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Italian postcard by Rizzoli & C., Milano, 1938. Photo: Pesce.

 

Oretta Fiume (1919-1994) was an Italian actress who became a star during the Fascist era after winning a competition.

 

Oretta Fiume was born June 6, 1919 in Fiume (now Rijeka in Croatia) as Claudia Scrobogna. She adopted her hometown as part of her stage name. In 1938 Fiume took part in one of the numerous competitions of the ERA Film for new faces of cinema, reaching first place, with future star Laura Solari in second place, debuting together in the film by Camillo Mastrocinque, L'orologio a cucù/The cuckoo clock (1938), with Vittorio De Sica. From her hometown she moved to Rome with two fellow friends: the aspiring actress Jucci Kellermann, who after a few years would marry Mario Soldati giving him three children (the actor Wolfango, Michele and the director Giovanni, husband of Stefania Sandrelli), and singer Olga Stancich - winner of the EIAR regional competition - who, between 1939 and 1943, among other things, would dub the songs from Marlene Dietrich's films in Italian. Written subsequently by Alessandro Blasetti for a part in the film Ettore Fieramosca (1938), she would also work with Gallone and Eduardo De Filippo, nevertheless never succeeding in emerging in important parts. In 1941 Fiume became the protagonist of the film Ragazza che dorme/Sleeping Girl (Giovacchino Forzano, 1941), shot at the Tirrenia studios in Pisorno - where she worked more often in the early 1940s. Passers-by and spectators could admire her portrayed in the beautiful posters posted on the walls and windows of cinemas, created by the painters Anselmo Ballester and Sergio Gargiulo. Fiume also starred opposite Nerio Bernardi and Adriano Rimoldi in Sempre più difficile (Renato Angiolillo, Piero Ballerini, 1943), her last film during the war years. She also worked marginally in revue shows on stage between 1943 and 1948.

 

In the late forties Fiume's appearances began to thin out, the last interpretations dates back to the mid-sixties: from a small part in Fellini's La dolce vita, until the last, in the film Thrilling by Carlo Lizzani. On the private side, Fiume had a sentimental relationship with the pianist Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli. She had two children: Riccardo (1941), with a film operator of the time (Giorgio Orsini) while both worked in the film factories of Tirrenia (Pisorno), and Federico Scorbogna (1959), who would be the child protagonist in the films La classe operaia va in paradiso/The Working Class Goes to Heaven (1971) by Elio Petri, with Gian Maria Volonté, Pane e cioccolata (1974) by Franco Brusati, with Nino Manfredi and Andremo in città (1966) by Nello Risi, with Geraldine Chaplin.

 

Oretta Fiume died April 22, 1994, age 74, in Rome.

Strasbourg (/ˈstræzbɜrɡ/, French pronunciation: ​[stʁaz.buʁ, stʁas.buʁ]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in north eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace were historically Alemannic-speaking, hence the city's Germanic name.[5] In 2006, the city proper had 272,975 inhabitants and its urban community 467,375 inhabitants. With 759,868 inhabitants in 2010, Strasbourg's metropolitan area (only the part of the metropolitan area on French territory) is the ninth largest in France. The transnational Eurodistrict Strasbourg-Ortenau had a population of 884,988 inhabitants in 2008.[6]

 

Strasbourg is the seat of several European institutions, such as the Council of Europe (with its European Court of Human Rights, its European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and its European Audiovisual Observatory) and the Eurocorps, as well as the European Parliament and the European Ombudsman of the European Union. The city is also the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine and the International Institute of Human Rights.[7]

 

Strasbourg's historic city centre, the Grande Île (Grand Island), was classified a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1988, the first time such an honour was placed on an entire city centre. Strasbourg is immersed in the Franco-German culture and although violently disputed throughout history, has been a bridge of unity between France and Germany for centuries, especially through the University of Strasbourg, currently the second largest in France, and the coexistence of Catholic and Protestant culture. The largest Islamic place of worship in France, the Strasbourg Grand Mosque, was inaugurated by French Interior Minister Manuel Valls on 27 September 2012.[8]

 

Economically, Strasbourg is an important centre of manufacturing and engineering, as well as a hub of road, rail, and river transportation. The port of Strasbourg is the second largest on the Rhine after Duisburg, Germany.

 

Etymology and Names

The city's Gallicized name (Lower Alsatian: Strossburi, [ˈʃd̥rɔːsb̥uri]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is of Germanic origin and means "Town (at the crossing) of roads". The modern Stras- is cognate to the German Straße and English street, all of which are derived from Latin strata ("paved road"), while -bourg is cognate to the German Burg and English borough, all of which are derived from Proto-Germanic *burgz ("hill fort, fortress").

 

Geography

 

Strasbourg seen from Spot Satellite

Strasbourg is situated on the eastern border of France with Germany. This border is formed by the River Rhine, which also forms the eastern border of the modern city, facing across the river to the German town Kehl. The historic core of Strasbourg however lies on the Grande Île in the River Ill, which here flows parallel to, and roughly 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) from, the Rhine. The natural courses of the two rivers eventually join some distance downstream of Strasbourg, although several artificial waterways now connect them within the city.

 

The city lies in the Upper Rhine Plain, at between 132 metres (433 ft) and 151 metres (495 ft) above sea level, with the upland areas of the Vosges Mountains some 20 km (12 mi) to the west and the Black Forest 25 km (16 mi) to the east. This section of the Rhine valley is a major axis of north-south travel, with river traffic on the Rhine itself, and major roads and railways paralleling it on both banks.

 

The city is some 400 kilometres (250 mi) east of Paris. The mouth of the Rhine lies approximately 450 kilometres (280 mi) to the north, or 650 kilometres (400 mi) as the river flows, whilst the head of navigation in Basel is some 100 kilometres (62 mi) to the south, or 150 kilometres (93 mi) by river.

 

Climate

 

In spite of its position far inland, Strasbourg's climate is classified as Oceanic (Köppen climate classification Cfb), with warm, relatively sunny summers and cold, overcast winters. Precipitation is elevated from mid-spring to the end of summer, but remains largely constant throughout the year, totaling 631.4 mm (24.9 in) annually. On average, snow falls 30 days per year.

 

The highest temperature ever recorded was 38.5 °C (101.3 °F) in August 2003, during the 2003 European heat wave. The lowest temperature ever recorded was −23.4 °C (−10.1 °F) in December 1938.

 

Strasbourg's location in the Rhine valley, sheltered from the dominant winds by the Vosges and Black Forest mountains, results in poor natural ventilation, making Strasbourg one of the most atmospherically polluted cities of France.[10][11] Nonetheless, the progressive disappearance of heavy industry on both banks of the Rhine, as well as effective measures of traffic regulation in and around the city have reduced air pollution.

 

Prehistory

The first traces of human occupation in the environs of Strasbourg go back many thousands of years.[16] Neolithic, bronze age and iron age artifacts have been uncovered by archeological excavations. It was permanently settled by proto-Celts around 1300 BC. Towards the end of the third century BC, it developed into a Celtic township with a market called "Argentorate". Drainage works converted the stilthouses to houses built on dry land.[17]

 

From Romans

The Romans under Nero Claudius Drusus established a military outpost belonging to the Germania Superior Roman province at Strasbourg's current location, and named it Argentoratum. (Hence the town is commonly called Argentina in medieval Latin.[18]) The name "Argentoratum" was first mentioned in 12 BC and the city celebrated its 2,000th birthday in 1988. "Argentorate" as the toponym of the Gaulish settlement preceded it before being Latinized, but it is not known by how long. The Roman camp was destroyed by fire and rebuilt six times between the first and the fifth centuries AD: in 70, 97, 235, 355, in the last quarter of the fourth century, and in the early years of the fifth century. It was under Trajan and after the fire of 97 that Argentoratum received its most extended and fortified shape. From the year 90 on, the Legio VIII Augusta was permanently stationed in the Roman camp of Argentoratum. It then included a cavalry section and covered an area of approximately 20 hectares. Other Roman legions temporarily stationed in Argentoratum were the Legio XIV Gemina and the Legio XXI Rapax, the latter during the reign of Nero.

 

The centre of Argentoratum proper was situated on the Grande Île (Cardo: current Rue du Dôme, Decumanus: current Rue des Hallebardes). The outline of the Roman "castrum" is visible in the street pattern in the Grande Ile. Many Roman artifacts have also been found along the current Route des Romains, the road that led to Argentoratum, in the suburb of Kœnigshoffen. This was where the largest burial places were situated, as well as the densest concentration of civilian dwelling places and commerces next to the camp. Among the most outstanding finds in Kœnigshoffen were (found in 1911–12) the fragments of a grand Mithraeum that had been shattered by early Christians in the fourth century. From the fourth century, Strasbourg was the seat of the Bishopric of Strasbourg (made an Archbishopric in 1988). Archaeological excavations below the current Église Saint-Étienne in 1948 and 1956 unearthed the apse of a church dating back to the late fourth or early fifth century, considered to be the oldest church in Alsace. It is supposed that this was the first seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Strasbourg.

 

The Alemanni fought the Battle of Argentoratum against Rome in 357. They were defeated by Julian, later Emperor of Rome, and their King Chonodomarius was taken prisoner. On 2 January 366, the Alemanni crossed the frozen Rhine in large numbers to invade the Roman Empire. Early in the fifth century, the Alemanni appear to have crossed the Rhine, conquered, and then settled what is today Alsace and a large part of Switzerland.

 

In the fifth century Strasbourg was occupied successively by Alemanni, Huns, and Franks. In the ninth century it was commonly known as Strazburg in the local language, as documented in 842 by the Oaths of Strasbourg. This trilingual text contains, alongside texts in Latin and Old High German (teudisca lingua), the oldest written variety of Gallo-Romance (lingua romana) clearly distinct from Latin, the ancestor of Old French. The town was also called Stratisburgum or Strateburgus in Latin, from which later came Strossburi in Alsatian and Straßburg in Standard German, and then Strasbourg in French. The Oaths of Strasbourg is considered as marking the birth of the two countries of France and Germany with the division of the Carolingian Empire.[19]

 

A major commercial centre, the town came under the control of the Holy Roman Empire in 923, through the homage paid by the Duke of Lorraine to German King Henry I. The early history of Strasbourg consists of a long conflict between its bishop and its citizens. The citizens emerged victorious after the Battle of Oberhausbergen in 1262, when King Philip of Swabia granted the city the status of an Imperial Free City.

 

Around 1200, Gottfried von Straßburg wrote the Middle High German courtly romance Tristan, which is regarded, alongside Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival and the Nibelungenlied, as one of great narrative masterpieces of the German Middle Ages.

 

A revolution in 1332 resulted in a broad-based city government with participation of the guilds, and Strasbourg declared itself a free republic. The deadly bubonic plague of 1348 was followed on 14 February 1349 by one of the first and worst pogroms in pre-modern history: over a thousand Jews were publicly burnt to death, with the remainder of the Jewish population being expelled from the city.[20] Until the end of the 18th century, Jews were forbidden to remain in town after 10 pm. The time to leave the city was signalled by a municipal herald blowing the Grüselhorn (see below, Museums, Musée historique);.[21] A special tax, the Pflastergeld (pavement money), was furthermore to be paid for any horse that a Jew would ride or bring into the city while allowed to.[22]

 

Construction on Strasbourg Cathedral began in the twelfth century, and it was completed in 1439 (though, of the towers, only the north tower was built), becoming the World's Tallest Building, surpassing the Great Pyramid of Giza. A few years later, Johannes Gutenberg created the first European moveable type printing press in Strasbourg.

 

In July 1518, an incident known as the Dancing Plague of 1518 struck residents of Strasbourg. Around 400 people were afflicted with dancing mania and danced constantly for weeks, most of them eventually dying from heart attack, stroke or exhaustion.

 

In the 1520s during the Protestant Reformation, the city, under the political guidance of Jacob Sturm von Sturmeck and the spiritual guidance of Martin Bucer embraced the religious teachings of Martin Luther. Their adherents established a Gymnasium, headed by Johannes Sturm, made into a University in the following century. The city first followed the Tetrapolitan Confession, and then the Augsburg Confession. Protestant iconoclasm caused much destruction to churches and cloisters, notwithstanding that Luther himself opposed such a practice. Strasbourg was a centre of humanist scholarship and early book-printing in the Holy Roman Empire, and its intellectual and political influence contributed much to the establishment of Protestantism as an accepted denomination in the southwest of Germany. (John Calvin spent several years as a political refugee in the city). The Strasbourg Councillor Sturm and guildmaster Matthias represented the city at the Imperial Diet of Speyer (1529), where their protest led to the schism of the Catholic Church and the evolution of Protestantism. Together with four other free cities, Strasbourg presented the confessio tetrapolitana as its Protestant book of faith at the Imperial Diet of Augsburg in 1530, where the slightly different Augsburg Confession was also handed over to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.

 

After the reform of the Imperial constitution in the early sixteenth century and the establishment of Imperial Circles, Strasbourg was part of the Upper Rhenish Circle, a corporation of Imperial estates in the southwest of Holy Roman Empire, mainly responsible for maintaining troops, supervising coining, and ensuring public security.

 

After the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg around 1440, the first printing offices outside the inventor's hometown Mainz were established around 1460 in Strasbourg by pioneers Johannes Mentelin and Heinrich Eggestein. Subsequently, the first modern newspaper was published in Strasbourg in 1605, when Johann Carolus received the permission by the City of Strasbourg to print and distribute a weekly journal written in German by reporters from several central European cities.

 

From Thirty Years' War to First World War

The Free City of Strasbourg remained neutral during the Thirty Years' War 1618-1648, and retained its status as a Free Imperial City. However, the city was later annexed by Louis XIV of France to extend the borders of his kingdom.

 

Louis' advisors believed that, as long as Strasbourg remained independent, it would endanger the King's newly annexed territories in Alsace, and, that to defend these large rural lands effectively, a garrison had to be placed in towns such as Strasbourg.[23] Indeed, the bridge over the Rhine at Strasbourg had been used repeatedly by Imperial (Holy Roman Empire) forces,[24] and three times during the Franco-Dutch War Strasbourg had served as a gateway for Imperial invasions into Alsace.[25] In September 1681 Louis' forces, though lacking a clear casus belli, surrounded the city with overwhelming force. After some negotiation, Louis marched into the city unopposed on 30 September 1681 and proclaimed its annexation.[26]

 

This annexation was one of the direct causes of the brief and bloody War of the Reunions whose outcome left the French in possession. The French annexation was recognized by the Treaty of Ryswick (1697). The official policy of religious intolerance which drove most Protestants from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 was not applied in Strasbourg and in Alsace, because both had a special status as a province à l'instar de l'étranger effectif (a kind of foreign province of the king of France). Strasbourg Cathedral, however, was taken from the Lutherans to be returned to the Catholics as the French authorities tried to promote Catholicism wherever they could (some other historic churches remained in Protestant hands). Its language also remained overwhelmingly German: the German Lutheran university persisted until the French Revolution. Famous students included Goethe and Herder.

  

The Duke of Lorraine and Imperial troops crossing the Rhine at Strasbourg during the War of the Austrian Succession, 1744

During a dinner in Strasbourg organized by Mayor Frédéric de Dietrich on 25 April 1792, Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle composed "La Marseillaise". The same year François Christophe Kellermann, a child of Strasbourg was appointed the head of the Mosel Army. He led his company to victory at the battle of Valmy and saved the young French republic. He was later appointed Duke of Valmy by Napoléon in 1808.

 

During this period Jean-Baptiste Kléber, also born in Strasbourg, led the French army to win several decisive victories. A statue of Kléber now stands in the centre of the city, at Place Kléber, and he is still one of the most famous French officers. He was later appointed Marshal of France by Napoléon.

 

Strasbourg's status as a free city was revoked by the French Revolution. Enragés, most notoriously Eulogius Schneider, ruled the city with an increasingly iron hand. During this time, many churches and monasteries were either destroyed or severely damaged. The cathedral lost hundreds of its statues (later replaced by copies in the 19th century) and in April 1794, there was talk of tearing its spire down, on the grounds that it was against the principle of equality. The tower was saved, however, when in May of the same year citizens of Strasbourg crowned it with a giant tin Phrygian cap. This artifact was later kept in the historical collections of the city until it was destroyed by the Germans in 1870 during the Franco-Prussian war.[27]

 

In 1805, 1806 and 1809, Napoléon Bonaparte and his first wife, Joséphine stayed in Strasbourg.[28] In 1810, his second wife Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma spent her first night on French soil in the palace. Another royal guest was King Charles X of France in 1828.[29] In 1836, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte unsuccessfully tried to lead his first Bonapartist coup in Strasbourg.

 

During the Franco-Prussian War and the Siege of Strasbourg, the city was heavily bombarded by the Prussian army. The bombardment of the city was meant to break the morale of the people of Strasbourg.[30] On 24 and 26 August 1870, the Museum of Fine Arts was destroyed by fire, as was the Municipal Library housed in the Gothic former Dominican church, with its unique collection of medieval manuscripts (most famously the Hortus deliciarum), rare Renaissance books, archeological finds and historical artifacts. The gothic cathedral was damaged as well as the medieval church of Temple Neuf, the theatre, the city hall, the court of justice and many houses. At the end of the siege 10,000 inhabitants were left without shelter; over 600 died, including 261 civilians, and 3200 were injured, including 1,100 civilians.[31]

 

In 1871, after the end of the war, the city was annexed to the newly established German Empire as part of the Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen under the terms of the Treaty of Frankfurt. As part of Imperial Germany, Strasbourg was rebuilt and developed on a grand and representative scale, such as the Neue Stadt, or "new city" around the present Place de la République. Historian Rodolphe Reuss and Art historian Wilhelm von Bode were in charge of rebuilding the municipal archives, libraries and museums. The University, founded in 1567 and suppressed during the French Revolution as a stronghold of German sentiment,[citation needed] was reopened in 1872 under the name Kaiser-Wilhelms-Universität.

  

Strasbourg in the 1890s.

A belt of massive fortifications was established around the city, most of which still stands today, renamed after French generals and generally classified as Monuments historiques; most notably Fort Roon (now Fort Desaix) and Fort Podbielski (now Fort Ducrot) in Mundolsheim, Fort von Moltke (now Fort Rapp) in Reichstett, Fort Bismarck (now Fort Kléber) in Wolfisheim, Fort Kronprinz (now Fort Foch) in Niederhausbergen, Fort Kronprinz von Sachsen (now Fort Joffre) in Holtzheim and Fort Großherzog von Baden (now Fort Frère) in Oberhausbergen.[32]

 

Those forts subsequently served the French army (Fort Podbielski/Ducrot for instance was integrated into the Maginot Line[33]), and were used as POW-camps in 1918 and 1945.

 

Two garrison churches were also erected for the members of the Imperial German army, the Lutheran Église Saint-Paul and the Roman Catholic Église Saint-Maurice.

 

1918 to the present

 

A lost, then restored, symbol of modernity in Strasbourg : a room in the Aubette building designed by Theo van Doesburg, Hans Arp and Sophie Taeuber-Arp.

 

Following the defeat of the German empire in World War I and the abdication of the German Emperor, some revolutionary insurgents declared Alsace-Lorraine as an independent Republic, without preliminary referendum or vote. On 11 November 1918 (Armistice Day), communist insurgents proclaimed a "soviet government" in Strasbourg, following the example of Kurt Eisner in Munich as well as other German towns. French troops commanded by French general Henri Gouraud entered triumphantly in the city on 22 November. A major street of the city now bears the name of that date (Rue du 22 Novembre) which celebrates the entry of the French in the city.[34][35][36] Viewing the massive cheering crowd gathered under the balcony of Strasbourg's town hall, French President Raymond Poincaré stated that "the plebiscite is done".[37]

 

In 1919, following the Treaty of Versailles, the city was annexed by France in accordance with U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's "Fourteen Points" without a referendum. The date of the assignment was retroactively established on Armistice Day. It is doubtful whether a referendum in Strasbourg would have ended in France's favour since the political parties striving for an autonomous Alsace or a connection to France accounted only for a small proportion of votes in the last Reichstag as well as in the local elections.[38] The Alsatian autonomists who were pro French had won many votes in the more rural parts of the region and other towns since the annexation of the region by Germany in 1871. The movement started with the first election for the Reichstag; those elected were called "les députés protestataires", and until the fall of Bismarck in 1890, they were the only deputies elected by the Alsatians to the German parliament demanding the return of those territories to France.[39] At the last Reichstag election in Strasbourg and its periphery, the clear winners were the Social Democrats; the city was the administrative capital of the region, was inhabited by many Germans appointed by the central government in Berlin and its flourishing economy attracted many Germans. This could explain the difference between the rural vote and the one in Strasbourg. After the war, many Germans left Strasbourg and went back to Germany; some of them were denounced by the locals or expelled by the newly appointed authorities. The Saverne Affair was vivid in the memory among the Alsatians.

 

In 1920, Strasbourg became the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine, previously located in Mannheim, one of the oldest European institutions. It moved into the former Imperial Palace.

 

When the Maginot Line was built, the Sous-secteur fortifié de Strasbourg (fortified sub-sector of Strasbourg) was laid out on the city's territory as a part of the Secteur fortifié du Bas-Rhin, one of the sections of the Line. Blockhouses and casemates were built along the Grand Canal d'Alsace and the Rhine in the Robertsau forest and the port.[40]

 

Between the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 and the Anglo-French declaration of War against the German Reich on 3 September 1939, the entire city (a total of 120,000 people) was evacuated, like other border towns as well. Until the arrival of the Wehrmacht troops mid-June 1940, the city was, for ten months, completely empty, with the exception of the garrisoned soldiers. The Jews of Strasbourg had been evacuated to Périgueux and Limoges, the University had been evacuated to Clermont-Ferrand.

 

After the ceasefire following the Fall of France in June 1940, Alsace was annexed to Germany and a rigorous policy of Germanisation was imposed upon it by the Gauleiter Robert Heinrich Wagner. When, in July 1940, the first evacuees were allowed to return, only residents of Alsatian origin were admitted. The last Jews were deported on 15 July 1940 and the main synagogue, a huge Romanesque revival building that had been a major architectural landmark with its 54-metre-high dome since its completion in 1897, was set ablaze, then razed.[41]

 

In September 1940 the first Alsatian resistance movement led by Marcel Weinum called La main noire (The black hand) was created. It was composed by a group of 25 young men aged from 14 to 18 years old who led several attacks against the German occupation. The actions culminated with the attack of the Gauleiter Robert Wagner, the highest commander of Alsace directly under the order of Hitler. In March 1942, Marcel Weinum was prosecuted by the Gestapo and sentenced to be beheaded at the age of 18 in April 1942 in Stuttgart, Germany. His last words will be: "If I have to die, I shall die but with a pure heart". From 1943 the city was bombarded by Allied aircraft. While the First World War had not notably damaged the city, Anglo-American bombing caused extensive destruction in raids of which at least one was allegedly carried out by mistake.[42] In August 1944, several buildings in the Old Town were damaged by bombs, particularly the Palais Rohan, the Old Customs House (Ancienne Douane) and the Cathedral.[43] On 23 November 1944, the city was officially liberated by the 2nd French Armoured Division under General Leclerc. He achieved the oath that he made with his soldiers, after the decisive Capture of Kufra. With the Oath of Kuffra, they swore to keep up the fight until the French flag flew over the Cathedral of Strasbourg.

 

Many people from Strasbourg were incorporated in the German Army against their will, and were sent to the eastern front, those young men and women were called Malgré-nous. Many tried to escape from the incorporation, join the French Resistance, or desert the Wehrmacht but many couldn't because they were running the risk of having their families sent to work or concentration camps by the Germans. Many of these men, especially those who did not answer the call immediately, were pressured to "volunteer" for service with the SS, often by direct threats on their families. This threat obliged the majority of them to remain in the German army. After the war, the few that survived were often accused of being traitors or collaborationists, because this tough situation was not known in the rest of France, and they had to face the incomprehension of many. In July 1944, 1500 malgré-nous were released from Soviet captivity and sent to Algiers, where they joined the Free French Forces. Nowadays history recognizes the suffering of those people, and museums, public discussions and memorials have been built to commemorate this terrible period of history of this part of Eastern France (Alsace and Moselle). Liberation of Strasbourg took place on 23 November 1944.

 

In 1947, a fire broke out in the Musée des Beaux-Arts and devastated a significant part of the collections. This fire was an indirect consequence of the bombing raids of 1944: because of the destruction inflicted on the Palais Rohan, humidity had infiltrated the building, and moisture had to be fought. This was done with welding torches, and a bad handling of these caused the fire.[44]

 

In the 1950s and 1960s the city was enlarged by new residential areas meant to solve both the problem of housing shortage due to war damage and that of the strong growth of population due to the baby boom and immigration from North Africa: Cité Rotterdam in the North-East, Quartier de l'Esplanade in the South-East, Hautepierre in the North-West. Between 1995 and 2010, a new district has been built in the same vein, the Quartier des Poteries, south of Hautepierre.

 

In 1958, a violent hailstorm destroyed most of the historical greenhouses of the Botanical Garden and many of the stained glass windows of St. Paul's Church.

 

In 1949, the city was chosen to be the seat of the Council of Europe with its European Court of Human Rights and European Pharmacopoeia. Since 1952, the European Parliament has met in Strasbourg, which was formally designated its official 'seat' at the Edinburgh meeting of the European Council of EU heads of state and government in December 1992. (This position was reconfirmed and given treaty status in the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam). However, only the (four-day) plenary sessions of the Parliament are held in Strasbourg each month, with all other business being conducted in Brussels and Luxembourg. Those sessions take place in the Immeuble Louise Weiss, inaugurated in 1999, which houses the largest parliamentary assembly room in Europe and of any democratic institution in the world. Before that, the EP sessions had to take place in the main Council of Europe building, the Palace of Europe, whose unusual inner architecture had become a familiar sight to European TV audiences.[45] In 1992, Strasbourg became the seat of the Franco-German TV channel and movie-production society Arte.

 

In 2000, a terrorist plot to blow up the cathedral was prevented thanks to the cooperation between French and German police that led to the arrest in late 2000 of a Frankfurt-based group of terrorists.

 

On 6 July 2001, during an open-air concert in the Parc de Pourtalès, a single falling Platanus tree killed thirteen people and injured 97. On 27 March 2007, the city was found guilty of neglect over the accident and fined €150,000.[46]

 

In 2006, after a long and careful restoration, the inner decoration of the Aubette, made in the 1920s by Hans Arp, Theo van Doesburg, and Sophie Taeuber-Arp and destroyed in the 1930s, was made accessible to the public again. The work of the three artists had been called "the Sistine Chapel of abstract art".

 

Architecture

 

Strasbourg, Cathedral of Our Lady

The city is chiefly known for its sandstone Gothic Cathedral with its famous astronomical clock, and for its medieval cityscape of Rhineland black and white timber-framed buildings, particularly in the Petite France district or Gerberviertel ("tanners' district") alongside the Ill and in the streets and squares surrounding the cathedral, where the renowned Maison Kammerzell stands out.

 

Notable medieval streets include Rue Mercière, Rue des Dentelles, Rue du Bain aux Plantes, Rue des Juifs, Rue des Frères, Rue des Tonneliers, Rue du Maroquin, Rue des Charpentiers, Rue des Serruriers, Grand' Rue, Quai des Bateliers, Quai Saint-Nicolas and Quai Saint-Thomas. Notable medieval squares include Place de la Cathédrale, Place du Marché Gayot, Place Saint-Étienne, Place du Marché aux Cochons de Lait and Place Benjamin Zix.

 

Maison des tanneurs.

 

In addition to the cathedral, Strasbourg houses several other medieval churches that have survived the many wars and destructions that have plagued the city: the Romanesque Église Saint-Étienne, partly destroyed in 1944 by Allied bombing raids, the part Romanesque, part Gothic, very large Église Saint-Thomas with its Silbermann organ on which Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Albert Schweitzer played,[49] the Gothic Église protestante Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune with its crypt dating back to the seventh century and its cloister partly from the eleventh century, the Gothic Église Saint-Guillaume with its fine early-Renaissance stained glass and furniture, the Gothic Église Saint-Jean, the part Gothic, part Art Nouveau Église Sainte-Madeleine, etc. The Neo-Gothic church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Catholique (there is also an adjacent church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Protestant) serves as a shrine for several 15th-century wood worked and painted altars coming from other, now destroyed churches and installed there for public display. Among the numerous secular medieval buildings, the monumental Ancienne Douane (old custom-house) stands out.

 

The German Renaissance has bequeathed the city some noteworthy buildings (especially the current Chambre de Commerce et d'Industrie, former town hall, on Place Gutenberg), as did the French Baroque and Classicism with several hôtels particuliers (i.e. palaces), among which the Palais Rohan (1742, now housing three museums) is the most spectacular. Other buildings of its kind are the "Hôtel de Hanau" (1736, now the city hall), the Hôtel de Klinglin (1736, now residence of the préfet), the Hôtel des Deux-Ponts (1755, now residence of the military governor), the Hôtel d'Andlau-Klinglin (1725, now seat of the administration of the Port autonome de Strasbourg) etc. The largest baroque building of Strasbourg though is the 150 m (490 ft) long 1720s main building of the Hôpital civil. As for French Neo-classicism, it is the Opera House on Place Broglie that most prestigiously represents this style.

