declaration of rights . The next three years were dominated by struggle for political control, exacerbated by economic depression . Military defeats following the outbreak of the French Revolutionary Wars in April 1792 resulted in the insurrection of 10 August 1792 . The monarchy was abolished and replaced by the French First Republic in September, while Louis XVI

11088-435: The Consulate seized power in a coup led by Napoleon . Napoleon became First Consul in 1799 and later Emperor of the French Empire (1804–1814; 1815). Changing sets of European coalitions declared wars on Napoleon's empire . His armies conquered most of continental Europe with swift victories such as the battles of Jena-Auerstadt and Austerlitz . Members of the Bonaparte family were appointed monarchs in some of

11286-445: The French Republic , is a country located primarily in Western Europe . Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America , Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the North Atlantic, the French West Indies , and many islands in Oceania and the Indian Ocean , giving it one of the largest discontiguous exclusive economic zones in the world . Metropolitan France shares borders with Belgium and Luxembourg to

11484-417: The French zone of occupation . A memorial to the men from Pfeffelbach who had fallen or gone missing in the war was dedicated on 19 November 1961. Sadly, the war had not claimed its last victim by 1945. At about eight o’clock on the morning of the Harvest Festival in 1952, the village was shaken by an explosion. Two young men, Ewald Aulenbacher and Hans Wagen, who had been doing some digging work beside one of

11682-569: The Hercynian uplift in the Paleozoic Era , the Armorican Massif , the Massif Central , the Morvan , the Vosges and Ardennes ranges and the island of Corsica were formed. These massifs delineate several sedimentary basins such as the Aquitaine Basin in the southwest and the Paris Basin in the north. Various routes of natural passage, such as the Rhône Valley , allow easy communication. The Alpine, Pyrenean and Jura mountains are much younger and have less eroded forms. At 4,810.45 metres (15,782 ft) above sea level, Mont Blanc , located in

11880-405: The House of Plantagenet , rulers of the County of Anjou , established its dominion over the surrounding provinces of Maine and Touraine , then built an "empire" from England to the Pyrenees , covering half of modern France. Tensions between France and the Plantagenet empire would last a hundred years, until Philip II of France conquered, between 1202 and 1214, most continental possessions of

12078-406: The Madrid train bombings in 2004 . Opération Chammal , France's military efforts to contain ISIS , killed over 1,000 ISIS troops between 2014 and 2015. The vast majority of France's territory and population is situated in Western Europe and is called Metropolitan France . It is bordered by the North Sea in the north, the English Channel in the northwest, the Atlantic Ocean in the west and

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12276-402: The Mediterranean Sea in the southeast. Its land borders consist of Belgium and Luxembourg in the northeast, Germany and Switzerland in the east, Italy and Monaco in the southeast, and Andorra and Spain in the south and southwest. Except for the northeast, most of France's land borders are roughly delineated by natural boundaries and geographic features: to the south and southeast,

12474-429: The Oberamt of Lichtenberg, which had now been expanded into ten Schultheißereien , and whose capital was moved to Diedelkopf . In 1477, the regesta mentioned in the Lichtenberg accounts, under palace income, a small fulling mill, although its location is now unknown. At the time when history was moving from the Middle Ages to modern times, Pfeffelbach had 42 inhabitants who were liable to taxation, making it one of

12672-459: The Popular Front government (e.g., annual leave , eight-hour workdays , women in government ). In 1940, France was invaded and quickly defeated by Nazi Germany . France was divided into a German occupation zone in the north, an Italian occupation zone and an unoccupied territory, the rest of France, which consisted of the southern France and the French empire. The Vichy government , an authoritarian regime collaborating with Germany, ruled

12870-450: The Protestant church establishment in Pfeffelbach found its way into today's Evangelical Church in the Rhineland (a full member of the Evangelical Church in Germany ). The Duke of Saxe-Cobourg decreed the merger of the two Protestant denominations in 1818, and the decision handed down by a synod in Baumholder in 1820 instituted the "complete union" of the two denominations, Lutheranism and Calvinism. The now united Evangelical Church of

13068-400: The Remigiusland had been handed over to Count Gerlach I from the Nahegau as a Vogtei (1121), who took this and other Vogteien that he held from the Archbishopric of Mainz and the Bishopric of Reims, along with some of his own holdings, and founded the County of Veldenz . In 1138, a number of villages were mentioned as belonging to Kusel, among them Peffelenbach . The County of Veldenz

13266-413: The Roman Empire . So-called 'Greek Mills' used water wheels with a horizontal wheel (and vertical shaft). A "Roman Mill" features a vertical wheel (on a horizontal shaft). Greek style mills are the older and simpler of the two designs, but only operate well with high water velocities and with small diameter millstones. Roman style mills are more complicated as they require gears to transmit the power from

13464-493: The Romans , undershot, overshot and breastshot waterwheel mills. The earliest evidence of a water-driven wheel appears in the technical treatises Pneumatica and Parasceuastica of the Greek engineer Philo of Byzantium (ca. 280−220 BC). The British historian of technology M.J.T. Lewis has shown that those portions of Philo of Byzantium's mechanical treatise which describe water wheels and which have been previously regarded as later Arabic interpolations, actually date back to

13662-488: The Seven Years' War (1756–1763). Its European territory kept growing, however, with acquisitions such as Lorraine and Corsica . Louis XV's weak rule, including the decadence of his court, discredited the monarchy, which in part paved the way for the French Revolution . Louis XVI (r. 1774–1793) supported America with money, fleets and armies , helping them win independence from Great Britain . France gained revenge, but verged on bankruptcy—a factor that contributed to

13860-441: The Sui dynasty (581–618 AD) was said to operate hundreds of them by the beginning of the 6th century. A source written in 612 AD mentions Buddhist monks arguing over the revenues gained from watermills. The Tang dynasty (618–907 AD) 'Ordinances of the Department of Waterways' written in 737 AD stated that watermills should not interrupt riverine transport and in some cases were restricted to use in certain seasons of

14058-456: The ancient world ". It featured 16 overshot waterwheels to power an equal number of flour mills. The capacity of the mills has been estimated at 4.5 tons of flour per day, sufficient to supply enough bread for the 12,500 inhabitants occupying the town of Arelate at that time. A similar mill complex existed on the Janiculum hill, whose supply of flour for Rome 's population was judged by emperor Aurelian important enough to be included in

14256-619: The granary in Baghdad . More than 300 watermills were at work in Iran till 1960. Now only a few are still working. One of the famous ones is the water mill of Askzar and the water mill of the Yazd city, still producing flour. Typically, water is diverted from a river or impoundment or mill pond to a turbine or water wheel, along a channel or pipe (variously known as a flume , head race, mill race , leat , leet, lade (Scots) or penstock ). The force of

