In 1997,
the British Bulldog was crowned the first
WWF European Champion by winning a tournament that was held over several shows in Germany, culminating in a finals victory over
Owen Hart. Upon winning the title,
Shawn Michaels became the first
Grand Slam Champion in WWE. Michaels is the only wrestler to have held both the
WWF Championship and the European title at the same time. After winning the European title, both
D'Lo Brown and
Al Snow were billed from different parts of Europe each week while champion. During Snow's reign, he and "Head" dressed up as various ethnic stereotypes corresponding to the European location they were billed from, though not always in a politically or geographically correct manner. The title was retired briefly in April 1999 by then-champion
Shane McMahon, who wanted to retire as an "undefeated champion". McMahon reintroduced the championship two months later and gave it to
Mideon, who saw the title belt in Shane's travel bag and asked if he could have it. Three wrestlers accomplished this feat. The first was
D'Lo Brown, who defeated
Mideon for the European title at
Fully Loaded in 1999 and two nights later at a
Monday Night Raw taping, defeated
Jeff Jarrett to win the
Intercontinental Championship. A month later, at
SummerSlam, Jarrett defeated Brown to win both titles but awarded the European Championship to
Mark Henry the following day. On the February 10, 2000 edition of
SmackDown!,
Kurt Angle defeated
Val Venis for the European Championship. Seventeen days later, at
No Way Out, Angle defeated
Chris Jericho for the Intercontinental Championship and became the third Eurocontinental Champion. Angle held the titles until
WrestleMania 2000, when he faced Jericho and
Chris Benoit in a two-fall triple threat match for both titles. In a rarity, Angle lost both of his championships without being pinned or forced to submit; Benoit defeated Jericho in the first fall for the Intercontinental Championship and Jericho defeated Benoit in the second fall to take the European Championship. In May 2002, the WWF was renamed to WWE and the title was renamed accordingly, though the physical belt was not updated to reflect the name change. The title was then
unified with the
WWE Intercontinental Championship in a
ladder match on the July 22, 2002 episode of
Raw, when Intercontinental Champion
Rob Van Dam defeated European Champion
Jeff Hardy. ==Reigns==