32 destinations chosen entrely subjectively

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Hello and welcome to the second part of your Christmas bonus, my entirely subjective list of places to visit in Germany. Today we will cover the remaining Bundesländer, namely Nordrhein-Westfalen, Rheinland-Pfalz, Saarland, Sachsen, Sachsen-Anhalt, Schleswig-Holstein, Thüringen and two more places that I have chosen entirely because I can.

One of the legacies of the Holy roman empire is that Germany does not have just one place where everything happens,  where politicians, entrepreneurs, bankers, artists, and actors travel on the same underground trains and eat at the same restaurants. Berlin is the capital with its political class of members of the Bundestag, journalists and lobbyist and at the same time a major gathering place for artists, musicians and thespians of all stripes and home to many tech startups. But the bankers are in Frankfurt, the headquarters of the major companies are in Stuttgart, Munich, Düsseldorf and spread around everywhere. Several of the major publishing houses are in Hamburg, the private TV stations in Munich, but none of these places have a monopoly on any of these activities. There are banks headquartered in Munich and major corporates in Frankfurt, there is great theater in Düsseldorf, Dresden and Schwerin, there are world leading companies headquartered in tiny towns like Künzelsau.

And that cuts through to the major cultural sites. Though the quip that there were 365 states in the Holy Roman empire is vastly exaggerated,  there were once a hundred capital cities, from splendid Dresden to tiny Hohenzollern-Hechingen, each with its princely residence, cathedral, grand monastery and theater. The great artists either travelled from court to court, leaving behind their works here or there, or stayed in one of the free imperial cities, operating large workshops.

Therefore what you cannot do in Germany is to go to one city and see all the major treasures the country has “collected” over the centuries, as you can do in the Louvre or the British Museum and the National Gallery. In Germany you have to move around, see one thing at the time, always in the knowledge that its significant counterpart is a few hundred miles north, south, east or west of you. This is one of the legacies of the medieval empire that Germany has in common with Italy.

And hence we are going through each of the Bundesländer trying to pick out one absolute must-see and one place where you are likely to encounter fewer people. And as we have covered 9 Bundesländer up to Mecklenburg-Vorpommern already, the next location we will have to get to is Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany’s most populous state.

Nordrhein-Westfalen

If we talk about must sees, Aachen is where every upstanding listener of the History of the Germans will go, and it is undoubtably the right thing to do. The imperial chapel, with its Roman columns brought across from Rome and Ravenna and Barbarossa’s magnificent chandelier provided suitable surroundings for the coronations since Otto the Great. And if you happen to go there, take a look at the treasures in the Dommuseum, worth every second of it. And do not forget to listen to the ghoulish opening of Charlemagne’s grave by Otto III in episode 14  .

Cologne

A close second place you should not miss is Cologne. The city has been mentioned 500 times already in the show and there are likely another 500 incidences to come. Germany’s most venerable and for a long time largest city has been the stage for events from the Prologue episode to the siege of Neuss we discussed in episode 214.  As the seat of one of the seven Prince electors, a major pilgrimage destination and the main hub in the trade between the empire and England, Cologne often played a decisive role. Its history is so varied and significant, it warrants its own podcast, the History of Cologne by Willem Fromm.

Of the things to see in Cologne, the Cathedral and its shrine of the Three Wise Men is unavoidable. I would also recommend the Römisch-Germanische Museum, that displays items related to the long history of Roman presence in Germany and specifically in Cologne.  And do not miss the remains of Cologne’s history as a free imperial merchant city and senior member of the Hansetag League. The Overstolzen House, a 13th-century Romanesque house, and the Town Hall, with its 16th-century porch, the Gürzenich, or Banquet Hall, of the merchants of the city (1441–47), and the 16th-century Arsenal are all reconstructed on the outside, though the interior has sadly been lost to war damage.

These alone would justify a visit, but what makes it a must see are the 12 great Romanesque churches including Sankt Gereon, Sankt Severin, Sankt Ursula, Sankt Maria im Kapitol, Sankt Kunibert, Sankt Pantaleon, Sankt Aposteln, and Gross Sankt Martin. Few places in Europe can boast such a density of sacral architecture erected between the 4^th and the 13^th century.  