 

Strasbourg also offers high-class eclecticist buildings in its very extended German district, the Neustadt, being the main memory of Wilhelmian architecture since most of the major cities in Germany proper suffered intensive damage during World War II. Streets, boulevards and avenues are homogeneous, surprisingly high (up to seven stories) and broad examples of German urban lay-out and of this architectural style that summons and mixes up five centuries of European architecture as well as Neo-Egyptian, Neo-Greek and Neo-Babylonian styles. The former imperial palace Palais du Rhin, the most political and thus heavily criticized of all German Strasbourg buildings epitomizes the grand scale and stylistic sturdiness of this period. But the two most handsome and ornate buildings of these times are the École internationale des Pontonniers (the former Höhere Mädchenschule, girls college) with its towers, turrets and multiple round and square angles[50] and the École des Arts décoratifs with its lavishly ornate façade of painted bricks, woodwork and majolica.[51]

 

Notable streets of the German district include: Avenue de la Forêt Noire, Avenue des Vosges, Avenue d'Alsace, Avenue de la Marseillaise, Avenue de la Liberté, Boulevard de la Victoire, Rue Sellénick, Rue du Général de Castelnau, Rue du Maréchal Foch, and Rue du Maréchal Joffre. Notable squares of the German district include: Place de la République, Place de l'Université, Place Brant, and Place Arnold

 

As for modern and contemporary architecture, Strasbourg possesses some fine Art Nouveau buildings (such as the huge Palais des Fêtes and houses and villas like Villa Schutzenberger and Hôtel Brion), good examples of post-World War II functional architecture (the Cité Rotterdam, for which Le Corbusier did not succeed in the architectural contest) and, in the very extended Quartier Européen, some spectacular administrative buildings of sometimes utterly large size, among which the European Court of Human Rights building by Richard Rogers is arguably the finest. Other noticeable contemporary buildings are the new Music school Cité de la Musique et de la Danse, the Musée d'Art moderne et contemporain and the Hôtel du Département facing it, as well as, in the outskirts, the tramway-station Hoenheim-Nord designed by Zaha Hadid.

  

Place Kléber

The city has many bridges, including the medieval and four-towered Ponts Couverts that, despite their name, are no longer covered. Next to the Ponts Couverts is the Barrage Vauban, a part of Vauban's 17th-century fortifications, that does include a covered bridge. Other bridges are the ornate 19th-century Pont de la Fonderie (1893, stone) and Pont d'Auvergne (1892, iron), as well as architect Marc Mimram's futuristic Passerelle over the Rhine, opened in 2004.

 

The largest square at the centre of the city of Strasbourg is the Place Kléber. Located in the heart of the city's commercial area, it was named after general Jean-Baptiste Kléber, born in Strasbourg in 1753 and assassinated in 1800 in Cairo. In the square is a statue of Kléber, under which is a vault containing his remains. On the north side of the square is the Aubette (Orderly Room), built by Jacques François Blondel, architect of the king, in 1765–1772.

 

Parks

 

The Pavillon Joséphine (rear side) in the Parc de l'Orangerie

 

The Château de Pourtalès (front side) in the park of the same name

 

Strasbourg features a number of prominent parks, of which several are of cultural and historical interest: the Parc de l'Orangerie, laid out as a French garden by André le Nôtre and remodeled as an English garden on behalf of Joséphine de Beauharnais, now displaying noteworthy French gardens, a neo-classical castle and a small zoo; the Parc de la Citadelle, built around impressive remains of the 17th-century fortress erected close to the Rhine by Vauban;[52] the Parc de Pourtalès, laid out in English style around a baroque castle (heavily restored in the 19th century) that now houses a small three-star hotel,[53] and featuring an open-air museum of international contemporary sculpture.[54] The Jardin botanique de l'Université de Strasbourg (botanical garden) was created under the German administration next to the Observatory of Strasbourg, built in 1881, and still owns some greenhouses of those times. The Parc des Contades, although the oldest park of the city, was completely remodeled after World War II. The futuristic Parc des Poteries is an example of European park-conception in the late 1990s. The Jardin des deux Rives, spread over Strasbourg and Kehl on both sides of the Rhine opened in 2004 and is the most extended (60-hectare) park of the agglomeration. The most recent park is Parc du Heyritz (8,7 ha), opened in 2014 along a canal facing the hôpital civil.

Spidey - ( Presents ) - Elvira - Mistress Of The Dark - The Movie Review -

Youtube Link - Please Click On The Link Below To See The Full Video On My Youtube Channel -

www.youtube.com/watch?v=V__GKneUWto

 

Elvira (Cassandra Peterson ) Jeff Conaway - Susan Kellermann - Eddie McClurg -

W.Morgan Sheppard - Daniel Greene -And Others - Good Cast --

1996 -Lakeshore Entertainment -

Story By - Cassandra Peterson - John Paragon -

Rating - 1-10 Spiderwebs - My Rating - 7 1/2 Spiderwebs -

 

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The Hotel Sacher is located in the first District of Vienna after the Vienna State Opera. Famous specialty of the house is the original Sachertorte. The hotel is a member of the Leading Hotels of the World.

History

Anna Maria Sacher

On the grounds of the demolished Kärntnertortheatre, directly opposite the newly opened imperial Court Opera, was built a Maison meuble. The restaurateur Eduard Sacher bought the house modeled on a Renaissance palace and opened in 1876, Hotel de l' Opera with the restaurant. The son of Franz Sacher, the inventor of the Sachertorte, had however already made ​​a name for himself as a restaurateur, and named the house quickly to Hotel Sacher .

He married 1880 the 21- year-old Anna Fuchs, who henceforth cooperated in the hotel and quickly took over the business because of her husband's deteriorating health . Edward died in 1892, and Anna Sacher now ran the hotel as so-called widow operation. Which at that time was an extremely emancipated woman with cigar and her beloved French Bulldog (in Vienna: " Sacher-Bully" ) was always to be found, continued the business with rigor, but also with kindness. So they talked back then a company health insurance for their employees.

From the beginning, the Sacher was one of the best addresses in the city and in 1871 for the wine and delicatessen for kuk Appointed purveyor. This privilege his widow Anna was once again awarded after the death of Eduard Sacher. Before the opera you enjoyed the exquisite cuisine, they met in the legendary private rooms, and high-ranking representatives from politics always used the house for discreet meetings. The exclusive hotel was already a social institution . But then the economically difficult years after the First World War left its mark on the house.

Shortly before her death in 1930, Anna Sacher withdrew from the guide. Only after her death was announced that the hotel was heavily in debt and assets of the former was not much left. In 1934, finally came to bankruptcy.

The lawyer Hans Gürtler, his wife Poldi and the hotelier couple Joseph and Anna Siller acquired the now dilapidated house and renovated it extensively: from the heating system, electrics, running hot and cold water in all rooms has been adapted all the modern needs. From now on, the earned money should always flow back into the house. First time, the Sachertorte not only in their own premises were offered for consumption, but also sold on the street.

The house was again the meeting place for the growing company. But the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany in 1938 brought this to an abrupt end. Swastika flags flying in front of the hotel now. During the Second World War but the house remained largely spared from damage. Immediately after the liberation of Vienna it was occupied by Soviet troops, the Vienna first district around the hotel but was soon jointly managed by the Allies and thus it came six years into British hands.

1951 got the Siller family and Gürtler their property back. Josef Siller had died in 1949. Again, the hotel had to be extensively renovated. As well as new dining venues emerged at the Sacher. Hans Gürtler also laid the foundation for the art collection of the 19th Century. Anna Siller died in 1962, and the hotel was entirely in the possession of the Gürtler family. In 1967 the company received the National Award and since then the federal coat of arms may be used in commercial transactions. The son Rolf Gürtler took over the business in 1970, but shortly thereafter, in an accident, after which he succeeded his son Peter Gürtler. This took over in 1989, the Austrian Court Hotel in Salzburg. This was later renamed the Hotel Sacher Salzburg. Since his death in 1990 his 1983 divorced woman Elisabeth Gürtler-Mauthner leads the family with their daughter Alexandra.

In 2006 the building, which is composed in its buildings of six town houses, refurbished thermally under the direction of architects Frank & Partners, and the loft conversion, in which a spa area was accommodated, provided while preserving the monument idea with a striking bright aluminum roof.

Offer

The Hotel Sacher at night

As a member of the Hospitality Association of The Leading Hotels of the World, which ensures quality control in five star hospitality sector, the Hotel Sacher is one of the best addresses in Austria. Since the expansion of 2006 also meets the criteria of a Leading Spa.

In the House, the Anna Sacher restaurant, the Red Bar, the Blue Bar, Confiserie, Café Sacher are and the Sacher Eck (coin). The cafe was founded in 2004 awarded the Golden Coffee Bean Jacobs.

Also in the building, but not as a part of the hotel, is the former imperial Court and chamber Supplier Wilhelm Jungmann & Neffe.

Since 1999, the Original Sacher-Torte is produced in a production office in Vienna Simmering, from where it is exported to the whole world. After a decades-long legal battle with the Imperial Sugar Bakery Demel only the dessert made ​​by Sacher may adorn with the title "original". The Sachertorte is imitated by many coffee houses, bakeries and pastry shops.

Rooms of the Hotel Sacher

The Sacher shop in the Hotel Sacher

The famous Sacher Torte

Famous guests

Main entrance of the hotel in the evening

Many prominent guests had the house in the Philharmonikerstraße. Anna Sacher had a photo gallery of her guests in her boudoir. The signatures of all she embroidered herself on a table cloth. Located in the middle of it Emperor Franz Joseph.

Crowned heads, statesmen, diplomats and politicians lodged at the Sacher: Edward VIII, Wallis Simpson, Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, Prince Rainier, Princess Grace, John F. Kennedy, Kofi Annan and many more.

Because of the close proximity to the Opera House of course many artists were under the guests: Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein, Leo Slezak, Plácido Domingo, José Carreras and Rudolf Nureyev. Music critic Marcel Prawy lived until his death in 2003, even as a permanent guest at the Sacher.

Graham Greene had here the idea for the screenplay of the film The Third Man. A British officer told him about the underground passages of Vienna, whereupon Greene in the bar wrote down the first ideas immediately.

Her role in the Sissi films Romy Schneider owed ​​their similarity with the bust of the Empress, who is at the hotel and was the director Ernst Marischka noticed. During filming, she lived with her mother Magda Schneider at the Sacher.

Invited to an unusual press conference in April 1969, John Lennon and Yoko Ono to the Sacher. They held one of her legendary "Bagism" actions in their hotel rooms to media representatives (including André Heller, who reported for the Ö3 jukebox), in order to express their ideas of world peace.

Traditionally, all suites are named for operas and composers (eg, La Traviata, Carmen, Idomeneo, The Magic Flute, Madame Butterfly, Nabucco, Rigoletto, Leonard Bernstein, etc.). The new suites on the top floor of the house bearing the names of contemporary operas, such as Lulu and Billy Budd named.

Hotel Sacher in film and on stage

The Hotel Sacher has been immortalized in numerous films and stage plays .

Hotel Sacher, 1939

In the German-speaking area, the hotel was also supported by the TV series Hello - Hotel Sacher ... Portier! popular with Fritz Eckhardt .

Literature

Ernst Hagen: Hotel Sacher. Austria slept in your beds. Zsolnay , Vienna , 1976, ISBN 3-552-02827-7

Ingrid Haslinger: customer - Emperor. The history of the former imperial purveyors. Schroll, Vienna 1996 , ISBN 3-85202-129-4 .

János Kalmár , Mella Waldstein: K.u.K. Purveyors of Vienna. Stocker , Graz 2001, ISBN 3-7020-0935-3 . Pp. 10-15 .

Monika Kellermann : The great Sacher-back book. Pastries, cakes and pastries. Seehamer -Verlag, Weyarn 1994, ISBN 3-929626-28-4

Franz Maier- Bruck : The great Sacher Cookbook. The Austrian cuisine. Seehamer -Verlag, Weyarn 1994, ISBN 3-929626-27-6

Leo Mazakarini : The Hotel Sacher in Vienna. Grafe and Unzer, Munich, 1977, ISBN 3-7742-5018-9

Emil Seeliger: Hotel Sacher. World history at supper. Publisher Schaffer, Berlin 1942

William Fraenkel: Establishment Eduard Sacher in Vienna: General Construction Journal, Volume 1877 (online at ANNO)

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel_Sacher

10 Jahre Dyke March Berlin - "The Future is Dyke"

Traditionell einen Tag vor der CSD-Parade in Berlin feierte der kommerzfreie Dyke March am 21. Juli 2023 sein zehnjähriges Bestehen. Angeführt von einer Dykes-on-Bikes-Gruppe mit ungefähr 50 Motorrädern/rollern waren geschätzt 8.500 bis zu 10.000 Teilnehmende am Freitag auf der Straße in Kreuzberg, Treptow und Neukölln vertreten. Auch u.a. Carolin Emcke und Georgine Kellermann nahmen daran teil.

Gestartet wurde der March etwas verspätet gegen 18:30 Uhr vor dem Festsaal Kreuzberg und führte als Demonstrationsroute durch die Puschkinallee – Bouchéstraße – Karl Kunger Straße – Wildenbruchstraße – Sonnenallee – Pannierstraße – Glogauer Straße – Reichenberger Straße – Ohlauer Straße – Wiener Straße – Lausitzer Strabe – Skalitzer Straße – Schlesische Straße – Puschkinallee und zurück zum Festsaal Kreuzberg, wo die offizielle Dyke March Abschlussparty „Dykes Do It Better!“ startete.

Von mehreren Teilnehmenden hörte ich die Kritik, das die Route nicht sichtbar genug gewählt wurde. So wünschte man sich einen March in belebten und stark frequentierten Kiezen mit viel "Raum auf den Straßen", um tatsächlich "von außen" gesehen und gehört zu werden.

 

Die Parade für Lesben, Dykes, bisexuelle Frauen, transgeschlechtliche und nichtbinäre Menschen sowie ihre Unterstützer für lesbische Sichtbarkeit ist keine Konkurrenz, sondern soll eine Ergänzung zum CSD sein. „Weil auch beim CSD die Lesben oft ein bisschen untergehen. Es ist doch meistens eine sehr männlich dominierte Veranstaltung“, sagte Daniela Bergmann, Mitorganisatorin des Dyke Marchs gegenüber zur taz.

Diese große lesbische Präsenz an einem Tag des Jahres steht eine weitgehende Unsichtbarkeit im restlichen Jahr gegenüber. Sie zeigt sich auch darin, dass es in ganz Deutschland nur noch eine Lesbenbar ("La Gata" in Frankfurt am Main) und in Berlin mit der "Begine" nur eine einzige Frauenkneipe existieren. Im Vergleich zur reichhaltigen Ausgeh-Infrastruktur der Schwulen in der Hauptstadt ist das ein trauriges Bild. Natürlich gehen auch lesbische Frauen hier aus, man findet sie zum Beispiel in der "Möbel Olfe", im "Südblock" oder der "Oya Bar" – Orte, die sie allerdings nicht für sich haben.

 

Gegen 19:45 Uhr brach auf Höhe der Sonnenallee (ungefährer Beginn des Demonstrationszuges) ein heftiger Sturzregen mit Gewitter aus. Dies führte kurzzeitig dazu, das sich der Dyke March verdünnte, nach dem Regenguss aber formierte sich der March laut Manuela Kay (Dyke-March-Organisatorin) gegenüber queer.de wieder größtenteils und gelangte schließlich zu seinem Endpunkt am Festsaal Kreuzberg, wo im Anschluss die große Party stieg.

Es war ein sehr großer, bunter und starker Dyke March in diesem Jahr, der weitestgehend frei von Übergriffigkeiten blieb. Bleibt zu hoffen, das er sich im nächsten Jahr nochmals verdoppelt.

 

Kontrast zum transinklusiven Dyke March

Bei vergangenen Dyke Marches gab es wiederholt transfeindliche Vorfälle, dies blieb allerdings in diesem Jahr aus. Das mag vielleicht auch daran gelegen haben, weil sich im Juni laut Berlin Register unter dem Motto „Lesbisch nicht Queer!“ bei einem eigenen "Real Dyke March" in Berlin-Charlottenburg ca. 26 Menschen zusammen gefunden hatten, um sich gegen die sogenannten selbst ernannten „Trans-Trends“ abzugrenzen. Der "Real Dyke March" wird seit einigen Jahren als Gegenstück zum transinklusiven Berliner "Dyke March" organisiert.

Den "Real Dyke March" unterstützen immer wieder auch streitbare Feministen mit Hang zu Verschwörungsmythen, dem verbreiten von Fake-News und teils auch rechtsoffenen Positionen und Bezügen, die als transfeindliche Hetze vorwiegend im Internet aus der TERF-Szene verbreitet werden, um dann auf die Straße zu gelangen. Das Akronym TERF steht dabei für "Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminism" („Trans-ausschließender Radikalfeminismus“).

Große Unterstützung bekommt die TERF-Szene auch von der Frauenrechtlerin Alice Schwarzer, die sich nicht als Putin-Versteherin sehen will - sie sich aber 2014 auf ihrer Seite genau so positionierte ("Warum ich trotz allem Putin verstehe!") und die sich schon vor vielen Jahren zum Instrument russischer Propaganda gemacht hat, als sie z.B. 2016 einen Kommentar der Chefredakteurin Margarita Simonjan von Russia Today in der EMMA übernahm, der dort bis heute vorzufinden ist.

Anfang diesen Jahres veranstaltete sie mit Sahra Wagenknecht die putinfreundliche Großkundgebung "Manifest für den Frieden", bei der auch nicht wenige Rechte, Rechtsextreme und Antidemokraten vertreten waren. Schwarzer´s Positionen finden sich oft und gern in rechtskonservativen und rechtsextremen Medien wieder, wo ihre Meinungen für die entsprechende Community beworben wird.

 

Das Selbstbestimmungsgesetz ist in Teilen ein sehr kontrovers versucht diskutiertes Thema. Meinen Beobachtungen zufolge haben sich die Fronten unlängst durch die TERF-Szene radikal, aber auch auf beiden Seiten verhärtet. Darüber hinaus gibt es Kritiker -einzelner Positionen- in Bezug auf das Selbstbestimmungsgesetz, die sich nicht in der TERF-Szene bewegen und sich darin auch nicht verorten, aber keinen sachlichen Austausch in der Community mehr vorfinden. Damit ist m.E. die versuchte Spaltung aus der TERF-Szene in naher Zukunft vorprogrammiert. Was sich daran in Zukunft evtl. ändern kann oder wird, wird wohl erst die Zeit zeigen.

 

hinzugezogene Quellen

dykemarchberlin.com/

taz.de/Dyke-March-in-Berlin/!5945112/

www.queer.de/detail.php?article_id=46415 (archive.fo/T1FLs)

www.nd-aktuell.de/artikel/1174892.jubilaeum-jahre-dyke-ma... (archive.fo/RWlJ4)

www.tagesspiegel.de/gesellschaft/queerspiegel/vor-dem-dyk... (archive.fo/tiX2t)

twitter.com/GeorgineKellerm/status/1682444874237333506

www.youtube.com/watch?v=4apWdLXPhpg

 

twitter.com/kinkalitzken/status/1672319526845685772

www.lsvd.de/de/ct/6417-Selbstbestimmungsgesetz (archive.fo/K4U6s)

berliner-register.de/artikel/realdykemarch-504/ (archive.fo/aVycD)

www.queer.de/detail.php?article_id=46122 (archive.fo/wtUg8)

www.nd-aktuell.de/artikel/1174255.demonstration-realer-ge... (archive.fo/PxDir)

www.fr.de/meinung/kolumnen/alice-schwarzer-emma-und-terf-... (archive.fo/8VWKB)

www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de/alice-schwarzer-transsexuali... (archive.fo/SYloS)

www.zeit.de/news/2022-11/06/alice-schwarzer-sieht-sich-ni... (archive.fo/3HGAa)

www.aliceschwarzer.de/artikel/warum-ich-trotz-allem-putin... (archive.fo/2kCij)

www.emma.de/artikel/wir-wollen-nicht-mehr-sein-wie-ihr-33... (archive.fo/MAibE)

www.flickr.com/photos/sozialfotografie/albums/72177720306...

web.archive.org/web/20170819034832/https://www.reporter-o...

 

-------------------------------------------------

 

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Alle Verstöße werden geahndet und rechtlich verfolgt!

 

Vielen Dank!

Stand: Juli 2023

© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

Click on the image to see with black frame.

 

More Description in French and English on : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/collections/7...

 

My Best ☆ FAVES by you, on : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/sets/72157625...

  

Thank you all for your comments, invitations and support :)

© Mathias Kellermann 2013 - All rights reserved - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI d'une peine ​allant jusqu’à 3 ans de prison et 300 000 euros d’amende.

 

Click on the image to see with black frame.

 

My best pics on : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/sets/72157625...

 

To visit my personal website :mathiaskellermann.wix.com/photography

 

Thank you all for your comments, invitations and support :)

 

The Hotel Sacher is located in the first District of Vienna after the Vienna State Opera. Famous specialty of the house is the original Sachertorte. The hotel is a member of the Leading Hotels of the World.

History

Anna Maria Sacher

On the grounds of the demolished Kärntnertortheatre, directly opposite the newly opened imperial Court Opera, was built a Maison meuble. The restaurateur Eduard Sacher bought the house modeled on a Renaissance palace and opened in 1876, Hotel de l' Opera with the restaurant. The son of Franz Sacher, the inventor of the Sachertorte, had however already made ​​a name for himself as a restaurateur, and named the house quickly to Hotel Sacher .

He married 1880 the 21- year-old Anna Fuchs, who henceforth cooperated in the hotel and quickly took over the business because of her husband's deteriorating health . Edward died in 1892, and Anna Sacher now ran the hotel as so-called widow operation. Which at that time was an extremely emancipated woman with cigar and her beloved French Bulldog (in Vienna: " Sacher-Bully" ) was always to be found, continued the business with rigor, but also with kindness. So they talked back then a company health insurance for their employees.

From the beginning, the Sacher was one of the best addresses in the city and in 1871 for the wine and delicatessen for kuk Appointed purveyor. This privilege his widow Anna was once again awarded after the death of Eduard Sacher. Before the opera you enjoyed the exquisite cuisine, they met in the legendary private rooms, and high-ranking representatives from politics always used the house for discreet meetings. The exclusive hotel was already a social institution . But then the economically difficult years after the First World War left its mark on the house.

Shortly before her death in 1930, Anna Sacher withdrew from the guide. Only after her death was announced that the hotel was heavily in debt and assets of the former was not much left. In 1934, finally came to bankruptcy.

The lawyer Hans Gürtler, his wife Poldi and the hotelier couple Joseph and Anna Siller acquired the now dilapidated house and renovated it extensively: from the heating system, electrics, running hot and cold water in all rooms has been adapted all the modern needs. From now on, the earned money should always flow back into the house. First time, the Sachertorte not only in their own premises were offered for consumption, but also sold on the street.

The house was again the meeting place for the growing company. But the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany in 1938 brought this to an abrupt end. Swastika flags flying in front of the hotel now. During the Second World War but the house remained largely spared from damage. Immediately after the liberation of Vienna it was occupied by Soviet troops, the Vienna first district around the hotel but was soon jointly managed by the Allies and thus it came six years into British hands.

1951 got the Siller family and Gürtler their property back. Josef Siller had died in 1949. Again, the hotel had to be extensively renovated. As well as new dining venues emerged at the Sacher. Hans Gürtler also laid the foundation for the art collection of the 19th Century. Anna Siller died in 1962, and the hotel was entirely in the possession of the Gürtler family. In 1967 the company received the National Award and since then the federal coat of arms may be used in commercial transactions. The son Rolf Gürtler took over the business in 1970, but shortly thereafter, in an accident, after which he succeeded his son Peter Gürtler. This took over in 1989, the Austrian Court Hotel in Salzburg. This was later renamed the Hotel Sacher Salzburg. Since his death in 1990 his 1983 divorced woman Elisabeth Gürtler-Mauthner leads the family with their daughter Alexandra.

In 2006 the building, which is composed in its buildings of six town houses, refurbished thermally under the direction of architects Frank & Partners, and the loft conversion, in which a spa area was accommodated, provided while preserving the monument idea with a striking bright aluminum roof.

Offer

The Hotel Sacher at night

As a member of the Hospitality Association of The Leading Hotels of the World, which ensures quality control in five star hospitality sector, the Hotel Sacher is one of the best addresses in Austria. Since the expansion of 2006 also meets the criteria of a Leading Spa.

In the House, the Anna Sacher restaurant, the Red Bar, the Blue Bar, Confiserie, Café Sacher are and the Sacher Eck (coin). The cafe was founded in 2004 awarded the Golden Coffee Bean Jacobs.

Also in the building, but not as a part of the hotel, is the former imperial Court and chamber Supplier Wilhelm Jungmann & Neffe.

Since 1999, the Original Sacher-Torte is produced in a production office in Vienna Simmering, from where it is exported to the whole world. After a decades-long legal battle with the Imperial Sugar Bakery Demel only the dessert made ​​by Sacher may adorn with the title "original". The Sachertorte is imitated by many coffee houses, bakeries and pastry shops.

Rooms of the Hotel Sacher

The Sacher shop in the Hotel Sacher

The famous Sacher Torte

Famous guests

Main entrance of the hotel in the evening

Many prominent guests had the house in the Philharmonikerstraße. Anna Sacher had a photo gallery of her guests in her boudoir. The signatures of all she embroidered herself on a table cloth. Located in the middle of it Emperor Franz Joseph.

Crowned heads, statesmen, diplomats and politicians lodged at the Sacher: Edward VIII, Wallis Simpson, Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, Prince Rainier, Princess Grace, John F. Kennedy, Kofi Annan and many more.

Because of the close proximity to the Opera House of course many artists were under the guests: Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein, Leo Slezak, Plácido Domingo, José Carreras and Rudolf Nureyev. Music critic Marcel Prawy lived until his death in 2003, even as a permanent guest at the Sacher.

Graham Greene had here the idea for the screenplay of the film The Third Man. A British officer told him about the underground passages of Vienna, whereupon Greene in the bar wrote down the first ideas immediately.

Her role in the Sissi films Romy Schneider owed ​​their similarity with the bust of the Empress, who is at the hotel and was the director Ernst Marischka noticed. During filming, she lived with her mother Magda Schneider at the Sacher.

Invited to an unusual press conference in April 1969, John Lennon and Yoko Ono to the Sacher. They held one of her legendary "Bagism" actions in their hotel rooms to media representatives (including André Heller, who reported for the Ö3 jukebox), in order to express their ideas of world peace.

Traditionally, all suites are named for operas and composers (eg, La Traviata, Carmen, Idomeneo, The Magic Flute, Madame Butterfly, Nabucco, Rigoletto, Leonard Bernstein, etc.). The new suites on the top floor of the house bearing the names of contemporary operas, such as Lulu and Billy Budd named.

Hotel Sacher in film and on stage

The Hotel Sacher has been immortalized in numerous films and stage plays .

Hotel Sacher, 1939

In the German-speaking area, the hotel was also supported by the TV series Hello - Hotel Sacher ... Portier! popular with Fritz Eckhardt .

Literature

Ernst Hagen: Hotel Sacher. Austria slept in your beds. Zsolnay , Vienna , 1976, ISBN 3-552-02827-7

Ingrid Haslinger: customer - Emperor. The history of the former imperial purveyors. Schroll, Vienna 1996 , ISBN 3-85202-129-4 .

János Kalmár , Mella Waldstein: K.u.K. Purveyors of Vienna. Stocker , Graz 2001, ISBN 3-7020-0935-3 . Pp. 10-15 .

Monika Kellermann : The great Sacher-back book. Pastries, cakes and pastries. Seehamer -Verlag, Weyarn 1994, ISBN 3-929626-28-4

Franz Maier- Bruck : The great Sacher Cookbook. The Austrian cuisine. Seehamer -Verlag, Weyarn 1994, ISBN 3-929626-27-6

Leo Mazakarini : The Hotel Sacher in Vienna. Grafe and Unzer, Munich, 1977, ISBN 3-7742-5018-9

Emil Seeliger: Hotel Sacher. World history at supper. Publisher Schaffer, Berlin 1942

William Fraenkel: Establishment Eduard Sacher in Vienna: General Construction Journal, Volume 1877 (online at ANNO)

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel_Sacher

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German postcard by Photochemie, Berlin, no. K. 1833. Photo: Willinger, Berlin.

 

Hermann Vallentin (1872-1945) was a prolific German stage and screen actor, who acted in over 150 German silent and sound films between 1914 and 1933.

