Middle Rhine in the context of "Lorelei"

The Rhineland (German: Rheinland [ˈʁaɪ̯nˌlant] ; Dutch: Rijnland; Kölsch: Rhingland; Latin: Rhenania) is a loosely defined area of western Germany along the Rhine, chiefly its middle section. It is the main industrial heartland of Germany because of its many factories, and it has historic ties to the Holy Roman Empire, Prussia, and the German Empire.

Upper Rhine (German: Oberrhein [ˈoːbɐˌʁaɪn] ; French: Rhin Supérieur is the section of the Rhine between the Middle Bridge in Basel, Switzerland, and the Rhine knee in Bingen, Germany. Representing kilometres 167 to 529 of the river it is surrounded by the Upper Rhine Plain (Oberrheinische Tiefebene). Most of its upper section marks the France–Germany border.

The Upper Rhine is one of four sections of the river between Lake Constance and the North Sea, and is succeeded downstream by the Middle Rhine and Lower Rhine; only the High Rhine and Alpine Rhine lie above it. The countries and states along the Upper Rhine are Switzerland, France (Alsace) and the German states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. The largest cities along the river are Basel, Mulhouse, Strasbourg, Karlsruhe, Mannheim, Ludwigshafen and Mainz.

Koblenz (UK: /koʊˈblɛnts/ koh-BLENTS, US: /ˈkoʊblɛnts/ KOH-blents, German: [ˈkoːblɛnts] ; Moselle Franconian: Kowelenz) is a city in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate, on the banks of the rivers Rhine (Middle Rhine) and Moselle, a multinational tributary.

Koblenz was established as a Roman military post by Drusus c. 8 BC. Its name originates from the Latin (ad) cōnfluentēs, meaning "(at the) confluence". The actual confluence is today known as the "German Corner", a symbol of the unification of Germany that features an equestrian statue of Emperor William I. The city celebrated its 2,000th anniversary in 1992.

Lower Rhine (German: Niederrhein, pronounced [ˈniːdɐˌʁaɪn] ; kilometres 660 to 1,033 of the Rhine) is the section of the Rhine between Bonn in Germany and the North Sea at Hook of Holland in the Netherlands, including the Nederrijn (English: Nether Rhine) within the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta; alternatively, Lower Rhine may also refer to just the part upstream of Pannerdens Kop (km 660–865.5), excluding the Nederrijn.

It is the last of the four sections of the Rhine between Lake Constance and the North Sea (the others being the High Rhine, Upper Rhine and Middle Rhine).

High Rhine (German: Hochrhein, pronounced [ˈhoːxˌʁaɪn] ; kilometres 0 to 167 of the Rhine) is the section of the Rhine between Lake Constance (Bodensee) and the city of Basel, flowing in a general east-to-west direction and forming mostly the Germany–Switzerland border. It is the first of four named sections of the Rhine (High Rhine, Upper Rhine, Middle Rhine, Lower Rhine) between Lake Constance and the river delta at the North Sea.

Germania Superior ("Upper Germania") was an imperial province of the Roman Empire. It comprised an area of today's western Switzerland, the French Jura and Alsace regions, and southwestern Germany. Important cities were Besançon (Vesontio), Strasbourg (Argentoratum), Wiesbaden (Aquae Mattiacae), and Germania Superior's capital, Mainz (Mogontiacum). It comprised the Middle Rhine, bordering on the Limes Germanicus, and on the Alpine province of Raetia to the south-east. Although it had been occupied militarily since the reign of Augustus, Germania Superior (along with Germania Inferior) was not made into an official province until c. 85 AD.

Hans Memling (also spelled Memlinc; c. 1430 – 11 August 1494) was a German-Flemish painter who worked in the tradition of Early Netherlandish painting. Born in the Middle Rhine region, he probably spent his childhood in Mainz. During his apprenticeship as a painter he moved to the Netherlands and spent time in the Brussels workshop of Rogier van der Weyden. In 1465 he was made a citizen of Bruges, where he became one of the leading artists and the master of a large workshop. A tax document from 1480 lists him among the wealthiest citizens. Memling's religious works often incorporated donor portraits of the clergymen, aristocrats, and burghers (bankers, merchants, and politicians) who were his patrons. These portraits built upon the styles which Memling learned in his youth.

He married Anna de Valkenaere sometime between 1470 and 1480, and they had three children. Memling's art was rediscovered in the 19th century, attaining wide popularity.

Austrasia was a historical region and the northeastern realm within the core of the Frankish State during the Early Middle Ages, centering on the regions between Meuse, Moselle, Middle Rhine and the Main rivers. It included the original Frankish-ruled territories within what had been the northernmost part of Roman Gaul and parts of Roman Germania. It also stretched beyond the old Roman borders on the Rhine into Frankish areas which had never been formally under Roman rule. It came into being as a part of the Frankish Kingdom, founded by the Merovingian king Clovis I (r. 481–511), who expanded Frankish rule further to the southwest, into Gaul, whose northern regions came to be known as Neustria.

These two realms, or sub-kingdoms (Austrasia and Neustria), along with Aquitaine and Burgundy, were subsequently ruled by various rulers from the Merovingian dynasty, followed in the 8th and 9th centuries by their successors from the Carolingian dynasty, whose own powerbase was in Austrasia itself. The two Frankish dynasties did not always have a single ruling monarch over the whole Frankish realm, and already by 561, Austrasia was ruled as a separate kingdom within the Frankish realm by the Merovingian king Sigebert I (561–575). Kings often allowed different family members to rule sub-kingdoms, and these were sometimes in conflict with each other, despite the underlying continuity of the overall Frankish state.