It all started in, 58 BC, when the Romans put Alsace on the historical map.

In the 5thC, the Alemanni invaded Alsace; soon to be followed by the Merovingians who reorganised the area with the help of the Church.

Circa 625-630, The name Alsace appeared for the first time; it was then a dukedom which split into two halves around 740-750. These coincide roughly with today's counties (departments).

In 842, The Strasbourg Oath of Allegiance written in Old German and Old French, decided the way Europe would be divided up under Charlemagne.

In the 11thC, the Ottonian emperors founded the German Holy Roman Empire with Alsace playing an important role.

From 1048 to 1054, Leo IX, a pope originally from Alsace, modernised the Church.

In the 12thC, the Hohenstaufens established their imperial power-base in Alsace, founding a number of towns there; Hagenau became one of their capitals.

In the 13thC, the towns became free towns and in 1354 ten of them formed a union, the Decapolis. Gothic Art, of which Strasbourg Cathedral is a magnificent example, reflected the region's growing prosperity. Agriculture and trade expanded thanks to the Rhine Valley routes and the St Gotthard Pass to Italy.

In the 15thC, Alsace became an intellectual centre thanks partly to printing, the first trials taking place there.

The region became a centre of Humanism and the Reformation; Luther's theses were extremely popular and led to the Peasants' War in 1525. They were harshly repressed.

During the Renaissance, Alsace grew rich again; this can be seen in the magnificent architecture of the public buildings and bourgeois mansions. Grunewald's Issenheim Retable, with its remarkable pictorial virtuosity, marks the beginnings of the Renaissance in art.

The period of rising prosperity was brutally interrupted by the Thirty Years War. Alsace was laid waste again. The Peace of 1648 resulted in the province's steady incorporation into the Kingdom of France. Louis XIV captured Strasbourg in 1681; the Rhine became the frontier with Germany. Reconstruction and the reconversion of Alsace by the Catholic Church led to a growing prosperity. This was the highpoint of the Baroque and Classical periods, with French and German influences to be seen in both religious and lay building. It was also the golden age of organ building which left the region a unique heritage.

The French Revolution of 1789 completed Alsace's integration into the French Nation. Under Napoleon, Alsace supplied the armies with a great many soldiers and provisions. Following the 1815 defeat at Waterloo and the subsequent occupation, the region went through a serious economic crisis. Middle class businessmen subsequently modernised and transformed the local economy, finally overcoming the recession around 1850 thanks to increasing investment in industry. Modernisation of the local economy and towns continued...

Since 1871, Alsace and northern Lorraine have been part of a special territory that once belonged to the German Empire. Returned to France in 1918, Alsace retained its own special laws, German labour laws in particular. Industry then suffered the economic crisis of 1930, and again in the period leading up to the Second World War.

From 1940 to 1944-45 the region was held by Nazi Germany.

In 1949, The Council of Europe took its place in Strasbourg alongside the first truly European organisation, the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine. Today, the European Parliament holds its sessions and the European Court of Human Rights sits in Strasbourg. With Geneva, Strasbourg is the only European city that is not a national capital to be the seat of international institutions.

The year 1968 marked a renaissance in Alsatian literature; is now flourishing in three languages: French, German and the local dialect, Elsasserditsch.

1979 The European Parliament, elected by universal suffrage, held its first session in Strasbourg. It was following in the footsteps of the European Court of Human Rights, the European Youth Centre, the ARTE TV channel, Eurocorps, and the Assembly of the Regions of Europe? Alsace became the heart of the new Europe.

1994 - 1999 Construction of the new European Parliament buildings