14454-675: The official language of France and Europe's aristocracy. France became rivals of the House of Habsburg during the Italian Wars , which would dictate much of their later foreign policy until the mid-18th century. French explorers claimed lands in the Americas, paving expansion of the French colonial empire . The rise of Protestantism led France to a civil war known as the French Wars of Religion . This forced Huguenots to flee to Protestant regions such as

14652-463: The trap-bath split such as Received Pronunciation , though it can be also heard in some other dialects such as Cardiff English . The oldest traces of archaic humans in what is now France date from approximately 1.8 million years ago. Neanderthals occupied the region into the Upper Paleolithic era but were slowly replaced by Homo sapiens around 35,000 BC. This period witnessed

14850-508: The 1970s France faced an economic crisis and allowed new immigrants (mostly from the Maghreb , in northwest Africa) to permanently settle in France with their families and acquire citizenship. It resulted in hundreds of thousands of Muslims living in subsidised public housing and suffering from high unemployment rates. The government had a policy of assimilation of immigrants, where they were expected to adhere to French values and norms. Since

15048-512: The 19th century, and it, too, existed before the Thirty Years' War. Once also standing within Pfeffelbach's limits was a walking mill, although its exact site is now unknown. About the middle of the 19th century, the first hard-stone quarries were opened within Pfeffelbach's limits. The first major quarry was opened in 1870, while others followed in 1887 and 1904. Workers and, as a secondary occupation, also smallhold farmers could seek employment in

15246-599: The 200 years of the Crusades, in such a fashion that the Arabs referred to crusaders as Franj . French Crusaders imported French into the Levant , making Old French the base of the lingua franca ("Frankish language") of the Crusader states . The Albigensian Crusade was launched in 1209 to eliminate the heretical Cathars in the southwest of modern-day France. From the 11th century,

15444-646: The 4th century, a period of revival and prosperity. In 312, Emperor Constantine I converted to Christianity . Christians, who had been persecuted, increased. But from the 5th century, the Barbarian Invasions resumed. Teutonic tribes invaded the region, the Visigoths settling in the southwest, the Burgundians along the Rhine River Valley, and the Franks in the north. In Late antiquity , ancient Gaul

15642-591: The 6th century AD water-powered stone sawmills at Gerasa and Ephesus . Literary references to water-powered marble saws in what is now Germany can be found in Ausonius 4th century AD poem Mosella . They also seem to be indicated about the same time by the Christian saint Gregory of Nyssa from Anatolia , demonstrating a diversified use of water-power in many parts of the Roman Empire . The earliest turbine mill

15840-608: The 9th century. A variety of industrial watermills were used in the Islamic world, including gristmills , hullers , sawmills , ship mills, stamp mills , steel mills , sugar mills , and tide mills . By the 11th century, every province throughout the Islamic world had these industrial watermills in operation, from al-Andalus and North Africa to the Middle East and Central Asia . Muslim and Middle Eastern Christian engineers also used crankshafts and water turbines , gears in watermills and water-raising machines , and dams as

16038-805: The Alps on the France–Italy border , is the highest point in Western Europe. Although 60% of municipalities are classified as having seismic risks (though moderate). The coastlines offer contrasting landscapes: mountain ranges along the French Riviera , coastal cliffs such as the Côte d'Albâtre , and wide sandy plains in the Languedoc . Corsica lies off the Mediterranean coast. France has an extensive river system consisting of

16236-562: The Atlantic Ocean. Other water courses drain towards the Meuse and Rhine along the northeastern borders. France has 11,000,000 km (4,200,000 sq mi) of marine waters within three oceans under its jurisdiction, of which 97% are overseas. France was one of the first countries to create an environment ministry, in 1971. France is ranked 19th by carbon dioxide emissions due to the country's heavy investment in nuclear power following

16434-456: The British chemist and sinologist Joseph Needham speculates that the water-powered millstone could have existed in Han China by the 1st century AD, there is no sufficient literary evidence for it until the 5th century AD. In 488 AD, the mathematician and engineer Zu Chongzhi had a watermill erected which was inspected by Emperor Wu of Southern Qi (r. 482–493 AD). The engineer Yang Su of

16632-621: The Christian Gallo-Roman culture , and ancient Gaul was renamed Francia ("Land of the Franks"). The Germanic Franks adopted Romanic languages . Clovis made Paris his capital and established the Merovingian dynasty , but his kingdom would not survive his death. The Franks treated land as a private possession and divided it among their heirs, so four kingdoms emerged from that of Clovis: Paris, Orléans , Soissons , and Rheims . The last Merovingian kings lost power to their mayors of

16830-533: The Dukes of Zweibrücken sought to promote schooling in their country. At this time, it was most often the pastor who did the teaching. All the good intentions that went into these initiatives in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, however, were annihilated in the ravages of the Thirty Years' War . Only with great effort was a new system built up after the war. In Pfeffelbach, the pastor resigned from his extra duty as schoolmaster in 1651. Hired as schoolteacher then

17028-538: The Franks was known as the francisca ), although these weapons may have been named because of their use by the Franks, not the other way around. In English, 'France' is pronounced / f r æ n s / FRANSS in American English and / f r ɑː n s / FRAHNSS or / f r æ n s / FRANSS in British English. The pronunciation with / ɑː / is mostly confined to accents with

17226-521: The Franks". Later kings expanded their directly possessed domaine royal to cover over half of modern France by the 15th century. Royal authority became more assertive, centred on a hierarchically conceived society distinguishing nobility , clergy, and commoners . The nobility played a prominent role in Crusades to restore Christian access to the Holy Land . French knights made up most reinforcements in

17424-521: The French government's longtime historical association with the Catholic Church , Charlemagne tried to revive the Western Roman Empire and its cultural grandeur. Charlemagne's son, Louis I kept the empire united, however in 843, it was divided between Louis' three sons, into East Francia , Middle Francia and West Francia . West Francia approximated the area occupied by modern France and

17622-580: The Greek 3rd century BC original. The sakia gear is, already fully developed, for the first time attested in a 2nd-century BC Hellenistic wall painting in Ptolemaic Egypt . Lewis assigns the date of the invention of the horizontal-wheeled mill to the Greek colony of Byzantium in the first half of the 3rd century BC, and that of the vertical-wheeled mill to Ptolemaic Alexandria around 240 BC. The Greek geographer Strabo reports in his Geography

17820-577: The Kuselbach in Kusel 's outlying centre of Diedelkopf. Pfeffelbach borders in the north on the municipality of Berschweiler bei Baumholder , in the northeast on the municipality of Thallichtenberg , in the east on the municipality of Ruthweiler , in the southeast on the town of Kusel and the municipality of Ehweiler , in the south on the municipality of Albessen , in the southwest on the municipality of Freisen (outlying centre of Schwarzerden, Saarland ), in

