On 1 July 2007 the state of Saxony-Anhalt will have a different county-structure: the present 21 counties (Landkreise) will merge into 11 counties (Landkreise). These will be:
- Anhalt-Bitterfeld county (Landkreis Anhalt-Bitterfeld) (merger of Bitterfeld and Köthen and part of Anhalt-Zerbst)
- Börde county (Landkreis Börde) (merger of Bördekreis and Ohrekreis)
- Burgenland county (Landkreis Burgenland) (merger of Burgenland and Weißenfels)
- Harz county (Landkreis Harz) (merger of Halberstadt, Quedlinburg and Wernigerode as well as Falkenstein/Harz)
- Jerichower Land county (Landkreis Jerichower Land) (= Jerichower Land and c. half of Anhalt-Zerbst)
- Mansfeld-Südharz county (Landkreis Mansfeld-Südharz) (merger of Mansfelder Land and Sangerhausen)
- Saale county (Saalekreis) (merger of Merseburg-Querfurt and Saalkreis)
- Salzland county (Landkreis Salzland) (merger of Aschersleben-Staßfurt (without Falkenstein/Harz), Bernburg and Schönebeck.
- Wittenberg county (Landkreis Wittenberg) (= Wittenberg County and c. half of Anhalt-Zerbst)
- The Landkreise Altmarkkreis Salzwedel and Stendal will remain unchanged.
The county-free cities (kreisfreien Städte) Magdeburg and Halle will retain their status. The county-free city (kreisfreie Stadt) Dessau will merge with its neigbour Roßlau. into Dessau-Roßlau city.
Source: this webpage.
Jörg Majewski, 3 Jan 2007

County-Free City Flags / Flaggen kreisfreier Städte

There are three county-free cities (kreisfreie Städte) whose flags were all documented in Erwin Günther's series about East German city flags (Günther 1996a and Günther 1996b).
Stefan Schwoon, 16 Feb 2001

Municipal Flags

The first five issues of Der Flaggenkurier featured a series by Erwin Günther about city flags in East Germany. The first four parts covered cities in Brandenburg and Saxony-Anhalt. Part 3, the first one dealing with Saxony-Anhalt, is Günther 1996a (Erwin Günther, Ostdeutsche Stadtflaggen (3): Sachsen-Anhalt, in Der Flaggenkurier, no. 3, 1996, pp. 5-13).
I sent drawings of the flags to Andreas Herzfeld, president of the DGF, who also manages the Der Flaggenkurier website, and obtained his permission to send them to FotW too. The flags were mostly made by colouring the drawings in Der Flaggenkurier according to the descriptions in the text, therefore my own contribution to these flags is small and only of technical nature.

During the times of the German Democratic Republic city flags had no official status, only unofficial flags existed and were sometimes created for special occasions like anniversaries. Only in 1990 were city flags officially admitted again.

In general, the articles by Erwin Günther give more detailed information about the history of the town, the background and description of the arms, and occasionally on the history of the flag. The paragraphs written by me are just rough paraphrases of the most important informations with regard to the town and the flag, sometimes with additional information.
Stefan Schwoon, 19 Apr 2001

The second article dealing with Saxony-Anhalt, Part 4, is Günther 1996b (Erwin Günther, Ostdeutsche Stadtflaggen (4): Sachsen-Anhalt (Fortsetzung), in Der Flaggenkurier, no. 4, 1996, pp. 17-22) and is available online (German text only) with black and white drawings of the flags. The article contains more information about the background and the history of the arms than the one I give.
Stefan Schwoon, 30 May 2001