Viking raids in the Rhineland
The area known today as the Rhineland begins at the confluence of the Moselle and the Rhine and ends at Emmerich, where the Rhine divides into the Lek and the Waal to form a delta. In the east, the Rhineland ends close to the Rhine itself, being bounded by low mountain ranges such as the Siebengebirge or Bergisches Land. To the west its boundary is less well defined, but in general parlance it runs beyond the present state border with the Netherlands, i.e. east of the Meuse. Because the modern state of Rhineland-Palatinate lies south of the Moselle, the low mountain range of the Eifel north of the river is usually seen as belonging to the Rhineland. Areas south of the Moselle, such as the Hunsrück, are also considered to be part of the Rhineland.
Early clashes in the Rhine campaign of 1796
The Rhine river begins in the Canton of Graubünden (also called the Grisons), near Lake Toma and flows along the alpine region bordered by Liechtenstein, northward into Lake Constance where it traverses the lake in three "ditches": Oberseerhein, Seerhein, and Unterseerhein, . From there, it leaves the lake at Reichenau and flows westerly along the border between the German states and the Swiss Cantons. The stretch between Rheinfall, by Schaffhausen and Basel, called the High Rhine, cuts through steep hillsides and flows over a gravel bed; in such places as the former rapids at Laufenburg, it moved in torrents.
At Basel, the terrain flattens. There the Rhine makes a wide, northerly turn, in what is called the Rhine knee, and enters the what the locals call the Rhine ditch ("Rheingraben"), part of a rift valley bordered by the Black Forest on the east and Vosges mountains on the west. Called the Upper Rhine (distinguished from the High Rhine), the river flows south to north. In 1796, the plain on both sides of the river, some wide, was dotted with villages and farms. At both far edges of the flood plain, especially on the eastern side, the old mountains created dark shadows on the horizon. Tributaries cut through the hilly terrain of the Black Forest, creating deep defiles in the mountains. The tributaries then wound in rivulets through the flood plain to the river.