Location

Altenbuch lies in the Bavarian Lower Main (Bayerischer Untermain) region in the Spessart (range).

Subdivisions

The community has the following Gemarkungen (traditional rural cadastral areas): Altenbucher Forst, Oberaltenbuch, Unteraltenbuch, Altenbucher Leibstuhl.

Religion

Altenbuch formerly belonged to the Catholic parish of Dorfprozelten and only became a parish in its own right about 1760. Saint Wolfgang's Church was built in 1770 in the Baroque style and was converted and expanded several times.

Coat of arms

The community's arms might be described thus: Per pale dexter argent a Latin cross sable, sinister vert the same of the first, in base an oakleaf palewise counterchanged.

The community was formed out of two formerly separate ones in 1938, and it is for these that the two crosses stand. The Teutonic Knights’s cross on the dexter (armsbearer’s right, viewer’s left) side refers to that order’s commandry of Prozelten, which had holdings in Unteraltenbuch from 1317 onwards, and by 1329 was exercising blood court rights in this part of the commandry. In 1484, the commandry passed to the Archbishopric of Mainz and stayed in its ownership until the Old Empire came to an end in 1803. The silver cross on the sinister (armsbearer’s left, viewer’s right) side is taken from the arms formerly borne by the Charterhouse of Grünau and recalls the Charterhouse’s lordship in Oberaltenbuch beginning in 1657. The Charterhouse was founded by Elisabeth von Hohenlohe and dissolved at Secularization in 1803. The oakleaf represents the community’s geographical location in the Spessart and at the same time refers to Unteraltenbuch’s long tradition of forestry. From the late 15th century the place was the seat of one of the six “riding foresters”; from the late 17th century the district forester had his seat here. Even after being transferred to Bavaria, the forester's office stayed in Unteraltenbuch.

The arms have been borne since 1973.^[2]