(Pfalz), a medieval principality in southwestern Germany.
The Palatinate became well known in the 12th century, when its rulers acquired the title and rights of counts palatine and came to be called counts of the Rhenish Palatinate (after the place where the principality’s territory was located). In 1214 the Palatinate passed to the family of the Bavarian Wittelsbachs. In 1329 it separated itself from Bavaria under the rule of an individual branch of the Wittelsbachs; it also gained northern Bavaria, which acquired the name of the Upper Palatinate, in contrast to the Rhenish, or Lower, Palatinate. In 1356 the counts of the Rhenish Palatinate were granted the rights of electors. In 1386 the first university in Germany was founded at their residence in Heidelberg.
During the Reformation, from the second half of the 16th century, the Palatinate was a bulwark of Calvinism. The Palatinate elector Frederick V, who headed the Protestant Union of German Princes, was elected king of Bohemia in 1619. But during the Thirty Years’ War of 1618^18, after the defeat of the Bohemian troops at White Mountain in 1620, he lost Bohemia and in 1623 the Palatinate as well. It was transferred to Bavarian jurisdiction. In accordance with the Treaty of Westphalia of 1648, the Palatinate electorate, with the exception of the Upper Palatinate, was restored. In 1793–94 part of the Rhenish Palatinate was occupied by French troops and in 1801 was annexed by France; another part was divided among the German principalities. In 1814–15 most of the Palatinate was ceded to Bavaria. The remainder was partitioned among Prussia, Baden, and Hesse-Darmstadt.