 

Born 24 May 1872 in Berlin, Hermann Vallentin was the son of the wood merchant and factory owner Felix Vallentin. He was the brother of the actress Rosa Valetti. After playing music at the Königliches Schauspielhaus in Berlin with Max Grube and Hans Oberländer, he received a first engagement at the Central Theater in Berlin in the 1895/96 season. In the next few years, he performed at various Berlin theaters. From 1914 Vallentin was also a busy actor, e.g. the billionaire Lloyd in the popular film Der Tunnel (William Wauer, PAGU 1915). It was the first of several film adaptations of Bernhard Kellermann's 1913 novel 'Der Tunnel' about the construction of a vast tunnel under the Atlantic Ocean connecting Europe and America. Vallentin was very versatile as actor and could play any kind of character. He mostly embodied family patriots, patriarchs and directors, but also small-scale philistines and - often - police commissioners.

 

In the 1910s Vallentin did several films for Paul Davidson's company PAGU/ Union, such as John Riew (Walter Schmidthässler, 1917) with Dagny Servaes, after which he worked at Friedrich Zelnik's Berliner Filmmanufaktur in films with Zelnik himself, Mady Christians, Lya Mara and Maria Leiko such as Am Scheidewege (Alfred Halm, 1918) with Mady Christians and Die Nonne und der Harlekin (Alfred Halm, 1918) with Lya Mara. In addition to Zelnik also Fred Sauer often directed the films at the Berliner Filmmanufaktur. When Zelnik and Mara founded their own film company around 1920, Valentin continued for a while to act in their films (e.g. Der Abenteurer von Paris, Fred Sauer 1920). Vallentin also played at other companies, e.g. opposite Hedda Vernon in Fesseln (Hubert Moest, Eiko, 1918), and opposite Mia May in Wogen des Schicksals (Joe May, May-Film 1918). Even when shifting to other companies, it was still Halm who often directed Vallentin, e.g. in Die letzten Kolczaks (PAGU, 1920) with Ellen Richter and the Henny Porten vehicle Die goldene Krone (UFA, 1920). On stage, he often worked for the Deutsches Theater under the direction of Max Reinhardt and performed with his sister Rosa Valetti in such cabarets as the 'Kabarett Größenwahn' (1920) and 'Die Rampe' (1923).

 

Hermann Vallentin acted in five films by Ewald André Dupont and three by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau. For Dupont, he played the lead in Herztrumpf/Hearts Are Trumps (Ewald André Dupont, 1920) opposite Hans Mierendorff and Adele Sandrock, in the crime film Der Mord ohne Täter/Murder Without Cause (Ewald André Dupont, 1920), and in the early sound film Zwei Welten (1930), while he had supporting parts in Dupont's Henny Porten comedy Sie und die Drei (1922) and the Porten drama Das alte Gesetz (1923). For Murnau, he appeared in the silent Kammerspiel drama Schloß Vogelöd/The Haunted Castle (F.W. Murnau, 1921), the comedy Die Finanzen des Großherzogs (1923-24) with Harry Liedtke, and the classic Der letzte Mann/The Last Laugh (F.W. Murnau, 1924), starring Emil Jannings. Vallentin had a major part opposite Lil Dagover and Albert Steinrück in Ludwig Berger's Der Richter von Zalamea (1920), opposite Conrad Veidt in Urban Gad's Christian Wahnschaffe (1920), opposite Leontine Kühnberg (with whom he did several films around this time) in Judith Trachtenberg (Henrik Galeen, 1920), and opposite Emil Jannings in Die Ratten (Hanns Kobe, 1921). In the early 1920s Vallentin had major parts in e.g. Hanneles Himmelfahrt (Urban Gad, 1922) with Margarete Schlegel, Der Mann aus Stahl (Joseph Delmont, 1922) with Luciano Albertini, Tragödie der Liebe (Joe May, 1922-23) with Mia May and Emil Jannings, Friedrich Schiller (Curt Goetz, 1922-23) with Theodor Loos in the title role, and Das Haus am Meer (Fritz Kaufmann, 1923-24), starring Asta Nielsen.

 

In the mid-1920s, Vallentin had major parts in e.g. Im Namen des Kaisers (Robert Dinesen, 1924-25) with Lya de Putti, and Madame wünscht keine Kinder/ Madame Wants No Children (Alexander Korda, 1926) starring María Corda, Harry Liedtke and Maria Paudler. The latter film was made for the American Fox Film Corporation's German subsidiary. Other major parts Vallentin had from the mid-1920s onward were in e.g. Der Herr Generaldirektor (Fritz Wendhausen, 1925), Das Erwachen des Weibes (Fred Sauer, 1927), Die glühende Gasse (Paul Sugar, 1927), and the Franco-German production Der Sprung ins Glück (Augusto Genina, 1927/28) - in which Vallentin played opposite Carmen Boni and André Roanne. Vallentin had himself the lead as the circus director in Die letzte Galavorstellung des Zirkus Wolfsohn (1927-28) by Domenico Gambino, while he was once more united with Henny Porten as the 'Burgkastellan Süßkind' in Lotte (Carl Froehlich, 1928). Meanwhile, Vallentin had small parts in Fritz Lang's films Der müde Tod (1921), Spione (1927-28) and Frau im Mond (1928-29).

 

Vallentin easily made the transition to German sound cinema. He could first be seen in Atlantik (Ewald André Dupont, 1929), a German-language version of the film Atlantic (1929) made at Elstree Studios by British International Pictures. The film was the first fully talking film to be released in Germany, where it was a major hit. It was based on the play 'The Berg' by Ernest Raymond which itself was based on the Titanic disaster. Another early sound film was the satire Der Hauptmann von Köpenick/The Captain from Köpenick (Richard Oswald, 1931), based on the Hauptmann von Köpenick affair in 1906. A poor cobbler named Wilhelm Voigt purchased the second-hand uniform of a Prussian infantry captain. Wearing this, he travelled to the borough of Köpenick and ordered a troop of guardsmen to place themselves under his command. He then declared the town hall to be under military law, ordering the arrest of the mayor and treasurer and confiscating all the funds in the exchequer. Max Adalbert played Wilhelm Voigt, the title figure, and Vallentin played the uniform tailor Adolph Wormser. In the early 1930s Vallentin played the title role opposite Anna Sten in Lohnbuchhalter Kremke (Marie Harder, 1930), while he had major parts in e.g. Meine Frau, die Hochstaplerin (Kurt Gerron, 1931) with Heinz Rühmann. He also played bit parts in various films, the last one being the Harry Piel film Sprung in den Abgrund (1932-33).

 

The takeover of the Nazi's ended Vallentin's film career abruptly - he was Jewish. In 1933 he emigrated and between 1934 and 1939 he worked on stage subsequently in Basel, Aussig, Prague, Vienna, again Basel and Zürich. In 1939 he emigrated to Palestine. Since he was not powerful in Hebrew, he had to cease all acting. He gave lectures, poems, and was temporarily spokesman of German-language news in the Palestine Broadcasting Service (P.B.S.). Hermann Vallentin died age 73 on 18 September 1945 in Tel Aviv. His niece Lotte Stein was also an actress. Source: IMDb, German Wikipedia, www.steffi-line.de/archiv_text/nost_film20b40/292_vallent...

Strasbourg (/ˈstræzbɜrɡ/, French pronunciation: ​[stʁaz.buʁ, stʁas.buʁ]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in north eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace were historically Alemannic-speaking, hence the city's Germanic name.[5] In 2006, the city proper had 272,975 inhabitants and its urban community 467,375 inhabitants. With 759,868 inhabitants in 2010, Strasbourg's metropolitan area (only the part of the metropolitan area on French territory) is the ninth largest in France. The transnational Eurodistrict Strasbourg-Ortenau had a population of 884,988 inhabitants in 2008.[6]

 

Strasbourg is the seat of several European institutions, such as the Council of Europe (with its European Court of Human Rights, its European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and its European Audiovisual Observatory) and the Eurocorps, as well as the European Parliament and the European Ombudsman of the European Union. The city is also the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine and the International Institute of Human Rights.[7]

 

Strasbourg's historic city centre, the Grande Île (Grand Island), was classified a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1988, the first time such an honour was placed on an entire city centre. Strasbourg is immersed in the Franco-German culture and although violently disputed throughout history, has been a bridge of unity between France and Germany for centuries, especially through the University of Strasbourg, currently the second largest in France, and the coexistence of Catholic and Protestant culture. The largest Islamic place of worship in France, the Strasbourg Grand Mosque, was inaugurated by French Interior Minister Manuel Valls on 27 September 2012.[8]

 

Economically, Strasbourg is an important centre of manufacturing and engineering, as well as a hub of road, rail, and river transportation. The port of Strasbourg is the second largest on the Rhine after Duisburg, Germany.

 

Etymology and Names

The city's Gallicized name (Lower Alsatian: Strossburi, [ˈʃd̥rɔːsb̥uri]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is of Germanic origin and means "Town (at the crossing) of roads". The modern Stras- is cognate to the German Straße and English street, all of which are derived from Latin strata ("paved road"), while -bourg is cognate to the German Burg and English borough, all of which are derived from Proto-Germanic *burgz ("hill fort, fortress").

 

Geography

 

Strasbourg seen from Spot Satellite

Strasbourg is situated on the eastern border of France with Germany. This border is formed by the River Rhine, which also forms the eastern border of the modern city, facing across the river to the German town Kehl. The historic core of Strasbourg however lies on the Grande Île in the River Ill, which here flows parallel to, and roughly 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) from, the Rhine. The natural courses of the two rivers eventually join some distance downstream of Strasbourg, although several artificial waterways now connect them within the city.

 

The city lies in the Upper Rhine Plain, at between 132 metres (433 ft) and 151 metres (495 ft) above sea level, with the upland areas of the Vosges Mountains some 20 km (12 mi) to the west and the Black Forest 25 km (16 mi) to the east. This section of the Rhine valley is a major axis of north-south travel, with river traffic on the Rhine itself, and major roads and railways paralleling it on both banks.

 

The city is some 400 kilometres (250 mi) east of Paris. The mouth of the Rhine lies approximately 450 kilometres (280 mi) to the north, or 650 kilometres (400 mi) as the river flows, whilst the head of navigation in Basel is some 100 kilometres (62 mi) to the south, or 150 kilometres (93 mi) by river.

 

Climate

 

In spite of its position far inland, Strasbourg's climate is classified as Oceanic (Köppen climate classification Cfb), with warm, relatively sunny summers and cold, overcast winters. Precipitation is elevated from mid-spring to the end of summer, but remains largely constant throughout the year, totaling 631.4 mm (24.9 in) annually. On average, snow falls 30 days per year.

 

The highest temperature ever recorded was 38.5 °C (101.3 °F) in August 2003, during the 2003 European heat wave. The lowest temperature ever recorded was −23.4 °C (−10.1 °F) in December 1938.

 

Strasbourg's location in the Rhine valley, sheltered from the dominant winds by the Vosges and Black Forest mountains, results in poor natural ventilation, making Strasbourg one of the most atmospherically polluted cities of France.[10][11] Nonetheless, the progressive disappearance of heavy industry on both banks of the Rhine, as well as effective measures of traffic regulation in and around the city have reduced air pollution.

 

Prehistory

The first traces of human occupation in the environs of Strasbourg go back many thousands of years.[16] Neolithic, bronze age and iron age artifacts have been uncovered by archeological excavations. It was permanently settled by proto-Celts around 1300 BC. Towards the end of the third century BC, it developed into a Celtic township with a market called "Argentorate". Drainage works converted the stilthouses to houses built on dry land.[17]

 

From Romans

The Romans under Nero Claudius Drusus established a military outpost belonging to the Germania Superior Roman province at Strasbourg's current location, and named it Argentoratum. (Hence the town is commonly called Argentina in medieval Latin.[18]) The name "Argentoratum" was first mentioned in 12 BC and the city celebrated its 2,000th birthday in 1988. "Argentorate" as the toponym of the Gaulish settlement preceded it before being Latinized, but it is not known by how long. The Roman camp was destroyed by fire and rebuilt six times between the first and the fifth centuries AD: in 70, 97, 235, 355, in the last quarter of the fourth century, and in the early years of the fifth century. It was under Trajan and after the fire of 97 that Argentoratum received its most extended and fortified shape. From the year 90 on, the Legio VIII Augusta was permanently stationed in the Roman camp of Argentoratum. It then included a cavalry section and covered an area of approximately 20 hectares. Other Roman legions temporarily stationed in Argentoratum were the Legio XIV Gemina and the Legio XXI Rapax, the latter during the reign of Nero.

 

The centre of Argentoratum proper was situated on the Grande Île (Cardo: current Rue du Dôme, Decumanus: current Rue des Hallebardes). The outline of the Roman "castrum" is visible in the street pattern in the Grande Ile. Many Roman artifacts have also been found along the current Route des Romains, the road that led to Argentoratum, in the suburb of Kœnigshoffen. This was where the largest burial places were situated, as well as the densest concentration of civilian dwelling places and commerces next to the camp. Among the most outstanding finds in Kœnigshoffen were (found in 1911–12) the fragments of a grand Mithraeum that had been shattered by early Christians in the fourth century. From the fourth century, Strasbourg was the seat of the Bishopric of Strasbourg (made an Archbishopric in 1988). Archaeological excavations below the current Église Saint-Étienne in 1948 and 1956 unearthed the apse of a church dating back to the late fourth or early fifth century, considered to be the oldest church in Alsace. It is supposed that this was the first seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Strasbourg.

 

The Alemanni fought the Battle of Argentoratum against Rome in 357. They were defeated by Julian, later Emperor of Rome, and their King Chonodomarius was taken prisoner. On 2 January 366, the Alemanni crossed the frozen Rhine in large numbers to invade the Roman Empire. Early in the fifth century, the Alemanni appear to have crossed the Rhine, conquered, and then settled what is today Alsace and a large part of Switzerland.

 

In the fifth century Strasbourg was occupied successively by Alemanni, Huns, and Franks. In the ninth century it was commonly known as Strazburg in the local language, as documented in 842 by the Oaths of Strasbourg. This trilingual text contains, alongside texts in Latin and Old High German (teudisca lingua), the oldest written variety of Gallo-Romance (lingua romana) clearly distinct from Latin, the ancestor of Old French. The town was also called Stratisburgum or Strateburgus in Latin, from which later came Strossburi in Alsatian and Straßburg in Standard German, and then Strasbourg in French. The Oaths of Strasbourg is considered as marking the birth of the two countries of France and Germany with the division of the Carolingian Empire.[19]

 

A major commercial centre, the town came under the control of the Holy Roman Empire in 923, through the homage paid by the Duke of Lorraine to German King Henry I. The early history of Strasbourg consists of a long conflict between its bishop and its citizens. The citizens emerged victorious after the Battle of Oberhausbergen in 1262, when King Philip of Swabia granted the city the status of an Imperial Free City.

 

Around 1200, Gottfried von Straßburg wrote the Middle High German courtly romance Tristan, which is regarded, alongside Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival and the Nibelungenlied, as one of great narrative masterpieces of the German Middle Ages.

 

A revolution in 1332 resulted in a broad-based city government with participation of the guilds, and Strasbourg declared itself a free republic. The deadly bubonic plague of 1348 was followed on 14 February 1349 by one of the first and worst pogroms in pre-modern history: over a thousand Jews were publicly burnt to death, with the remainder of the Jewish population being expelled from the city.[20] Until the end of the 18th century, Jews were forbidden to remain in town after 10 pm. The time to leave the city was signalled by a municipal herald blowing the Grüselhorn (see below, Museums, Musée historique);.[21] A special tax, the Pflastergeld (pavement money), was furthermore to be paid for any horse that a Jew would ride or bring into the city while allowed to.[22]

 

Construction on Strasbourg Cathedral began in the twelfth century, and it was completed in 1439 (though, of the towers, only the north tower was built), becoming the World's Tallest Building, surpassing the Great Pyramid of Giza. A few years later, Johannes Gutenberg created the first European moveable type printing press in Strasbourg.

 

In July 1518, an incident known as the Dancing Plague of 1518 struck residents of Strasbourg. Around 400 people were afflicted with dancing mania and danced constantly for weeks, most of them eventually dying from heart attack, stroke or exhaustion.

 

In the 1520s during the Protestant Reformation, the city, under the political guidance of Jacob Sturm von Sturmeck and the spiritual guidance of Martin Bucer embraced the religious teachings of Martin Luther. Their adherents established a Gymnasium, headed by Johannes Sturm, made into a University in the following century. The city first followed the Tetrapolitan Confession, and then the Augsburg Confession. Protestant iconoclasm caused much destruction to churches and cloisters, notwithstanding that Luther himself opposed such a practice. Strasbourg was a centre of humanist scholarship and early book-printing in the Holy Roman Empire, and its intellectual and political influence contributed much to the establishment of Protestantism as an accepted denomination in the southwest of Germany. (John Calvin spent several years as a political refugee in the city). The Strasbourg Councillor Sturm and guildmaster Matthias represented the city at the Imperial Diet of Speyer (1529), where their protest led to the schism of the Catholic Church and the evolution of Protestantism. Together with four other free cities, Strasbourg presented the confessio tetrapolitana as its Protestant book of faith at the Imperial Diet of Augsburg in 1530, where the slightly different Augsburg Confession was also handed over to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.

 

After the reform of the Imperial constitution in the early sixteenth century and the establishment of Imperial Circles, Strasbourg was part of the Upper Rhenish Circle, a corporation of Imperial estates in the southwest of Holy Roman Empire, mainly responsible for maintaining troops, supervising coining, and ensuring public security.

 

After the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg around 1440, the first printing offices outside the inventor's hometown Mainz were established around 1460 in Strasbourg by pioneers Johannes Mentelin and Heinrich Eggestein. Subsequently, the first modern newspaper was published in Strasbourg in 1605, when Johann Carolus received the permission by the City of Strasbourg to print and distribute a weekly journal written in German by reporters from several central European cities.

 

From Thirty Years' War to First World War

The Free City of Strasbourg remained neutral during the Thirty Years' War 1618-1648, and retained its status as a Free Imperial City. However, the city was later annexed by Louis XIV of France to extend the borders of his kingdom.

 

Louis' advisors believed that, as long as Strasbourg remained independent, it would endanger the King's newly annexed territories in Alsace, and, that to defend these large rural lands effectively, a garrison had to be placed in towns such as Strasbourg.[23] Indeed, the bridge over the Rhine at Strasbourg had been used repeatedly by Imperial (Holy Roman Empire) forces,[24] and three times during the Franco-Dutch War Strasbourg had served as a gateway for Imperial invasions into Alsace.[25] In September 1681 Louis' forces, though lacking a clear casus belli, surrounded the city with overwhelming force. After some negotiation, Louis marched into the city unopposed on 30 September 1681 and proclaimed its annexation.[26]

 

This annexation was one of the direct causes of the brief and bloody War of the Reunions whose outcome left the French in possession. The French annexation was recognized by the Treaty of Ryswick (1697). The official policy of religious intolerance which drove most Protestants from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 was not applied in Strasbourg and in Alsace, because both had a special status as a province à l'instar de l'étranger effectif (a kind of foreign province of the king of France). Strasbourg Cathedral, however, was taken from the Lutherans to be returned to the Catholics as the French authorities tried to promote Catholicism wherever they could (some other historic churches remained in Protestant hands). Its language also remained overwhelmingly German: the German Lutheran university persisted until the French Revolution. Famous students included Goethe and Herder.

  

The Duke of Lorraine and Imperial troops crossing the Rhine at Strasbourg during the War of the Austrian Succession, 1744

During a dinner in Strasbourg organized by Mayor Frédéric de Dietrich on 25 April 1792, Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle composed "La Marseillaise". The same year François Christophe Kellermann, a child of Strasbourg was appointed the head of the Mosel Army. He led his company to victory at the battle of Valmy and saved the young French republic. He was later appointed Duke of Valmy by Napoléon in 1808.

 

During this period Jean-Baptiste Kléber, also born in Strasbourg, led the French army to win several decisive victories. A statue of Kléber now stands in the centre of the city, at Place Kléber, and he is still one of the most famous French officers. He was later appointed Marshal of France by Napoléon.

 

Strasbourg's status as a free city was revoked by the French Revolution. Enragés, most notoriously Eulogius Schneider, ruled the city with an increasingly iron hand. During this time, many churches and monasteries were either destroyed or severely damaged. The cathedral lost hundreds of its statues (later replaced by copies in the 19th century) and in April 1794, there was talk of tearing its spire down, on the grounds that it was against the principle of equality. The tower was saved, however, when in May of the same year citizens of Strasbourg crowned it with a giant tin Phrygian cap. This artifact was later kept in the historical collections of the city until it was destroyed by the Germans in 1870 during the Franco-Prussian war.[27]

 

In 1805, 1806 and 1809, Napoléon Bonaparte and his first wife, Joséphine stayed in Strasbourg.[28] In 1810, his second wife Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma spent her first night on French soil in the palace. Another royal guest was King Charles X of France in 1828.[29] In 1836, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte unsuccessfully tried to lead his first Bonapartist coup in Strasbourg.

 

During the Franco-Prussian War and the Siege of Strasbourg, the city was heavily bombarded by the Prussian army. The bombardment of the city was meant to break the morale of the people of Strasbourg.[30] On 24 and 26 August 1870, the Museum of Fine Arts was destroyed by fire, as was the Municipal Library housed in the Gothic former Dominican church, with its unique collection of medieval manuscripts (most famously the Hortus deliciarum), rare Renaissance books, archeological finds and historical artifacts. The gothic cathedral was damaged as well as the medieval church of Temple Neuf, the theatre, the city hall, the court of justice and many houses. At the end of the siege 10,000 inhabitants were left without shelter; over 600 died, including 261 civilians, and 3200 were injured, including 1,100 civilians.[31]

 

In 1871, after the end of the war, the city was annexed to the newly established German Empire as part of the Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen under the terms of the Treaty of Frankfurt. As part of Imperial Germany, Strasbourg was rebuilt and developed on a grand and representative scale, such as the Neue Stadt, or "new city" around the present Place de la République. Historian Rodolphe Reuss and Art historian Wilhelm von Bode were in charge of rebuilding the municipal archives, libraries and museums. The University, founded in 1567 and suppressed during the French Revolution as a stronghold of German sentiment,[citation needed] was reopened in 1872 under the name Kaiser-Wilhelms-Universität.

  

Strasbourg in the 1890s.

A belt of massive fortifications was established around the city, most of which still stands today, renamed after French generals and generally classified as Monuments historiques; most notably Fort Roon (now Fort Desaix) and Fort Podbielski (now Fort Ducrot) in Mundolsheim, Fort von Moltke (now Fort Rapp) in Reichstett, Fort Bismarck (now Fort Kléber) in Wolfisheim, Fort Kronprinz (now Fort Foch) in Niederhausbergen, Fort Kronprinz von Sachsen (now Fort Joffre) in Holtzheim and Fort Großherzog von Baden (now Fort Frère) in Oberhausbergen.[32]

 

Those forts subsequently served the French army (Fort Podbielski/Ducrot for instance was integrated into the Maginot Line[33]), and were used as POW-camps in 1918 and 1945.

 

Two garrison churches were also erected for the members of the Imperial German army, the Lutheran Église Saint-Paul and the Roman Catholic Église Saint-Maurice.

 

1918 to the present

 

A lost, then restored, symbol of modernity in Strasbourg : a room in the Aubette building designed by Theo van Doesburg, Hans Arp and Sophie Taeuber-Arp.

 

Following the defeat of the German empire in World War I and the abdication of the German Emperor, some revolutionary insurgents declared Alsace-Lorraine as an independent Republic, without preliminary referendum or vote. On 11 November 1918 (Armistice Day), communist insurgents proclaimed a "soviet government" in Strasbourg, following the example of Kurt Eisner in Munich as well as other German towns. French troops commanded by French general Henri Gouraud entered triumphantly in the city on 22 November. A major street of the city now bears the name of that date (Rue du 22 Novembre) which celebrates the entry of the French in the city.[34][35][36] Viewing the massive cheering crowd gathered under the balcony of Strasbourg's town hall, French President Raymond Poincaré stated that "the plebiscite is done".[37]

 

In 1919, following the Treaty of Versailles, the city was annexed by France in accordance with U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's "Fourteen Points" without a referendum. The date of the assignment was retroactively established on Armistice Day. It is doubtful whether a referendum in Strasbourg would have ended in France's favour since the political parties striving for an autonomous Alsace or a connection to France accounted only for a small proportion of votes in the last Reichstag as well as in the local elections.[38] The Alsatian autonomists who were pro French had won many votes in the more rural parts of the region and other towns since the annexation of the region by Germany in 1871. The movement started with the first election for the Reichstag; those elected were called "les députés protestataires", and until the fall of Bismarck in 1890, they were the only deputies elected by the Alsatians to the German parliament demanding the return of those territories to France.[39] At the last Reichstag election in Strasbourg and its periphery, the clear winners were the Social Democrats; the city was the administrative capital of the region, was inhabited by many Germans appointed by the central government in Berlin and its flourishing economy attracted many Germans. This could explain the difference between the rural vote and the one in Strasbourg. After the war, many Germans left Strasbourg and went back to Germany; some of them were denounced by the locals or expelled by the newly appointed authorities. The Saverne Affair was vivid in the memory among the Alsatians.

 

In 1920, Strasbourg became the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine, previously located in Mannheim, one of the oldest European institutions. It moved into the former Imperial Palace.

 

When the Maginot Line was built, the Sous-secteur fortifié de Strasbourg (fortified sub-sector of Strasbourg) was laid out on the city's territory as a part of the Secteur fortifié du Bas-Rhin, one of the sections of the Line. Blockhouses and casemates were built along the Grand Canal d'Alsace and the Rhine in the Robertsau forest and the port.[40]

 

Between the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 and the Anglo-French declaration of War against the German Reich on 3 September 1939, the entire city (a total of 120,000 people) was evacuated, like other border towns as well. Until the arrival of the Wehrmacht troops mid-June 1940, the city was, for ten months, completely empty, with the exception of the garrisoned soldiers. The Jews of Strasbourg had been evacuated to Périgueux and Limoges, the University had been evacuated to Clermont-Ferrand.

 

After the ceasefire following the Fall of France in June 1940, Alsace was annexed to Germany and a rigorous policy of Germanisation was imposed upon it by the Gauleiter Robert Heinrich Wagner. When, in July 1940, the first evacuees were allowed to return, only residents of Alsatian origin were admitted. The last Jews were deported on 15 July 1940 and the main synagogue, a huge Romanesque revival building that had been a major architectural landmark with its 54-metre-high dome since its completion in 1897, was set ablaze, then razed.[41]

 

In September 1940 the first Alsatian resistance movement led by Marcel Weinum called La main noire (The black hand) was created. It was composed by a group of 25 young men aged from 14 to 18 years old who led several attacks against the German occupation. The actions culminated with the attack of the Gauleiter Robert Wagner, the highest commander of Alsace directly under the order of Hitler. In March 1942, Marcel Weinum was prosecuted by the Gestapo and sentenced to be beheaded at the age of 18 in April 1942 in Stuttgart, Germany. His last words will be: "If I have to die, I shall die but with a pure heart". From 1943 the city was bombarded by Allied aircraft. While the First World War had not notably damaged the city, Anglo-American bombing caused extensive destruction in raids of which at least one was allegedly carried out by mistake.[42] In August 1944, several buildings in the Old Town were damaged by bombs, particularly the Palais Rohan, the Old Customs House (Ancienne Douane) and the Cathedral.[43] On 23 November 1944, the city was officially liberated by the 2nd French Armoured Division under General Leclerc. He achieved the oath that he made with his soldiers, after the decisive Capture of Kufra. With the Oath of Kuffra, they swore to keep up the fight until the French flag flew over the Cathedral of Strasbourg.

 

Many people from Strasbourg were incorporated in the German Army against their will, and were sent to the eastern front, those young men and women were called Malgré-nous. Many tried to escape from the incorporation, join the French Resistance, or desert the Wehrmacht but many couldn't because they were running the risk of having their families sent to work or concentration camps by the Germans. Many of these men, especially those who did not answer the call immediately, were pressured to "volunteer" for service with the SS, often by direct threats on their families. This threat obliged the majority of them to remain in the German army. After the war, the few that survived were often accused of being traitors or collaborationists, because this tough situation was not known in the rest of France, and they had to face the incomprehension of many. In July 1944, 1500 malgré-nous were released from Soviet captivity and sent to Algiers, where they joined the Free French Forces. Nowadays history recognizes the suffering of those people, and museums, public discussions and memorials have been built to commemorate this terrible period of history of this part of Eastern France (Alsace and Moselle). Liberation of Strasbourg took place on 23 November 1944.

 

In 1947, a fire broke out in the Musée des Beaux-Arts and devastated a significant part of the collections. This fire was an indirect consequence of the bombing raids of 1944: because of the destruction inflicted on the Palais Rohan, humidity had infiltrated the building, and moisture had to be fought. This was done with welding torches, and a bad handling of these caused the fire.[44]

 

In the 1950s and 1960s the city was enlarged by new residential areas meant to solve both the problem of housing shortage due to war damage and that of the strong growth of population due to the baby boom and immigration from North Africa: Cité Rotterdam in the North-East, Quartier de l'Esplanade in the South-East, Hautepierre in the North-West. Between 1995 and 2010, a new district has been built in the same vein, the Quartier des Poteries, south of Hautepierre.

