Lower Saxony (Germany) Coat of Arms Plaque

Lower Saxony is a German state (Bundesland) situated in northwestern Germany and is second in area, with 47,624 square kilometres (18,388 sq mi), and fourth in population (8 million) among the sixteen Länder of Germany. In rural areasNorthern Low Saxon, a dialect of Low German, is still spoken, but the number of speakers is declining. Lower Saxony borders on (from north and clockwise) the North Sea, the states of Schleswig-Holstein, Hamburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Brandenburg,Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia, and the Netherlands. In fact, Lower Saxony borders more neighbours than any other singleBundesland. The state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen forms two enclaves within Lower Saxony, one being the city of Bremen, the other, its seaport city ofBremerhaven. The state's principal cities include the state capital Hanover, Brunswick, Lüneburg, Osnabrück, Oldenburg, Hildesheim, Wolfenbüttel, Wolfsburgand Göttingen. The northwestern area of Lower Saxony, which lies on the coast of the North Sea, is called East Frisia and the seven East Frisian Islands offshore are popular with tourists. In the extreme west of Lower Saxony is the Emsland, a traditionally poor and sparsely populated area, once dominated by inaccessible swamps. The northern half of Lower Saxony, also known as the North German Plains, is almost invariably flat except for the gentle hills around the Bremen geestland. Towards the south and southwest lie the northern parts of the German Central Uplands: the Weser Uplands and the Harz mountains. Between these two lie theLower Saxon Hills, a range of low ridges.