image author: Samtgemeinde Lühe

The Alte Land consisted of twelve administrative district (entirety of the farmsteads) and six bailiwicks in the old political classification. Neither the administrative districts nor the bailiwicks were communities in today's sense, but only sub-districts, 'districts'. The community was the Alte Land, it's representative the state assembly.

The captain, lower Saxony 'Höfmann', was the authorised representative of his district. The captains were members of the state assembly and placed the statements of the 'interested' (owner of four or more acres land) before their meetings of their districts and were bound at the vote in the state assembly by these decisions. For the lord mayor, the head of the Altlander self-administration and the accountant of the state bank were so to speak sub-accountants, who to collect the district's part of state costs as well as state contribution, that means state tax. There was no remuneration for the administration but in individual cases they were allowed to invoice their cash expenditures and waste of time and then receive the money in a 'village invoice'. Annually the village invoice was entered into the 'village book' and checked by the interested whereby for consumption costs (beer, spirits and tobacco) a special sum was entered. These captains also had a certain judiciary power.

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