 

In 1958, a violent hailstorm destroyed most of the historical greenhouses of the Botanical Garden and many of the stained glass windows of St. Paul's Church.

 

In 1949, the city was chosen to be the seat of the Council of Europe with its European Court of Human Rights and European Pharmacopoeia. Since 1952, the European Parliament has met in Strasbourg, which was formally designated its official 'seat' at the Edinburgh meeting of the European Council of EU heads of state and government in December 1992. (This position was reconfirmed and given treaty status in the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam). However, only the (four-day) plenary sessions of the Parliament are held in Strasbourg each month, with all other business being conducted in Brussels and Luxembourg. Those sessions take place in the Immeuble Louise Weiss, inaugurated in 1999, which houses the largest parliamentary assembly room in Europe and of any democratic institution in the world. Before that, the EP sessions had to take place in the main Council of Europe building, the Palace of Europe, whose unusual inner architecture had become a familiar sight to European TV audiences.[45] In 1992, Strasbourg became the seat of the Franco-German TV channel and movie-production society Arte.

 

In 2000, a terrorist plot to blow up the cathedral was prevented thanks to the cooperation between French and German police that led to the arrest in late 2000 of a Frankfurt-based group of terrorists.

 

On 6 July 2001, during an open-air concert in the Parc de Pourtalès, a single falling Platanus tree killed thirteen people and injured 97. On 27 March 2007, the city was found guilty of neglect over the accident and fined €150,000.[46]

 

In 2006, after a long and careful restoration, the inner decoration of the Aubette, made in the 1920s by Hans Arp, Theo van Doesburg, and Sophie Taeuber-Arp and destroyed in the 1930s, was made accessible to the public again. The work of the three artists had been called "the Sistine Chapel of abstract art".

 

Architecture

 

Strasbourg, Cathedral of Our Lady

The city is chiefly known for its sandstone Gothic Cathedral with its famous astronomical clock, and for its medieval cityscape of Rhineland black and white timber-framed buildings, particularly in the Petite France district or Gerberviertel ("tanners' district") alongside the Ill and in the streets and squares surrounding the cathedral, where the renowned Maison Kammerzell stands out.

 

Notable medieval streets include Rue Mercière, Rue des Dentelles, Rue du Bain aux Plantes, Rue des Juifs, Rue des Frères, Rue des Tonneliers, Rue du Maroquin, Rue des Charpentiers, Rue des Serruriers, Grand' Rue, Quai des Bateliers, Quai Saint-Nicolas and Quai Saint-Thomas. Notable medieval squares include Place de la Cathédrale, Place du Marché Gayot, Place Saint-Étienne, Place du Marché aux Cochons de Lait and Place Benjamin Zix.

 

Maison des tanneurs.

 

In addition to the cathedral, Strasbourg houses several other medieval churches that have survived the many wars and destructions that have plagued the city: the Romanesque Église Saint-Étienne, partly destroyed in 1944 by Allied bombing raids, the part Romanesque, part Gothic, very large Église Saint-Thomas with its Silbermann organ on which Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Albert Schweitzer played,[49] the Gothic Église protestante Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune with its crypt dating back to the seventh century and its cloister partly from the eleventh century, the Gothic Église Saint-Guillaume with its fine early-Renaissance stained glass and furniture, the Gothic Église Saint-Jean, the part Gothic, part Art Nouveau Église Sainte-Madeleine, etc. The Neo-Gothic church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Catholique (there is also an adjacent church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Protestant) serves as a shrine for several 15th-century wood worked and painted altars coming from other, now destroyed churches and installed there for public display. Among the numerous secular medieval buildings, the monumental Ancienne Douane (old custom-house) stands out.

 

The German Renaissance has bequeathed the city some noteworthy buildings (especially the current Chambre de Commerce et d'Industrie, former town hall, on Place Gutenberg), as did the French Baroque and Classicism with several hôtels particuliers (i.e. palaces), among which the Palais Rohan (1742, now housing three museums) is the most spectacular. Other buildings of its kind are the "Hôtel de Hanau" (1736, now the city hall), the Hôtel de Klinglin (1736, now residence of the préfet), the Hôtel des Deux-Ponts (1755, now residence of the military governor), the Hôtel d'Andlau-Klinglin (1725, now seat of the administration of the Port autonome de Strasbourg) etc. The largest baroque building of Strasbourg though is the 150 m (490 ft) long 1720s main building of the Hôpital civil. As for French Neo-classicism, it is the Opera House on Place Broglie that most prestigiously represents this style.

 

Strasbourg also offers high-class eclecticist buildings in its very extended German district, the Neustadt, being the main memory of Wilhelmian architecture since most of the major cities in Germany proper suffered intensive damage during World War II. Streets, boulevards and avenues are homogeneous, surprisingly high (up to seven stories) and broad examples of German urban lay-out and of this architectural style that summons and mixes up five centuries of European architecture as well as Neo-Egyptian, Neo-Greek and Neo-Babylonian styles. The former imperial palace Palais du Rhin, the most political and thus heavily criticized of all German Strasbourg buildings epitomizes the grand scale and stylistic sturdiness of this period. But the two most handsome and ornate buildings of these times are the École internationale des Pontonniers (the former Höhere Mädchenschule, girls college) with its towers, turrets and multiple round and square angles[50] and the École des Arts décoratifs with its lavishly ornate façade of painted bricks, woodwork and majolica.[51]

 

Notable streets of the German district include: Avenue de la Forêt Noire, Avenue des Vosges, Avenue d'Alsace, Avenue de la Marseillaise, Avenue de la Liberté, Boulevard de la Victoire, Rue Sellénick, Rue du Général de Castelnau, Rue du Maréchal Foch, and Rue du Maréchal Joffre. Notable squares of the German district include: Place de la République, Place de l'Université, Place Brant, and Place Arnold

 

As for modern and contemporary architecture, Strasbourg possesses some fine Art Nouveau buildings (such as the huge Palais des Fêtes and houses and villas like Villa Schutzenberger and Hôtel Brion), good examples of post-World War II functional architecture (the Cité Rotterdam, for which Le Corbusier did not succeed in the architectural contest) and, in the very extended Quartier Européen, some spectacular administrative buildings of sometimes utterly large size, among which the European Court of Human Rights building by Richard Rogers is arguably the finest. Other noticeable contemporary buildings are the new Music school Cité de la Musique et de la Danse, the Musée d'Art moderne et contemporain and the Hôtel du Département facing it, as well as, in the outskirts, the tramway-station Hoenheim-Nord designed by Zaha Hadid.

  

Place Kléber

The city has many bridges, including the medieval and four-towered Ponts Couverts that, despite their name, are no longer covered. Next to the Ponts Couverts is the Barrage Vauban, a part of Vauban's 17th-century fortifications, that does include a covered bridge. Other bridges are the ornate 19th-century Pont de la Fonderie (1893, stone) and Pont d'Auvergne (1892, iron), as well as architect Marc Mimram's futuristic Passerelle over the Rhine, opened in 2004.

 

The largest square at the centre of the city of Strasbourg is the Place Kléber. Located in the heart of the city's commercial area, it was named after general Jean-Baptiste Kléber, born in Strasbourg in 1753 and assassinated in 1800 in Cairo. In the square is a statue of Kléber, under which is a vault containing his remains. On the north side of the square is the Aubette (Orderly Room), built by Jacques François Blondel, architect of the king, in 1765–1772.

 

Parks

 

The Pavillon Joséphine (rear side) in the Parc de l'Orangerie

 

The Château de Pourtalès (front side) in the park of the same name

 

Strasbourg features a number of prominent parks, of which several are of cultural and historical interest: the Parc de l'Orangerie, laid out as a French garden by André le Nôtre and remodeled as an English garden on behalf of Joséphine de Beauharnais, now displaying noteworthy French gardens, a neo-classical castle and a small zoo; the Parc de la Citadelle, built around impressive remains of the 17th-century fortress erected close to the Rhine by Vauban;[52] the Parc de Pourtalès, laid out in English style around a baroque castle (heavily restored in the 19th century) that now houses a small three-star hotel,[53] and featuring an open-air museum of international contemporary sculpture.[54] The Jardin botanique de l'Université de Strasbourg (botanical garden) was created under the German administration next to the Observatory of Strasbourg, built in 1881, and still owns some greenhouses of those times. The Parc des Contades, although the oldest park of the city, was completely remodeled after World War II. The futuristic Parc des Poteries is an example of European park-conception in the late 1990s. The Jardin des deux Rives, spread over Strasbourg and Kehl on both sides of the Rhine opened in 2004 and is the most extended (60-hectare) park of the agglomeration. The most recent park is Parc du Heyritz (8,7 ha), opened in 2014 along a canal facing the hôpital civil.

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Potsdam, Villa Kellermann

En 1885, l'Administration, soucieuse de porter les signaux au plus près des dangers et d'en augmenter la portée, construit à Pern une trompette à vapeur de grande puissance dont le pavillon, long de 5 mètres, pouvait décrire un arc de cercle en pivotant autour de son axe et ainsi balayer l'horizon. Pour alimenter la machine, un impluvium permettait de récolter l'eau de pluie, qui était stockée dans une citerne située sous le bâtiment. Désaffecté en 1900, un nouveau signal ayant été mis en place sur la galerie du phare de Créac'h, l'édifice est acquis par un commerçant de l'île. L'écrivain Bernhardt Kellermann, dans son roman La Mer, le surnomme la « villa des tempêtes ».

 

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The Hotel Sacher is located in the first District of Vienna after the Vienna State Opera. Famous specialty of the house is the original Sachertorte. The hotel is a member of the Leading Hotels of the World.

History

Anna Maria Sacher

On the grounds of the demolished Kärntnertortheatre, directly opposite the newly opened imperial Court Opera, was built a Maison meuble. The restaurateur Eduard Sacher bought the house modeled on a Renaissance palace and opened in 1876, Hotel de l' Opera with the restaurant. The son of Franz Sacher, the inventor of the Sachertorte, had however already made ​​a name for himself as a restaurateur, and named the house quickly to Hotel Sacher .

He married 1880 the 21- year-old Anna Fuchs, who henceforth cooperated in the hotel and quickly took over the business because of her husband's deteriorating health . Edward died in 1892, and Anna Sacher now ran the hotel as so-called widow operation. Which at that time was an extremely emancipated woman with cigar and her beloved French Bulldog (in Vienna: " Sacher-Bully" ) was always to be found, continued the business with rigor, but also with kindness. So they talked back then a company health insurance for their employees.

From the beginning, the Sacher was one of the best addresses in the city and in 1871 for the wine and delicatessen for kuk Appointed purveyor. This privilege his widow Anna was once again awarded after the death of Eduard Sacher. Before the opera you enjoyed the exquisite cuisine, they met in the legendary private rooms, and high-ranking representatives from politics always used the house for discreet meetings. The exclusive hotel was already a social institution . But then the economically difficult years after the First World War left its mark on the house.

Shortly before her death in 1930, Anna Sacher withdrew from the guide. Only after her death was announced that the hotel was heavily in debt and assets of the former was not much left. In 1934, finally came to bankruptcy.

The lawyer Hans Gürtler, his wife Poldi and the hotelier couple Joseph and Anna Siller acquired the now dilapidated house and renovated it extensively: from the heating system, electrics, running hot and cold water in all rooms has been adapted all the modern needs. From now on, the earned money should always flow back into the house. First time, the Sachertorte not only in their own premises were offered for consumption, but also sold on the street.

The house was again the meeting place for the growing company. But the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany in 1938 brought this to an abrupt end. Swastika flags flying in front of the hotel now. During the Second World War but the house remained largely spared from damage. Immediately after the liberation of Vienna it was occupied by Soviet troops, the Vienna first district around the hotel but was soon jointly managed by the Allies and thus it came six years into British hands.

1951 got the Siller family and Gürtler their property back. Josef Siller had died in 1949. Again, the hotel had to be extensively renovated. As well as new dining venues emerged at the Sacher. Hans Gürtler also laid the foundation for the art collection of the 19th Century. Anna Siller died in 1962, and the hotel was entirely in the possession of the Gürtler family. In 1967 the company received the National Award and since then the federal coat of arms may be used in commercial transactions. The son Rolf Gürtler took over the business in 1970, but shortly thereafter, in an accident, after which he succeeded his son Peter Gürtler. This took over in 1989, the Austrian Court Hotel in Salzburg. This was later renamed the Hotel Sacher Salzburg. Since his death in 1990 his 1983 divorced woman Elisabeth Gürtler-Mauthner leads the family with their daughter Alexandra.

In 2006 the building, which is composed in its buildings of six town houses, refurbished thermally under the direction of architects Frank & Partners, and the loft conversion, in which a spa area was accommodated, provided while preserving the monument idea with a striking bright aluminum roof.

Offer

The Hotel Sacher at night

As a member of the Hospitality Association of The Leading Hotels of the World, which ensures quality control in five star hospitality sector, the Hotel Sacher is one of the best addresses in Austria. Since the expansion of 2006 also meets the criteria of a Leading Spa.

In the House, the Anna Sacher restaurant, the Red Bar, the Blue Bar, Confiserie, Café Sacher are and the Sacher Eck (coin). The cafe was founded in 2004 awarded the Golden Coffee Bean Jacobs.

Also in the building, but not as a part of the hotel, is the former imperial Court and chamber Supplier Wilhelm Jungmann & Neffe.

Since 1999, the Original Sacher-Torte is produced in a production office in Vienna Simmering, from where it is exported to the whole world. After a decades-long legal battle with the Imperial Sugar Bakery Demel only the dessert made ​​by Sacher may adorn with the title "original". The Sachertorte is imitated by many coffee houses, bakeries and pastry shops.

Rooms of the Hotel Sacher

The Sacher shop in the Hotel Sacher

The famous Sacher Torte

Famous guests

Main entrance of the hotel in the evening

Many prominent guests had the house in the Philharmonikerstraße. Anna Sacher had a photo gallery of her guests in her boudoir. The signatures of all she embroidered herself on a table cloth. Located in the middle of it Emperor Franz Joseph.

Crowned heads, statesmen, diplomats and politicians lodged at the Sacher: Edward VIII, Wallis Simpson, Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, Prince Rainier, Princess Grace, John F. Kennedy, Kofi Annan and many more.

Because of the close proximity to the Opera House of course many artists were under the guests: Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein, Leo Slezak, Plácido Domingo, José Carreras and Rudolf Nureyev. Music critic Marcel Prawy lived until his death in 2003, even as a permanent guest at the Sacher.

Graham Greene had here the idea for the screenplay of the film The Third Man. A British officer told him about the underground passages of Vienna, whereupon Greene in the bar wrote down the first ideas immediately.

Her role in the Sissi films Romy Schneider owed ​​their similarity with the bust of the Empress, who is at the hotel and was the director Ernst Marischka noticed. During filming, she lived with her mother Magda Schneider at the Sacher.

Invited to an unusual press conference in April 1969, John Lennon and Yoko Ono to the Sacher. They held one of her legendary "Bagism" actions in their hotel rooms to media representatives (including André Heller, who reported for the Ö3 jukebox), in order to express their ideas of world peace.

Traditionally, all suites are named for operas and composers (eg, La Traviata, Carmen, Idomeneo, The Magic Flute, Madame Butterfly, Nabucco, Rigoletto, Leonard Bernstein, etc.). The new suites on the top floor of the house bearing the names of contemporary operas, such as Lulu and Billy Budd named.

Hotel Sacher in film and on stage

The Hotel Sacher has been immortalized in numerous films and stage plays .

Hotel Sacher, 1939

In the German-speaking area, the hotel was also supported by the TV series Hello - Hotel Sacher ... Portier! popular with Fritz Eckhardt .

Literature

Ernst Hagen: Hotel Sacher. Austria slept in your beds. Zsolnay , Vienna , 1976, ISBN 3-552-02827-7

Ingrid Haslinger: customer - Emperor. The history of the former imperial purveyors. Schroll, Vienna 1996 , ISBN 3-85202-129-4 .

János Kalmár , Mella Waldstein: K.u.K. Purveyors of Vienna. Stocker , Graz 2001, ISBN 3-7020-0935-3 . Pp. 10-15 .

Monika Kellermann : The great Sacher-back book. Pastries, cakes and pastries. Seehamer -Verlag, Weyarn 1994, ISBN 3-929626-28-4

Franz Maier- Bruck : The great Sacher Cookbook. The Austrian cuisine. Seehamer -Verlag, Weyarn 1994, ISBN 3-929626-27-6

Leo Mazakarini : The Hotel Sacher in Vienna. Grafe and Unzer, Munich, 1977, ISBN 3-7742-5018-9

Emil Seeliger: Hotel Sacher. World history at supper. Publisher Schaffer, Berlin 1942

William Fraenkel: Establishment Eduard Sacher in Vienna: General Construction Journal, Volume 1877 (online at ANNO)

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel_Sacher

© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

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Location: Gießen, Kinogasse

 

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© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

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© Mathias Kellermann 2013 - All rights reserved - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI d'une peine ​allant jusqu’à 3 ans de prison et 300 000 euros d’amende.

 

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Architect: RKW Architektur +

Built: 2013

fr.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Italie_13&oldid=42...

 

Italie 13 (ou Italie XIII) est le nom d'une vaste opération d'urbanisme engagée à Paris dans les années 1960 et interrompue au milieu des années 1970. Son objectif était de transformer en profondeur certains quartiers du 13e arrondissement, autour de l'avenue d'Italie dont elle a tiré son nom. De cette opération, partiellement mise en œuvre, datent les nombreuses tours du sud de l'arrondissement et en particulier le quartier des Olympiades.

  

Les tours des Olympiades derrière le seul bâtiment restant des usines Panhard

L'opération Italie 13 est l'une des réponses proposées par les urbanistes à un diagnostic souvent formulé par les architectes et les politiques depuis le début du xxe siècle : les arrondissements périphériques de Paris et plus particulièrement le XIIIe arrondissement comprennent de nombreux ilôts jugés insalubres ou simplement « mal construits ». La rénovation de ces îlots, soigneusement répertoriés par Raymond Lopez (architecte-conseil pour la ville de Paris) et son assistant Michel Holley, doit se faire non par un simple assainissement des immeubles mais par une réorganisation d'ensemble de ces quartiers dans l'esprit de la Charte d'Athènes de Le Corbusier :

construction en hauteur afin de libérer des espaces libres au sol et d'assurer aux appartements une meilleure luminosité

séparation des fonctions : les voies destinées à une circulation automobile importante doivent être distinctes de celles qui sont consacrées à la desserte locale ou aux trajets piétonniers.

D'autres principes de Le Corbusier, comme celui des parcs entourant les tours, sont toutefois mis de côté.

Le Plan d'urbanisme directeur (PUD), rédigé en 1959 et appliqué dès 1961, résume en quelques mots la nouvelle conception de la ville : « La trame urbaine n'est plus définie par les rues, mais par l'ordonnance des constructions, elles-mêmes guidées par des considérations fonctionnelles ». Le quartier des Olympiades illustrera ce programme à la perfection.

Grâce au soutien d'un pouvoir politique fort instauré par l'avènement de la Cinquième République, l'opération Italie 13 peut être lancée. Le Conseil de Paris l'approuve le 13 janvier 1966 et la confie au secteur privé. Elle doit couvrir un secteur de 87 hectares entre la place d'Italie, l'avenue de Choisy, les rues de Tolbiac et Nationale, les boulevards des Maréchaux et une partie des quartiers de Maison-Blanche et de la Butte aux Cailles de part et d'autre de l'avenue d'Italie. Il s'agit de construire 16 400 logements et 150 000 mètres carrés de surfaces commerciales et de bureaux, ainsi que des écoles et de petits jardins.

Les nombreux intervenants sont réunis au sein de l'Atelier de rénovation urbaine d'Italie 13 sous l'impulsion d'Albert Ascher et Michel Holley. Les tours doivent toutes avoir à peu près la même hauteur : une trentaine d'étages. Holley estime en effet que l'urbanisme de tours, loin d'opérer une rupture traumatique avec le passé, prolonge la vieille tradition parisienne de l'unité de hauteur des bâtiments. De la place des Vosges aux grandes avenues haussmanniennes, l'uniformité des gabarits est en effet un élément essentiel du paysage parisien.

Des résultats contrastés

 

Les principales réalisations de l'opération Italie 13 sont répartis sur trois principaux quartiers auxquels il faut ajouter quelques bâtiments isolés.

 

Vue des trois principaux quartiers de tours depuis la tour Super-Italie, annotée avec le nom des tours

Les Olympiades

L'opération des Olympiades, dirigée par Michel Holley de 1969 à 1974, est une mise en œuvre complète, la seule dans Paris avec le quartier Front-de-Seine, des objectifs du PUD :

les tours et les barres sont orientées le long d'un axe approximativement nord-sud indépendamment de l'orientation des rues. Leur disposition fait penser à une vallée de montagne centrée sur les fausses pagodes du centre commercial, loin de la structure traditionnelle du tissu urbain.

certaines rues sont mêmes invisibles, enfouies sous la dalle et utilisées uniquement pour l'accès des automobiles aux tours et les livraisons de marchandise : rues du Javelot et du Disque.

la séparation fonctionnelle consiste à réserver les avenues à la circulation automobile et la dalle aux piétons : les commerces sont installés sur la dalle, de même que l'entrée principale des tours.

 

La dalle des Olympiades

Il s'agit du plus vaste espace sur dalle de Paris avec le quartier du Front-de-Seine dans le XVe arrondissement. La dalle recouvre la gare de marchandise des Gobelins (située en fait assez loin de la manufacture et de l'avenue du même nom) qui communique avec les rues souterraines. Elle comporte huit tours et trois barres dont les noms correspondent à des villes olympiques : Athènes, Sapporo, Helsinki, Tokyo...

L'opération des Olympiades visait à séduire une population de cadres jeunes en tablant sur le modernisme du quartier et la présence de nombreux équipements scolaires et sportifs. Or les tours, éloignées du centre de Paris, trop standardisées dans leur architecture, n'ont pas attiré les Parisiens. Les tours sont restées inoccupées pendant plusieurs années et l'opération aurait sans doute été un échec sans l'arrivée des premiers réfugiés vietnamiens vers 1975. Ils ont rapidement occupé les appartements en vivant à plusieurs familles par appartement afin de payer les loyers élevés. Suivi par d'autres vagues de réfugiés et d'immigrés cambodgiens, laotiens, aujourd'hui chinois, ils ont ouvert ou repris de nombreux commerces financés par le système de la tontine et en ont fait l'un des quartiers asiatiques de Paris.

Curieusement, les toits en forme de pagode qui recouvrent les boutiques de la dalle ont été réalisés avant l'arrivée des Asiatiques et sans relation avec eux.

De nos jours, le quartier, dont la maintenance est complexe et coûteuse, fait l'objet de projets de rénovation dans le cadre d'un grand projet de renouvellement urbain (GPRU).

 

De droite à gauche : le Périscope (M. Novarina), Antoine-et-Cléopâtre (M. Holley) et les quatre tours du centre Galaxie

L'avenue d'Italie devait être élargie aux dimensions des Champs-Élysées et transformée en voie rapide, rattachée à un réseau de radiales traversant les arrondissements XII à XX. Les piétons et la desserte locale devaient traverser l'avenue par des passerelles ou des tunnels.

Du côté impair, Michel Holley a dessiné les plans de la tour Antoine-et-Cléopâtre, l'une des rares à échapper au modèle parallélépipédique strict.

De l'autre côté, quatre tours et une barre aux noms de minéraux ont été édifiés autour d'un jardin privé qui surplombe le centre commercial Italie II (anciennement Galaxie). Il s'agit d'un embryon de dalle : l'entrée principale de certaines tours se trouve au niveau de la passerelle qui devait enjamber l'avenue d'Italie. C'est l'un des seuls endroits où l'avenue d'Italie a été élargie à 70 mètres comme le prévoyait l'opération Italie 13.

Le projet le plus ambitieux de l'opération Italie 13 était celui de la tour Apogée : d'une hauteur comparable à celle de la tour Montparnasse, elle devait servir de « signal » à l'entrée du quartier, au bord de la place d'Italie. Proposée par Michel Holley sous diverses formes au cours des années 1970, la hauteur projetée à diminué progressivement avant l'annulation finale du projet. En 1980, l'État français a dû payer 470 millions de francs au promoteur pour être revenu sur le permis de construire qu'il lui avait délivré.

Le quartier Masséna

Ce quartier, qui occupe l'ancien emplacement des usines Panhard-Levassor de la porte d'Ivry à la rue Gandon, comprend d'est en ouest :

la villa d'Este où la concentration de tours est sans doute la plus élevée de Paris

le centre commercial Masséna 13

le quartier de la porte de Choisy.

Les tours de ce quartier donnent de plain-pied sur la rue et sont mieux intégrées dans le tissu urbain. Elles portent des noms de compositeurs ou de villes italiennes : Puccini, Palerme, Rimini...

Autres constructions

Il faut rajouter à cette liste quelques bâtiments et opérations isolés :

vers la porte d'Italie : la tour Super-Italie, seule tour ronde du quartier (Maurice Novarina, 1974) et la tour Chambord au bord du boulevard Kellermann.

le long du boulevard Vincent-Auriol : divers ensembles d'immeubles de grande hauteur dont trois tours portant les noms de Cheops, Chephren et Mykerinos à cause de leur forme légèrement pyramidale à la base, à côté desquelles se dresse l'une des tours les plus originales de Paris : la tour du Nouveau-Monde, dont les murs sont ornés de bas-reliefs sur toute leur hauteur.

  

La fin d'Italie 13 et le retour à une conception de la ville plus traditionnelle

 

La sortie de terre des tours s'est accompagnée d'un changement d'état d'esprit de la population, qui a trouvé un écho chez les professionnels (enquêtes de l'Atelier parisien d'urbanisme) et les politiques. En 1974, le nouveau président de la République, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, marque le point d'arrêt des grandes opérations d'urbanisme de tours. L'opération Italie 13 n'aura donc été que très partiellement mise en œuvre.

Il est difficile de nier que la construction des tours, vue autrefois comme un progrès décisif, n'a guère profité à l'image du XIIIe arrondissement, d'autant plus que, construites sur une hauteur, elles sont beaucoup plus visibles depuis le reste de Paris que les tours du Front-de-Seine. Sur le plan esthétique, l'uniformité des parallélépipèdes parisiens séduit certainement moins les Parisiens que l'exubérance de Manhattan pour les New-Yorkais. Les habitants, eux, portent un jugement très contrasté selon la tour dans laquelle ils résident, car la situation varie considérablement d'un immeuble à l'autre au niveau des équipements fournis, de l'état d'entretien et du standing général.

Toutefois, la dalle des Olympiades a conservé ses commerces et ne présente pas l'aspect d'esplanade semi-déserte du Front-de-Seine. L'arrivée de populations asiatiques a probablement permis de sauvegarder le dynamisme du quartier.

À cause du semi-échec de ce type d'opération, l'urbanisme s'est lancé en France, et en particulier à Paris, dans une direction beaucoup plus modeste. L'opération Paris Rive Gauche, à quelques centaines de mètres des Olympiades, seule opération urbaine de grande envergure menée à Paris depuis Italie 13, marque sur l'avenue Pierre-Mendès-France le retour à l'alignement sur rue et au gabarit uniforme : la pierre de taille de l'époque haussmanienne a simplement laissé la place à la paroi de verre. Et le patrimoine urbain, que le PUD croyait pouvoir négliger en dehors du « périmètre sacré » des six premiers arrondissements, fait désormais l'objet de toutes les attentions : alors que les architectes des années 1960 prévoyaient de détruire une gare d'Orsay devenue inutile, leurs successeurs des années 2000 intègrent la plupart des derniers vestiges du passé industriel (Grands Moulins de Paris, SUDAC, Frigos) dans les nouveaux quartiers du xxie siècle.

German postcard by Genossenschaft Deutscher Bühnen-Angehorigen, Berlin / Verband der konzertierenden Künstler Deutschlands, Berlin. Photo: Karl Schenker, Berlin.

 

Austrian-American soprano singer and actress Fritzi Massary (1882-1969) was one of the greatest 20th century operetta divas. She was a superstar in Berlin and Vienna in the Weimar era, but after the rise of the Nazis, Massary was forced to flee Germany. In London, she appeared in an operetta Noel Coward wrote for her. The popular singer also starred in several early German ‘sound pictures’ and other silent films.

