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Roman
legions began the conquest of Gaul about 190 BC. Julius Caesar
completed it about 60 BC. When the Pax Romana was imposed on this
region, it suppressed long-standing internecine conflicts among
Franks and Gauls, who were then able to establish permanent settlements
and to prosper. During their occupation, the Romans realized that
the valley of the Zorn River was one of the best and easiest routes
through the Vosges Mountains from the lowland of Alsace to the
highland of Lorraine. To control this route and to monitor movements
of the local tribes, Roman soldiers built a fort on the end of
a ridge overlooking a critical part of the valley. In the center
of the walled area they erected a typical round watchtower, a
few stones of which can still be seen. When the Visigoths invaded
Italy around the year 400, all the Roman legions were withdrawn
to protect the city of Rome. (They failed, but that's somebody
else's story.) The collapse of the Roman
Empire permitted Germanic tribes to filter into the region of
Alsace-Lorraine and to settle there. They gave the fort on the
Zorn the German name Lützel Burg, meaning Little Fort. The
fort and the village below it are still called Lützelburg
today.
A
man named Stephan, born in Lützelburg about 1585, migrated
north and settled in Gemünden, Germany, north of Idar-Oberstein.
He became an indentured miller, married, and had at least two
sons. His marriage license, dated 14 November 1614, identified
him as "Stephan from Lützelburg, a resident of Gemünden."
The people of Gemünden referred to him as Stephan the Lützelburger.
His sons were named Adam Lützelburger and Philipp Lützelburger.
In that period of widespread illiteracy, few common people could
spell their own names. When necessary, they would pronounce their
names and a scribe would write what he thought he heard. By 1800,
the name which started as Lützelburger was being spelled
in many ways, the most common of which was Litzenberger.
Stephan's
great-great-grandson, Sebastian Litzenberger, took his family
to Russia in 1766. His descendants attended Russian schools and
wrote their names in the Cyrillic alphabet, in which the sounds
of some letters do not match well with those of our Latin alphabet.
When later generations began writing in German or English, most
of them spelled their name Litzenberger or Litzenberg, but some
spelled it Litchenberger.
Stephan's
great-great-great-great-grandson, Peter Litzenberger, landed in
Pennsylvania about 1766. He and his family were true pioneers
and frontiersmen, moving west through Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana,
and Illinois so fast that the school system could not keep up
with them. Two or three generations were illiterate. When Peter's
descendants learned to read and write, some spelled their name
Litsenberger and others spelled it Litsinberger.
All
of the Litzenbergers and Litzenbergs in Russia and most of those
in the United States, including descendants using other surnames
now, are progeny of Stephan from the Lützel Burg in Alsace
located 20 miles (30 km) WNW of Strasbourg.
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The
best known Lützel Burg is the one which is now called Luxembourg.
On top of a high cliff dominating the city is a bronze plaque
which says, "Auf diesem Felsen stand die Lützel Burg,
10 - 16 J." (On this rock stood the Little Fort, 10th to
16th Centuries). The name Luxembourg appears to be a French variation
of Lützelburg. We know of several Litzenberger families in
Germany and America which probably emigrated from Luxembourg and
were called Lützelburgers by residents of the new places
in which they settled. For centuries, Germans living near Luxembourg
have sometimes referred to it as Lützelburger-Land.
There
may have been Lützel Burgs in Silesia (now southwest Poland)
and Thuringia (east central Germany) also. In the village of Fischbach
near Idar-Oberstein, we found a very small family of Litzenbergers
who told us their ancestor came from Silesia to work in Fischbach's
copper mine. It has been reported that Michael Lützenberger,
mayor of Rhodt near Landau from 1615 to 1658, originated from
Koppelsdorf in Coburg, Thuringia. We have names and sketchy data
about 165 of Michael's progeny, ending about 1800.
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