Rodgau, Germany

Around Saint Peter's Church (Peterskirche) arose the settlement of Wichenkirchen (or Wizzinkirchin) in Frankish times as a Thorpe (one-street village). It had its first documentary mention in 1287 in the Seligenstadt Monastery's accord with the Auheimer Mark. Weiskirchen was at this time Mother Church to the villages of Jügesheim, Hainhausen and Rembrücken. The first landlords, the Lords of Hagenhausen – later of Eppstein – sold the Amt of Steinheim in 1425 along with Weiskirchen, a village belonging to it, to the Archbishop and Elector of Mainz, to whom the village belonged until 1803. With this, Weiskirchen formed an ecclesiastical and economic hub in the Rodgau. When the Auheimer Mark (a communally held parcel of land to which belonged several villages) was divided up in 1786, Weiskirchen received a share of the forest.

After Secularization in 1803, the Amt of Steinheim along with Weiskirchen passed to Hesse. In 1896 the Rodgaubahn (railway) with a railway station in Weiskirchen opened.

In the course of the 19th century, Weiskirchen shifted from a farming village to a worker's community. Of the once well known village with its timber-frame houses very little is left. During National Socialist times, the small Jewish community was driven out. In March 2005, the small, restored former synagogue was ceremoniously reopened as a memorial. Since 1967, the Weiskirchen transmitter, a medium-wave transmitter owned by Hessischer Rundfunk, has been in operation on Weiskirchen's northwestern outskirts on a frequency of 594 kHz although this has now been dismantled.

In 1576, Weiskirchen had 37 households. In 1681, 111 inhabitants lived in 26 households. In 1834, 655 people lived in the village. A century later, in 1939, that figure had risen to 1,740. By 1970, the population had risen to 4,840 inhabitants. In late 2007, the constituent community had 6,115 inhabitants.

As early as 1108, Rodgau's smallest constituent community (with a population today of roughly 3,800) had a documentary mention as the location of a moated castle belonging to the Lords of Hagenhausen, in which it was named as Haginhusen. Remains of this castle still lie under a meadow near the Rodau on today's Burgstraße (road). The Hagenhausen noble family, who after moving to the Taunus began styling themselves the Lords of Eppstein, and writing many a page in mediaeval German history, found themselves holding great importance and power from the 13th century onwards. Four Archbishops of Mainz alone were installed by the Eppsteins. Hainhausen, though, did not benefit from the former lords’ descendants’ lordliness. In 1425, the Lords of Eppstein sold the Amt of Steinheim along with Hainhausen to the Archbishop and Elector of Mainz. Its low point came, as it did for all the surrounding villages too, in the Thirty Years' War, at which time the Plague also raged among the population. The survivors besought the patron saint of Plague sufferers, Saint Roch for help. The end of the deadly epidemic is still celebrated today every year on 16 August with a procession, whose destination was originally the Rochus-Kapelle (“Saint Roch’s Chapel”), consecrated in 1692. Nowadays, though, the newer Rochus-Kirche (“Saint Roch’s Church”), standing at a different site in the heart of the community, serves as the procession's endpoint, and has since the late 19th century. Saint Roch's Church houses as an art history treasure a pietà from the mid 14th century which depicts in sculpture Mary and Jesus after he has been taken down from the Cross. After Secularization in 1803, Hainhausen passed to Hesse.

In 1681, 101 inhabitants lived in 18 households. In 1834, there were 341 inhabitants in Hainhausen. In 1939, this had risen to 835 inhabitants. In 1970, Hainhausen had 2,051 inhabitants. In late 2007 the constituent community had 3,820 inhabitants.

Founded as a clump village, today's constituent community had its first documentary mention in 1261 under the name Guginsheim. One of Charlemagne’s Vögte (singular: Vogt) named Gugin or Guginhart was supposedly the namesake. Other forms of the name used over the course of the Middle Ages were Gugesheym, Gogeßheym, Goginsheym, and Gugesheim. In the local speech, Jügesheim is sometimes still called Giesem today. Jügesheim was founded in Frankish times, or more particularly in Merovingian times (between 481 and 560). Near the old Roman roads in the Maingau woods, which crossed near Jügesheim, the Franks built new military colonies to control the land.

In the Middle Ages, the surrounding woodlands belonged to the Wildbann Dreieich, a royal hunting forest, one of whose 30 Wildhuben (special estates whose owners were charged with guarding the hunting forest) was maintained in Jügesheim. In 1425, the Lords of Eppstein sold the Amt of Steinheim along with Jügesheim to the Archbishop and Elector of Mainz.