Once you have done this marathon, head down to Früh’s, Sünner im Walfisch or Sion for a refreshing Kölsch and the unique atmosphere of a classic beer house. If you do that, you have to take the S-Bahn down to Cologne’s eternal rival, Düsseldorf and taste their Altbier in one of their traditional beer houses like the Füchschen, Schiffchen or Uerige.

Essen – Zeche Zollverein

18 million people spread over 34,000 km² making Nordrhein-Westfalen one of Europe’s most densely populated areas, in particular the almost continuous urban landscape between Düsseldorf and Dortmund, otherwise known as the Ruhr.

I would love to say that the Ruhr is pretty, but that would be pushing it. There are pretty places though, like the Bredeny lake and its park with the villa of the Krupp family or the Schwebebahn in Wuppertal. Several of these cities are very old; Essen abbey boasts an Ottonian Westwerk and 10^th century artworks and Dortmund had been a member of the Hanse and still retains some vestiges of that time, whilst Mercator established a cartography business in Duisburg.

If people travel here from afar, it is usually related to football, or soccer for our American friends, given the region hosts some of the most successful and most storied clubs.

But there is another way to get an understanding what made this state where almost one fifth of Germans live. And that is a visit to Zeche Zollverein, a coal mining industrial complex that counts amongst the largest of its kind in europe. It operated from 1847 to 1986 and has now been turned into a museum, or to be more precise, one of the many buildings on the site is now the Ruhr Museum providing an insight int how this region turned into one of the largest industrial agglomerations in the world.

But what impressed me more than the exhibits is the sheer scale and awesome beauty the structure. It comprises two large complexes, the mine with its Shaft 12, built in the Bauhaus style that is the basis of the claim that this is the most beautiful coal mine in the world. And then there is the nearby coking plant, a 600m long behemoth.  The canal that ran alongside once held water used to cool down the coke. Today it is used In winter as one of the coolest ice rings I can imagine.

Zeche Zollverein has a museum but is not a museum, it is a vibrant centre with 150 start-ups and corporations using the space, a range of cultural institutions, a branch of the university and shops. Since opening in the 1990s, Zeche Zollverein has become a weekend destinations for people from all around, including my cousin who took me there and left me speechless.

That is unfortunately all we can cover in Nordrhein-Westfalen, leaving such gems as Paderborn (see episode 19) and Münster for later exploration.

Rheinland-Pfalz

It is time to head down to Rheinland-Pfalz, the state created in 1946 from chunks of Prussia’s Rhine province, Rheinhessen and the Bavarian Palatinate. This is the land of the archbishops of Mainz and Trier, the Counts Palatine on the Rhine, the counts of Nassau and most significantly the various barons on their castles overlooking the Rhine river.

Which gets me to the must-see in Rheinland-Pfalz, and that is the Rhine valley, namely the bit between Mainz and Bonn. I know, it is on everybody’s bucket list for a visit to Germany, but so is Heidelberg and we covered that as well.

What is most fascinating is the gap between its preception and what it actually signifies in German history. Turner and Byron had made the rhine valley into one of the main destinations on the grand Tour and many a mylord travelled along citing  these stanzas from Childe Harold’s pilgrimage:

childe harold audio – Google Search 2:11:20

   The castled crag of Drachenfels

   Frowns o’er the wide and winding Rhine.

   Whose breast of waters broadly swells

   Between the banks which bear the vine,

   And hills all rich with blossomed trees,

   And fields which promise corn and wine,

   And scattered cities crowning these,

   Whose far white walls along them shine,

   Have strewed a scene, which I should see

   With double joy wert THOU with me!

The river nobly foams and flows,

   The charm of this enchanted ground,

   And all its thousand turns disclose

   Some fresher beauty varying round;

   The haughtiest breast its wish might bound

   Through life to dwell delighted here;

   Nor could on earth a spot be found

   To Nature and to me so dear,

   Could thy dear eyes in following mine

   Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine!

