Braunschweig: Encyclopedia - Braunschweig

Braunschweig

Braunschweig [ˈbraunʃvaik] (English Brunswick) is a city of 245,500 people (as of December 31, 2004), located in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is located north of the Harz mountains at the farthest navigable point of the Oker river, which connects to the North Sea via the rivers Aller and Weser.

Braunschweig - History

The date and circumstances of the town's foundation are unknown. Tradition maintains that Braunschweig was created through the merger of two settlements, one founded by Bruno II, a Saxon count who died before 1017 on one side of the river Oker and the other the settlement of Count Dankward, after whom the still surviving Castle is named. The town's original name of Brunswik is a combination of the name Bruno and wik, a place where merchants rested and stored their goods. The town's name therefore indicates an ideal resting-place, as it lay by a ford across the Oker River. Documents from the St. Magni Church from 1031 give the city's name as Brunesguik. Another explanation of the city's name is that it comes from Brand, or burning, indicating a place which developed after the landscape was cleared through burning.

In the 12th century Duke Henry the Lion made Braunschweig the capital of his state and built Brunswick Cathedral. He became so powerful that he dared to refuse military aid to emperor Frederick I Barbarossa, which led to his condemnation and fall.

Braunschweig was a member of the Hanseatic League from the 13th century to the middle of the 17th century. In the 18th century Braunschweig was not only a political, but also a cultural centre. Emilia Galotti by Lessing and Goethe's Faust were played for the first time in Braunschweig.

Braunschweig was a duchy until 1918, and afterwards a state within the Weimar Republic. It achieved an inglorious fame by making Adolf Hitler a German citizen, which allowed him to become a candidate for the German Reichstag and become Head of Government (Reichskanzler). Hitler was employed by the Braunschweig State Government in February 1932 and thereby obtained German citizenship. The later site selection of the Volkswagen plant in nearby Wolfsburg (Fallersleben) was likely a thank-you gift for this granting of citizenship.

During World War II, Braunschweig was a Sub-area Headquarters (Untergebiet Hauptquartier) of Military District (Wehrkreis) XI. It was also the Garrison Town of the 31st Infanterie Division, which took part in the invasions of Poland, Belgium, France, and Russia. It was one of the units that was destroyed during the withdrawal from Russia at the end of the war. As a result, it was severely damaged by Anglo-American aerial attacks. The air raid on October 15, 1944 destroyed most of the Altstadt (old town), which consisted of half-timbered houses, as well as most of the churches. Only the Cathedral, which was changed into a National shrine (German: Nationale Weihestätte) by the Nazi-Government, withstood the bombs. After the war, the Cathedral was turned into a Protestant church again. A small section of the old centre of town did survive the bombing and remains quite distinctive. Much of the remainder, including the historic "Alte Waage" have been restored and now appear again in their pre-war glory.

Braunschweig - Historical population

1811: 27,600 inhabitants
1830: 35,300
1849: 39,000
1880: 75,000
1890: 100,000
1900: 128,200
1925: 146,900

Braunschweig - Sights

• The beautiful Burgplatz (Castle Square), comprised of a group of buildings of great historical and cultural significance: the Cathedral (built at the end of the 12th-century), the Burg Dankwarderode (a 19th-century reconstruction of the old castle of Henry the Lion), the Neo-Gothic Town Hall (built in 1893-1900), as well as some picturesque half-timbered houses, such as the Gildehaus (Guild House), today the seat of the Craftsman's Association. On the centre of the square stands the Burglöwe, a Romanesque statue of a Lion, cast in bronze in 1166. Today it has became the true symbol of Braunschweig.
• The Altstadtmarkt ("old town market"), surrounded by old town hall (built between the 13th and the 15th centuries in Gothic style), and the Martinikirche (church of Saint Martin, from 1195).

• The Magniviertel (St Magnus' Quarter), a remainder of ancient Braunschweig, lined with cobblestoned streets, little shops and cafés, centered around the 13th-century Magnikirche (St Magnus' Church). Here is also the Rizzi-Haus, a highly distinctive, cartoonish office building designed by architect James Rizzi for the Expo 2000.
• The Gothic Aegidienkirche (church of Saint Giles), built in the 13th century, with an adjoining monastery, which is today a museum.
• The "Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum", an important art museum and the oldest museum in Germany (founded 1754)

Recommended Day Trips:

• Hildesheim: beautiful medieval town famous for its UNESCO-cultural heritage cathedrals, market place and old half-timbered houses.
• Hameln: the beautiful town is famous for the folk tale of the Pied Piper of Hameln
• Wolfenbüttel: the Residenzstadt (residential city) of the Dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg for several centuries, Wolfenbüttel is home to a Wasserburg (castle surrounded by a moat) and the Bibliotheca Augusta (Herzog-August Bibliothek, or the Duke August library) housing the largest collection of medieval manuscripts in Europe. The city is historically important also for its numerous half-timber houses, many of which date back several centuries since Wolfenbüttel was left largely untouched by WWII.

Braunschweig - Miscellaneous

Braunschweig has been an important industrial area. Today it is known for its University and research institutes, mainly the Federal Agricultural Research Centre (English website) and the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB). The PTB Braunschweig maintains the atomic clock responsible for the DCF77 time signal and the official German time.

Also located in Braunschweig is the "Martino-Katharineum" (website), a secondary school founded in 1415. It had such famous pupils as Carl Friedrich Gauss, Hoffmann von Fallersleben, Richard Dedekind and Louis Spohr.

Brunswick is the home of two piano companies, both known worldwide for the high quality of their instruments: Schimmel and Grotrian-Steinweg (cf. Steinway). Both companies were founded in the 19th century.

Braunschweig is famous for Till Eulenspiegel, a medieval jester who played many practical jokes on its citizens. It also had - and still has - many breweries, and still a very peculiar kind of beer is made called Mumme, first quoted in 1390, a malt-extract that was shipped all over the world.

Near Braunschweig at Cremlingen-Abbenrode, there is a large medium wave transmitter, which transmits the program of "Deutschlandfunk" on 756 kHz, the transmitter Cremlingen.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Braunschweig", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki