ear 1235, the Duchy of Brunswick-L�neburg emerged, ruled by a family whose aristocratic lines repeatedly divided and re-united. The smaller states that kept re-appearing as a result, and which ranked as principalities, were usually named after the location of the ducal seat. Thus between 1267 and 1269 a Principality of L�neburg was created for the first time, with L�neburg as the seat of the royal Residenz. In 1371, in the wake of the L�neburg War of Succession, rebel citizens threw the princes out of the town and destroyed their royal castle on the Kalkberg along with the nearby monastery. The state peace treaty in 1392 granted their demand to become a free imperial town, a status they were able to defend until 1637. The money now stayed in the town, enabling fine houses and churches were built.
In 1392 L�neburg was accorded the staple right. This forced merchants who travelled through the area with their carts to stop in L�neburg, unload their wares, and offer them for sale for a certain period. So that merchants could not go around L�neburg, an impassable defensive barrier was built west of the town in 1397; a similar barrier was built east of the town in 1479.
The L�neburg Prelates' War caused a crisis from 1446 to 1462. This was not a war in the proper sense, but rather a bitter dispute between the town council and those members of the clergy who were also part-owners of the town's saltworks. It was not resolved until the intervention of the Danish King Christian I, the Bishop of Schwerin and the L�beck Bishop, Arnold Westphal.
In 1454 the citizens demanded even more influence over public life.
Since 2007, L�neburg has once again held the title of a Hanseatic city.
With the demise of the Hanseatic League � and the absence of herrings around 1560 around Falsterbo in Scania � the biggest customers of L�neburg's salt broke away and the town rapidly became impoverished. Hardly any new houses were built in central L�neburg after
