Electorate of Trier

Electorate of Trier
Kurfürstentum Trier  (German) Électorat de Trèves  (French)
State of the Holy Roman Empire
898–1801
Flag Coat of arms
The Electorate of Trier in 1720
Capital		Trier, Ehrenbreitstein
Languages		French, Latin, Luxembourgish, Moselle Franconian German
Religion		Roman Catholic
Government		Principality
Elector of Trier
•	1768–1803	Prince Clemens Wenceslaus of Saxony
Historical era		Middle Ages
•	Autonomy granted	772
•	Imperial immediacy	898
•	Raised to electorate	between 1189 and 1212
•	Trier city rights	1212
•	Joined Electoral Rhenish Circle	1512
•	Treaty of Lunéville	9 February 1801
•	Reconstituted as G/D Lower Rhine within Prussia	9 June 1815
Preceded by Succeeded by County Palatine of the Rhine Rhin-et-Moselle Sarre (department) Nassau-Weilburg

The Electorate of Trier (German: Kurfürstentum Trier or Kurtrier), traditionally known in English by its French name of Trèves, was an ecclesiastical principality of the Holy Roman Empire that existed from the end of the 9th to the early 19th century. It consisted of the temporal possessions of the prince-archbishop of Trier (Erzbistum Trier), also prince-elector of the empire. There were only two other ecclesiastical prince-electors in the Empire: the Electorate of Cologne and the Electorate of Mainz, among which Mainz ranked first.

The capital of the electorate was Trier, with the main residence of the Elector being Koblenz from the 16th century onward. The electorate was secularized in 1803 during Napoleonic rule.

The Elector of Trier, in his capacity as archbishop, also administered the archdiocese of Trier, whose territory did not correspond to the electorate (see map below).

Trier, as the important Roman provincial capital of Augusta Treverorum, had been the seat of a bishop since Roman times. It was raised to archiepiscopal status during the reign of Charlemagne, whose will mentions the bishoprics of Metz, Toul and Verdun as its suffragans.

The bishops of Trier were already virtually independent territorial magnates during the Merovingian dynasty. In 772 Charlemagne granted Bishop Wiomad complete immunity from the jurisdiction of the ruling count for all the churches and monasteries, as well as villages and castles that belonged to the Church of St. Peter at Trier. In 816 Louis the Pious confirmed to Archbishop Hetto the privileges of protection and immunity granted by his father.