18018-628: The Neolithic, including the Carnac stones site (approximately 3,300 BC). In 600 BC, Ionian Greeks from Phocaea founded the colony of Massalia (present-day Marseille ). Celtic tribes penetrated parts of eastern and northern France, spreading through the rest of the country between the 5th and 3rd century BC. Around 390 BC, the Gallic chieftain Brennus and his troops made their way to Roman Italy , defeated

18216-477: The Pfeffelbach school, but the changes were not over yet. Soon, the upper classes were all grouped into the Hauptschule Kusel , and now there was only the primary school left in Pfeffelbach. In Kusel, students can also attend vocational schools and other kinds of secondary school . There are also special schools for children with learning difficulties or mental handicaps . The nearest university town

18414-582: The Principality of Lichtenberg belonged in Prussian times after 1834 within the Rhenish Provincial Church to the church district of Sankt Wendel. Fundamentally, this organizational structure remains in place even today. The village's Roman Catholic Christians belong, in line with their historical development, to the deaconry of Kusel, and they also attend services in Kusel . During the 18th century,

18612-688: The Pyrenees and the Alps and the Jura, respectively, and to the east, the Rhine river. Metropolitan France includes various coastal islands, of which the largest is Corsica . Metropolitan France is situated mostly between latitudes 41° and 51° N , and longitudes 6° W and 10° E , on the western edge of Europe, and thus lies within the northern temperate zone. Its continental part covers about 1000 km from north to south and from east to west. Metropolitan France covers 551,500 square kilometres (212,935 sq mi),

18810-651: The Restkreis until 1937, when it was transferred to the Birkenfeld district . This was created by uniting the Restkreis with a hitherto Oldenburg district of that same name. The new, bigger district was grouped into the Prussian Regierungsbezirk of Koblenz. After the Second World War , the village at first lay in the Regierungsbezirk of Koblenz in the then newly founded state of Rhineland-Palatinate . In

19008-516: The Revolution. Some of the Enlightenment occurred in French intellectual circles, and scientific breakthroughs, such as the naming of oxygen (1778) and the first hot air balloon carrying passengers (1783), were achieved by French scientists. French explorers took part in the voyages of scientific exploration through maritime expeditions. Enlightenment philosophy, in which reason is advocated as

19206-606: The Romans in the Battle of the Allia , and besieged and ransomed Rome. This left Rome weakened, and the Gauls continued to harass the region until 345 BC when they entered into a peace treaty. But the Romans and the Gauls remained adversaries for centuries. Around 125 BC, the south of Gaul was conquered by the Romans, who called this region Provincia Nostra ("Our Province"), which evolved into Provence in French. Julius Caesar conquered

19404-453: The Sankt Wendel district's 94 municipalities had to be ceded to the British - and French - occupied Saar in 1919. The remaining 68 municipalities then bore the designation "Restkreis St. Wendel-Baumholder", with the first syllable of Restkreis having the same meaning as in English, in the sense of "left over". The district seat was at Baumholder . In the summer of 1833, Pfeffelbach's church

19602-558: The bigger villages in the Amt of Lichtenberg. In 1516, Nickolaus Becker von Lichtenberg was mentioned; he was to be the last local priest before the Reformation . In 1523, the parish became Lutheran under Ludwig II, Duke of Zweibrücken (the Reformation had taken hold throughout the duchy by 1526). In 1533 came the first ecclesiastical visitation in the Oberamt of Lichtenberg, at which Pfeffelbach

19800-416: The buckets fill, the weight of the water starts to turn the wheel. The water spills out of the bucket on the down side into a spillway leading back to river. Since the wheel itself is set above the spillway, the water never impedes the speed of the wheel. The impulse of the water on the wheel is also harnessed in addition to the weight of the water once in the buckets. Overshot wheels require the construction of

19998-476: The church in Pfeffelbach could also be used simultaneously . In earlier times, a few Jews also lived in the village as the Dukes’ Schutzjuden . The council is made up of 16 council members, who were elected by proportional representation at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairman. The municipal election held on 7 June 2009 yielded the following results: "WGR"

20196-489: The church in Pfeffelbach, where it lay in a simple crypt under the pulpit and was later almost forgotten. On 9 June 1846, the late Duchess's coffin was raised and there followed another translation, this time to Coburg , where it at first lay at the town church, before being moved to the mausoleum on the Glockenberg in 1860. One of Duchess Luise's sons was Prince Albert , Queen Victoria 's consort. Pfeffelbach belonged to

20394-530: The churchtower showing the upper parts of a man's and a woman's bodies with the inscription "D M" ( Dis Manibus – "to the Di Manes "). Besides this, there were reports of Roman archaeological finds as far back as the 16th century. In 1967, on the Anieshügel (a hill), Karlheinz Schultheiß unearthed many potsherds, some of them from the 2nd or 3rd century AD, and bits of tile. Pfeffelbach may have been founded in

20592-708: The clergyman, Bösius, troops of the Duke of Lorraine had behaved most wickedly in Pfeffelbach, and the village saw no end to the misery. In 1675, in a directory by Textor under the heading Entfestigungen und Zerstörungen im Rheingebiet während des 17. Jahrhunderts ("Decay and Destruction in the Rhine Area During the 17th Century"), Pfeffelbach appears among the villages burnt down by King Louis XIV's armies. That same year, only 13 families still lived in Pfeffelbach; by 1688, this had risen to 22. Eighty years later, in 1768, Pfeffelbach had 375 inhabitants. The 18th century then brought

20790-730: The constitutional July Monarchy ; French troops began the conquest of Algeria . Unrest led to the French Revolution of 1848 and the end of the July Monarchy. The abolition of slavery and introduction of male universal suffrage was re-enacted in 1848. In 1852, president of the French Republic, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte , Napoleon I's nephew, was proclaimed emperor of the Second Empire , as Napoleon III. He multiplied French interventions abroad, especially in Crimea , Mexico and Italy . Napoleon III

20988-579: The course of administrative restructuring in this state in 1969, the Amt of Burglichtenberg was dissolved. Pfeffelbach passed to the newly founded Verbandsgemeinde of Kusel-Altenglan and to the Kusel district, in which it remains today. It also found itself in the new Regierungsbezirk of Rheinhessen-Pfalz , although this has since been dissolved. According to an 1816 report, Pfeffelbach had 63 bungalows, 20 two-storey houses and 10 "wooden houses" (this likely meant timber-frame houses) with 474 inhabitants. Among

21186-576: The course of the village renewal project, council decided upon an overhaul of the village centre. This included a new fountain complex, a bus waiting hall and parking. In 1992, the contract for this work was awarded to the firm Alpha-Bau, Kusel, for DM  282,000. A further DM 27,000 contract went to the Peters nursery for the plants. The fountain complex was dedicated on 4 December 1993. The flooding problem in Pfeffelbach's "Pfarracker" led in October 1995 to

