Wolfenbüttel
Wolfenbüttel is a town in Lower Saxony, Germany, located on the Oker river about 13 kilometres south of Brunswick. It is the seat of the District of (Landkreis) Wolfenbüttel and of the bishop of the Protestant Lutheran State Church of Brunswick. It is also the southernmost of the 172 towns in northern Germany whose names end in büttel, meaning "residence" or "settlement."
History
It is not known when Wolfenbüttel was founded, but it was first mentioned in 1118 as Wulferisbutle. The first settlement was probably restricted to a tiny islet in the Oker river.
Wolfenbüttel became the residence of the dukes of Brunswick in 1432. Over the following three centuries it grew to be a centre of the arts, and personages such as Michael Praetorius, Johann Rosenmüller, Gottfried Leibniz, and Gotthold Ephraim Lessing lived there. The ducal court eventually returned to Braunschweig in 1753 and Wolfenbüttel subsequently lost in importance.
The Battle of Wolfenbüttel, part of the Thirty Years' War, was fought here in June 1641, when the Swedes under Wrangel and the Count of Königsmark defeated the Austrians under Archduke Leopold of Habsburg.