And as the boat floated between the Lorely and Katzenellenbogen the representatives of Thomas Cook sold the tourists steel engravings of Burg Katz, the Mäuseturm in Bingen or Stolzenfels castle which they would hang on their walls to dream of grim robber barons, helpless prelates and damsels in distress. All these images and dreams of the Romantic Rhine ended up in the rubbish bin when Germans and Brits faced each other across their trenches in World War I.

But that romantic yearning for crumbling castles, picturesque towns and to quote Byron again: peasant girls, with deep blue eyes,  And hands which offer early flowers” was not an exclusively British obsession.

The Germans were at it too, Goethe, Hölderlin and Kleist started the literary tradition that peaked with Heinrich Heine and Clemens von Brentano, Schumann and Liszt composed piano pieces, symphonies and Lieder, Wagner’s ring of the Nibelungen takes place on the Rhine, before we get into the less salubrious world of the “Wacht am Rhein” and Carl Zuckmaier’s famous Wine, Women and Song. During the 19^th century rich industrialists and the Orussian royal family turned the castle ruins into what a fairytale gothic castle was supposed to look like.

The whole place is so drenched in narratives, myths and anecdotes, it is a dreamworld made into reality. A dreamworld that obfuscates its real significance. The Rhine had been the backbone of the European economy for centuries, the main transmission line that connected the Low Countries and Italy. Its castles were toll stations funding princely ambitions, may they have been territorial, political or religious all through German history. Its cities were centres of trade and innovation, its villages made the world’s favourite white wine etc., etc.

And it is gorgeous!. Take a trip down the river either on the train that follows the banks of the river, or on a ship or boat….

Trier

Going from one of the absolute top destinations in Germany we now go to one that is quite incomprehensibly overlooked, and that is Trier. Trier may not formally be Germany’s oldest city, but it is certainly the one that holds more ancient Roman buildings than any other in Germany, and could easily compete with better known places in France or Spain.

Augusta Treverorum became one of the four capitals of the Roman empire in 293 AD and grew to between 75,000 and 100,000 inhabitants. It retains its famous city gate, the Porta Nigra from this period, the Aula Palatina, the basilica that once served as the throne room of emperor Constantine was preserved as a church, making it the largest extant hall from classical antiquity, it’s cathedral goes back to a church commissioned again by the emperor Constantine, and retains much of the old structure, with later additions in the 10^th, 11^th and 12^th century. Trier obviously comes with the usual complement of amphitheatre, ruins of the impressive Roman bath, and a still fully functioning 2^nd century bridge. The Rheinische Landesmuseum holds more exhibits from Roman times, including the famous Wine ship of Neumagen that explains a lot about trade on the Moselle and Rhine and Roman navigation and the largest treasure of Roman gold coins ever found.

And if you have time, drop into the city library that holds the Codex Egberti, one of the great Ottonian illuminated manuscripts, a reminder that Trier was not just important in roman times but had been a crucial archbishopric throughout the Middle Ages and into the early modern period. Who could forget Baldwin of Luxemburg, brother of emperor Henry VII and eminence grise of the empire for most of the 14^th century.

That is of course only a small selections of the delights of Rheinland-Pfalz. You will almost certainly want to go to Speyer as well and marvel at its great cathedral we described already in episode 25 or spend some time in Mainz, home to the most senior of Prince Electors as well as of Johannes Gutenberg (episodes 186 to 188), or follow the river to Worms, original home of the Salian emperors and site of the Nibelungenlied.

Saarland

Fortunately our next destination is not far. The smallest of the territorial German states, the Saarland is where we go next. And I have to make a grave admission, I have never done more than drive through. I will of course remedy that, but what it means is that for now I cannot offer any personal recommendations.

Amongst the things I found that could entice me to go to the Saarland is first up the Saarschleife, a gigantic bend in the River Saar caused by the stream hitting a hard Quarzite rock. It looks cool.

