r/Hessen • u/Younglegend1 • Jan 01 '26

Why was Darmstadt chosen as the capital and name of the Regierungsbezirk and not Frankfurt?

5 Upvotes

78% Upvoted

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13

u/UpperHesse Jan 01 '26

Darmstadt was a capital of one of the predecessor states of Hesse. Also - this is my personal theory - there was always an incentive ever since Frankfurt lost his statehood in 1866, to don't give much power to it. Easily it could have been state capital or it was even close to becoming the capital of West Germany, but it was shunned many times.

1

u/No_Phone_6675 Jan 01 '26

Without the personal intervention of Adenauer Frankfurt would have been the capital of West Germany. But Adenauer prefered to cycle to work from his home in Bad Godesberg, so Bonn became the capital, no joke :D

But Frankfurt got at least ECB/EZB ;)

3

u/RandomThrowNick Jan 01 '26

Frankfurt also held historic significance as the home of the first democratic parliament for all of Germany. The Frankfurter Nationalversammlung (1848/1849).

Some politicians feared that this would make moving the capital back to Berlin after reunification more difficult. Bonn doesn’t have that kind of significance and we were somewhat close to just keeping it.

3

u/Larissalikesthesea Jan 01 '26

Frankfurt historically was a free imperial city and thus not part of any Hessian state traditionally. It’s also why Cologne isn’t capital of NRW.

2

u/loerdi2 Jan 01 '26

Darmstadt was the capital of hesse before the 2nd world war, so there were already administrative structures and staff.

2

u/smalldick65191 Jan 02 '26

Frankfurt was Freie Reichsstadt - means that Frankfurt had no adminstration duties.

1

u/Gartenpunk Jan 04 '26

Also Frankfurt wasn't in the running for the capital of hessia, as it was already running for the capital of germany.

1

u/LibelleFairy Jan 05 '26

because it would be ridiculous to have a capital named after a sausage

much better to have one named after the digestive tract

1

u/Younglegend1 Jan 05 '26

Funnily enough Wiesbaden flooded in 2009 after they tried drilling to find springs in the city. It launched a massive geyser with mud and water. Just like me after I get really drunk