21384-450: The date of the earliest tide mills, all of which were discovered on the Irish coast: A 6th century vertical-wheeled tide mill was located at Killoteran near Waterford . A twin flume horizontal-wheeled tide mill dating to c. 630 was excavated on Little Island . Alongside it, another tide mill was found which was powered by a vertical undershot wheel. The Nendrum Monastery mill from 787

21582-586: The draining water to drive a mill wheel or wheels. This is particularly effective in places where the tidal differential is very great, such as the Bay of Fundy in Canada where the tides can rise fifty feet, or the now derelict village of Tide Mills, East Sussex . The last two examples in the United Kingdom which are restored to working conditions can be visited at Eling , Hampshire and at Woodbridge , Suffolk . Run of

21780-453: The early 7th century, watermills were also well established in Ireland . A century later they began to spread across the former Roman Rhine and Danube frontier into the other parts of Germany . Ship mills and tide mills , both of which yet unattested for the ancient period, were introduced in the 6th century. In recent years, a number of new archaeological finds has consecutively pushed back

21978-487: The earth, we taste again the golden age . The Roman encyclopedist Pliny mentions in his Naturalis Historia of around 70 AD water-powered trip hammers operating in the greater part of Italy. There is evidence of a fulling mill in 73/74 AD in Antioch , Roman Syria . The 2nd century AD multiple mill complex of Barbegal in southern France has been described as "the greatest known concentration of mechanical power in

22176-718: The emergence of cave painting in the Dordogne and Pyrenees , including at Lascaux , dated to c.  18,000 BC. At the end of the Last Glacial Period (10,000 BC), the climate became milder; from approximately 7,000 BC, this part of Western Europe entered the Neolithic era, and its inhabitants became sedentary . After demographic and agricultural development between the 4th and 3rd millennia BC, metallurgy appeared , initially working gold, copper and bronze , then later iron . France has numerous megalithic sites from

22374-516: The empire, leaving England and Aquitaine to the Plantagenets. Charles IV the Fair died without an heir in 1328. The crown passed to Philip of Valois , rather than Edward of Plantagenet, who became Edward III of England . During the reign of Philip, the monarchy reached the height of its medieval power. However Philip's seat on the throne was contested by Edward in 1337, and England and France entered

22572-439: The end Mayor Edmund Müller, on his own initiative, had a pavilion built that solved the space problem, at least at first. In 1968, a sporting ground was laid out near the school with a 100-metre track, a gymnasium and a children's playground . As a result of constant reorganizations and efforts at centralization, there were time and again space problems, and frequent teacher turnover. Eventually, eleven classes were being taught at

22770-594: The ensuing uprising of European monarchies against his rule, Napoleon was defeated. About a million Frenchmen died during the Napoleonic Wars . After his brief return from exile, Napoleon was finally defeated in 1815 at the Battle of Waterloo , and the Bourbon monarchy was restored with new constitutional limitations. The discredited Bourbon dynasty was overthrown by the July Revolution of 1830, which established

22968-421: The fact that the wheel itself, entering the water behind the main thrust of the flow driving the wheel, followed by the lift of the wheel out of the water ahead of the main thrust, actually impedes its own operation. The overshot wheel solves this problem by bringing the water flow to the top of the wheel. The water fills buckets built into the wheel, rather than the simple paddle wheel design of undershot wheels. As

23166-534: The forefront of the development of a supranational European Union , notably by signing the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, establishing the eurozone in 1999 and signing the Treaty of Lisbon in 2007. France has fully reintegrated into NATO and since participated in most NATO-sponsored wars. Since the 19th century, France has received many immigrants , often male foreign workers from European Catholic countries who generally returned home when not employed. During

23364-577: The former Oberamt of Lichtenberg, parts of the former Electorate of Trier and the Waldgraviate-Rhinegraviate , this was a newly created exclave of the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld , which as of 1826 became the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha . Its seat was Sankt Wendel , and it was subdivided into the Cantons of Sankt Wendel, Baumholder (in which Pfeffelbach lay) and Grumbach. Pfeffelbach lay in

23562-464: The four major rivers Seine , the Loire , the Garonne , the Rhône and their tributaries, whose combined catchment includes over 62% of the metropolitan territory. The Rhône divides the Massif Central from the Alps and flows into the Mediterranean Sea at the Camargue . The Garonne meets the Dordogne just after Bordeaux, forming the Gironde estuary , the largest estuary in Western Europe which after approximately 100 kilometres (62 mi) empties into

23760-417: The grim epidemic in Pfeffelbach and the neighbouring villages of Schwarzerden and Reichweiler in 1612 alone. To add to these woes, a fire broke out in Pfeffelbach the following year, destroying several houses including the rectory, barns and stables. Churchwarden Preuel wrote in a report dated 10 August 1613: "Last Friday, a great fire raged, in which the rectory, the barn, the stable and other buildings in

23958-406: The houses, struck a buried Teller mine , which blew up, tearing both men to bits. In 1964, passenger rail service between Kusel and Schwarzerden came to an end, and beginning on 1 June 1967 the railway line closed entirely with the suspension of goods transport as well. On 20 September 1965, preparatory work began for Flurbereinigung . In 1968, the new water cistern was finished. In August 1991, in

24156-440: The ironworks in Neunkirchen am Potzberg and in a few cases even in the building trade. The greater part of the population, though, worked mainly in agriculture . The First World War also saw the local church lose its bell, which had to be given up for war requirements. In October 1918, the village was gripped by an influenza epidemic . Fully half the villagers became ill, and 21 of them died. On 11 November of that same year came

24354-412: The lack of gearing; the speed of the water directly set the maximum speed of the runner stone which, in turn, set the rate of milling. Most watermills in Britain and the United States of America had a vertical waterwheel, one of four kinds: undershot, breast-shot, overshot and pitchback wheels. This vertical produced rotary motion around a horizontal axis, which could be used (with cams) to lift hammers in

24552-429: The largest among European Union members. France's total land area, with its overseas departments and territories (excluding Adélie Land ), is 643,801 km (248,573 sq mi), 0.45% of the total land area on Earth. France possesses a wide variety of landscapes, from coastal plains in the north and west to mountain ranges of the Alps in the southeast, the Massif Central in the south-central and Pyrenees in

24750-400: The middle of the 19th century, the 1,000 mark was breached, and in 2000, the population peaked at 1,063 inhabitants at a time when population figures were generally seen to be shrinking. The following table shows occupations outside farming in Pfeffelbach about 1900: The following table shows population development over the centuries for Pfeffelbach: If it is assumed that Pfeffelbach's name