The other location would be the Volklinger Eisenwerke, the only fully intact steel works from the 19^th and 20^th century. There are visiting tours and a museum explaining how this enormous facility operated, as well as special exhibitions. So if you decide to skip the Zeche Zollverein in Essen, and you want to better understand Germany’s industrial past, this might be a suitable replacement.

Sachsen

Our next Bundesland is almost due east from here – it is Saxony in all its splendour. And when we talk about Saxony as in the kingdom and now Bundesland of Saxony, as opposed to the stem duchy of Saxony,  we are talking about a state created by and for the House of Wettin. For much of the 17^th and 18^th century this principality outshone Prussia, its neighbour to the north. Augustus the Strong and then his son Augustus III were both electors of Saxony and kings of Poland. They maintained two capitals, Dresden and Warsaw where they made a credible attempt at competing with the Versailles of Louis XIV. This expenditure relegated the dynasty back to the second league, but left behind some of the grandest and most impressive baroque architecture on German soil.

In other words, Dresden is a must-see. Several of the structures that had been heavily damaged, even wiped out by the Bombing of Dresden in February 1945 but much has now been reconstructed. In particular the Frauenkirche has become a symbol of reconciliation and rebirth. The whole process had already started under the GDR government with the reconstruction of the Semperoper  in the 1980s and continued with the almost complete rebuild of for example the Taschenberg Palais and the Residenzschloss. I worked in Dresden in 1991 and I had the chance to visit the building site of the Residenzschloss. Seeing the concrete walls of what is today the audience chamber of Augustus the Strong was one of the weirder experiences I ever had in sightseeing.

But whilst much of the city centre had suffered horribly, there are several absolute gems of the heyday of baroque Dresden that have survived largely unaltered. There is the Alte Gemäldegalerie that houses the collection of Italian renaissance art put together by the otherwise hapless Augustus III, and the Grüne Gewölbe, the treasury of the House of Wettin that had been made accessible as a museum in 1729 as a means to project its immense wealth.

Going a bit further afield, you may want to see Meissen where the principality started and its castle where  Johann Friedrich Böttger established the famous Meissener Porzellanmanufactur, the first place where porcelain was produced in Europe. Porcelain was an obsession amongst aristocrats in the 17^th and 18^th century, but had gone into total overdrive amongst the German princes. Everyone had a porcelain collection, usually housed in small “Chinese” room full of mirrors and golden wall shelfs. In Dresden you had an entire palace to house the collection, the Japanese Palace in the Neustadt.

Today the collection is shown in the Zwinger, once part of the city’s defences but repurposed by Augustus the Strong as, a party palace, orangery, garden, just something very unique and strangely wonderful. A Japanese palace was of course not enough exoticism for the spendthrift Saxon rulers, so they had a Chinese palace too, in Pillnitz, just a few miles upriver.  Pillnitz is of course not just one small Chinese villa, but three separate buildings, one on the water, one on the hill and one in the middle. And there is Moritzburg, the fairytale castle in a lake full of hunting trophies..and, and, and.

I am going to shut up now. And if you go to Dresden, just spare a few days for Leipzig too. Where Dresden was where the money was spent, Leipzig is where it was made. And today Leipzig is arguably the more vibrant of the two cities.

Bad Muskau

When it comes to overspending, the two Augustuses are hard to beat, but it can be done. The man who achieved that sheer impossible feat was Hermann, Fürst von Pückler-Muskau. He is today mostly remembered for Fürst Pückler ice cream, a mix of chocolate, vanilla and strawberry flavours he did not even invent himself but was just named in his honour by the Prussian court cook.

He was a famous dandy who kept a team of white stags to pull his carriage down Unter den Linden, but his true achievement was as a gardener. His two parks, one in Bad Muskau in Saxony and the other in Branitz in Brandenburg are absolute high points in European garden architecture. Laid out in an English style the park stretches 5.6 km² across what is now the German-Polish border. As you would expect, this is an artificial landscape of lakes and hills dotted with various follies and pavilions.

