The district as known today was created in 1975 in the reorganization of the districts of North Rhine-Westphalia, by merging the former districts of Aachen and Monschau, and some parts of the districts of Düren, Jülich and Schleiden as well as the Selfkant district, while a part of the former district was incorporated to the district-free city of Aachen.
The Landkreis Aachen was formed in 1816 from the two French cantons Burtscheid and Eschweiler, with its capital set to the city of Burtscheid. In 1897 Burtscheid was incorporated into the city of Aachen, but the administrative seat stayed there, even though the capital was no longer part of the district.
Geography
Geographically the district covers a part of the Eifel mountains in the south, but also the lowlands of the Niederrheinische Bucht.
Coat of arms
The top of the coat of arms shows the black lion, the sign of Jülich, as the district contains mostly former parts of the duchy of Jülich. In the bottom the swan on a deer antler is the sign of the city of Burtscheid, which was the capital of the district till it was incorporated into the city of Aachen.
Aachen (French Aix-la-Chapelle, Dutch Aken, Latin Aquisgranum, Ripuarian Oche) is a spa city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, on the border with Belgium and the Netherlands, 65 km to the west of Cologne, and the westernmost city in Germany, at 50°46′ N 6°6′ E.
RWTH Aachen University, established in 1870, is one of the major universities for technical studies, especially for electrical and mechanical engineering.
In the Imperial Circle Estates of the Reichsreform (Imperial Reform) concluded at Worms in 1495, Aachen was represented in the Lower Rhenish-Westphalian circle.