24948-402: The most varied of occupations, many of whom must commute elsewhere to their jobs. Among the businesses and professionals in Pfeffelbach are a heating installer, a locksmith, a kitchen studio, a plasterer's shop, a cabinetmaker's shop, a physician , several massage parlours, footcare and cosmetics studios, a plant nursery , a bakery and a butcher's shop. Beginning in the late 16th century,

25146-484: The most-used language in diplomacy, science, and literature until the 20th century. France took control of territories in the Americas, Africa and Asia. In 1685, Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes , forcing thousands of Huguenots into exile and published the Code Noir providing the legal framework for slavery and expelling Jews from French colonies. Under the wars of Louis XV (r. 1715–1774), France lost New France and most Indian possessions after its defeat in

25344-399: The municipality decided to establish a website and have an email address . Pfeffelbach's inhabitants earned their livelihoods in earlier times mainly at agriculture . There were also the obligatory craftsmen in this comparatively big village. In the 19th century, there were already job opportunities at the stone quarries, especially for farmers’ younger sons. It was in this time that there

25542-444: The name form Peychnillenbach (named in 1316) was counted by Ernst Christmann , whereas researchers Dolch and Greule reckon that this name belonged to a former village near Diedelkopf . There are other, unpublished attempts to interpret the village's name. The prefix might, for instance, have something to do with the word "Paffen" or "Pfaffen" (German for "clerics" or "parsons" – a usage now considered disparaging), which would point to

25740-430: The name took a definite article – was named in geometer Johannes Hoffmann's writings (" Der Stauderhof war damals eine Räuberhöhle, und die Bewohner schreckten auch vor Morden nicht zurück " – "The Stauderhof was then a den of robbers, and its dwellers did not shy away from murder , either."), but otherwise crops up nowhere else. Pfeffelbach was as early on as the Middle Ages already a parish hub. Bearing witness to this

25938-405: The newly established kingdoms. These victories led to the worldwide expansion of French revolutionary ideals and reforms, such as the metric system , Napoleonic Code and Declaration of the Rights of Man. In 1812 Napoleon attacked Russia , reaching Moscow. Thereafter his army disintegrated through supply problems, disease, Russian attacks, and finally winter. After this catastrophic campaign and

26136-422: The north, Germany to the northeast, Switzerland to the east, Italy and Monaco to the southeast, Andorra and Spain to the south, and a maritime border with the United Kingdom to the northwest. Its metropolitan area extends from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean and from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea . Its eighteen integral regions (five of which are overseas) span

26334-421: The now otherwise heirless County of Veldenz – his wife had inherited the county, but not her father's title – and by redeeming the hitherto pledged County of Zweibrücken, Stephan founded a new County Palatine, as whose comital residence he chose the town of Zweibrücken : the County Palatine – later Duchy – of Palatinate-Zweibrücken . Pfeffelbach remained a seat within this state, now of an Unteramt , itself within

26532-417: The occupations listed below. Most of these traditional occupations are no longer to be found. Even farming has been reduced to an occupation of lesser importance now that vast swathes of farmland are worked by only a few operations. Bit by bit, the village underwent a shift from a farming village to a workers’ village, but even this must be qualified today. Even though a whole series of businesses have located in

26730-448: The off-and-on Hundred Years' War . Boundaries changed, but landholdings inside France by English Kings remained extensive for decades. With charismatic leaders, such as Joan of Arc , French counterattacks won back most English continental territories. France was struck by the Black Death , from which half of the 17 million population died. The French Renaissance saw cultural development and standardisation of French, which became

26928-464: The palace (head of household). One mayor of the palace, Charles Martel , defeated an Umayyad invasion of Gaul at the Battle of Tours (732). His son, Pepin the Short , seized the crown of Francia from the weakened Merovingians and founded the Carolingian dynasty . Pepin's son, Charlemagne , reunited the Frankish kingdoms and built an empire across Western and Central Europe . Proclaimed Holy Roman Emperor by Pope Leo III and thus establishing

27126-437: The period between 1795 and 1819. Owing to the annexation by France after the French Revolution and during the Napoleonic Era that followed, Pfeffelbach lost its status as an Amt seat. In the course of territorial reorganization, Pfeffelbach was grouped into the Department of Sarre , the Arrondissement of Birkenfeld, the Canton of Kusel and the Mairie ("Mayoralty") of Burglichtenberg. On Easter Monday 1802, there

27324-470: The power available for British grain milling. By the early 20th century, availability of cheap electrical energy made the watermill obsolete in developed countries although some smaller rural mills continued to operate commercially later throughout the century. A few historic mills such as the Water Mill , Newlin Mill and Yates Mill in the US and The Darley Mill Centre in the UK still operate for demonstration purposes. Small-scale commercial production

27522-556: The power from a toothed annular ring that is mounted near the outer edge of the wheel. This drives the machinery using a spur gear mounted on a shaft rather than taking power from the central axle . However, the basic mode of operation remains the same; gravity drives machinery through the motion of flowing water . Toward the end of the 19th century, the invention of the Pelton wheel encouraged some mill owners to replace over- and undershot wheels with Pelton wheel turbines driven through penstocks . A different type of watermill

27720-473: The priest at the church at Pfeffelbach. By 1329, however, Boemund von St. Wendel held the chaplaincy at Pfeffelbach. In 1385, the regesta of the Counts of Veldenz mentioned the Amt of Pfeffelbach and named the Amts- Schultheiß as "Berscheln". In 1444, the County of Veldenz met its end when Count Friedrich III of Veldenz died without a male heir. His daughter Anna wed King Ruprecht's son Count Palatine Stephan . By uniting his own Palatine holdings with

27918-506: The primary source of legitimacy , undermined the power of and support for the monarchy and was a factor in the Revolution. The French Revolution was a period of political and societal change that began with the Estates General of 1789 , and ended with the coup of 18 Brumaire in 1799 and the formation of the French Consulate . Many of its ideas are fundamental principles of liberal democracy , while its values and institutions remain central to modern political discourse. Its causes were

28116-494: The records from the 18th century are mainly about the teacher's income. Fifty to sixty parish children attended lessons around 1600, from some 80 families living throughout the parish. By the late 18th century, this had grown to roughly one hundred children. In 1847, and thus already into Prussian times, Pfeffelbach got its own schoolhouse, after all kinds of provisory arrangements had served as schoolrooms. The municipality had this first schoolhouse torn down in 1902 and replaced with

28314-410: The reduction of human labour: Hold back your hand from the mill, you grinding girls; even if the cockcrow heralds the dawn, sleep on. For Demeter has imposed the labours of your hands on the nymphs , who leaping down upon the topmost part of the wheel, rotate its axle; with encircling cogs, it turns the hollow weight of the Nisyrian millstones . If we learn to feast toil-free on the fruits of