 

Fritzi Massary was born Friederike Massaryk in Vienna in the Austro-Hungarian Empire on 1882. She was the eldest of three daughters of a Jewish family, and her father was a businessman. Her parents, and especially her mother, encouraged her talent via singing lessons, with the result that their daughter, now renamed Fritzi Massary, received her first engagement in a small part at the Landestheater in Linz in 1899/1900. In 1900 she appeared in another minor role at the Carl Schultze Theatre in Hamburg, returning to Vienna in the following year and being employed at a summer theater, Danzer’s Orpheum, until 1904. At around this time she was baptised as a Protestant and in 1903 she gave birth to a daughter, Liesl. She had her first sensational success in revue at the Metropol-Theater in Berlin in 1904. She refined her vocal abilities in the next years and soon belonged to the most elegant performers of her time. In 1907, she made her cinema debut for Messter Film in the short 'tonbild' (sound picture) Komm du kleines Kohlenmädchen (1907) opposite Joseph Giampietro. The next year, she made several more of such short films with a song on a sound disk for Deutsche Bioscop GmbH, like Trallala Lied/Trallala Song (1908), Donnerwetter, tadellos/Gosh, faultless (1908) with Henry Bender, and Auf ins Metropol/On to the city (1908). For Deutsche Film, she made Viola (1912). On stage, her real breakthrough occurred in 1911, when she appeared as guest artist at Max Reinhardt’s Künstlertheater in Jacques Offenbach’s La Belle Hélène, alongside Maria Jeritza. From then on “der Massary” reigned over the Berlin stage, which was at the time the centre of cabaret, revue and operetta. Among the works created especially for her was the operetta Die Kaiserin (The Empress) by Leo Fall (1915). Under Bruno Walter she sang the title role in Franz Lehar’s Die lustige Witwe (The Merry Widow) and Adele in Johann Strauss’s Die Fledermaus (The Bat). During World War I, she performed for the soldiers of the Imperial German Army in theatres in occupied Belgium. In 1915 she appeared in the silent film Der Tunnel/The Tunnel (William Wauer, 1915) starring Friedrich Kayßler and Hermann Vallentin. It was the first of several film adaptations of Bernhard Kellermann's 1913 novel Der Tunnel about the construction of a vast tunnel under the Atlantic Ocean connecting Europe and America. The film was made by Paul Davidson's PAGU production company, with sets designed by art director Hermann Warm, five years before he designed Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari/The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (Robert Wiene, 1920). Massary’s later films were Die Rose von Stambul/The Rose of Stamboul (Felix Basch, Arthur Wellin, 1919) and Narrentanz der Liebe/Mie (Arthur Wellin, 1920), opposite Ernst Stahl-Nachbaur.

 

Fritzi Massary was closely associated with the composer Oscar Strauss, creating roles in six of his operettas. In 1920, she worked with Strauss on the hit Der letzte Walzer (The Last Waltz). Her biographer Robert Wennersten explained her popularity in an interview with Kevin Clarke: “Her singing voice was not exceptional, but her delivery of the songs certainly was. Take “Oh-la-la” from Der Letzte Walzer: every time those syllables came around she sang them differently, and every variation was funny or slightly salacious.” Massary was so popular that she had an important impact to the fashion of her times. At the height of her career – between 1918 and 1932 – Massary asked for and was given complete control over her productions. Everything – the supporting cast, the costumes, the sets, the props and lighting – was subject to her approval. Massary’s career in Germany came to an abrupt end when she became a butt of the anti-Semitic propaganda because of her Jewish marriage with actor Max Pallenberg. In late 1932 the couple left Germany, shortly before the Nazis seized dictatorial power in a paramilitary revolution and declared a Third Reich. The couple travelled through Austria and Switzerland, but in 1934 Max Pallenberg died in a plane crash in Karlsbad. Fritzi had now lost everything. She moved to London, where she became friends with Noël Coward and starred in his theatrical musical Operette in 1938. In February 1939, shortly before the outbreak of World War II, she moved to Beverly Hills, California to join her daughter’s family, and lived there among other exiles such as Elisabeth Bergner, Fritz Kortner, Ernst Lubitsch, Thomas Mann and Max Reinhardt. She put an extended effort into continuing her career, going to New York to look for Broadway roles and talking to Hollywood directors about film roles. To no avail, unfortunately. From then on, she focused on her garden and her dogs. Beginning in 1952, she regularly spent summers in Germany. In 1957, Germany honoured her with the Großes Bundesverdienstkreuz (Grand Cross of Merit). She continued to reside in Beverly Hills until her death in Los Angeles in 1969. Fritzi Massary was married twice, first to an eye doctor Bernhard Pollack in 1914. Massary's second marriage was to the Austrian actor Max Pallenberg, from 1917 till his death in 1934. With Karl-Kuno Rollo Graf von Coudenhove, she had her only child, Elisabeth Maria Karl (called Liesl) (1903–1979). Liesl later married the author Bruno Frank. Though Coudenhove was Liesl's father, Massary was never married to him.

 

Sources: Beatrix Borchard (Jewish Women’s Archive), Kevin Clarke (Operetta Research Center), Stadtmuseum Berlin (German), Wikipedia (English and German) and IMDb.

© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

Cette vieille dame qui s'active est en train de récupérer du bois de peuplier afin de préparer le feu qui servira à préparer à manger.

Le peuplier est avec l'abricotier, une des seules essence d'arbre que l'on retrouve à ces altitudes élevées. Elle sert de bois de chauffage mais aussi de charpente pour la construction des maisons, notamment des toitures.

 

This old lady is active in the process of recovering poplar wood for the fire that will be used to cook

Poplars are with apricot trees, the only trees found at these high altitudes. It will be used for firewood but also carpentry in houses, specially for roof structures.

 

More description in French & English will follow on the album page : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/sets/72157630...

 

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Galerie Kellermann, Dusseldorf

13-01-2019 t/m 23-02-2019

Strasbourg (/ˈstræzbɜrɡ/, French pronunciation: ​[stʁaz.buʁ, stʁas.buʁ]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in north eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace were historically Alemannic-speaking, hence the city's Germanic name.[5] In 2006, the city proper had 272,975 inhabitants and its urban community 467,375 inhabitants. With 759,868 inhabitants in 2010, Strasbourg's metropolitan area (only the part of the metropolitan area on French territory) is the ninth largest in France. The transnational Eurodistrict Strasbourg-Ortenau had a population of 884,988 inhabitants in 2008.[6]

 

Strasbourg is the seat of several European institutions, such as the Council of Europe (with its European Court of Human Rights, its European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and its European Audiovisual Observatory) and the Eurocorps, as well as the European Parliament and the European Ombudsman of the European Union. The city is also the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine and the International Institute of Human Rights.[7]

 

Strasbourg's historic city centre, the Grande Île (Grand Island), was classified a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1988, the first time such an honour was placed on an entire city centre. Strasbourg is immersed in the Franco-German culture and although violently disputed throughout history, has been a bridge of unity between France and Germany for centuries, especially through the University of Strasbourg, currently the second largest in France, and the coexistence of Catholic and Protestant culture. The largest Islamic place of worship in France, the Strasbourg Grand Mosque, was inaugurated by French Interior Minister Manuel Valls on 27 September 2012.[8]

 

Economically, Strasbourg is an important centre of manufacturing and engineering, as well as a hub of road, rail, and river transportation. The port of Strasbourg is the second largest on the Rhine after Duisburg, Germany.

 

Etymology and Names

The city's Gallicized name (Lower Alsatian: Strossburi, [ˈʃd̥rɔːsb̥uri]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is of Germanic origin and means "Town (at the crossing) of roads". The modern Stras- is cognate to the German Straße and English street, all of which are derived from Latin strata ("paved road"), while -bourg is cognate to the German Burg and English borough, all of which are derived from Proto-Germanic *burgz ("hill fort, fortress").

 

Geography

 

Strasbourg seen from Spot Satellite

Strasbourg is situated on the eastern border of France with Germany. This border is formed by the River Rhine, which also forms the eastern border of the modern city, facing across the river to the German town Kehl. The historic core of Strasbourg however lies on the Grande Île in the River Ill, which here flows parallel to, and roughly 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) from, the Rhine. The natural courses of the two rivers eventually join some distance downstream of Strasbourg, although several artificial waterways now connect them within the city.

 

The city lies in the Upper Rhine Plain, at between 132 metres (433 ft) and 151 metres (495 ft) above sea level, with the upland areas of the Vosges Mountains some 20 km (12 mi) to the west and the Black Forest 25 km (16 mi) to the east. This section of the Rhine valley is a major axis of north-south travel, with river traffic on the Rhine itself, and major roads and railways paralleling it on both banks.

 

The city is some 400 kilometres (250 mi) east of Paris. The mouth of the Rhine lies approximately 450 kilometres (280 mi) to the north, or 650 kilometres (400 mi) as the river flows, whilst the head of navigation in Basel is some 100 kilometres (62 mi) to the south, or 150 kilometres (93 mi) by river.

 

Climate

 

In spite of its position far inland, Strasbourg's climate is classified as Oceanic (Köppen climate classification Cfb), with warm, relatively sunny summers and cold, overcast winters. Precipitation is elevated from mid-spring to the end of summer, but remains largely constant throughout the year, totaling 631.4 mm (24.9 in) annually. On average, snow falls 30 days per year.

 

The highest temperature ever recorded was 38.5 °C (101.3 °F) in August 2003, during the 2003 European heat wave. The lowest temperature ever recorded was −23.4 °C (−10.1 °F) in December 1938.

 

Strasbourg's location in the Rhine valley, sheltered from the dominant winds by the Vosges and Black Forest mountains, results in poor natural ventilation, making Strasbourg one of the most atmospherically polluted cities of France.[10][11] Nonetheless, the progressive disappearance of heavy industry on both banks of the Rhine, as well as effective measures of traffic regulation in and around the city have reduced air pollution.

 

Prehistory

The first traces of human occupation in the environs of Strasbourg go back many thousands of years.[16] Neolithic, bronze age and iron age artifacts have been uncovered by archeological excavations. It was permanently settled by proto-Celts around 1300 BC. Towards the end of the third century BC, it developed into a Celtic township with a market called "Argentorate". Drainage works converted the stilthouses to houses built on dry land.[17]

 

From Romans

The Romans under Nero Claudius Drusus established a military outpost belonging to the Germania Superior Roman province at Strasbourg's current location, and named it Argentoratum. (Hence the town is commonly called Argentina in medieval Latin.[18]) The name "Argentoratum" was first mentioned in 12 BC and the city celebrated its 2,000th birthday in 1988. "Argentorate" as the toponym of the Gaulish settlement preceded it before being Latinized, but it is not known by how long. The Roman camp was destroyed by fire and rebuilt six times between the first and the fifth centuries AD: in 70, 97, 235, 355, in the last quarter of the fourth century, and in the early years of the fifth century. It was under Trajan and after the fire of 97 that Argentoratum received its most extended and fortified shape. From the year 90 on, the Legio VIII Augusta was permanently stationed in the Roman camp of Argentoratum. It then included a cavalry section and covered an area of approximately 20 hectares. Other Roman legions temporarily stationed in Argentoratum were the Legio XIV Gemina and the Legio XXI Rapax, the latter during the reign of Nero.

 

The centre of Argentoratum proper was situated on the Grande Île (Cardo: current Rue du Dôme, Decumanus: current Rue des Hallebardes). The outline of the Roman "castrum" is visible in the street pattern in the Grande Ile. Many Roman artifacts have also been found along the current Route des Romains, the road that led to Argentoratum, in the suburb of Kœnigshoffen. This was where the largest burial places were situated, as well as the densest concentration of civilian dwelling places and commerces next to the camp. Among the most outstanding finds in Kœnigshoffen were (found in 1911–12) the fragments of a grand Mithraeum that had been shattered by early Christians in the fourth century. From the fourth century, Strasbourg was the seat of the Bishopric of Strasbourg (made an Archbishopric in 1988). Archaeological excavations below the current Église Saint-Étienne in 1948 and 1956 unearthed the apse of a church dating back to the late fourth or early fifth century, considered to be the oldest church in Alsace. It is supposed that this was the first seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Strasbourg.

 

The Alemanni fought the Battle of Argentoratum against Rome in 357. They were defeated by Julian, later Emperor of Rome, and their King Chonodomarius was taken prisoner. On 2 January 366, the Alemanni crossed the frozen Rhine in large numbers to invade the Roman Empire. Early in the fifth century, the Alemanni appear to have crossed the Rhine, conquered, and then settled what is today Alsace and a large part of Switzerland.

 

In the fifth century Strasbourg was occupied successively by Alemanni, Huns, and Franks. In the ninth century it was commonly known as Strazburg in the local language, as documented in 842 by the Oaths of Strasbourg. This trilingual text contains, alongside texts in Latin and Old High German (teudisca lingua), the oldest written variety of Gallo-Romance (lingua romana) clearly distinct from Latin, the ancestor of Old French. The town was also called Stratisburgum or Strateburgus in Latin, from which later came Strossburi in Alsatian and Straßburg in Standard German, and then Strasbourg in French. The Oaths of Strasbourg is considered as marking the birth of the two countries of France and Germany with the division of the Carolingian Empire.[19]

 

A major commercial centre, the town came under the control of the Holy Roman Empire in 923, through the homage paid by the Duke of Lorraine to German King Henry I. The early history of Strasbourg consists of a long conflict between its bishop and its citizens. The citizens emerged victorious after the Battle of Oberhausbergen in 1262, when King Philip of Swabia granted the city the status of an Imperial Free City.

 

Around 1200, Gottfried von Straßburg wrote the Middle High German courtly romance Tristan, which is regarded, alongside Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival and the Nibelungenlied, as one of great narrative masterpieces of the German Middle Ages.

 

A revolution in 1332 resulted in a broad-based city government with participation of the guilds, and Strasbourg declared itself a free republic. The deadly bubonic plague of 1348 was followed on 14 February 1349 by one of the first and worst pogroms in pre-modern history: over a thousand Jews were publicly burnt to death, with the remainder of the Jewish population being expelled from the city.[20] Until the end of the 18th century, Jews were forbidden to remain in town after 10 pm. The time to leave the city was signalled by a municipal herald blowing the Grüselhorn (see below, Museums, Musée historique);.[21] A special tax, the Pflastergeld (pavement money), was furthermore to be paid for any horse that a Jew would ride or bring into the city while allowed to.[22]

 

Construction on Strasbourg Cathedral began in the twelfth century, and it was completed in 1439 (though, of the towers, only the north tower was built), becoming the World's Tallest Building, surpassing the Great Pyramid of Giza. A few years later, Johannes Gutenberg created the first European moveable type printing press in Strasbourg.

 

In July 1518, an incident known as the Dancing Plague of 1518 struck residents of Strasbourg. Around 400 people were afflicted with dancing mania and danced constantly for weeks, most of them eventually dying from heart attack, stroke or exhaustion.

 

In the 1520s during the Protestant Reformation, the city, under the political guidance of Jacob Sturm von Sturmeck and the spiritual guidance of Martin Bucer embraced the religious teachings of Martin Luther. Their adherents established a Gymnasium, headed by Johannes Sturm, made into a University in the following century. The city first followed the Tetrapolitan Confession, and then the Augsburg Confession. Protestant iconoclasm caused much destruction to churches and cloisters, notwithstanding that Luther himself opposed such a practice. Strasbourg was a centre of humanist scholarship and early book-printing in the Holy Roman Empire, and its intellectual and political influence contributed much to the establishment of Protestantism as an accepted denomination in the southwest of Germany. (John Calvin spent several years as a political refugee in the city). The Strasbourg Councillor Sturm and guildmaster Matthias represented the city at the Imperial Diet of Speyer (1529), where their protest led to the schism of the Catholic Church and the evolution of Protestantism. Together with four other free cities, Strasbourg presented the confessio tetrapolitana as its Protestant book of faith at the Imperial Diet of Augsburg in 1530, where the slightly different Augsburg Confession was also handed over to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.

 

After the reform of the Imperial constitution in the early sixteenth century and the establishment of Imperial Circles, Strasbourg was part of the Upper Rhenish Circle, a corporation of Imperial estates in the southwest of Holy Roman Empire, mainly responsible for maintaining troops, supervising coining, and ensuring public security.

 

After the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg around 1440, the first printing offices outside the inventor's hometown Mainz were established around 1460 in Strasbourg by pioneers Johannes Mentelin and Heinrich Eggestein. Subsequently, the first modern newspaper was published in Strasbourg in 1605, when Johann Carolus received the permission by the City of Strasbourg to print and distribute a weekly journal written in German by reporters from several central European cities.

 

From Thirty Years' War to First World War

The Free City of Strasbourg remained neutral during the Thirty Years' War 1618-1648, and retained its status as a Free Imperial City. However, the city was later annexed by Louis XIV of France to extend the borders of his kingdom.

 

Louis' advisors believed that, as long as Strasbourg remained independent, it would endanger the King's newly annexed territories in Alsace, and, that to defend these large rural lands effectively, a garrison had to be placed in towns such as Strasbourg.[23] Indeed, the bridge over the Rhine at Strasbourg had been used repeatedly by Imperial (Holy Roman Empire) forces,[24] and three times during the Franco-Dutch War Strasbourg had served as a gateway for Imperial invasions into Alsace.[25] In September 1681 Louis' forces, though lacking a clear casus belli, surrounded the city with overwhelming force. After some negotiation, Louis marched into the city unopposed on 30 September 1681 and proclaimed its annexation.[26]

 

This annexation was one of the direct causes of the brief and bloody War of the Reunions whose outcome left the French in possession. The French annexation was recognized by the Treaty of Ryswick (1697). The official policy of religious intolerance which drove most Protestants from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 was not applied in Strasbourg and in Alsace, because both had a special status as a province à l'instar de l'étranger effectif (a kind of foreign province of the king of France). Strasbourg Cathedral, however, was taken from the Lutherans to be returned to the Catholics as the French authorities tried to promote Catholicism wherever they could (some other historic churches remained in Protestant hands). Its language also remained overwhelmingly German: the German Lutheran university persisted until the French Revolution. Famous students included Goethe and Herder.

  

The Duke of Lorraine and Imperial troops crossing the Rhine at Strasbourg during the War of the Austrian Succession, 1744

During a dinner in Strasbourg organized by Mayor Frédéric de Dietrich on 25 April 1792, Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle composed "La Marseillaise". The same year François Christophe Kellermann, a child of Strasbourg was appointed the head of the Mosel Army. He led his company to victory at the battle of Valmy and saved the young French republic. He was later appointed Duke of Valmy by Napoléon in 1808.

 

During this period Jean-Baptiste Kléber, also born in Strasbourg, led the French army to win several decisive victories. A statue of Kléber now stands in the centre of the city, at Place Kléber, and he is still one of the most famous French officers. He was later appointed Marshal of France by Napoléon.

 

Strasbourg's status as a free city was revoked by the French Revolution. Enragés, most notoriously Eulogius Schneider, ruled the city with an increasingly iron hand. During this time, many churches and monasteries were either destroyed or severely damaged. The cathedral lost hundreds of its statues (later replaced by copies in the 19th century) and in April 1794, there was talk of tearing its spire down, on the grounds that it was against the principle of equality. The tower was saved, however, when in May of the same year citizens of Strasbourg crowned it with a giant tin Phrygian cap. This artifact was later kept in the historical collections of the city until it was destroyed by the Germans in 1870 during the Franco-Prussian war.[27]

 

In 1805, 1806 and 1809, Napoléon Bonaparte and his first wife, Joséphine stayed in Strasbourg.[28] In 1810, his second wife Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma spent her first night on French soil in the palace. Another royal guest was King Charles X of France in 1828.[29] In 1836, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte unsuccessfully tried to lead his first Bonapartist coup in Strasbourg.

 

During the Franco-Prussian War and the Siege of Strasbourg, the city was heavily bombarded by the Prussian army. The bombardment of the city was meant to break the morale of the people of Strasbourg.[30] On 24 and 26 August 1870, the Museum of Fine Arts was destroyed by fire, as was the Municipal Library housed in the Gothic former Dominican church, with its unique collection of medieval manuscripts (most famously the Hortus deliciarum), rare Renaissance books, archeological finds and historical artifacts. The gothic cathedral was damaged as well as the medieval church of Temple Neuf, the theatre, the city hall, the court of justice and many houses. At the end of the siege 10,000 inhabitants were left without shelter; over 600 died, including 261 civilians, and 3200 were injured, including 1,100 civilians.[31]

 

In 1871, after the end of the war, the city was annexed to the newly established German Empire as part of the Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen under the terms of the Treaty of Frankfurt. As part of Imperial Germany, Strasbourg was rebuilt and developed on a grand and representative scale, such as the Neue Stadt, or "new city" around the present Place de la République. Historian Rodolphe Reuss and Art historian Wilhelm von Bode were in charge of rebuilding the municipal archives, libraries and museums. The University, founded in 1567 and suppressed during the French Revolution as a stronghold of German sentiment,[citation needed] was reopened in 1872 under the name Kaiser-Wilhelms-Universität.

  

Strasbourg in the 1890s.

A belt of massive fortifications was established around the city, most of which still stands today, renamed after French generals and generally classified as Monuments historiques; most notably Fort Roon (now Fort Desaix) and Fort Podbielski (now Fort Ducrot) in Mundolsheim, Fort von Moltke (now Fort Rapp) in Reichstett, Fort Bismarck (now Fort Kléber) in Wolfisheim, Fort Kronprinz (now Fort Foch) in Niederhausbergen, Fort Kronprinz von Sachsen (now Fort Joffre) in Holtzheim and Fort Großherzog von Baden (now Fort Frère) in Oberhausbergen.[32]

 

Those forts subsequently served the French army (Fort Podbielski/Ducrot for instance was integrated into the Maginot Line[33]), and were used as POW-camps in 1918 and 1945.

 

Two garrison churches were also erected for the members of the Imperial German army, the Lutheran Église Saint-Paul and the Roman Catholic Église Saint-Maurice.

 

1918 to the present

 

A lost, then restored, symbol of modernity in Strasbourg : a room in the Aubette building designed by Theo van Doesburg, Hans Arp and Sophie Taeuber-Arp.

 

Following the defeat of the German empire in World War I and the abdication of the German Emperor, some revolutionary insurgents declared Alsace-Lorraine as an independent Republic, without preliminary referendum or vote. On 11 November 1918 (Armistice Day), communist insurgents proclaimed a "soviet government" in Strasbourg, following the example of Kurt Eisner in Munich as well as other German towns. French troops commanded by French general Henri Gouraud entered triumphantly in the city on 22 November. A major street of the city now bears the name of that date (Rue du 22 Novembre) which celebrates the entry of the French in the city.[34][35][36] Viewing the massive cheering crowd gathered under the balcony of Strasbourg's town hall, French President Raymond Poincaré stated that "the plebiscite is done".[37]

 

In 1919, following the Treaty of Versailles, the city was annexed by France in accordance with U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's "Fourteen Points" without a referendum. The date of the assignment was retroactively established on Armistice Day. It is doubtful whether a referendum in Strasbourg would have ended in France's favour since the political parties striving for an autonomous Alsace or a connection to France accounted only for a small proportion of votes in the last Reichstag as well as in the local elections.[38] The Alsatian autonomists who were pro French had won many votes in the more rural parts of the region and other towns since the annexation of the region by Germany in 1871. The movement started with the first election for the Reichstag; those elected were called "les députés protestataires", and until the fall of Bismarck in 1890, they were the only deputies elected by the Alsatians to the German parliament demanding the return of those territories to France.[39] At the last Reichstag election in Strasbourg and its periphery, the clear winners were the Social Democrats; the city was the administrative capital of the region, was inhabited by many Germans appointed by the central government in Berlin and its flourishing economy attracted many Germans. This could explain the difference between the rural vote and the one in Strasbourg. After the war, many Germans left Strasbourg and went back to Germany; some of them were denounced by the locals or expelled by the newly appointed authorities. The Saverne Affair was vivid in the memory among the Alsatians.

 

In 1920, Strasbourg became the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine, previously located in Mannheim, one of the oldest European institutions. It moved into the former Imperial Palace.

 

When the Maginot Line was built, the Sous-secteur fortifié de Strasbourg (fortified sub-sector of Strasbourg) was laid out on the city's territory as a part of the Secteur fortifié du Bas-Rhin, one of the sections of the Line. Blockhouses and casemates were built along the Grand Canal d'Alsace and the Rhine in the Robertsau forest and the port.[40]

 

Between the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 and the Anglo-French declaration of War against the German Reich on 3 September 1939, the entire city (a total of 120,000 people) was evacuated, like other border towns as well. Until the arrival of the Wehrmacht troops mid-June 1940, the city was, for ten months, completely empty, with the exception of the garrisoned soldiers. The Jews of Strasbourg had been evacuated to Périgueux and Limoges, the University had been evacuated to Clermont-Ferrand.

 

After the ceasefire following the Fall of France in June 1940, Alsace was annexed to Germany and a rigorous policy of Germanisation was imposed upon it by the Gauleiter Robert Heinrich Wagner. When, in July 1940, the first evacuees were allowed to return, only residents of Alsatian origin were admitted. The last Jews were deported on 15 July 1940 and the main synagogue, a huge Romanesque revival building that had been a major architectural landmark with its 54-metre-high dome since its completion in 1897, was set ablaze, then razed.[41]

 

In September 1940 the first Alsatian resistance movement led by Marcel Weinum called La main noire (The black hand) was created. It was composed by a group of 25 young men aged from 14 to 18 years old who led several attacks against the German occupation. The actions culminated with the attack of the Gauleiter Robert Wagner, the highest commander of Alsace directly under the order of Hitler. In March 1942, Marcel Weinum was prosecuted by the Gestapo and sentenced to be beheaded at the age of 18 in April 1942 in Stuttgart, Germany. His last words will be: "If I have to die, I shall die but with a pure heart". From 1943 the city was bombarded by Allied aircraft. While the First World War had not notably damaged the city, Anglo-American bombing caused extensive destruction in raids of which at least one was allegedly carried out by mistake.[42] In August 1944, several buildings in the Old Town were damaged by bombs, particularly the Palais Rohan, the Old Customs House (Ancienne Douane) and the Cathedral.[43] On 23 November 1944, the city was officially liberated by the 2nd French Armoured Division under General Leclerc. He achieved the oath that he made with his soldiers, after the decisive Capture of Kufra. With the Oath of Kuffra, they swore to keep up the fight until the French flag flew over the Cathedral of Strasbourg.

 

Many people from Strasbourg were incorporated in the German Army against their will, and were sent to the eastern front, those young men and women were called Malgré-nous. Many tried to escape from the incorporation, join the French Resistance, or desert the Wehrmacht but many couldn't because they were running the risk of having their families sent to work or concentration camps by the Germans. Many of these men, especially those who did not answer the call immediately, were pressured to "volunteer" for service with the SS, often by direct threats on their families. This threat obliged the majority of them to remain in the German army. After the war, the few that survived were often accused of being traitors or collaborationists, because this tough situation was not known in the rest of France, and they had to face the incomprehension of many. In July 1944, 1500 malgré-nous were released from Soviet captivity and sent to Algiers, where they joined the Free French Forces. Nowadays history recognizes the suffering of those people, and museums, public discussions and memorials have been built to commemorate this terrible period of history of this part of Eastern France (Alsace and Moselle). Liberation of Strasbourg took place on 23 November 1944.

 

In 1947, a fire broke out in the Musée des Beaux-Arts and devastated a significant part of the collections. This fire was an indirect consequence of the bombing raids of 1944: because of the destruction inflicted on the Palais Rohan, humidity had infiltrated the building, and moisture had to be fought. This was done with welding torches, and a bad handling of these caused the fire.[44]

 

In the 1950s and 1960s the city was enlarged by new residential areas meant to solve both the problem of housing shortage due to war damage and that of the strong growth of population due to the baby boom and immigration from North Africa: Cité Rotterdam in the North-East, Quartier de l'Esplanade in the South-East, Hautepierre in the North-West. Between 1995 and 2010, a new district has been built in the same vein, the Quartier des Poteries, south of Hautepierre.

 

In 1958, a violent hailstorm destroyed most of the historical greenhouses of the Botanical Garden and many of the stained glass windows of St. Paul's Church.

 

In 1949, the city was chosen to be the seat of the Council of Europe with its European Court of Human Rights and European Pharmacopoeia. Since 1952, the European Parliament has met in Strasbourg, which was formally designated its official 'seat' at the Edinburgh meeting of the European Council of EU heads of state and government in December 1992. (This position was reconfirmed and given treaty status in the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam). However, only the (four-day) plenary sessions of the Parliament are held in Strasbourg each month, with all other business being conducted in Brussels and Luxembourg. Those sessions take place in the Immeuble Louise Weiss, inaugurated in 1999, which houses the largest parliamentary assembly room in Europe and of any democratic institution in the world. Before that, the EP sessions had to take place in the main Council of Europe building, the Palace of Europe, whose unusual inner architecture had become a familiar sight to European TV audiences.[45] In 1992, Strasbourg became the seat of the Franco-German TV channel and movie-production society Arte.

 

In 2000, a terrorist plot to blow up the cathedral was prevented thanks to the cooperation between French and German police that led to the arrest in late 2000 of a Frankfurt-based group of terrorists.

