Diet

a national assembly. The word is considered a derivation of the Latin dies, a day, having reference to a legislative assembly called to meet on a fixed day. Diet, therefore, is a general term like congress, parliament, convention, legislature.

The most noted diet was the great council of lords called by the emperor of Germany. The various sessions were known by the city in which they were held. The Diets of Worms were held in 1495 and 1521. The latter diet was the one, it may be remembered, before which Luther was summoned. The Diet of Augsburg met in 1530. The imperial diets consisted originally of nobles, but, during the fourteenth century, representatives of the free cities were admitted. The diets named above sat in three colleges: (1) the electoral princes; (2) the princes, temporal and spiritual; and (3) representatives from the imperial cities. The colleges deliberated separately. An agreement of all three was necessary before a measure might be presented to the emperor for his approval.

The term is now little used. The diet of Switzerland, established in 1803 by Napoleon was superseded in 1848 by the Federal Assembly, consisting of two houses, the Council of the States and the National Council. The Diet of Denmark, consisting of two houses, the Landsthing, or upper house, and the Folkething, or lower house, is known more frequently as the Rigsdag. The Diet of Sweden consisted formerly of four chambers or estates,-nobles, clergy, citizens, and peasants. In 1866 this diet was replaced by a modern parliament, still known, however, as the Diet. The Diet of Norway is known as the Storthing. The Diet of the modern German Empire consists of the Bundesrath and the Reichstag. There is no word to include both houses.