The sheer scale of the project pushed the man who was born as one of the richest nobleman in Germany deep into debt. In a desperate attempt to raise funds he and his wife divorced so that he could go to England and marry a wealthy heiress. That scheme turned out to be a touch too obvious and the British press made a mockery of the German prince’s attempts to woo an English rose. Pückler described events in hilarious letters to his now divorced but still much loved wife. She then published these letters to rustle up cash, which turned into a best seller. Like modern a day sailing youtuber, Pückler embarked on a new career as a travel writer. He journeyed across the Ottoman empire, even made it to Ethiopia and Sudan. One of the souvenirs he brought back from his trips was an11-year old Ethiopian enslaved girl that he installed in Bad Muskau where she promptly succumbed to the inclement climate, and probably just utter misery.

Money eventually ran out completely and Pückler had to sell his castle and gardens in Bad Muskau in 1845 and moved to Branitz where he could not stop himself and got gardening again. He died in 1871. Like his lifestyle, his religious convictions were at odds with the conservative world of 19^th century Germany. Since cremation was not yet permitted, he went around the problem by having his heart dissolved in sulphuric acid, and ordered that his body should be embedded in caustic soda, caustic potash, and caustic lime. These granular remains were then buried underneath a pyramid in his garden.

His life cries out for its own episode.

Sachsen-Anhalt

Moving swiftly, or in fact not so very swiftly on, we come to Sachsen-Anhalt. This is the land of Otto the Great who is buried in Magdeburg cathedral and his father, Heinrich the Fowler whose grave is somewhere underneath the abbey church of Quedlinburg. Even Barbarossa squeezed himself in on the Kyffhauser, which is shared between Sachsen-Anhalt and Thüringen.

Naumburg

And the must-see place here is also linked to these early medieval days, it is the Cathedral of Naumburg, and more specifically the Stifterfiguren, the sculptures of the founders of the church. These include the legendarily alluring Uta von Ballingstedt, but also the other 11, each carved by an absolute master of the craft in the 13^th century. If you are following me on social media you can find a post going through every single one of the 12 figures and their histories.

The second destination in this state is Dessau. This is another of these tiny capitals, in this case the seat of the dukes of Sachsen-Anhalt-Dessau. Not much of the old city of Dessau is left, apart from a ducal palace. But halfway between Dessau and Wittenberg, famous for Luther’s theses, is the garden landscape of Dessau-Wörlitz, a set of interwoven palaces and parks that cover an impressive 142 km²

But that is not the only reason why I would suggest to go there, the real attraction is the Bauaus. You can visit the original building where the Bauhaus school moved to after it had been more or less expelled from Weimar in the 1920s. It is a fascinating structure that, like much of the other ideas of the Bauhaus had enormous influence on the way the world looks everywhere from Texas to Tokyo. The Bauhaus museum is by the way not in the actual Bauhaus buildings, but in the centre of Dessau.

Schleswig-Holstein

Time to take our last trip up north and have a look at Schleswig Holstein. As a sailor, this is my place, along with Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. It is just stunningly beautiful if you have a soft spot for hard winds and sandy beaches.

Culturally the must see place is of course Lübeck, the queen of the Hanse. We did a whole series on the Hanse and the role of Lübeck within it, we talked about the art and culture that in the main centred here – episode 127, so I am not sure what I can add in this episode. Maybe take a marzipan safari. Whilst Niederegger has become the leading brand for German Marzipan, there are four more manufacturers in Lübeck and true aficionados prefer either Mest or Martens or Carstens or Lubeca over the better known fare. Lots to discover…

As for the second location in Schleswig Holstein, there are of course the islands, namely Sylt which provide a uniquely German summer holiday experience and of course any kind of water sports in the Förde on the Baltic shore, including but not limited to sailing.

But I would like to break a lance for the city of Schleswig, the seat of the dukes of Holstein-Gottorp who occasionally ruled Denmark, Sweden and Russia, though not all at the same time. There is an impressive palace here with gardens and the like.

