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Bishopric of Merseburg
Prince-Bishopric of Merseburg Hochstift Merseburg | |||||||||
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| 1004–1565 | |||||||||
 Coat of arms
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 Bishoprics of Merseburg, Naumburg and Zeitz (violet) about 1250 | |||||||||
| Status | Prince-Bishopric | ||||||||
| Capital | Merseburg | ||||||||
| Common languages | Upper Saxon | ||||||||
| Religion | Roman Catholic | ||||||||
| Government | Prince-Bishopric | ||||||||
| Historical era | Middle Ages | ||||||||
• Bishopric established | 967 | ||||||||
| 1004 | |||||||||
• Turned Protestant | 1544 | ||||||||
• Incorporated by Saxony | 1565 | ||||||||
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The Bishopric of Merseburg was an episcopal see on the eastern border of the medieval Duchy of Saxony with its centre in Merseburg, where Merseburg Cathedral was constructed. The see was founded in 967 by Emperor Otto I at the same time in the same manner as those of Meissen and Zeitz (from 1029: Naumburg), all suffragan dioceses of the Archbishopric of Magdeburg as part of a plan to bind the adjacent Slavic ("Wendish") lands in the Saxon Eastern March beyond the Saale River more closely to the Holy Roman Empire.
The prince-bishopric was re-established by King Henry II of Germany in 1004. It then covered a considerable small territory stretching from the Saale up to the Mulde River and the Margraviate of Meissen in the east.
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