as a result of the congress of vienna, prussia received the western, small part of its profit from the second partition of poland under the designation "grand duchy of posen". prussia kept nothing from the third partition. to compensate for this, the territories to the west of germany were passed over. a decree issued in vienna on 30 april 1815 created the prussian province of jülich-cleves-berg and the grand duchy of the lower rhine. in 1822, the rhine province was established from both, with the title of "grand duke of the lower rhine" being kept. over long periods of his history, the rhineland had not fixed political boundaries. thus, the name was little more than a geographical concept or a landscape that conceived a multitude of spiritual and secular principalities, counties, imperial abbeys, small dominions and imperial cities.