Rathsweiler

Rathsweiler
Coat of arms
Rathsweiler
Location of Rathsweiler within Kusel district
Coordinates: 49°35′52.95″N 7°27′30.52″E / 49.5980417°N 7.4584778°E / 49.5980417; 7.4584778Coordinates: 49°35′52.95″N 7°27′30.52″E / 49.5980417°N 7.4584778°E / 49.5980417; 7.4584778
Country	Germany
State	Rhineland-Palatinate
District	Kusel
Municipal assoc.	Altenglan
Government
• Mayor	Klaus Müller
Area
• Total	4.24 km2 (1.64 sq mi)
Elevation	200 m (700 ft)
Population (2015-12-31)
• Total	158
• Density	37/km2 (97/sq mi)
Time zone	CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2)
Postal codes	66887
Dialling codes	06387
Vehicle registration	KUS

Rathsweiler is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Kusel district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Altenglan, whose seat is in the like-named municipality.

The municipality lies near the river Glan in the Western Palatinate. Rathsweiler lies in the Glan valley near where the Steinalb empties into the Glan at an elevation of 187 m above sea level and at the foot of the Hohlbusch (403 m) and the Nollkopf (402 m). Within the village itself, elevations range from 195 to 220 m above sea level. The municipal area measures 425 ha, of which 116 ha is wooded and roughly 10 ha is settled. In 1987, 160 ha of land was sold to the Federal Republic and it now belongs to the Baumholder troop drilling ground.

Rathsweiler borders in the west and north on the Baumholder troop drilling ground, in the east on the municipality of Niederalben and in the south on the municipality of Ulmet.

Also belonging to Rathsweiler is the outlying homestead of Christoffelsmühle.

Originally, the village lay along the Zweibrücken–Meisenheim cross-country road as a linear village (by some definitions, a “thorpe”). Rathsweiler’s original characterization as a thorpe, however, was later lost in the expansion that the village underwent in the 19th and 20th centuries. These expansions lie on the road known today as Bundesstraße 420 and in a new building zone in the village’s southwest. A row of old Einfirsthäuser (“houses with a single roof ridge”) or Quereinhäuser (combination residential and commercial houses divided for these two purposes down the middle, perpendicularly to the street) along the former village street is said to be a special cultural monument featuring preserved farmhouses that were typical of the Westrich, an historic region that encompasses areas in both Germany and France. The Christoffelsmühle, an old watermill, lies roughly 1 km from the village core in the village’s north end on the Steinalb, and can be reached only along a farm lane and forest path, or an indirect road from the neighbouring village of Niederalben. The waterwheel is still running even today.