status of
a town and surrounded with walls by Wolfelin, advocate (_Landvogt_) of
the emperor Frederick II. in Alsace, a masterful and ambitious man,
whose accumulated wealth was confiscated by the emperor in 1235, and who
is said to have been murdered by his wife lest her portion should also
be seized. In 1226 Colmar became an imperial city, and the civic rights
(_Stadtrecht_) conferred on it in 1274 by Rudolph of Habsburg became the
model for those of many other cities. Its civic history is much the same
as that of other medieval towns: a struggle between the democratic gilds
and the aristocratic "families," which ended in 1347 in the inclusion of
the former in the governing body, and in the 17th century in the
complete exclusion of the latter. In 1255 Colmar joined the league of
Rhenish cities, and in 1476 and 1477 took a vigorous share in the
struggle against Charles the Bold. In 1632, during the Thirty Years'
War, it was taken by the Swedes, and in 1635 by the French, who held it
till after the Peace of Westphalia (1649). In 1673 the French again
occupied it and dismantled the fortifications. In 1681 it was formally
annexed to France by a decree of Louis XIV.'s _Chambre de Reunion_, and
remained French till 1871, when it passed with Alsace-Lorraine to the
new German empire.

See "Annalen und Chronik von Kolmar," German translation, G. H. Pabst,
in _Geschichtsschreiber der deutschen Vorzeit_ (2nd ed., G.
Wattenbach, Leipzig, 1897); Sigmund Billing, _Kleine Chronik der Stadt
Kolmar_ (Colmar, 1891); Hund, _Kolmar vor und wahrend seiner
Entwickelung zur Reichsstadt_ (Strassburg, 1899); J. Liblin,
_Chronique de Colmar_, 58-1400 (Mulhausen, 1867-1868); T. F. X.
Hunkler, _Gesch. der Stadt Kolmar_ (Colmar, 1838). For further
references see Ulysse Chevalier, _Repertoire des sources.
Topobibliographie_ (Montbeliard, 1894-1899); and Waltz, _Bibliographie
de la ville de Colmar_ (Mulhausen, 1902).

COLNE, a market town and municipal borough in the Clitheroe
parliamentary division of Lancashire, England, 34-1/2 m. N. by E. from
Manchester by the Lancashire & Yorkshire railway; it is served also by a
branch of the Midland railway from Skipton. Pop. (1901) 23,000. It
stands on a hilly site above a small affluent of the river Calder. The
church of St Bartholomew retains some Norman work, but is chiefly of
various later periods. There is a cloth hall or piece hall, originally
used as an exchange when wooll