Kusel

Kusel (ˈkuːzl̩; written Cusel until 1865) is a town in the Kusel district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the seat of the Kusel-Altenglan Verbandsgemeinde and is also the district seat. The well-known operatic tenor Fritz Wunderlich was born in Kusel. Kusel lies on the Kuselbach in Rhineland-Palatinate's southwest, in the North Palatine Uplands roughly 30 km northwest of Kaiserslautern. The Kuselbach rises in the outlying centre of Diedelkopf where the Bledesbach and the Pfeffelbach (or Aalbach) meet. The dale is hemmed in by a row of mountains, on the left bank the Ödesberg (375 m), and on the right the Gaisberg (355 m), the Roßberg (314 m) and the Herrchenberg (385 m). The floor of the dale lies roughly 220 m above sea level. Prominent landmarks just beyond the town's limits are Lichtenberg Castle to the west and the Remigiusberg (368 m) and the Potzberg (562 m) to the east. With roughly 5,000 inhabitants, Kusel challenges Cochem for the title of Germany's smallest district seat. Kusel borders in the north on the municipalities of Körborn and Blaubach, in the northeast on the municipality of Altenglan, in the east on the municipality of Rammelsbach, in the southeast on the municipality of Haschbach am Remigiusberg, in the south on the municipality of Schellweiler, in the southwest on the municipality of Ehweiler, in the west on the municipality of Pfeffelbach and in the northwest on the municipality of Ruthweiler. The town of Kusel is divided foremost into the Kernstadt (Inner Town) and the historic Altstadt (Old Town), with the former ringing the latter, and also into the Stadtteil of Diedelkopf, which has melded onto the Inner Town, the residential area “Am Holler” and a further Stadtteil, Bledesbach. The town was from the Middle Ages until the 19th century ringed with a town wall that had three town gates and five towers. In the town core, the mediaeval street layout has been preserved to this day, although the old buildings were burnt out almost utterly in a great fire in 1794.