28512-418: The reign of Louis XIV . The French Revolution of 1789 overthrew the Ancien Régime and produced the Declaration of the Rights of Man , which expresses the nation's ideals to this day. France reached its political and military zenith in the early 19th century under Napoleon Bonaparte , subjugating part of continental Europe and establishing the First French Empire . The collapse of the empire initiated

28710-413: The remainder of Gaul and overcame a revolt by Gallic chieftain Vercingetorix in 52 BC. Gaul was divided by Augustus into provinces and many cities were founded during the Gallo-Roman period , including Lugdunum (present-day Lyon ), the capital of the Gauls. In 250–290 AD, Roman Gaul suffered a crisis with its fortified borders attacked by barbarians . The situation improved in the first half of

28908-399: The revolt was a political failure (the Gaullist party emerged stronger than before) it announced a split between the French and de Gaulle, who resigned. In the post-Gaullist era, France remained one of the most developed economies in the world but faced crises that resulted in high unemployment rates and increasing public debt. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, France has been at

29106-448: The river schemes do not divert water at all and usually involve undershot wheels the mills are mostly on the banks of sizeable rivers or fast flowing streams. Other watermills were set beneath large bridges where the flow of water between the stanchions was faster. At one point London bridge had so many water wheels beneath it that bargemen complained that passage through the bridge was impaired. In 1870 watermills still produced 2/3 of

29304-401: The road occurs one block from a bridge across the Pfeffelbach. Branching off the highway to the south here is Hauptstraße ("Main Street"), which then crosses the brook and turns eastwards to run through the edge of the more heavily built-up area. The trackbed of the former railway (now a cycleway and footpath) runs along the south of the village site, while the former railway station stands in

29502-436: The same tincture is very rare. The following are listed buildings or sites in Rhineland-Palatinate 's Directory of Cultural Monuments: Twice each year in Pfeffelbach, an autocross race is held on the abandoned stone quarry lands. The kermis (church consecration festival, locally known as the Kerwe ) is always held on the fourth Sunday in September. The following clubs are currently active in Pfeffelbach: Pfeffelbach

29700-436: The second-largest behind the British Empire . Including metropolitan France, the total area reached almost 13 million square kilometres in the 1920s and 1930s, 9% of the world's land. Known as the Belle Époque , the turn of the century was characterised by optimism, regional peace, economic prosperity and technological, scientific and cultural innovations. In 1905, state secularism was officially established . France

29898-516: The side of the River Fleet . In 537 AD, ship mills were ingeniously used by the East Roman general Belisarius , when the besieging Goths cut off the water supply for those mills. These floating mills had a wheel that was attached to a boat moored in a fast flowing river. The surviving evidence for watermills sharply increases with the emergence of documentary genres such as monastic charters , Christian hagiography and Germanic legal codes . These were more inclined to address watermilling,

30096-534: The so-called Remigiusland , which, it is highly likely, was donated towards the end of the 6th century to the then Bishopric of Reims by the Merovingian Frankish King Childebert II . On 19 November 1124, Archbishop Adelbert I of Mainz acknowledged for Abbot Odo of the Abbey of Saint-Remi in Reims the latter's ownership, within the Reims holdings around Kusel , of the Church of Kusel with its chapels of ease at Altenglan , Konken and Pfeffelbach. Shortly before this, Pfeffelbach's first documentary mention,

30294-426: The south and east, hard-stone quarries can be found, some of which are still being worked. The municipal area measures 1 132 ha, of which 600 ha is wooded. The brook that flows through Pfeffelbach is the village's namesake ( Bach means "brook" in German ). It rises just below Schwarzerden, a constituent community of Freisen in the Saarland , and after flowing for just under 6 km, it empties into

30492-421: The southwest. Due to its numerous overseas departments and territories scattered across the planet, France possesses the second-largest exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in the world, covering 11,035,000 km (4,261,000 sq mi). Its EEZ covers approximately 8% of the total surface of all the EEZs of the world. Metropolitan France has a wide variety of topographical sets and natural landscapes. During

30690-488: The state and reinforced royal power. He destroyed castles of defiant lords and denounced the use of private armies. By the end of the 1620s, Richelieu established "the royal monopoly of force". France fought in the Thirty Years' War , supporting the Protestant side against the Habsburgs. From the 16th to the 19th century, France was responsible for about 10% of the transatlantic slave trade . During Louis XIV 's minority, trouble known as The Fronde occurred. This rebellion

30888-438: The street from the church. Three former mills stand on the brook, the Schwarzenborner Mühle upstream from the village, and farther downstream the Altmühle and the Bremmenmühle . Noteworthy new building zones have sprung up near the old railway station (Binnerwies-Pfarracker) and north of the highway. The oldest traces of the past in Pfeffelbach go back to Roman times, namely a piece of an old gravestone used as spolia in

31086-406: The supply of water available. As waterwheel technology improved mills became more efficient, and by the 19th century, it was common for the great spur wheel to drive several stone nuts, so that a single water wheel could drive as many as four stones. Each step in the process increased the gear ratio which increased the maximum speed of the runner stone. Adjusting the sluice gate and thus the flow of

31284-439: The surrounding area were stricken with a formidable flood . In 1921, an electrical supply network was built in the village. The year 1931 marked the end of an era in Pfeffelbach when Adam Schäfer wove the very last homemade linen on his own loom at his own house. The cottage spinning and weaving industry had once been the norm, with spinning wheels , looms and other equipment for making textiles in every farmhouse. The 1930s saw

31482-424: The unoccupied territory. Free France , the government-in-exile led by  Charles de Gaulle , was set up in London. From 1942 to 1944, about 160,000 French citizens, including around 75,000 Jews , were deported to death and concentration camps . On 6 June 1944, the Allies invaded Normandy , and in August they invaded Provence . The Allies and French Resistance emerged victorious, and French sovereignty

31680-407: The upper field of the escutcheon , the demilion ("half" lion, cut off at the waist) is a reference to the village's former allegiance to the County of Veldenz . The charge on the lower field, the uprooted tree, is modelled on an old Schultheiß seal. The arms have been borne since 1962 when they were approved by the Rhineland-Palatinate Ministry of the Interior. A coat of arms with both fields of

31878-444: The veterans’ association, which had been established only the year before, planted the so-called Bismarckeiche (" Bismarck Oak"). It was a gift from Otto von Bismarck himself to the local veterans’ association and came from the Sachsenwald near Friedrichsruh . In 1900 there were for the first time miners and foundry workers in Pfeffelbach who were employed in the Saar area. In 1914, the First World War broke out. On 16 August 1917,

