The Mediatised Houses are the noble families of Germany which lost their immediacy during the Mediatisation which began in 1806. "Mediatisation" is the process of an immediate state annexing the territory of another immediate state, though leaving the annexed with several rights and privileges. The mediatisation began in Germany when Napoleon Bonaparte of France defeated the Holy Roman Empire in wars past, leading to the dissolution of the Empire in 1806. Napoleon replaced it with the Confederation of the Rhine with the incentive that any state which joined could annex the territory of states which did not.