document granting these rights is said to have been lost.
The town's name, "Homburg", comes from the Hohenberg Castle. The postfix "vor der H�he" was probably first recorded in a document in 1399.
The Hessen-Homburg noble family of landgraves was founded with Friedrich I of Hessen-Homburg. Friedrich II (1680�1708) attained fame as Prince of Homburg. In 1866, as a result of the Austro-Prussian War, Homburg became Prussian territory.
With the coming of the spa industry in the mid 19th century, which profited greatly from the casino built in town, the town changed into an internationally famous spa town. Bad Homburg was particularly favoured by Russian nobility for its baths.
The spa industry began with the discovery of the Elisabethenbrunnen (Brunnen is German for "well") in 1834 (although the designation "Bad" was not conferred until 1912). The first spa building and the first casino in Homburg were built in 1841�1842 by the brothers Fran�ois (1806�1877) and Louis Blanc (1806�1852), who later took over the Casino in Monte Carlo, which is why the Homburg Casino is sometimes called the "Mother of Monte Carlo". In 1860, the town was connected with Frankfurt by a railway line, the Homburger Bahn.
In 1888, Bad Homburg became known throughout the German Empire because Kaiser Wilhelm II declared Bad Homburg's Schloss an Imperial summer residence, and later financed the building of the Church of the Redeemer (Erl�serkirche) close by. His mother, too, Victoria, the old emperor's widow � and Queen Victoria's eldest daughter � lived there for several years. King Edward VII was also often a guest. It was he who introduced the Homburg hat and permanent turn-up trousers. He also underwent fasting cures at Homburg 32 times.
The "Bad Homburger Golf Club 1899 e.V." in the R�derweisen in Dornholzhausen � nowadays part of Bad Homburg � is Germany's oldest golf club. It had its beginnings in the Bad Homburg Spa Park (Kurpark), where the old