32076-561: The village a time of general upswing and growth. In 1792, French Revolutionary troops marched in. In 1795, cantonal official Benzino closed the church books in Pfeffelbach; that is to say, he forbade the church to keep any more records of baptisms , weddings and deaths , reasoning that this was the civil registry office's job. This office was located at Lichtenberg Castle . The newly instituted Bürgermeisterei ("Mayoralty") of Burg Lichtenberg, however, only began keeping such records in 1819. Consequently, no such records are available from

32274-433: The village itself, there are villagers in the most varied of occupations, many of whom must commute to jobs elsewhere. From a religious standpoint, most inhabitants belong to the Evangelical faith. While there were 216 people living in the village in 1609 (in neighbouring Ruthweiler 86), the population, which suffered losses in the 17th century's many wars, rose until the early 19th century to almost 500 inhabitants. About

32472-432: The village itself. The operations were heavily bound to economic cycles. The quarries originally produced only paving stones, but later also crushed stone and ballast for road and railway building. Two quarries are still in business even now, but now employ few workers. Besides the quarries, there are small businesses, shops and inns in the village. All in all, Pfeffelbach is nowadays a residential community for people in

32670-407: The village were destroyed." In 1618, the Thirty Years' War broke out, bringing the village its share of great hardship and woe. A great part of the population was killed, and buildings were burnt down. Further death and destruction came along with French King Louis XIV's wars of conquest. In 1626, Hans Schworm, the innkeeper, was running the mill at Reichweiler. In 1642, according to a report from

32868-517: The village's craftsmen were three millers , one shoemaker , two tailors , one bricklayer , one cabinetmaker , one smith and one knacker . Between 1841 and 1877, the geometer Efferz undertook a cadastral survey. One soldier from Pfeffelbach fell in the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. That same year, Peter Aulenbacher, Jakob Braun and Jakob Heß opened Pfeffelbach's first stone quarry . Paving stones from this quarry and others that were subsequently opened were shipped by horse and cart to Kusel and for

33066-401: The village's having arisen in the Early Middle Ages near a monastery . Within Pfeffelbach's current limits, two now vanished villages can be mentioned, Herzweiler and Stauderhof. Herzweiler lay near the municipal limit with Reichweiler and was likely forsaken as long ago as the 15th century, but references to it still crop up in rural cadastral toponyms, such as Herzerberg. The Stauderhof –

33264-413: The village's southeast end. Halfway between the church and the old railway lies the sporting ground. Standing here, too, is what was once the school's gymnasium , but is now a multipurpose hall. In the newer neighbourhood to the northeast lies the graveyard. The building work in the 19th and 20th centuries mainly took place on the through road and Hauptstraße. The former schoolhouse stands slantwise across

33462-433: The water flow was strong enough) that only ground grain for its successive owners’ needs, and only served others if the estate mill was overloaded. This mill, too, was mentioned even before the Thirty Years' War , and by 1632, it was owned by Heinrich Süß. A third mill downstream from the village in turn bore the names Neumühle ("New Mill"), Brunnenmühle , Bremmenmühle , and last, Faußmühle , according to its owners during

33660-486: The water past the main wheel allowed the miller to compensate for seasonal variations in the water supply. Finer speed adjustment was made during the milling process by tentering , that is, adjusting the gap between the stones according to the water flow, the type of grain being milled, and the grade of flour required. In many mills (including the earliest) the great spur wheel turned only one stone, but there might be several mills under one roof. The earliest illustration of

33858-596: The water's movement drives the blades of a wheel or turbine, which in turn rotates an axle that drives the mill's other machinery. Water leaving the wheel or turbine is drained through a tail race, but this channel may also be the head race of yet another wheel, turbine or mill. The passage of water is controlled by sluice gates that allow maintenance and some measure of flood control; large mill complexes may have dozens of sluices controlling complicated interconnected races that feed multiple buildings and industrial processes. Watermills can be divided into two kinds, one with

34056-431: The west on the municipality of Reichweiler and in the northwest on the municipality of Eckersweiler ( Birkenfeld district ). The streets in Pfeffelbach's old built-up area run in an almost star-shaped pattern towards the church , whose location may well be considered the village's point of origin. Running thence, northwards, is the street Bangertseck, which then turns northwestwards. Running eastwards and northeastwards

34254-419: The whole Frankish Empire , the name France comes from the Latin Francia , or "realm of the Franks ". The name of the Franks is related to the English word frank ("free"): the latter stems from the Old French franc ("free, noble, sincere"), and ultimately from the Medieval Latin word francus ("free, exempt from service; freeman, Frank"), a generalisation of the tribal name that emerged as

34452-456: The year. From other Tang-era sources of the 8th century, it is known that these ordinances were taken very seriously, as the government demolished many watermills owned by great families, merchants, and Buddhist abbeys that failed to acknowledge ordinances or meet government regulations. A eunuch serving Emperor Xuanzong of Tang (r. 712–756 AD) owned a watermill by 748 AD which employed five waterwheels that ground 300 bushels of wheat

34650-401: Was invaded by Germany and defended by Great Britain at the start of World War I in August 1914. A rich industrial area in the north was occupied. France and the Allies emerged victorious against the Central Powers at tremendous human cost. It left 1.4 million French soldiers dead, 4% of its population. Interwar was marked by intense international tensions and social reforms introduced by

34848-494: Was Hans Simon Brill, who, given his income, would settle for nothing less than being freed of compulsory labour duty. He also owned the best cart in the village, and the municipality would rather have forgone his teaching than his compulsory labour. About this problem, school inspector Gervinus reported his opinion that a clergyman could perform better at teaching than an ordinary man, and that there would be no guarantee that comparable teaching could be expected from Brill. From this,

35046-410: Was a founding member of NATO and attempted to regain control of French Indochina , but was defeated by the Viet Minh in 1954. France faced another anti-colonialist conflict in Algeria , then part of France and home to over one million European settlers ( Pied-Noir ). The French systematically used torture and repression, including extrajudicial killings to keep control. This conflict nearly led to

35244-444: Was another great fire in Pfeffelbach. This one all but destroyed the village. Almost every house, along with the church and the rectory, was burnt down. Owing to the hard times – it was still the Napoleonic Era – not every house could be restored. After Napoleon's final defeat, the Congress of Vienna wrought yet another territorial reorganization. In 1816, Pfeffelbach passed to the Principality of Lichtenberg . Put together from part of

35442-451: Was divided into Germanic kingdoms and a remaining Gallo-Roman territory. Celtic Britons , fleeing the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain , settled in west Armorica ; the Armorican peninsula was renamed Brittany and Celtic culture was revived. The first leader to unite all Franks was Clovis I , who began his reign as king of the Salian Franks in 481, routing the last forces of the Roman governors in 486. Clovis said he would be baptised

35640-479: Was driven by feudal lords and sovereign courts as a reaction to the royal absolute power . The monarchy reached its peak during the 17th century and reign of Louis XIV. By turning lords into courtiers at the Palace of Versailles , his command of the military went unchallenged. The "Sun King" made France the leading European power. France became the most populous European country and had tremendous influence over European politics, economy, and culture. French became

