Imperial immediacy

Document signed by the Abbot of Marchtal, "immediate and exempt"

In the Holy Roman Empire, imperial immediacy (German: Reichsunmittelbarkeit or Reichsfreiheit) was the status of an individual or a territory which was defined as 'immediate' (unmittelbar) to Emperor and Empire (Kaiser und Reich) and not to any other intermediate authorities, while one that did not possess that status was defined as 'mediate' (mittelbar).^[1]

The possession of this imperial immediacy granted a constitutionally unique form of territorial authority known as "territorial superiority" (Landeshoheit) which had nearly all the attributes of sovereignty, but fell short of true sovereignty since the rulers of the Empire remained answerable to the Empire's institutions and basic laws. In the early modern period, the Empire consisted of over 1,800 immediate territories, ranging in size from quite large such as Austria, Bavaria, Saxony, and Brandenburg, down to the several hundred tiny immediate estates of the Imperial knights of only a few square kilometers or less, which were by far the most numerous.^[2]^[3]

^ Joachim Whaley, Germany and the Holy Roman Empire, Volume II, Oxford University Press, 2012, Glossary, p. 652.
^ Gagliardo, J. G. (1980). Reich and Empire as Idea and Reality, 1763–1806. Indiana University Press. p. 4–5.
^ Lebeau, Christine, ed. (2004). L'espace du Saint-Empire du Moyen-Âge à l'époque moderne. Presse Universitaire de Strasbourg. p. 117.

[1] Joachim Whaley, Germany and the Holy Roman Empire, Volume II, Oxford University Press, 2012, Glossary, p. 652.

[2] Gagliardo, J. G. (1980). Reich and Empire as Idea and Reality, 1763–1806. Indiana University Press. p. 4–5.

[3] Lebeau, Christine, ed. (2004). L'espace du Saint-Empire du Moyen-Âge à l'époque moderne. Presse Universitaire de Strasbourg. p. 117.

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