Meurthe is a former département of France. Its préfecture (capital) was Nancy. It ceased to exist following the annexation of Alsace-Lorraine by Germany in 1871.

The department of Meurthe was created on March 4, 1790, during the French Revolution, out of a part of the former province of Lorraine. It took its name from the Meurthe River flowing through it.

As of 1866, Meurthe had 714 communes. Its area was 6,070 km² (2,344 sq. miles). It was divided into 5 arrondissements: Nancy, Château-Salins, Lunéville, Sarrebourg and Toul.

After the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871, the northeastern part of the Meurthe département was annexed to the German Empire by the Treaty of Frankfurt. On May 18, 1871, about one-third of the Meurthe, corresponding approximately to the arrondissements of Château-Salins and Sarrebourg in the northeast of the département, were detached from Meurthe and annexed to Germany, becoming part of the Reichsland of Elsaß-Lothringen.

The remaining two-third of Meurthe were merged with the one-fifth of the Moselle département (arrondissement of Briey, in the extreme west of Moselle, to the northwest of Meurthe) which had escaped German annexation, and on September 7, 1871, the merger gave birth to the new Meurthe-et-Moselle département (area: 5,246 km², compared to 6,070 km² for the former Meurthe), with its préfecture at Nancy.

Moselle (French pronunciation: [mɔ.zɛl]) is a department in the east of France named after the river Moselle.

Moselle is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790. It was created from the former province of Lorraine.

In 1793, the foreign enclaves of Manderen, Lixing-lès-Rouhling, Momerstroff, and Créhange (Kriechingen), all possessions of princes of the German Holy Roman Empire, were annexed by France and incorporated into the Moselle département.

By the Treaty of Paris of 1814 following the first defeat and abdication of Napoleon, France had to surrender almost all its conquests since 1792. On the northeastern border, France was not restored to its 1792 borders, but a new border was established to put an end to the convoluted nature of the border, with all its enclaves and exclaves. As a result, the French exclave of Tholey (now in Saarland, Germany) as well as a few communes near Sierck-les-Bains (both territories until then part of the Moselle département) were ceded to Austria. On the other hand, the French annexations of 1793 were confirmed, and furthermore, the south of the Napoleonic département of Sarre was ceded to France, including the town of Lebach, the city of Saarbrücken, and the rich coal basin nearby. France was thus a net beneficiary of the Treaty of Paris, all the new territories ceded to her being far larger and more strategic than the few territories ceded to Austria. All these new territories were incorporated into the Moselle department, and so Moselle had now a larger territory than ever since 1790.