35838-405: Was executed in January 1793. After another revolt in June 1793 , the constitution was suspended and power passed from the National Convention to the Committee of Public Safety . About 16,000 people were executed in a Reign of Terror , which ended in July 1794 . Weakened by external threats and internal opposition, the Republic was replaced in 1795 by the Directory . Four years later in 1799,

36036-497: Was formed in 1958 by Charles de Gaulle . Algeria and most French colonies became independent in the 1960s, with the majority retaining close economic and military ties with France . France retains its centuries-long status as a global centre of art , science , and philosophy . It hosts the fourth-largest number of UNESCO World Heritage Sites and is the world's leading tourist destination , receiving 100 million foreign visitors in 2023 . A developed country , France has

36234-455: Was found in Chemtou and Testour , Roman North Africa , dating to the late 3rd or early 4th century AD. A possible water-powered furnace has been identified at Marseille , France. Mills were commonly used for grinding grain into flour (attested by Pliny the Elder ), but industrial uses as fulling and sawing marble were also applied. The Romans used both fixed and floating water wheels and introduced water power to other provinces of

36432-448: Was in early feudal times held by the church and was said to be the church estate mill, meaning that all the parish's farmers had to have their grain ground here. A Mühlenweistum (a Weistum – cognate with English wisdom – was a legal pronouncement issued by men learned in law in the Middle Ages and early modern times; a Mühlenweistum is one that deals with mills) for this mill was first put together in 1585 and survives today in

36630-410: Was in service from 1936 to 1969. Its trackbed nowadays serves as a cycleway and footpath. Kusel station is on the Landstuhl–Kusel railway served by Regionalbahn service RB 67, which uses part of the Glantalbahn and runs through to Kaiserslautern . France – in Europe  (green & dark grey) – in the European Union  (green) France , officially

36828-414: Was its precursor. During the 9th and 10th centuries, threatened by Viking invasions , France became a decentralised state: the nobility's titles and lands became hereditary, and authority of the king became more religious than secular, and so was less effective and challenged by noblemen. Thus was established feudalism in France. Some king's vassals grew so powerful they posed a threat to the king. After

37026-493: Was later divided into Ämter , which themselves comprised several Schultheißereien or Unterämter . Pfeffelbach became the seat of one such Schultheißerei in the Amt of Lichtenberg alongside the other Schultheißereien of Ulmet and Konken. In 1316, F. X. Glasschröder's Neue Urkunden zur pfälzischen Kirchengeschichte ("New Documents About Palatine Church History") mentioned the village as Peychnillenbach . In 1324, according to Thielmann von Konken, Wilhelm von Tholey became

37224-431: Was originally a big farming village, though by and by, workers came to seek their livelihoods in other occupations, too, at first mainly as stone quarry workers, and then in the early 20th century also as so-called Saargänger ("Saar-goers") at the collieries in the nearby Saarland . The farming village first turned into a workers’ village. For centuries, the mills were traditional businesses. The Altmühle ("Old Mill")

37422-436: Was placed at the end of the flume on the headrace, this turned the direction of the water without much loss of energy, and the direction of rotation was maintained. Daniels Mill near Bewdley , Worcestershire is an example of a flour mill that originally used a breastshot wheel, but was converted to use a pitchback wheel. Today it operates as a breastshot mill. Larger water wheels (usually overshot steel wheels) transmit

37620-432: Was plunged into a dynastic conflict with England known as the Hundred Years' War . In the 16th century, the French Renaissance saw culture flourish and a French colonial empire rise. Internally, France was dominated by the conflict with the House of Habsburg and the French Wars of Religion between Catholics and Huguenots . France was successful in the Thirty Years' War and further increased its influence during

37818-421: Was quite a strong trend towards emigration , especially to the United States . From the turn of the 20th century onwards, many men from Pfeffelbach worked at the coalmines in the Saarland . These Saargänger ("Saar-goers") often ran a small farm for their families’ own needs. According to a civil register from the late 19th century, there were some 200 farmers in the village, and alongside them, various people in

38016-406: Was represented by an Evangelical clergyman, as was every other parish in the Oberamt but Niederkirchen. In 1609, another Oberamt of Lichtenberg ecclesiastical visitation protocol yielded, among other things, the oldest known list of Pfeffelbach's inhabitants; there were 217. After the Plague had made itself felt in the village and the surrounding countryside in 1596 and 1597, 188 people died in

38214-453: Was restored with the Provisional Government of the French Republic (GPRF). This interim government, established by de Gaulle, continued to wage war against Germany and to purge collaborators from office . It made important reforms e.g. suffrage extended to women and the creation of a social security system. A new constitution resulted in the Fourth Republic (1946–1958), which saw strong economic growth ( les Trente Glorieuses ). France

38412-608: Was set to impose a carbon tax in 2009; however, the plan was abandoned due to fears of burdening French businesses. Forests account for 31 per cent of France's land area—the fourth-highest proportion in Europe—representing an increase of 7 per cent since 1990. French forests are some of the most diverse in Europe, comprising more than 140 species of trees. France had a 2018 Forest Landscape Integrity Index mean score of 4.52/10, ranking it 123rd globally. There are nine national parks and 46 natural parks in France. A regional nature park (French: parc naturel régional or PNR)

38610-441: Was situated on an island in Strangford Lough in Northern Ireland . Its millstones are 830 mm in diameter and the horizontal wheel is estimated to have developed 7 ⁄ 8 horsepower (650 W) at its peak. Remains of an earlier mill dated at 619 were also found at the site. In a 2005 survey the scholar Adam Lucas identified the following first appearances of various industrial mill types in Western Europe. Noticeable

38808-418: Was the scene of the late Duchess Luise's translation and burial (she had already been dead for two years by this time). The Duchess's embalmed body had at first been kept at the Schlösschen ("little palace") at Sankt Wendel , but then, as a result of sinister intrigues within the House of Saxe-Cobourg , somehow went astray. First, the coffin found its way to a legal assistant's house, and then in 1833 to

39006-404: Was unseated following defeat in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, and his regime replaced by the Third Republic . By 1875, the French conquest of Algeria was complete, with approximately 825,000 Algerians killed from famine, disease, and violence. France had colonial possessions since the beginning of the 17th century, but in the 19th and 20th centuries its empire extended greatly and became

39204-399: Was working in the village, but was generally held to be a drunkard , becoming so well known for this that tales are told about him in Pfeffelbach to this day. Beginning in 1588, Count Palatine Johannes I forced all his subjects to convert to Reformed belief as espoused by John Calvin . In the Saxe-Cobourg Principality of Lichtenberg and later on, in the Prussian Rhine Province ,

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