HESSE (Lat. _Hessia_, Ger. _Hessen_), a grand duchy forming a state of the German empire. It was known until 1866 as Hesse-Darmstadt, the history of which is given under a separate heading below. It consists of two main parts, separated from each other by a narrow strip of Prussian territory. The northern part is the province of Oberhessen; the southern consists of the contiguous provinces of Starkenburg and Rheinhessen. There are also eleven very small exclaves, mostly grouped about Homburg to the south-west of Oberhessen; but the largest is Wimpfen on the north-west frontier of Wurttemberg. Oberhessen is hilly; though of no great elevation it extends over the water-parting between the basins of the Rhine and the Weser, and in the Vogelsberg it has as its culminating point the Taufstein (2533 ft.). In the north-west it includes spurs of the Taunus. Between these two systems of hills lies the fertile undulating tract known as the Wetterau, watered by the Wetter, a tributary of the Main. Starkenburg occupies the angle between the Main and the Rhine, and in its south-eastern part includes some of the ranges of the Odenwald, the highest part being the Seidenbucher Hohe (1965 ft.). Rheinhessen is separated from Starkenburg by the Rhine, and has that river as its northern as well as its eastern frontier, though it extends across it at the north-east corner, where the Rhine, on receiving the Main, changes its course abruptly from south to west. The territory consists of a fertile tract of low hills, rising towards the south-west into the northern extremity of the Hardt range, but at no point reaching a height of more than 1050 ft. The area and population of the three provinces of Hesse are as follow: +-------------+------+---------------------+ | | Area.| Population. | | +------+----------+----------+ | |sq. m.| 1895. | 1905. | | +------+----------+----------+ | Oberhessen | 1267 | 271,524 | 296,755 | | Starkenburg | 1169 | 444,562 | 542,996 | | Rheinhessen | 530 | 322,934 | 369,424 | +-------------+------+----------+----------+ | Total | 2966 |1,039,020 |1,209,175 | +-------------+------+----------+----------+