Hanover's History in Figures

A long time has passed from the first settlements on the High Bank of the Leine in 950 to the host city for EXPO 2000. In between are the confirmation of city rights by Otto the Child, Duke of Brunswick and Lüneburg in 1241; its own right to mint coins in 1438; the invention of a pale ale in 1526; the Reformation in 1533; the rise to residence city in 1636; and a 123-year Personal Union with England from 1714 to 1837, during which the Kings of Hanover were also the Kings of England. Hanover has been occupied several times by foreign troops, was declared a kingdom in 1814, annexed by Prussia in 1866 and became the Prussian provincial capital – and has been the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony since 1946. Scholars worked in Hanover, above all the universal genius Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, the inventor of the „binary number system“ which formed the basis for today's computers. On the following pages you will get an insight into the development of Hanover from the village to the service center of the present.