 

On 6 July 2001, during an open-air concert in the Parc de Pourtalès, a single falling Platanus tree killed thirteen people and injured 97. On 27 March 2007, the city was found guilty of neglect over the accident and fined €150,000.[46]

 

In 2006, after a long and careful restoration, the inner decoration of the Aubette, made in the 1920s by Hans Arp, Theo van Doesburg, and Sophie Taeuber-Arp and destroyed in the 1930s, was made accessible to the public again. The work of the three artists had been called "the Sistine Chapel of abstract art".

 

Architecture

 

Strasbourg, Cathedral of Our Lady

The city is chiefly known for its sandstone Gothic Cathedral with its famous astronomical clock, and for its medieval cityscape of Rhineland black and white timber-framed buildings, particularly in the Petite France district or Gerberviertel ("tanners' district") alongside the Ill and in the streets and squares surrounding the cathedral, where the renowned Maison Kammerzell stands out.

 

Notable medieval streets include Rue Mercière, Rue des Dentelles, Rue du Bain aux Plantes, Rue des Juifs, Rue des Frères, Rue des Tonneliers, Rue du Maroquin, Rue des Charpentiers, Rue des Serruriers, Grand' Rue, Quai des Bateliers, Quai Saint-Nicolas and Quai Saint-Thomas. Notable medieval squares include Place de la Cathédrale, Place du Marché Gayot, Place Saint-Étienne, Place du Marché aux Cochons de Lait and Place Benjamin Zix.

 

Maison des tanneurs.

 

In addition to the cathedral, Strasbourg houses several other medieval churches that have survived the many wars and destructions that have plagued the city: the Romanesque Église Saint-Étienne, partly destroyed in 1944 by Allied bombing raids, the part Romanesque, part Gothic, very large Église Saint-Thomas with its Silbermann organ on which Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Albert Schweitzer played,[49] the Gothic Église protestante Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune with its crypt dating back to the seventh century and its cloister partly from the eleventh century, the Gothic Église Saint-Guillaume with its fine early-Renaissance stained glass and furniture, the Gothic Église Saint-Jean, the part Gothic, part Art Nouveau Église Sainte-Madeleine, etc. The Neo-Gothic church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Catholique (there is also an adjacent church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Protestant) serves as a shrine for several 15th-century wood worked and painted altars coming from other, now destroyed churches and installed there for public display. Among the numerous secular medieval buildings, the monumental Ancienne Douane (old custom-house) stands out.

 

The German Renaissance has bequeathed the city some noteworthy buildings (especially the current Chambre de Commerce et d'Industrie, former town hall, on Place Gutenberg), as did the French Baroque and Classicism with several hôtels particuliers (i.e. palaces), among which the Palais Rohan (1742, now housing three museums) is the most spectacular. Other buildings of its kind are the "Hôtel de Hanau" (1736, now the city hall), the Hôtel de Klinglin (1736, now residence of the préfet), the Hôtel des Deux-Ponts (1755, now residence of the military governor), the Hôtel d'Andlau-Klinglin (1725, now seat of the administration of the Port autonome de Strasbourg) etc. The largest baroque building of Strasbourg though is the 150 m (490 ft) long 1720s main building of the Hôpital civil. As for French Neo-classicism, it is the Opera House on Place Broglie that most prestigiously represents this style.

 

Strasbourg also offers high-class eclecticist buildings in its very extended German district, the Neustadt, being the main memory of Wilhelmian architecture since most of the major cities in Germany proper suffered intensive damage during World War II. Streets, boulevards and avenues are homogeneous, surprisingly high (up to seven stories) and broad examples of German urban lay-out and of this architectural style that summons and mixes up five centuries of European architecture as well as Neo-Egyptian, Neo-Greek and Neo-Babylonian styles. The former imperial palace Palais du Rhin, the most political and thus heavily criticized of all German Strasbourg buildings epitomizes the grand scale and stylistic sturdiness of this period. But the two most handsome and ornate buildings of these times are the École internationale des Pontonniers (the former Höhere Mädchenschule, girls college) with its towers, turrets and multiple round and square angles[50] and the École des Arts décoratifs with its lavishly ornate façade of painted bricks, woodwork and majolica.[51]

 

Notable streets of the German district include: Avenue de la Forêt Noire, Avenue des Vosges, Avenue d'Alsace, Avenue de la Marseillaise, Avenue de la Liberté, Boulevard de la Victoire, Rue Sellénick, Rue du Général de Castelnau, Rue du Maréchal Foch, and Rue du Maréchal Joffre. Notable squares of the German district include: Place de la République, Place de l'Université, Place Brant, and Place Arnold

 

As for modern and contemporary architecture, Strasbourg possesses some fine Art Nouveau buildings (such as the huge Palais des Fêtes and houses and villas like Villa Schutzenberger and Hôtel Brion), good examples of post-World War II functional architecture (the Cité Rotterdam, for which Le Corbusier did not succeed in the architectural contest) and, in the very extended Quartier Européen, some spectacular administrative buildings of sometimes utterly large size, among which the European Court of Human Rights building by Richard Rogers is arguably the finest. Other noticeable contemporary buildings are the new Music school Cité de la Musique et de la Danse, the Musée d'Art moderne et contemporain and the Hôtel du Département facing it, as well as, in the outskirts, the tramway-station Hoenheim-Nord designed by Zaha Hadid.

  

Place Kléber

The city has many bridges, including the medieval and four-towered Ponts Couverts that, despite their name, are no longer covered. Next to the Ponts Couverts is the Barrage Vauban, a part of Vauban's 17th-century fortifications, that does include a covered bridge. Other bridges are the ornate 19th-century Pont de la Fonderie (1893, stone) and Pont d'Auvergne (1892, iron), as well as architect Marc Mimram's futuristic Passerelle over the Rhine, opened in 2004.

 

The largest square at the centre of the city of Strasbourg is the Place Kléber. Located in the heart of the city's commercial area, it was named after general Jean-Baptiste Kléber, born in Strasbourg in 1753 and assassinated in 1800 in Cairo. In the square is a statue of Kléber, under which is a vault containing his remains. On the north side of the square is the Aubette (Orderly Room), built by Jacques François Blondel, architect of the king, in 1765–1772.

 

Parks

 

The Pavillon Joséphine (rear side) in the Parc de l'Orangerie

 

The Château de Pourtalès (front side) in the park of the same name

 

Strasbourg features a number of prominent parks, of which several are of cultural and historical interest: the Parc de l'Orangerie, laid out as a French garden by André le Nôtre and remodeled as an English garden on behalf of Joséphine de Beauharnais, now displaying noteworthy French gardens, a neo-classical castle and a small zoo; the Parc de la Citadelle, built around impressive remains of the 17th-century fortress erected close to the Rhine by Vauban;[52] the Parc de Pourtalès, laid out in English style around a baroque castle (heavily restored in the 19th century) that now houses a small three-star hotel,[53] and featuring an open-air museum of international contemporary sculpture.[54] The Jardin botanique de l'Université de Strasbourg (botanical garden) was created under the German administration next to the Observatory of Strasbourg, built in 1881, and still owns some greenhouses of those times. The Parc des Contades, although the oldest park of the city, was completely remodeled after World War II. The futuristic Parc des Poteries is an example of European park-conception in the late 1990s. The Jardin des deux Rives, spread over Strasbourg and Kehl on both sides of the Rhine opened in 2004 and is the most extended (60-hectare) park of the agglomeration. The most recent park is Parc du Heyritz (8,7 ha), opened in 2014 along a canal facing the hôpital civil.

Strasbourg (/ˈstræzbɜrɡ/, French pronunciation: ​[stʁaz.buʁ, stʁas.buʁ]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in north eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace were historically Alemannic-speaking, hence the city's Germanic name.[5] In 2006, the city proper had 272,975 inhabitants and its urban community 467,375 inhabitants. With 759,868 inhabitants in 2010, Strasbourg's metropolitan area (only the part of the metropolitan area on French territory) is the ninth largest in France. The transnational Eurodistrict Strasbourg-Ortenau had a population of 884,988 inhabitants in 2008.[6]

 

Strasbourg is the seat of several European institutions, such as the Council of Europe (with its European Court of Human Rights, its European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and its European Audiovisual Observatory) and the Eurocorps, as well as the European Parliament and the European Ombudsman of the European Union. The city is also the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine and the International Institute of Human Rights.[7]

 

Strasbourg's historic city centre, the Grande Île (Grand Island), was classified a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1988, the first time such an honour was placed on an entire city centre. Strasbourg is immersed in the Franco-German culture and although violently disputed throughout history, has been a bridge of unity between France and Germany for centuries, especially through the University of Strasbourg, currently the second largest in France, and the coexistence of Catholic and Protestant culture. The largest Islamic place of worship in France, the Strasbourg Grand Mosque, was inaugurated by French Interior Minister Manuel Valls on 27 September 2012.[8]

 

Economically, Strasbourg is an important centre of manufacturing and engineering, as well as a hub of road, rail, and river transportation. The port of Strasbourg is the second largest on the Rhine after Duisburg, Germany.

 

Etymology and Names

The city's Gallicized name (Lower Alsatian: Strossburi, [ˈʃd̥rɔːsb̥uri]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is of Germanic origin and means "Town (at the crossing) of roads". The modern Stras- is cognate to the German Straße and English street, all of which are derived from Latin strata ("paved road"), while -bourg is cognate to the German Burg and English borough, all of which are derived from Proto-Germanic *burgz ("hill fort, fortress").

 

Geography

 

Strasbourg seen from Spot Satellite

Strasbourg is situated on the eastern border of France with Germany. This border is formed by the River Rhine, which also forms the eastern border of the modern city, facing across the river to the German town Kehl. The historic core of Strasbourg however lies on the Grande Île in the River Ill, which here flows parallel to, and roughly 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) from, the Rhine. The natural courses of the two rivers eventually join some distance downstream of Strasbourg, although several artificial waterways now connect them within the city.

 

The city lies in the Upper Rhine Plain, at between 132 metres (433 ft) and 151 metres (495 ft) above sea level, with the upland areas of the Vosges Mountains some 20 km (12 mi) to the west and the Black Forest 25 km (16 mi) to the east. This section of the Rhine valley is a major axis of north-south travel, with river traffic on the Rhine itself, and major roads and railways paralleling it on both banks.

 

The city is some 400 kilometres (250 mi) east of Paris. The mouth of the Rhine lies approximately 450 kilometres (280 mi) to the north, or 650 kilometres (400 mi) as the river flows, whilst the head of navigation in Basel is some 100 kilometres (62 mi) to the south, or 150 kilometres (93 mi) by river.

 

Climate

 

In spite of its position far inland, Strasbourg's climate is classified as Oceanic (Köppen climate classification Cfb), with warm, relatively sunny summers and cold, overcast winters. Precipitation is elevated from mid-spring to the end of summer, but remains largely constant throughout the year, totaling 631.4 mm (24.9 in) annually. On average, snow falls 30 days per year.

 

The highest temperature ever recorded was 38.5 °C (101.3 °F) in August 2003, during the 2003 European heat wave. The lowest temperature ever recorded was −23.4 °C (−10.1 °F) in December 1938.

 

Strasbourg's location in the Rhine valley, sheltered from the dominant winds by the Vosges and Black Forest mountains, results in poor natural ventilation, making Strasbourg one of the most atmospherically polluted cities of France.[10][11] Nonetheless, the progressive disappearance of heavy industry on both banks of the Rhine, as well as effective measures of traffic regulation in and around the city have reduced air pollution.

 

Prehistory

The first traces of human occupation in the environs of Strasbourg go back many thousands of years.[16] Neolithic, bronze age and iron age artifacts have been uncovered by archeological excavations. It was permanently settled by proto-Celts around 1300 BC. Towards the end of the third century BC, it developed into a Celtic township with a market called "Argentorate". Drainage works converted the stilthouses to houses built on dry land.[17]

 

From Romans

The Romans under Nero Claudius Drusus established a military outpost belonging to the Germania Superior Roman province at Strasbourg's current location, and named it Argentoratum. (Hence the town is commonly called Argentina in medieval Latin.[18]) The name "Argentoratum" was first mentioned in 12 BC and the city celebrated its 2,000th birthday in 1988. "Argentorate" as the toponym of the Gaulish settlement preceded it before being Latinized, but it is not known by how long. The Roman camp was destroyed by fire and rebuilt six times between the first and the fifth centuries AD: in 70, 97, 235, 355, in the last quarter of the fourth century, and in the early years of the fifth century. It was under Trajan and after the fire of 97 that Argentoratum received its most extended and fortified shape. From the year 90 on, the Legio VIII Augusta was permanently stationed in the Roman camp of Argentoratum. It then included a cavalry section and covered an area of approximately 20 hectares. Other Roman legions temporarily stationed in Argentoratum were the Legio XIV Gemina and the Legio XXI Rapax, the latter during the reign of Nero.

 

The centre of Argentoratum proper was situated on the Grande Île (Cardo: current Rue du Dôme, Decumanus: current Rue des Hallebardes). The outline of the Roman "castrum" is visible in the street pattern in the Grande Ile. Many Roman artifacts have also been found along the current Route des Romains, the road that led to Argentoratum, in the suburb of Kœnigshoffen. This was where the largest burial places were situated, as well as the densest concentration of civilian dwelling places and commerces next to the camp. Among the most outstanding finds in Kœnigshoffen were (found in 1911–12) the fragments of a grand Mithraeum that had been shattered by early Christians in the fourth century. From the fourth century, Strasbourg was the seat of the Bishopric of Strasbourg (made an Archbishopric in 1988). Archaeological excavations below the current Église Saint-Étienne in 1948 and 1956 unearthed the apse of a church dating back to the late fourth or early fifth century, considered to be the oldest church in Alsace. It is supposed that this was the first seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Strasbourg.

 

The Alemanni fought the Battle of Argentoratum against Rome in 357. They were defeated by Julian, later Emperor of Rome, and their King Chonodomarius was taken prisoner. On 2 January 366, the Alemanni crossed the frozen Rhine in large numbers to invade the Roman Empire. Early in the fifth century, the Alemanni appear to have crossed the Rhine, conquered, and then settled what is today Alsace and a large part of Switzerland.

 

In the fifth century Strasbourg was occupied successively by Alemanni, Huns, and Franks. In the ninth century it was commonly known as Strazburg in the local language, as documented in 842 by the Oaths of Strasbourg. This trilingual text contains, alongside texts in Latin and Old High German (teudisca lingua), the oldest written variety of Gallo-Romance (lingua romana) clearly distinct from Latin, the ancestor of Old French. The town was also called Stratisburgum or Strateburgus in Latin, from which later came Strossburi in Alsatian and Straßburg in Standard German, and then Strasbourg in French. The Oaths of Strasbourg is considered as marking the birth of the two countries of France and Germany with the division of the Carolingian Empire.[19]

 

A major commercial centre, the town came under the control of the Holy Roman Empire in 923, through the homage paid by the Duke of Lorraine to German King Henry I. The early history of Strasbourg consists of a long conflict between its bishop and its citizens. The citizens emerged victorious after the Battle of Oberhausbergen in 1262, when King Philip of Swabia granted the city the status of an Imperial Free City.

 

Around 1200, Gottfried von Straßburg wrote the Middle High German courtly romance Tristan, which is regarded, alongside Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival and the Nibelungenlied, as one of great narrative masterpieces of the German Middle Ages.

 

A revolution in 1332 resulted in a broad-based city government with participation of the guilds, and Strasbourg declared itself a free republic. The deadly bubonic plague of 1348 was followed on 14 February 1349 by one of the first and worst pogroms in pre-modern history: over a thousand Jews were publicly burnt to death, with the remainder of the Jewish population being expelled from the city.[20] Until the end of the 18th century, Jews were forbidden to remain in town after 10 pm. The time to leave the city was signalled by a municipal herald blowing the Grüselhorn (see below, Museums, Musée historique);.[21] A special tax, the Pflastergeld (pavement money), was furthermore to be paid for any horse that a Jew would ride or bring into the city while allowed to.[22]

 

Construction on Strasbourg Cathedral began in the twelfth century, and it was completed in 1439 (though, of the towers, only the north tower was built), becoming the World's Tallest Building, surpassing the Great Pyramid of Giza. A few years later, Johannes Gutenberg created the first European moveable type printing press in Strasbourg.

 

In July 1518, an incident known as the Dancing Plague of 1518 struck residents of Strasbourg. Around 400 people were afflicted with dancing mania and danced constantly for weeks, most of them eventually dying from heart attack, stroke or exhaustion.

 

In the 1520s during the Protestant Reformation, the city, under the political guidance of Jacob Sturm von Sturmeck and the spiritual guidance of Martin Bucer embraced the religious teachings of Martin Luther. Their adherents established a Gymnasium, headed by Johannes Sturm, made into a University in the following century. The city first followed the Tetrapolitan Confession, and then the Augsburg Confession. Protestant iconoclasm caused much destruction to churches and cloisters, notwithstanding that Luther himself opposed such a practice. Strasbourg was a centre of humanist scholarship and early book-printing in the Holy Roman Empire, and its intellectual and political influence contributed much to the establishment of Protestantism as an accepted denomination in the southwest of Germany. (John Calvin spent several years as a political refugee in the city). The Strasbourg Councillor Sturm and guildmaster Matthias represented the city at the Imperial Diet of Speyer (1529), where their protest led to the schism of the Catholic Church and the evolution of Protestantism. Together with four other free cities, Strasbourg presented the confessio tetrapolitana as its Protestant book of faith at the Imperial Diet of Augsburg in 1530, where the slightly different Augsburg Confession was also handed over to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.

 

After the reform of the Imperial constitution in the early sixteenth century and the establishment of Imperial Circles, Strasbourg was part of the Upper Rhenish Circle, a corporation of Imperial estates in the southwest of Holy Roman Empire, mainly responsible for maintaining troops, supervising coining, and ensuring public security.

 

After the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg around 1440, the first printing offices outside the inventor's hometown Mainz were established around 1460 in Strasbourg by pioneers Johannes Mentelin and Heinrich Eggestein. Subsequently, the first modern newspaper was published in Strasbourg in 1605, when Johann Carolus received the permission by the City of Strasbourg to print and distribute a weekly journal written in German by reporters from several central European cities.

 

From Thirty Years' War to First World War

The Free City of Strasbourg remained neutral during the Thirty Years' War 1618-1648, and retained its status as a Free Imperial City. However, the city was later annexed by Louis XIV of France to extend the borders of his kingdom.

 

Louis' advisors believed that, as long as Strasbourg remained independent, it would endanger the King's newly annexed territories in Alsace, and, that to defend these large rural lands effectively, a garrison had to be placed in towns such as Strasbourg.[23] Indeed, the bridge over the Rhine at Strasbourg had been used repeatedly by Imperial (Holy Roman Empire) forces,[24] and three times during the Franco-Dutch War Strasbourg had served as a gateway for Imperial invasions into Alsace.[25] In September 1681 Louis' forces, though lacking a clear casus belli, surrounded the city with overwhelming force. After some negotiation, Louis marched into the city unopposed on 30 September 1681 and proclaimed its annexation.[26]

 

This annexation was one of the direct causes of the brief and bloody War of the Reunions whose outcome left the French in possession. The French annexation was recognized by the Treaty of Ryswick (1697). The official policy of religious intolerance which drove most Protestants from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 was not applied in Strasbourg and in Alsace, because both had a special status as a province à l'instar de l'étranger effectif (a kind of foreign province of the king of France). Strasbourg Cathedral, however, was taken from the Lutherans to be returned to the Catholics as the French authorities tried to promote Catholicism wherever they could (some other historic churches remained in Protestant hands). Its language also remained overwhelmingly German: the German Lutheran university persisted until the French Revolution. Famous students included Goethe and Herder.

  

The Duke of Lorraine and Imperial troops crossing the Rhine at Strasbourg during the War of the Austrian Succession, 1744

During a dinner in Strasbourg organized by Mayor Frédéric de Dietrich on 25 April 1792, Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle composed "La Marseillaise". The same year François Christophe Kellermann, a child of Strasbourg was appointed the head of the Mosel Army. He led his company to victory at the battle of Valmy and saved the young French republic. He was later appointed Duke of Valmy by Napoléon in 1808.

 

During this period Jean-Baptiste Kléber, also born in Strasbourg, led the French army to win several decisive victories. A statue of Kléber now stands in the centre of the city, at Place Kléber, and he is still one of the most famous French officers. He was later appointed Marshal of France by Napoléon.

 

Strasbourg's status as a free city was revoked by the French Revolution. Enragés, most notoriously Eulogius Schneider, ruled the city with an increasingly iron hand. During this time, many churches and monasteries were either destroyed or severely damaged. The cathedral lost hundreds of its statues (later replaced by copies in the 19th century) and in April 1794, there was talk of tearing its spire down, on the grounds that it was against the principle of equality. The tower was saved, however, when in May of the same year citizens of Strasbourg crowned it with a giant tin Phrygian cap. This artifact was later kept in the historical collections of the city until it was destroyed by the Germans in 1870 during the Franco-Prussian war.[27]

 

In 1805, 1806 and 1809, Napoléon Bonaparte and his first wife, Joséphine stayed in Strasbourg.[28] In 1810, his second wife Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma spent her first night on French soil in the palace. Another royal guest was King Charles X of France in 1828.[29] In 1836, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte unsuccessfully tried to lead his first Bonapartist coup in Strasbourg.

 

During the Franco-Prussian War and the Siege of Strasbourg, the city was heavily bombarded by the Prussian army. The bombardment of the city was meant to break the morale of the people of Strasbourg.[30] On 24 and 26 August 1870, the Museum of Fine Arts was destroyed by fire, as was the Municipal Library housed in the Gothic former Dominican church, with its unique collection of medieval manuscripts (most famously the Hortus deliciarum), rare Renaissance books, archeological finds and historical artifacts. The gothic cathedral was damaged as well as the medieval church of Temple Neuf, the theatre, the city hall, the court of justice and many houses. At the end of the siege 10,000 inhabitants were left without shelter; over 600 died, including 261 civilians, and 3200 were injured, including 1,100 civilians.[31]

 

In 1871, after the end of the war, the city was annexed to the newly established German Empire as part of the Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen under the terms of the Treaty of Frankfurt. As part of Imperial Germany, Strasbourg was rebuilt and developed on a grand and representative scale, such as the Neue Stadt, or "new city" around the present Place de la République. Historian Rodolphe Reuss and Art historian Wilhelm von Bode were in charge of rebuilding the municipal archives, libraries and museums. The University, founded in 1567 and suppressed during the French Revolution as a stronghold of German sentiment,[citation needed] was reopened in 1872 under the name Kaiser-Wilhelms-Universität.

  

Strasbourg in the 1890s.

A belt of massive fortifications was established around the city, most of which still stands today, renamed after French generals and generally classified as Monuments historiques; most notably Fort Roon (now Fort Desaix) and Fort Podbielski (now Fort Ducrot) in Mundolsheim, Fort von Moltke (now Fort Rapp) in Reichstett, Fort Bismarck (now Fort Kléber) in Wolfisheim, Fort Kronprinz (now Fort Foch) in Niederhausbergen, Fort Kronprinz von Sachsen (now Fort Joffre) in Holtzheim and Fort Großherzog von Baden (now Fort Frère) in Oberhausbergen.[32]

 

Those forts subsequently served the French army (Fort Podbielski/Ducrot for instance was integrated into the Maginot Line[33]), and were used as POW-camps in 1918 and 1945.

 

Two garrison churches were also erected for the members of the Imperial German army, the Lutheran Église Saint-Paul and the Roman Catholic Église Saint-Maurice.

 

1918 to the present

 

A lost, then restored, symbol of modernity in Strasbourg : a room in the Aubette building designed by Theo van Doesburg, Hans Arp and Sophie Taeuber-Arp.

 

Following the defeat of the German empire in World War I and the abdication of the German Emperor, some revolutionary insurgents declared Alsace-Lorraine as an independent Republic, without preliminary referendum or vote. On 11 November 1918 (Armistice Day), communist insurgents proclaimed a "soviet government" in Strasbourg, following the example of Kurt Eisner in Munich as well as other German towns. French troops commanded by French general Henri Gouraud entered triumphantly in the city on 22 November. A major street of the city now bears the name of that date (Rue du 22 Novembre) which celebrates the entry of the French in the city.[34][35][36] Viewing the massive cheering crowd gathered under the balcony of Strasbourg's town hall, French President Raymond Poincaré stated that "the plebiscite is done".[37]

 

In 1919, following the Treaty of Versailles, the city was annexed by France in accordance with U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's "Fourteen Points" without a referendum. The date of the assignment was retroactively established on Armistice Day. It is doubtful whether a referendum in Strasbourg would have ended in France's favour since the political parties striving for an autonomous Alsace or a connection to France accounted only for a small proportion of votes in the last Reichstag as well as in the local elections.[38] The Alsatian autonomists who were pro French had won many votes in the more rural parts of the region and other towns since the annexation of the region by Germany in 1871. The movement started with the first election for the Reichstag; those elected were called "les députés protestataires", and until the fall of Bismarck in 1890, they were the only deputies elected by the Alsatians to the German parliament demanding the return of those territories to France.[39] At the last Reichstag election in Strasbourg and its periphery, the clear winners were the Social Democrats; the city was the administrative capital of the region, was inhabited by many Germans appointed by the central government in Berlin and its flourishing economy attracted many Germans. This could explain the difference between the rural vote and the one in Strasbourg. After the war, many Germans left Strasbourg and went back to Germany; some of them were denounced by the locals or expelled by the newly appointed authorities. The Saverne Affair was vivid in the memory among the Alsatians.

 

In 1920, Strasbourg became the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine, previously located in Mannheim, one of the oldest European institutions. It moved into the former Imperial Palace.

 

When the Maginot Line was built, the Sous-secteur fortifié de Strasbourg (fortified sub-sector of Strasbourg) was laid out on the city's territory as a part of the Secteur fortifié du Bas-Rhin, one of the sections of the Line. Blockhouses and casemates were built along the Grand Canal d'Alsace and the Rhine in the Robertsau forest and the port.[40]

 

Between the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 and the Anglo-French declaration of War against the German Reich on 3 September 1939, the entire city (a total of 120,000 people) was evacuated, like other border towns as well. Until the arrival of the Wehrmacht troops mid-June 1940, the city was, for ten months, completely empty, with the exception of the garrisoned soldiers. The Jews of Strasbourg had been evacuated to Périgueux and Limoges, the University had been evacuated to Clermont-Ferrand.

 

After the ceasefire following the Fall of France in June 1940, Alsace was annexed to Germany and a rigorous policy of Germanisation was imposed upon it by the Gauleiter Robert Heinrich Wagner. When, in July 1940, the first evacuees were allowed to return, only residents of Alsatian origin were admitted. The last Jews were deported on 15 July 1940 and the main synagogue, a huge Romanesque revival building that had been a major architectural landmark with its 54-metre-high dome since its completion in 1897, was set ablaze, then razed.[41]

 

In September 1940 the first Alsatian resistance movement led by Marcel Weinum called La main noire (The black hand) was created. It was composed by a group of 25 young men aged from 14 to 18 years old who led several attacks against the German occupation. The actions culminated with the attack of the Gauleiter Robert Wagner, the highest commander of Alsace directly under the order of Hitler. In March 1942, Marcel Weinum was prosecuted by the Gestapo and sentenced to be beheaded at the age of 18 in April 1942 in Stuttgart, Germany. His last words will be: "If I have to die, I shall die but with a pure heart". From 1943 the city was bombarded by Allied aircraft. While the First World War had not notably damaged the city, Anglo-American bombing caused extensive destruction in raids of which at least one was allegedly carried out by mistake.[42] In August 1944, several buildings in the Old Town were damaged by bombs, particularly the Palais Rohan, the Old Customs House (Ancienne Douane) and the Cathedral.[43] On 23 November 1944, the city was officially liberated by the 2nd French Armoured Division under General Leclerc. He achieved the oath that he made with his soldiers, after the decisive Capture of Kufra. With the Oath of Kuffra, they swore to keep up the fight until the French flag flew over the Cathedral of Strasbourg.

 

Many people from Strasbourg were incorporated in the German Army against their will, and were sent to the eastern front, those young men and women were called Malgré-nous. Many tried to escape from the incorporation, join the French Resistance, or desert the Wehrmacht but many couldn't because they were running the risk of having their families sent to work or concentration camps by the Germans. Many of these men, especially those who did not answer the call immediately, were pressured to "volunteer" for service with the SS, often by direct threats on their families. This threat obliged the majority of them to remain in the German army. After the war, the few that survived were often accused of being traitors or collaborationists, because this tough situation was not known in the rest of France, and they had to face the incomprehension of many. In July 1944, 1500 malgré-nous were released from Soviet captivity and sent to Algiers, where they joined the Free French Forces. Nowadays history recognizes the suffering of those people, and museums, public discussions and memorials have been built to commemorate this terrible period of history of this part of Eastern France (Alsace and Moselle). Liberation of Strasbourg took place on 23 November 1944.

