Introduction
Hesse (Hessen in German) is the richest German non-city state in terms of GDP per capita. Its largest city is Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany's financial capital. The political capital of Hesse, though, is Wiesbaden. Darmstadt and Kassel played that role until 1945, when the modern state of Hesse (aka Greater Hesse) was formed out of the Prussian provinces of Hesse-Darmstadt and Hesse-Nassau.
The cultural region of Hesse is larger than the state and includes the area known as Rhenish Hesse in the neighbouring state of Rhineland-Palatinate, from which it is separated by the Rhine River. The oldest and second largest Hessian city, Mainz, is in Rhenish Hesse.
Hesse has a surface area of 21,100 km² (8,100 sq mi), roughly like Israel or the U.S. state of New Jersey. It has a population of 6,077,000 inhabitants, slightly more than Denmark, and the equivalent of the U.S. state of Missouri.
Before the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, what is now Hesse belonged to a multitude of small independent states, such as the Landgraviate of Hesse-Kassel, the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt, the Landgraviate of Hesse-Homburg, the Landgraviate of Hesse-Rotenburg, the Duchy of Nassau, the Principality of Waldeck, the County of Isenberg, the Prince-Bishopric of Fulda, the Free Imperial City of Wetzlar, or the Free Imperial City of Frankfurt.
Famous people from Hesse include (chronologically): the writer and politician Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the academics and authors Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm, the confectioner Henri Nestlé, the founder of the Reuters news agency Paul Reuter, the automobile entrepreneur Adam Opel, the aircraft manufacturer Willy Messerschmitt, and the F1 driver Sebastian Vettel.