 

In 1947, a fire broke out in the Musée des Beaux-Arts and devastated a significant part of the collections. This fire was an indirect consequence of the bombing raids of 1944: because of the destruction inflicted on the Palais Rohan, humidity had infiltrated the building, and moisture had to be fought. This was done with welding torches, and a bad handling of these caused the fire.[44]

 

In the 1950s and 1960s the city was enlarged by new residential areas meant to solve both the problem of housing shortage due to war damage and that of the strong growth of population due to the baby boom and immigration from North Africa: Cité Rotterdam in the North-East, Quartier de l'Esplanade in the South-East, Hautepierre in the North-West. Between 1995 and 2010, a new district has been built in the same vein, the Quartier des Poteries, south of Hautepierre.

 

In 1958, a violent hailstorm destroyed most of the historical greenhouses of the Botanical Garden and many of the stained glass windows of St. Paul's Church.

 

In 1949, the city was chosen to be the seat of the Council of Europe with its European Court of Human Rights and European Pharmacopoeia. Since 1952, the European Parliament has met in Strasbourg, which was formally designated its official 'seat' at the Edinburgh meeting of the European Council of EU heads of state and government in December 1992. (This position was reconfirmed and given treaty status in the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam). However, only the (four-day) plenary sessions of the Parliament are held in Strasbourg each month, with all other business being conducted in Brussels and Luxembourg. Those sessions take place in the Immeuble Louise Weiss, inaugurated in 1999, which houses the largest parliamentary assembly room in Europe and of any democratic institution in the world. Before that, the EP sessions had to take place in the main Council of Europe building, the Palace of Europe, whose unusual inner architecture had become a familiar sight to European TV audiences.[45] In 1992, Strasbourg became the seat of the Franco-German TV channel and movie-production society Arte.

 

In 2000, a terrorist plot to blow up the cathedral was prevented thanks to the cooperation between French and German police that led to the arrest in late 2000 of a Frankfurt-based group of terrorists.

 

On 6 July 2001, during an open-air concert in the Parc de Pourtalès, a single falling Platanus tree killed thirteen people and injured 97. On 27 March 2007, the city was found guilty of neglect over the accident and fined €150,000.[46]

 

In 2006, after a long and careful restoration, the inner decoration of the Aubette, made in the 1920s by Hans Arp, Theo van Doesburg, and Sophie Taeuber-Arp and destroyed in the 1930s, was made accessible to the public again. The work of the three artists had been called "the Sistine Chapel of abstract art".

 

Architecture

 

Strasbourg, Cathedral of Our Lady

The city is chiefly known for its sandstone Gothic Cathedral with its famous astronomical clock, and for its medieval cityscape of Rhineland black and white timber-framed buildings, particularly in the Petite France district or Gerberviertel ("tanners' district") alongside the Ill and in the streets and squares surrounding the cathedral, where the renowned Maison Kammerzell stands out.

 

Notable medieval streets include Rue Mercière, Rue des Dentelles, Rue du Bain aux Plantes, Rue des Juifs, Rue des Frères, Rue des Tonneliers, Rue du Maroquin, Rue des Charpentiers, Rue des Serruriers, Grand' Rue, Quai des Bateliers, Quai Saint-Nicolas and Quai Saint-Thomas. Notable medieval squares include Place de la Cathédrale, Place du Marché Gayot, Place Saint-Étienne, Place du Marché aux Cochons de Lait and Place Benjamin Zix.

 

Maison des tanneurs.

 

In addition to the cathedral, Strasbourg houses several other medieval churches that have survived the many wars and destructions that have plagued the city: the Romanesque Église Saint-Étienne, partly destroyed in 1944 by Allied bombing raids, the part Romanesque, part Gothic, very large Église Saint-Thomas with its Silbermann organ on which Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Albert Schweitzer played,[49] the Gothic Église protestante Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune with its crypt dating back to the seventh century and its cloister partly from the eleventh century, the Gothic Église Saint-Guillaume with its fine early-Renaissance stained glass and furniture, the Gothic Église Saint-Jean, the part Gothic, part Art Nouveau Église Sainte-Madeleine, etc. The Neo-Gothic church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Catholique (there is also an adjacent church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Protestant) serves as a shrine for several 15th-century wood worked and painted altars coming from other, now destroyed churches and installed there for public display. Among the numerous secular medieval buildings, the monumental Ancienne Douane (old custom-house) stands out.

 

The German Renaissance has bequeathed the city some noteworthy buildings (especially the current Chambre de Commerce et d'Industrie, former town hall, on Place Gutenberg), as did the French Baroque and Classicism with several hôtels particuliers (i.e. palaces), among which the Palais Rohan (1742, now housing three museums) is the most spectacular. Other buildings of its kind are the "Hôtel de Hanau" (1736, now the city hall), the Hôtel de Klinglin (1736, now residence of the préfet), the Hôtel des Deux-Ponts (1755, now residence of the military governor), the Hôtel d'Andlau-Klinglin (1725, now seat of the administration of the Port autonome de Strasbourg) etc. The largest baroque building of Strasbourg though is the 150 m (490 ft) long 1720s main building of the Hôpital civil. As for French Neo-classicism, it is the Opera House on Place Broglie that most prestigiously represents this style.

 

Strasbourg also offers high-class eclecticist buildings in its very extended German district, the Neustadt, being the main memory of Wilhelmian architecture since most of the major cities in Germany proper suffered intensive damage during World War II. Streets, boulevards and avenues are homogeneous, surprisingly high (up to seven stories) and broad examples of German urban lay-out and of this architectural style that summons and mixes up five centuries of European architecture as well as Neo-Egyptian, Neo-Greek and Neo-Babylonian styles. The former imperial palace Palais du Rhin, the most political and thus heavily criticized of all German Strasbourg buildings epitomizes the grand scale and stylistic sturdiness of this period. But the two most handsome and ornate buildings of these times are the École internationale des Pontonniers (the former Höhere Mädchenschule, girls college) with its towers, turrets and multiple round and square angles[50] and the École des Arts décoratifs with its lavishly ornate façade of painted bricks, woodwork and majolica.[51]

 

Notable streets of the German district include: Avenue de la Forêt Noire, Avenue des Vosges, Avenue d'Alsace, Avenue de la Marseillaise, Avenue de la Liberté, Boulevard de la Victoire, Rue Sellénick, Rue du Général de Castelnau, Rue du Maréchal Foch, and Rue du Maréchal Joffre. Notable squares of the German district include: Place de la République, Place de l'Université, Place Brant, and Place Arnold

 

As for modern and contemporary architecture, Strasbourg possesses some fine Art Nouveau buildings (such as the huge Palais des Fêtes and houses and villas like Villa Schutzenberger and Hôtel Brion), good examples of post-World War II functional architecture (the Cité Rotterdam, for which Le Corbusier did not succeed in the architectural contest) and, in the very extended Quartier Européen, some spectacular administrative buildings of sometimes utterly large size, among which the European Court of Human Rights building by Richard Rogers is arguably the finest. Other noticeable contemporary buildings are the new Music school Cité de la Musique et de la Danse, the Musée d'Art moderne et contemporain and the Hôtel du Département facing it, as well as, in the outskirts, the tramway-station Hoenheim-Nord designed by Zaha Hadid.

  

Place Kléber

The city has many bridges, including the medieval and four-towered Ponts Couverts that, despite their name, are no longer covered. Next to the Ponts Couverts is the Barrage Vauban, a part of Vauban's 17th-century fortifications, that does include a covered bridge. Other bridges are the ornate 19th-century Pont de la Fonderie (1893, stone) and Pont d'Auvergne (1892, iron), as well as architect Marc Mimram's futuristic Passerelle over the Rhine, opened in 2004.

 

The largest square at the centre of the city of Strasbourg is the Place Kléber. Located in the heart of the city's commercial area, it was named after general Jean-Baptiste Kléber, born in Strasbourg in 1753 and assassinated in 1800 in Cairo. In the square is a statue of Kléber, under which is a vault containing his remains. On the north side of the square is the Aubette (Orderly Room), built by Jacques François Blondel, architect of the king, in 1765–1772.

 

Parks

 

The Pavillon Joséphine (rear side) in the Parc de l'Orangerie

 

The Château de Pourtalès (front side) in the park of the same name

 

Strasbourg features a number of prominent parks, of which several are of cultural and historical interest: the Parc de l'Orangerie, laid out as a French garden by André le Nôtre and remodeled as an English garden on behalf of Joséphine de Beauharnais, now displaying noteworthy French gardens, a neo-classical castle and a small zoo; the Parc de la Citadelle, built around impressive remains of the 17th-century fortress erected close to the Rhine by Vauban;[52] the Parc de Pourtalès, laid out in English style around a baroque castle (heavily restored in the 19th century) that now houses a small three-star hotel,[53] and featuring an open-air museum of international contemporary sculpture.[54] The Jardin botanique de l'Université de Strasbourg (botanical garden) was created under the German administration next to the Observatory of Strasbourg, built in 1881, and still owns some greenhouses of those times. The Parc des Contades, although the oldest park of the city, was completely remodeled after World War II. The futuristic Parc des Poteries is an example of European park-conception in the late 1990s. The Jardin des deux Rives, spread over Strasbourg and Kehl on both sides of the Rhine opened in 2004 and is the most extended (60-hectare) park of the agglomeration. The most recent park is Parc du Heyritz (8,7 ha), opened in 2014 along a canal facing the hôpital civil.

Strasbourg (/ˈstræzbɜrɡ/, French pronunciation: ​[stʁaz.buʁ, stʁas.buʁ]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in north eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace were historically Alemannic-speaking, hence the city's Germanic name.[5] In 2006, the city proper had 272,975 inhabitants and its urban community 467,375 inhabitants. With 759,868 inhabitants in 2010, Strasbourg's metropolitan area (only the part of the metropolitan area on French territory) is the ninth largest in France. The transnational Eurodistrict Strasbourg-Ortenau had a population of 884,988 inhabitants in 2008.[6]

 

Strasbourg is the seat of several European institutions, such as the Council of Europe (with its European Court of Human Rights, its European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and its European Audiovisual Observatory) and the Eurocorps, as well as the European Parliament and the European Ombudsman of the European Union. The city is also the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine and the International Institute of Human Rights.[7]

 

Strasbourg's historic city centre, the Grande Île (Grand Island), was classified a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1988, the first time such an honour was placed on an entire city centre. Strasbourg is immersed in the Franco-German culture and although violently disputed throughout history, has been a bridge of unity between France and Germany for centuries, especially through the University of Strasbourg, currently the second largest in France, and the coexistence of Catholic and Protestant culture. The largest Islamic place of worship in France, the Strasbourg Grand Mosque, was inaugurated by French Interior Minister Manuel Valls on 27 September 2012.[8]

 

Economically, Strasbourg is an important centre of manufacturing and engineering, as well as a hub of road, rail, and river transportation. The port of Strasbourg is the second largest on the Rhine after Duisburg, Germany.

 

Etymology and Names

The city's Gallicized name (Lower Alsatian: Strossburi, [ˈʃd̥rɔːsb̥uri]; German: Straßburg, [ˈʃtʁaːsbʊɐ̯k]) is of Germanic origin and means "Town (at the crossing) of roads". The modern Stras- is cognate to the German Straße and English street, all of which are derived from Latin strata ("paved road"), while -bourg is cognate to the German Burg and English borough, all of which are derived from Proto-Germanic *burgz ("hill fort, fortress").

 

Geography

 

Strasbourg seen from Spot Satellite

Strasbourg is situated on the eastern border of France with Germany. This border is formed by the River Rhine, which also forms the eastern border of the modern city, facing across the river to the German town Kehl. The historic core of Strasbourg however lies on the Grande Île in the River Ill, which here flows parallel to, and roughly 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) from, the Rhine. The natural courses of the two rivers eventually join some distance downstream of Strasbourg, although several artificial waterways now connect them within the city.

 

The city lies in the Upper Rhine Plain, at between 132 metres (433 ft) and 151 metres (495 ft) above sea level, with the upland areas of the Vosges Mountains some 20 km (12 mi) to the west and the Black Forest 25 km (16 mi) to the east. This section of the Rhine valley is a major axis of north-south travel, with river traffic on the Rhine itself, and major roads and railways paralleling it on both banks.

 

The city is some 400 kilometres (250 mi) east of Paris. The mouth of the Rhine lies approximately 450 kilometres (280 mi) to the north, or 650 kilometres (400 mi) as the river flows, whilst the head of navigation in Basel is some 100 kilometres (62 mi) to the south, or 150 kilometres (93 mi) by river.

 

Climate

 

In spite of its position far inland, Strasbourg's climate is classified as Oceanic (Köppen climate classification Cfb), with warm, relatively sunny summers and cold, overcast winters. Precipitation is elevated from mid-spring to the end of summer, but remains largely constant throughout the year, totaling 631.4 mm (24.9 in) annually. On average, snow falls 30 days per year.

 

The highest temperature ever recorded was 38.5 °C (101.3 °F) in August 2003, during the 2003 European heat wave. The lowest temperature ever recorded was −23.4 °C (−10.1 °F) in December 1938.

 

Strasbourg's location in the Rhine valley, sheltered from the dominant winds by the Vosges and Black Forest mountains, results in poor natural ventilation, making Strasbourg one of the most atmospherically polluted cities of France.[10][11] Nonetheless, the progressive disappearance of heavy industry on both banks of the Rhine, as well as effective measures of traffic regulation in and around the city have reduced air pollution.

 

Prehistory

The first traces of human occupation in the environs of Strasbourg go back many thousands of years.[16] Neolithic, bronze age and iron age artifacts have been uncovered by archeological excavations. It was permanently settled by proto-Celts around 1300 BC. Towards the end of the third century BC, it developed into a Celtic township with a market called "Argentorate". Drainage works converted the stilthouses to houses built on dry land.[17]

 

From Romans

The Romans under Nero Claudius Drusus established a military outpost belonging to the Germania Superior Roman province at Strasbourg's current location, and named it Argentoratum. (Hence the town is commonly called Argentina in medieval Latin.[18]) The name "Argentoratum" was first mentioned in 12 BC and the city celebrated its 2,000th birthday in 1988. "Argentorate" as the toponym of the Gaulish settlement preceded it before being Latinized, but it is not known by how long. The Roman camp was destroyed by fire and rebuilt six times between the first and the fifth centuries AD: in 70, 97, 235, 355, in the last quarter of the fourth century, and in the early years of the fifth century. It was under Trajan and after the fire of 97 that Argentoratum received its most extended and fortified shape. From the year 90 on, the Legio VIII Augusta was permanently stationed in the Roman camp of Argentoratum. It then included a cavalry section and covered an area of approximately 20 hectares. Other Roman legions temporarily stationed in Argentoratum were the Legio XIV Gemina and the Legio XXI Rapax, the latter during the reign of Nero.

 

The centre of Argentoratum proper was situated on the Grande Île (Cardo: current Rue du Dôme, Decumanus: current Rue des Hallebardes). The outline of the Roman "castrum" is visible in the street pattern in the Grande Ile. Many Roman artifacts have also been found along the current Route des Romains, the road that led to Argentoratum, in the suburb of Kœnigshoffen. This was where the largest burial places were situated, as well as the densest concentration of civilian dwelling places and commerces next to the camp. Among the most outstanding finds in Kœnigshoffen were (found in 1911–12) the fragments of a grand Mithraeum that had been shattered by early Christians in the fourth century. From the fourth century, Strasbourg was the seat of the Bishopric of Strasbourg (made an Archbishopric in 1988). Archaeological excavations below the current Église Saint-Étienne in 1948 and 1956 unearthed the apse of a church dating back to the late fourth or early fifth century, considered to be the oldest church in Alsace. It is supposed that this was the first seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Strasbourg.

 

The Alemanni fought the Battle of Argentoratum against Rome in 357. They were defeated by Julian, later Emperor of Rome, and their King Chonodomarius was taken prisoner. On 2 January 366, the Alemanni crossed the frozen Rhine in large numbers to invade the Roman Empire. Early in the fifth century, the Alemanni appear to have crossed the Rhine, conquered, and then settled what is today Alsace and a large part of Switzerland.

 

In the fifth century Strasbourg was occupied successively by Alemanni, Huns, and Franks. In the ninth century it was commonly known as Strazburg in the local language, as documented in 842 by the Oaths of Strasbourg. This trilingual text contains, alongside texts in Latin and Old High German (teudisca lingua), the oldest written variety of Gallo-Romance (lingua romana) clearly distinct from Latin, the ancestor of Old French. The town was also called Stratisburgum or Strateburgus in Latin, from which later came Strossburi in Alsatian and Straßburg in Standard German, and then Strasbourg in French. The Oaths of Strasbourg is considered as marking the birth of the two countries of France and Germany with the division of the Carolingian Empire.[19]

 

A major commercial centre, the town came under the control of the Holy Roman Empire in 923, through the homage paid by the Duke of Lorraine to German King Henry I. The early history of Strasbourg consists of a long conflict between its bishop and its citizens. The citizens emerged victorious after the Battle of Oberhausbergen in 1262, when King Philip of Swabia granted the city the status of an Imperial Free City.

 

Around 1200, Gottfried von Straßburg wrote the Middle High German courtly romance Tristan, which is regarded, alongside Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival and the Nibelungenlied, as one of great narrative masterpieces of the German Middle Ages.

 

A revolution in 1332 resulted in a broad-based city government with participation of the guilds, and Strasbourg declared itself a free republic. The deadly bubonic plague of 1348 was followed on 14 February 1349 by one of the first and worst pogroms in pre-modern history: over a thousand Jews were publicly burnt to death, with the remainder of the Jewish population being expelled from the city.[20] Until the end of the 18th century, Jews were forbidden to remain in town after 10 pm. The time to leave the city was signalled by a municipal herald blowing the Grüselhorn (see below, Museums, Musée historique);.[21] A special tax, the Pflastergeld (pavement money), was furthermore to be paid for any horse that a Jew would ride or bring into the city while allowed to.[22]

 

Construction on Strasbourg Cathedral began in the twelfth century, and it was completed in 1439 (though, of the towers, only the north tower was built), becoming the World's Tallest Building, surpassing the Great Pyramid of Giza. A few years later, Johannes Gutenberg created the first European moveable type printing press in Strasbourg.

 

In July 1518, an incident known as the Dancing Plague of 1518 struck residents of Strasbourg. Around 400 people were afflicted with dancing mania and danced constantly for weeks, most of them eventually dying from heart attack, stroke or exhaustion.

 

In the 1520s during the Protestant Reformation, the city, under the political guidance of Jacob Sturm von Sturmeck and the spiritual guidance of Martin Bucer embraced the religious teachings of Martin Luther. Their adherents established a Gymnasium, headed by Johannes Sturm, made into a University in the following century. The city first followed the Tetrapolitan Confession, and then the Augsburg Confession. Protestant iconoclasm caused much destruction to churches and cloisters, notwithstanding that Luther himself opposed such a practice. Strasbourg was a centre of humanist scholarship and early book-printing in the Holy Roman Empire, and its intellectual and political influence contributed much to the establishment of Protestantism as an accepted denomination in the southwest of Germany. (John Calvin spent several years as a political refugee in the city). The Strasbourg Councillor Sturm and guildmaster Matthias represented the city at the Imperial Diet of Speyer (1529), where their protest led to the schism of the Catholic Church and the evolution of Protestantism. Together with four other free cities, Strasbourg presented the confessio tetrapolitana as its Protestant book of faith at the Imperial Diet of Augsburg in 1530, where the slightly different Augsburg Confession was also handed over to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.

 

After the reform of the Imperial constitution in the early sixteenth century and the establishment of Imperial Circles, Strasbourg was part of the Upper Rhenish Circle, a corporation of Imperial estates in the southwest of Holy Roman Empire, mainly responsible for maintaining troops, supervising coining, and ensuring public security.

 

After the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg around 1440, the first printing offices outside the inventor's hometown Mainz were established around 1460 in Strasbourg by pioneers Johannes Mentelin and Heinrich Eggestein. Subsequently, the first modern newspaper was published in Strasbourg in 1605, when Johann Carolus received the permission by the City of Strasbourg to print and distribute a weekly journal written in German by reporters from several central European cities.

 

From Thirty Years' War to First World War

The Free City of Strasbourg remained neutral during the Thirty Years' War 1618-1648, and retained its status as a Free Imperial City. However, the city was later annexed by Louis XIV of France to extend the borders of his kingdom.

 

Louis' advisors believed that, as long as Strasbourg remained independent, it would endanger the King's newly annexed territories in Alsace, and, that to defend these large rural lands effectively, a garrison had to be placed in towns such as Strasbourg.[23] Indeed, the bridge over the Rhine at Strasbourg had been used repeatedly by Imperial (Holy Roman Empire) forces,[24] and three times during the Franco-Dutch War Strasbourg had served as a gateway for Imperial invasions into Alsace.[25] In September 1681 Louis' forces, though lacking a clear casus belli, surrounded the city with overwhelming force. After some negotiation, Louis marched into the city unopposed on 30 September 1681 and proclaimed its annexation.[26]

 

This annexation was one of the direct causes of the brief and bloody War of the Reunions whose outcome left the French in possession. The French annexation was recognized by the Treaty of Ryswick (1697). The official policy of religious intolerance which drove most Protestants from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 was not applied in Strasbourg and in Alsace, because both had a special status as a province à l'instar de l'étranger effectif (a kind of foreign province of the king of France). Strasbourg Cathedral, however, was taken from the Lutherans to be returned to the Catholics as the French authorities tried to promote Catholicism wherever they could (some other historic churches remained in Protestant hands). Its language also remained overwhelmingly German: the German Lutheran university persisted until the French Revolution. Famous students included Goethe and Herder.

  

The Duke of Lorraine and Imperial troops crossing the Rhine at Strasbourg during the War of the Austrian Succession, 1744

During a dinner in Strasbourg organized by Mayor Frédéric de Dietrich on 25 April 1792, Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle composed "La Marseillaise". The same year François Christophe Kellermann, a child of Strasbourg was appointed the head of the Mosel Army. He led his company to victory at the battle of Valmy and saved the young French republic. He was later appointed Duke of Valmy by Napoléon in 1808.

 

During this period Jean-Baptiste Kléber, also born in Strasbourg, led the French army to win several decisive victories. A statue of Kléber now stands in the centre of the city, at Place Kléber, and he is still one of the most famous French officers. He was later appointed Marshal of France by Napoléon.

 

Strasbourg's status as a free city was revoked by the French Revolution. Enragés, most notoriously Eulogius Schneider, ruled the city with an increasingly iron hand. During this time, many churches and monasteries were either destroyed or severely damaged. The cathedral lost hundreds of its statues (later replaced by copies in the 19th century) and in April 1794, there was talk of tearing its spire down, on the grounds that it was against the principle of equality. The tower was saved, however, when in May of the same year citizens of Strasbourg crowned it with a giant tin Phrygian cap. This artifact was later kept in the historical collections of the city until it was destroyed by the Germans in 1870 during the Franco-Prussian war.[27]

 

In 1805, 1806 and 1809, Napoléon Bonaparte and his first wife, Joséphine stayed in Strasbourg.[28] In 1810, his second wife Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma spent her first night on French soil in the palace. Another royal guest was King Charles X of France in 1828.[29] In 1836, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte unsuccessfully tried to lead his first Bonapartist coup in Strasbourg.

 

During the Franco-Prussian War and the Siege of Strasbourg, the city was heavily bombarded by the Prussian army. The bombardment of the city was meant to break the morale of the people of Strasbourg.[30] On 24 and 26 August 1870, the Museum of Fine Arts was destroyed by fire, as was the Municipal Library housed in the Gothic former Dominican church, with its unique collection of medieval manuscripts (most famously the Hortus deliciarum), rare Renaissance books, archeological finds and historical artifacts. The gothic cathedral was damaged as well as the medieval church of Temple Neuf, the theatre, the city hall, the court of justice and many houses. At the end of the siege 10,000 inhabitants were left without shelter; over 600 died, including 261 civilians, and 3200 were injured, including 1,100 civilians.[31]

 

In 1871, after the end of the war, the city was annexed to the newly established German Empire as part of the Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen under the terms of the Treaty of Frankfurt. As part of Imperial Germany, Strasbourg was rebuilt and developed on a grand and representative scale, such as the Neue Stadt, or "new city" around the present Place de la République. Historian Rodolphe Reuss and Art historian Wilhelm von Bode were in charge of rebuilding the municipal archives, libraries and museums. The University, founded in 1567 and suppressed during the French Revolution as a stronghold of German sentiment,[citation needed] was reopened in 1872 under the name Kaiser-Wilhelms-Universität.

  

Strasbourg in the 1890s.

A belt of massive fortifications was established around the city, most of which still stands today, renamed after French generals and generally classified as Monuments historiques; most notably Fort Roon (now Fort Desaix) and Fort Podbielski (now Fort Ducrot) in Mundolsheim, Fort von Moltke (now Fort Rapp) in Reichstett, Fort Bismarck (now Fort Kléber) in Wolfisheim, Fort Kronprinz (now Fort Foch) in Niederhausbergen, Fort Kronprinz von Sachsen (now Fort Joffre) in Holtzheim and Fort Großherzog von Baden (now Fort Frère) in Oberhausbergen.[32]

 

Those forts subsequently served the French army (Fort Podbielski/Ducrot for instance was integrated into the Maginot Line[33]), and were used as POW-camps in 1918 and 1945.

 

Two garrison churches were also erected for the members of the Imperial German army, the Lutheran Église Saint-Paul and the Roman Catholic Église Saint-Maurice.

 

1918 to the present

 

A lost, then restored, symbol of modernity in Strasbourg : a room in the Aubette building designed by Theo van Doesburg, Hans Arp and Sophie Taeuber-Arp.

 

Following the defeat of the German empire in World War I and the abdication of the German Emperor, some revolutionary insurgents declared Alsace-Lorraine as an independent Republic, without preliminary referendum or vote. On 11 November 1918 (Armistice Day), communist insurgents proclaimed a "soviet government" in Strasbourg, following the example of Kurt Eisner in Munich as well as other German towns. French troops commanded by French general Henri Gouraud entered triumphantly in the city on 22 November. A major street of the city now bears the name of that date (Rue du 22 Novembre) which celebrates the entry of the French in the city.[34][35][36] Viewing the massive cheering crowd gathered under the balcony of Strasbourg's town hall, French President Raymond Poincaré stated that "the plebiscite is done".[37]

 

In 1919, following the Treaty of Versailles, the city was annexed by France in accordance with U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's "Fourteen Points" without a referendum. The date of the assignment was retroactively established on Armistice Day. It is doubtful whether a referendum in Strasbourg would have ended in France's favour since the political parties striving for an autonomous Alsace or a connection to France accounted only for a small proportion of votes in the last Reichstag as well as in the local elections.[38] The Alsatian autonomists who were pro French had won many votes in the more rural parts of the region and other towns since the annexation of the region by Germany in 1871. The movement started with the first election for the Reichstag; those elected were called "les députés protestataires", and until the fall of Bismarck in 1890, they were the only deputies elected by the Alsatians to the German parliament demanding the return of those territories to France.[39] At the last Reichstag election in Strasbourg and its periphery, the clear winners were the Social Democrats; the city was the administrative capital of the region, was inhabited by many Germans appointed by the central government in Berlin and its flourishing economy attracted many Germans. This could explain the difference between the rural vote and the one in Strasbourg. After the war, many Germans left Strasbourg and went back to Germany; some of them were denounced by the locals or expelled by the newly appointed authorities. The Saverne Affair was vivid in the memory among the Alsatians.

 

In 1920, Strasbourg became the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine, previously located in Mannheim, one of the oldest European institutions. It moved into the former Imperial Palace.

 

When the Maginot Line was built, the Sous-secteur fortifié de Strasbourg (fortified sub-sector of Strasbourg) was laid out on the city's territory as a part of the Secteur fortifié du Bas-Rhin, one of the sections of the Line. Blockhouses and casemates were built along the Grand Canal d'Alsace and the Rhine in the Robertsau forest and the port.[40]

 

Between the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 and the Anglo-French declaration of War against the German Reich on 3 September 1939, the entire city (a total of 120,000 people) was evacuated, like other border towns as well. Until the arrival of the Wehrmacht troops mid-June 1940, the city was, for ten months, completely empty, with the exception of the garrisoned soldiers. The Jews of Strasbourg had been evacuated to Périgueux and Limoges, the University had been evacuated to Clermont-Ferrand.

 

After the ceasefire following the Fall of France in June 1940, Alsace was annexed to Germany and a rigorous policy of Germanisation was imposed upon it by the Gauleiter Robert Heinrich Wagner. When, in July 1940, the first evacuees were allowed to return, only residents of Alsatian origin were admitted. The last Jews were deported on 15 July 1940 and the main synagogue, a huge Romanesque revival building that had been a major architectural landmark with its 54-metre-high dome since its completion in 1897, was set ablaze, then razed.[41]

 

In September 1940 the first Alsatian resistance movement led by Marcel Weinum called La main noire (The black hand) was created. It was composed by a group of 25 young men aged from 14 to 18 years old who led several attacks against the German occupation. The actions culminated with the attack of the Gauleiter Robert Wagner, the highest commander of Alsace directly under the order of Hitler. In March 1942, Marcel Weinum was prosecuted by the Gestapo and sentenced to be beheaded at the age of 18 in April 1942 in Stuttgart, Germany. His last words will be: "If I have to die, I shall die but with a pure heart". From 1943 the city was bombarded by Allied aircraft. While the First World War had not notably damaged the city, Anglo-American bombing caused extensive destruction in raids of which at least one was allegedly carried out by mistake.[42] In August 1944, several buildings in the Old Town were damaged by bombs, particularly the Palais Rohan, the Old Customs House (Ancienne Douane) and the Cathedral.[43] On 23 November 1944, the city was officially liberated by the 2nd French Armoured Division under General Leclerc. He achieved the oath that he made with his soldiers, after the decisive Capture of Kufra. With the Oath of Kuffra, they swore to keep up the fight until the French flag flew over the Cathedral of Strasbourg.

 

Many people from Strasbourg were incorporated in the German Army against their will, and were sent to the eastern front, those young men and women were called Malgré-nous. Many tried to escape from the incorporation, join the French Resistance, or desert the Wehrmacht but many couldn't because they were running the risk of having their families sent to work or concentration camps by the Germans. Many of these men, especially those who did not answer the call immediately, were pressured to "volunteer" for service with the SS, often by direct threats on their families. This threat obliged the majority of them to remain in the German army. After the war, the few that survived were often accused of being traitors or collaborationists, because this tough situation was not known in the rest of France, and they had to face the incomprehension of many. In July 1944, 1500 malgré-nous were released from Soviet captivity and sent to Algiers, where they joined the Free French Forces. Nowadays history recognizes the suffering of those people, and museums, public discussions and memorials have been built to commemorate this terrible period of history of this part of Eastern France (Alsace and Moselle). Liberation of Strasbourg took place on 23 November 1944.

 

In 1947, a fire broke out in the Musée des Beaux-Arts and devastated a significant part of the collections. This fire was an indirect consequence of the bombing raids of 1944: because of the destruction inflicted on the Palais Rohan, humidity had infiltrated the building, and moisture had to be fought. This was done with welding torches, and a bad handling of these caused the fire.[44]

 

In the 1950s and 1960s the city was enlarged by new residential areas meant to solve both the problem of housing shortage due to war damage and that of the strong growth of population due to the baby boom and immigration from North Africa: Cité Rotterdam in the North-East, Quartier de l'Esplanade in the South-East, Hautepierre in the North-West. Between 1995 and 2010, a new district has been built in the same vein, the Quartier des Poteries, south of Hautepierre.

 

In 1958, a violent hailstorm destroyed most of the historical greenhouses of the Botanical Garden and many of the stained glass windows of St. Paul's Church.

 

In 1949, the city was chosen to be the seat of the Council of Europe with its European Court of Human Rights and European Pharmacopoeia. Since 1952, the European Parliament has met in Strasbourg, which was formally designated its official 'seat' at the Edinburgh meeting of the European Council of EU heads of state and government in December 1992. (This position was reconfirmed and given treaty status in the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam). However, only the (four-day) plenary sessions of the Parliament are held in Strasbourg each month, with all other business being conducted in Brussels and Luxembourg. Those sessions take place in the Immeuble Louise Weiss, inaugurated in 1999, which houses the largest parliamentary assembly room in Europe and of any democratic institution in the world. Before that, the EP sessions had to take place in the main Council of Europe building, the Palace of Europe, whose unusual inner architecture had become a familiar sight to European TV audiences.[45] In 1992, Strasbourg became the seat of the Franco-German TV channel and movie-production society Arte.

 

In 2000, a terrorist plot to blow up the cathedral was prevented thanks to the cooperation between French and German police that led to the arrest in late 2000 of a Frankfurt-based group of terrorists.

 

On 6 July 2001, during an open-air concert in the Parc de Pourtalès, a single falling Platanus tree killed thirteen people and injured 97. On 27 March 2007, the city was found guilty of neglect over the accident and fined €150,000.[46]

 

In 2006, after a long and careful restoration, the inner decoration of the Aubette, made in the 1920s by Hans Arp, Theo van Doesburg, and Sophie Taeuber-Arp and destroyed in the 1930s, was made accessible to the public again. The work of the three artists had been called "the Sistine Chapel of abstract art".

 

Architecture

 

Strasbourg, Cathedral of Our Lady

The city is chiefly known for its sandstone Gothic Cathedral with its famous astronomical clock, and for its medieval cityscape of Rhineland black and white timber-framed buildings, particularly in the Petite France district or Gerberviertel ("tanners' district") alongside the Ill and in the streets and squares surrounding the cathedral, where the renowned Maison Kammerzell stands out.

 

Notable medieval streets include Rue Mercière, Rue des Dentelles, Rue du Bain aux Plantes, Rue des Juifs, Rue des Frères, Rue des Tonneliers, Rue du Maroquin, Rue des Charpentiers, Rue des Serruriers, Grand' Rue, Quai des Bateliers, Quai Saint-Nicolas and Quai Saint-Thomas. Notable medieval squares include Place de la Cathédrale, Place du Marché Gayot, Place Saint-Étienne, Place du Marché aux Cochons de Lait and Place Benjamin Zix.

 

Maison des tanneurs.

 

In addition to the cathedral, Strasbourg houses several other medieval churches that have survived the many wars and destructions that have plagued the city: the Romanesque Église Saint-Étienne, partly destroyed in 1944 by Allied bombing raids, the part Romanesque, part Gothic, very large Église Saint-Thomas with its Silbermann organ on which Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Albert Schweitzer played,[49] the Gothic Église protestante Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune with its crypt dating back to the seventh century and its cloister partly from the eleventh century, the Gothic Église Saint-Guillaume with its fine early-Renaissance stained glass and furniture, the Gothic Église Saint-Jean, the part Gothic, part Art Nouveau Église Sainte-Madeleine, etc. The Neo-Gothic church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Catholique (there is also an adjacent church Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux Protestant) serves as a shrine for several 15th-century wood worked and painted altars coming from other, now destroyed churches and installed there for public display. Among the numerous secular medieval buildings, the monumental Ancienne Douane (old custom-house) stands out.

 

The German Renaissance has bequeathed the city some noteworthy buildings (especially the current Chambre de Commerce et d'Industrie, former town hall, on Place Gutenberg), as did the French Baroque and Classicism with several hôtels particuliers (i.e. palaces), among which the Palais Rohan (1742, now housing three museums) is the most spectacular. Other buildings of its kind are the "Hôtel de Hanau" (1736, now the city hall), the Hôtel de Klinglin (1736, now residence of the préfet), the Hôtel des Deux-Ponts (1755, now residence of the military governor), the Hôtel d'Andlau-Klinglin (1725, now seat of the administration of the Port autonome de Strasbourg) etc. The largest baroque building of Strasbourg though is the 150 m (490 ft) long 1720s main building of the Hôpital civil. As for French Neo-classicism, it is the Opera House on Place Broglie that most prestigiously represents this style.

 

Strasbourg also offers high-class eclecticist buildings in its very extended German district, the Neustadt, being the main memory of Wilhelmian architecture since most of the major cities in Germany proper suffered intensive damage during World War II. Streets, boulevards and avenues are homogeneous, surprisingly high (up to seven stories) and broad examples of German urban lay-out and of this architectural style that summons and mixes up five centuries of European architecture as well as Neo-Egyptian, Neo-Greek and Neo-Babylonian styles. The former imperial palace Palais du Rhin, the most political and thus heavily criticized of all German Strasbourg buildings epitomizes the grand scale and stylistic sturdiness of this period. But the two most handsome and ornate buildings of these times are the École internationale des Pontonniers (the former Höhere Mädchenschule, girls college) with its towers, turrets and multiple round and square angles[50] and the École des Arts décoratifs with its lavishly ornate façade of painted bricks, woodwork and majolica.[51]

 

Notable streets of the German district include: Avenue de la Forêt Noire, Avenue des Vosges, Avenue d'Alsace, Avenue de la Marseillaise, Avenue de la Liberté, Boulevard de la Victoire, Rue Sellénick, Rue du Général de Castelnau, Rue du Maréchal Foch, and Rue du Maréchal Joffre. Notable squares of the German district include: Place de la République, Place de l'Université, Place Brant, and Place Arnold

 

As for modern and contemporary architecture, Strasbourg possesses some fine Art Nouveau buildings (such as the huge Palais des Fêtes and houses and villas like Villa Schutzenberger and Hôtel Brion), good examples of post-World War II functional architecture (the Cité Rotterdam, for which Le Corbusier did not succeed in the architectural contest) and, in the very extended Quartier Européen, some spectacular administrative buildings of sometimes utterly large size, among which the European Court of Human Rights building by Richard Rogers is arguably the finest. Other noticeable contemporary buildings are the new Music school Cité de la Musique et de la Danse, the Musée d'Art moderne et contemporain and the Hôtel du Département facing it, as well as, in the outskirts, the tramway-station Hoenheim-Nord designed by Zaha Hadid.

  

Place Kléber

The city has many bridges, including the medieval and four-towered Ponts Couverts that, despite their name, are no longer covered. Next to the Ponts Couverts is the Barrage Vauban, a part of Vauban's 17th-century fortifications, that does include a covered bridge. Other bridges are the ornate 19th-century Pont de la Fonderie (1893, stone) and Pont d'Auvergne (1892, iron), as well as architect Marc Mimram's futuristic Passerelle over the Rhine, opened in 2004.

 

The largest square at the centre of the city of Strasbourg is the Place Kléber. Located in the heart of the city's commercial area, it was named after general Jean-Baptiste Kléber, born in Strasbourg in 1753 and assassinated in 1800 in Cairo. In the square is a statue of Kléber, under which is a vault containing his remains. On the north side of the square is the Aubette (Orderly Room), built by Jacques François Blondel, architect of the king, in 1765–1772.

 

Parks

 

The Pavillon Joséphine (rear side) in the Parc de l'Orangerie

 

The Château de Pourtalès (front side) in the park of the same name

 

Strasbourg features a number of prominent parks, of which several are of cultural and historical interest: the Parc de l'Orangerie, laid out as a French garden by André le Nôtre and remodeled as an English garden on behalf of Joséphine de Beauharnais, now displaying noteworthy French gardens, a neo-classical castle and a small zoo; the Parc de la Citadelle, built around impressive remains of the 17th-century fortress erected close to the Rhine by Vauban;[52] the Parc de Pourtalès, laid out in English style around a baroque castle (heavily restored in the 19th century) that now houses a small three-star hotel,[53] and featuring an open-air museum of international contemporary sculpture.[54] The Jardin botanique de l'Université de Strasbourg (botanical garden) was created under the German administration next to the Observatory of Strasbourg, built in 1881, and still owns some greenhouses of those times. The Parc des Contades, although the oldest park of the city, was completely remodeled after World War II. The futuristic Parc des Poteries is an example of European park-conception in the late 1990s. The Jardin des deux Rives, spread over Strasbourg and Kehl on both sides of the Rhine opened in 2004 and is the most extended (60-hectare) park of the agglomeration. The most recent park is Parc du Heyritz (8,7 ha), opened in 2014 along a canal facing the hôpital civil.

© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

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L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

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Prof. Dr. Ursula Münch (v.l., Direktorin der Akademie für Politische Bildung), Dr. Wolfgang Schäuble (Präsident des Deutschen Bundestages), Prof. Dr. Dres. h.c. Hans-Jürgen Papier (Präsident des Bundesverfassungsgerichts a.D.), Dr. Gero Kellermann (Akademie für Politische Bildung)

Italian postcard. B.F.F. (Ballerini & Fratini Florence) Edit., No. 4387. E.N.I.C. Photo by Vaselli. Oretta Fiume in La fabbrica dell'imprevisto (Jacopo Comin, 1942).

 

Oretta Fiume (1919-1994) was an Italian actress who became a star during the Fascist era after winning a competition.

 

Oretta Fiume was born June 6, 1919 in Fiume (now Rijeka in Croatia) as Claudia Scrobogna. She adopted her hometown as part of her stage name. In 1938 Fiume took part in one of the numerous competitions of the ERA Film for new faces of cinema, reaching first place. Laura Solari was in second place. They debuted together in the film by Camillo Mastrocinque, L'orologio a cucù/The cuckoo clock (1938), with Vittorio De Sica. From her hometown she moved to Rome with two fellow friends: the aspiring actress Jucci Kellermann, who after a few years would marry Mario Soldati giving him three children (the actor Wolfango, Michele and the director Giovanni, husband of Stefania Sandrelli), and singer Olga Stancich - winner of the EIAR regional competition - who, between 1939 and 1943, among other things, would dub the songs from Marlene Dietrich's films in Italian. Written subsequently by Alessandro Blasetti for a part in the film Ettore Fieramosca (1938), she would also work with Gallone and Eduardo De Filippo, nevertheless never succeeding in emerging in important parts. In 1941 Fiume became the protagonist of the film Ragazza che dorme/Sleeping Girl (Giovacchino Forzano, 1941), shot at the Tirrenia studios in Pisorno - where she worked more often in the early 1940s. Passers-by and spectators could admire her portrayed in the beautiful posters posted on the walls and windows of cinemas, created by the painters Anselmo Ballester and Sergio Gargiulo. Fiume also starred opposite Nerio Bernardi and Adriano Rimoldi in Sempre più difficile (Renato Angiolillo, Piero Ballerini, 1943), her last film during the war years. She also worked marginally in revue shows on stage between 1943 and 1948.

 

In the late forties Fiume's appearances began to thin out, the last interpretations dates back to the mid-sixties: from a small part in Fellini's La dolce vita, until the last, in the film Brivido/ Thrilling by Carlo Lizzani. On the private side, Fiume had a sentimental relationship with the pianist Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli. She had two children: Riccardo (1941), with a film operator of the time (Giorgio Orsini) while both worked in the film factories of Tirrenia (Pisorno), and Federico Scorbogna (1959), who would be the child protagonist in the films La classe operaia va in paradiso/The Working Class Goes to Heaven (1971) by Elio Petri, with Gian Maria Volonté, Pane e cioccolata (1974) by Franco Brusati, with Nino Manfredi and Andremo in città (1966) by Nello Risi, with Geraldine Chaplin.

 

Oretta Fiume died April 22, 1994, age 74, in Rome.

Testpilot Speedy / Heft-Reihe

Testpilot Speedy

limitierte Sammlerausgabe (600 Exemplare)

Nachdruck der Gerstmayer-Reihe von 1957

Bemerkung: Beigabe in "HEINERLE - die begehrte Wundertüte"

art: Walter Kellermann

Norbert Dargatz Verlag (Deutschland; 1994)

ex libris MTP

www.comics.org/issue/1349208/

  

© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

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Architect: RKW Architektur +

Built: 2014

German postcard. Ross Verlag, Berlin, No. 695/1. Maxim Film. Henny Porten and Friedrich Kayssler in Gräfin Donelli/ Countess Donelli (G.W. Pabst, 1924).

 

Plot: Countess Mathilde Donelli (Porten) has become a widow early on, as her unfaithful husband killed himself. Now she is in material need. Her uncle, the much older Count Bergheim (Friedrich Kayssler), shows interest in Mathilde, but she is much more interested in Bergheim's handsome secretary Hellwig (Eberhard Leithoff). To help Mathilde, Hellwig sends Countess Donelli a larger sum of money. Thereupon the countess's uncle accuses his secretary of the theft because he wants to crush the young happiness. Graf Bergheim is prepared to waive a criminal complaint should Hellwig stay away from Mathilde from now on. Countess Donelli then lets himself be carried out to an act of desperation and shoots him down. The doctors can save the wounded man. Countess Donelli marries her great love after his recovery. Years later, Count Bergheim realizes that he would never had a chance with Mathilde and admits that he staged the embezzlement. Now Hellwig is finally rehabilitated.

 

Gräfin Donelli was a rather conventional melodrama, an early work of famous film director Pabst. On the sets the director met people he would work more often with: Henny Porten, cinematographer Guido Seeber and assistant-director Mark Sorkin. Herman Warm designed the sets. Gräfin Donelli passed censorship on 28 August 1924 dand premiered on 7 November 1924 at the Primus-Palast in Berlin.

 

Source: German Wikipedia, IMDB.

 

Sturdy and blond Henny Porten (1890-1960) was one of Germany's most important and popular film actresses of silent cinema. She became the quintessence of German womanhood, ladylike yet kindhearted and a not a little petit bourgeois. She was also the producer of many of her own films.

 

Friedrich Kayßler (1874-1945) was a German theatre and film actor, writer and composer. He appeared in 56 films between 1913 and 1945.

 

Kayßler was born in Neurode in the Prussian Silesia Province (now Nowa Ruda in Poland). He attended the gymnasium in Breslau (Wrocław), where he became a close friend of Christian Morgenstern and Fritz Beblo. Graduating in 1893 Kayßler studied philosophy at the universities of Breslau and Munich and began his theatre career at the Deutsches Theater in Berlin under manager Otto Brahm, later working at municipal theatres in Görlitz and Halle. At the Deutsches Theater, Kayßler had made friends with director Max Reinhardt, whose Schall und Rauch Kabarett ensemble in Berlin he joined in 1901. He followed Reinhardt, when he became manager of the Deutsches Theater in 1905, where Kayßler performed in Kleist's The Prince of Homburg, Goethe's Faust and Ibsen's Peer Gynt. He also succeeded Reinhardt as manager of the Berlin Volksbühne from 1918 until 1923. Kayssler also wrote several poems and dramas. In 1934 he starred alongside Veit Harlan in the Berlin premiere of Eugen Ortner's Meier Helmbrecht at the Staatliches Schauspielhaus.

 

In 1913 Kayssler first appeared as a film actor in the silent movie Welche sterben, wenn sie lieben by Carl Schönfeld. As the ambitious tunnel building engineer Max Allan he was the star of Der Tunnel (William Wauer 1915), based on Bernhard Kellermann's classic novel. Opposite Henny Porten he acted in various films in the 1920s: Die Liebe einer Königin (1923), Mutter und Kind (1924), Gräfin Donelli 1924), and later on, Luise, Königin von Preußen (Carl Froehlich, 1931) and 24 Stunden aus dem Leben einer Frau (Robert Land, 1931), while also acting in silent films with female stars such as Maria Corda (Tragödie im Hause Habsburg, 1924; Eine Dubarry von heute, 1926/27 ) and Mady Christians (Das brennende Herz, 1928/29).

 

Between 1930 and the early 1940s, Kayssler was also extremely active in German sound cinema, such as in Zwei Welten (1930), the German version of E.A. Dupont's Two Worlds, Stürme über dem Mont Blanc (Arnold Fanck, 1931) with Leni Riefenstahl, Das Flötenkonzert von Sans-souci (Gustav Ucicky, 1930) with Otto Gebuhr, the Harry Piel-film Das Schiff ohne Hafen (1931), and Der Hauptmann von Köpenick (Richard Oswald, 1931) with Max Adalbert. In 1932 he had the lead in the period piece on the Napoleonic wars, Die elf Schill'schen Offiziere (Rudolf Meinert, 1932). Other remarkable parts Kayssler had in e.g. Gold (Karl Hartl, 1934) with Hans Albers, and Der alte und der junge König (Hans Steinhoff, 1935) with Emil Jannings. In 1935 Kayssler had the lead in the anti-Russian film Friesennot by Willi Krause aka Peter Hagen. Other important leads he had in the Sherlock Holmes film Der Hund von Baskerville (Carl Lamac, 1937), the Kleist adaptation Der zerbrochene Krug (Gustav Ucicky, 1937) with Emil Jannings, as police prefect of Paris in Verwehte Spuren (Veit Harlan, 1938), as King of Prussia/German Emperor William I in Bismarck (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1940), and finally as Clara Schumann's father in Träumerei (1944) with Hilde Krahl as Clara and Mathias Wieman as Robert Schuman.

 

In March 1944, Kayssler's son Christian, who was also a popular film actor, was killed in an allied bombing raid. Kayßler was named as one of the Third Reich's most important artists in the Gottbegnadeten list of September 1944. He was killed during the Battle of Berlin, murdered by Red Army troops at his house in the suburb of Kleinmachnow, when trying to protect his wife.

 

Source: German Wikipedia, IMDB.

© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

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More Description in French and English on : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/collections/7...

 

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© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

Click on the image to see with black frame.

 

More Description in French and English on : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/collections/7...

 

My Best ☆ FAVES by you, on : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/sets/72157625...

  

Thank you all for your comments, invitations and support :)

© Mathias Kellermann 2011 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

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My Best ☆ FAVES by you, on : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/sets/72157625...

  

Thank you all for your comments, invitations and support :)

© Mathias Kellermann 2012 - This work is protected under international copyright laws and agreements. No part of this photostream may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system (except Flickr Expo system and Faves) , or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without my prior written permission.

 

L'exploitation et la reproduction à des fins commerciales ou non commerciales d'une oeuvre sans autorisation ecrite de son auteur constitue un acte de contrefaçon pénalement sanctionné au titre des articles L.122-4, L335-2 et L335-3 du CPI.

 

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More Description in French and English on : www.flickr.com/photos/matkeller-as-titus1st/collections/7...

 

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The Hotel Sacher is located in the first District of Vienna after the Vienna State Opera. Famous specialty of the house is the original Sachertorte. The hotel is a member of the Leading Hotels of the World.

History

Anna Maria Sacher

On the grounds of the demolished Kärntnertortheatre, directly opposite the newly opened imperial Court Opera, was built a Maison meuble. The restaurateur Eduard Sacher bought the house modeled on a Renaissance palace and opened in 1876, Hotel de l' Opera with the restaurant. The son of Franz Sacher, the inventor of the Sachertorte, had however already made ​​a name for himself as a restaurateur, and named the house quickly to Hotel Sacher .

He married 1880 the 21- year-old Anna Fuchs, who henceforth cooperated in the hotel and quickly took over the business because of her husband's deteriorating health . Edward died in 1892, and Anna Sacher now ran the hotel as so-called widow operation. Which at that time was an extremely emancipated woman with cigar and her beloved French Bulldog (in Vienna: " Sacher-Bully" ) was always to be found, continued the business with rigor, but also with kindness. So they talked back then a company health insurance for their employees.

From the beginning, the Sacher was one of the best addresses in the city and in 1871 for the wine and delicatessen for kuk Appointed purveyor. This privilege his widow Anna was once again awarded after the death of Eduard Sacher. Before the opera you enjoyed the exquisite cuisine, they met in the legendary private rooms, and high-ranking representatives from politics always used the house for discreet meetings. The exclusive hotel was already a social institution . But then the economically difficult years after the First World War left its mark on the house.

Shortly before her death in 1930, Anna Sacher withdrew from the guide. Only after her death was announced that the hotel was heavily in debt and assets of the former was not much left. In 1934, finally came to bankruptcy.

The lawyer Hans Gürtler, his wife Poldi and the hotelier couple Joseph and Anna Siller acquired the now dilapidated house and renovated it extensively: from the heating system, electrics, running hot and cold water in all rooms has been adapted all the modern needs. From now on, the earned money should always flow back into the house. First time, the Sachertorte not only in their own premises were offered for consumption, but also sold on the street.

The house was again the meeting place for the growing company. But the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany in 1938 brought this to an abrupt end. Swastika flags flying in front of the hotel now. During the Second World War but the house remained largely spared from damage. Immediately after the liberation of Vienna it was occupied by Soviet troops, the Vienna first district around the hotel but was soon jointly managed by the Allies and thus it came six years into British hands.

1951 got the Siller family and Gürtler their property back. Josef Siller had died in 1949. Again, the hotel had to be extensively renovated. As well as new dining venues emerged at the Sacher. Hans Gürtler also laid the foundation for the art collection of the 19th Century. Anna Siller died in 1962, and the hotel was entirely in the possession of the Gürtler family. In 1967 the company received the National Award and since then the federal coat of arms may be used in commercial transactions. The son Rolf Gürtler took over the business in 1970, but shortly thereafter, in an accident, after which he succeeded his son Peter Gürtler. This took over in 1989, the Austrian Court Hotel in Salzburg. This was later renamed the Hotel Sacher Salzburg. Since his death in 1990 his 1983 divorced woman Elisabeth Gürtler-Mauthner leads the family with their daughter Alexandra.

In 2006 the building, which is composed in its buildings of six town houses, refurbished thermally under the direction of architects Frank & Partners, and the loft conversion, in which a spa area was accommodated, provided while preserving the monument idea with a striking bright aluminum roof.

Offer

The Hotel Sacher at night

As a member of the Hospitality Association of The Leading Hotels of the World, which ensures quality control in five star hospitality sector, the Hotel Sacher is one of the best addresses in Austria. Since the expansion of 2006 also meets the criteria of a Leading Spa.

In the House, the Anna Sacher restaurant, the Red Bar, the Blue Bar, Confiserie, Café Sacher are and the Sacher Eck (coin). The cafe was founded in 2004 awarded the Golden Coffee Bean Jacobs.

Also in the building, but not as a part of the hotel, is the former imperial Court and chamber Supplier Wilhelm Jungmann & Neffe.

Since 1999, the Original Sacher-Torte is produced in a production office in Vienna Simmering, from where it is exported to the whole world. After a decades-long legal battle with the Imperial Sugar Bakery Demel only the dessert made ​​by Sacher may adorn with the title "original". The Sachertorte is imitated by many coffee houses, bakeries and pastry shops.

Rooms of the Hotel Sacher

The Sacher shop in the Hotel Sacher

The famous Sacher Torte

Famous guests

Main entrance of the hotel in the evening

Many prominent guests had the house in the Philharmonikerstraße. Anna Sacher had a photo gallery of her guests in her boudoir. The signatures of all she embroidered herself on a table cloth. Located in the middle of it Emperor Franz Joseph.

Crowned heads, statesmen, diplomats and politicians lodged at the Sacher: Edward VIII, Wallis Simpson, Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, Prince Rainier, Princess Grace, John F. Kennedy, Kofi Annan and many more.

Because of the close proximity to the Opera House of course many artists were under the guests: Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein, Leo Slezak, Plácido Domingo, José Carreras and Rudolf Nureyev. Music critic Marcel Prawy lived until his death in 2003, even as a permanent guest at the Sacher.

Graham Greene had here the idea for the screenplay of the film The Third Man. A British officer told him about the underground passages of Vienna, whereupon Greene in the bar wrote down the first ideas immediately.

Her role in the Sissi films Romy Schneider owed ​​their similarity with the bust of the Empress, who is at the hotel and was the director Ernst Marischka noticed. During filming, she lived with her mother Magda Schneider at the Sacher.

Invited to an unusual press conference in April 1969, John Lennon and Yoko Ono to the Sacher. They held one of her legendary "Bagism" actions in their hotel rooms to media representatives (including André Heller, who reported for the Ö3 jukebox), in order to express their ideas of world peace.

Traditionally, all suites are named for operas and composers (eg, La Traviata, Carmen, Idomeneo, The Magic Flute, Madame Butterfly, Nabucco, Rigoletto, Leonard Bernstein, etc.). The new suites on the top floor of the house bearing the names of contemporary operas, such as Lulu and Billy Budd named.

Hotel Sacher in film and on stage

The Hotel Sacher has been immortalized in numerous films and stage plays .

Hotel Sacher, 1939

In the German-speaking area, the hotel was also supported by the TV series Hello - Hotel Sacher ... Portier! popular with Fritz Eckhardt .

Literature

Ernst Hagen: Hotel Sacher. Austria slept in your beds. Zsolnay , Vienna , 1976, ISBN 3-552-02827-7

Ingrid Haslinger: customer - Emperor. The history of the former imperial purveyors. Schroll, Vienna 1996 , ISBN 3-85202-129-4 .

János Kalmár , Mella Waldstein: K.u.K. Purveyors of Vienna. Stocker , Graz 2001, ISBN 3-7020-0935-3 . Pp. 10-15 .

Monika Kellermann : The great Sacher-back book. Pastries, cakes and pastries. Seehamer -Verlag, Weyarn 1994, ISBN 3-929626-28-4

Franz Maier- Bruck : The great Sacher Cookbook. The Austrian cuisine. Seehamer -Verlag, Weyarn 1994, ISBN 3-929626-27-6

Leo Mazakarini : The Hotel Sacher in Vienna. Grafe and Unzer, Munich, 1977, ISBN 3-7742-5018-9

Emil Seeliger: Hotel Sacher. World history at supper. Publisher Schaffer, Berlin 1942

William Fraenkel: Establishment Eduard Sacher in Vienna: General Construction Journal, Volume 1877 (online at ANNO)

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel_Sacher

Original West German CKO tinplate Ford Taunus 20M taxis no. 416 with friction motor, in black and cream.

The interior has been changed on the later cream one.

I have a photo taken in Stuttgart in 1973 at the time when the standard colour for West German taxis was changing from black to cream, at that point they were more cream than black.

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