Beyond that there are three unique and compelling things here. The first are the remains of Hedeby or Haithabu, a Viking settlement that dominated the trade in the Baltic between the 8^th and 11^th century. You can see reconstructed Viking houses and a Viking museum explaining the significance of the place in international trade.

In the 7^th century the Danes built a line of fortifications from Haithabu on the Baltic to the North Sea shore which remained the main Danish line of defence against invasions until the Schleswig-Holstein war of 1864. The great wall of China, begun around the same time, is admittedly more impressive, but lost its military function in the 17^th century.

And then you have the cathedral of Schleswig, itself a lovely gothic church with an impressive carved main altar. The funky bit is in the cloister. Like so many churches and monasteries, Schleswig too was given a massive makeover in the 19^th century. The creative renovation work here included the discovery and enhancement of a frieze underneath the massacre of the innocents. The frieze depicted various animals, including some quickly identified as turkeys.

This caused some confusion given the original decoration dated back to 1320. The only viable explanation was that the Vikings must have been to America before and had brought the motif of the turkey back from their journeys. That rapidly turned int0 a whole narrative of brave Nordic sailors spreading out to the American continent long before any Spaniard had ever held a compass. Under the Nazis the story that men from Schleswig had discovered America became canon. It wasn’t until 1948 that Kurt Wehlte used x-ray to prove that the turkeys were indeed a turkey placed there by the 19^th century “restorers”.  

Thüringen

Congratulations, we have made it to the last Bundesland in alphabetical order, but by no means the least.

If you look on a map of the Holy roman empire from say after the peace of Westphalia, you see several large entities, Austrian and Spanish Habsburg, Bavaria, Brandenburg-Prussia, Saxony, Wurttemberg, Hessen, Brunswick etc. And then in between all these tiny places. And Thuringia is one of the regions where the chart says things like “various Saxon duchies” or “unmappable microterritories”.

Weimar

And here in Thuringia is the probably most famous of these duodez principalities, Sachsen-Weimar. This tiny principality whose political position was so insignificant, they did not have to contribute their own soldiers to the imperial Reichsmatrikel but simply paid an equivalent tax, managed to attract Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Friedrich Schiller, Martin Wielandt and Gottfried Herder to its court. And they came there and lived there during the absolute height of their fame. There is no real equivalent, unless you were to say that Charles Dickens, George Elliot, Thomas Hardy and Jane Austen had decided to live together in the grounds of Belvoir Castle. Very pretty, but a bit off the beaten track.

Weimar retains much that reminds one of these days when the country’s greatest writer was also the prime minister of the tiny state and walked across the park to have tea with the duchess and her court of local baronesses.

Weimar is of course also the place where the national assembly hunkered down to write the constitution of the republic in 1919, since Berlin was simply too dangerous.

Wartburg

Thuringia has many more of these smallish state capitals, including Gotha, home of Prince Albert and Meiningen, capital of the Duchy of Sachsen-Meiningen until 1918, complete with theatre and one of the oldest orchestras in the world. And of course Erfurt, beautifully restored to its late medieval glory. I could go on.

But the other place I would suggest you see in Thüringen would probably be on most people’s must see list anyway.  But again, I actually do make the rules, so I can break them if I want to.

Perched high above the town of Eisenach, Wartburg castle offers sweeping views over forested hills that immediately justify the journey. This is where Martin Luther found refuge and translated the New Testament into German—an act that shaped the language and transformed European religious life. Walking through his modest room gives you an intimate connection to ideas that changed the world.

Beyond the Reformation, Wartburg is also a cradle of German identity. Medieval legends of competition between singers, the courtly life that disgusted Saint Elisabeth of Thuringia, and 19th-century nationalism all converge within its walls. The architecture itself is striking, blending Romanesque foundations with later restorations that reflect changing artistic ideals.

Equally compelling is the setting. Wartburg sits amid hiking trails and quiet woodland, allowing you to combine cultural discovery with nature. It is everything with everything on it.

Odd Ones Out

And that is where I could, or maybe should end it. But no. I promised you two more places that are purely subjectively my favourites amongst the must-sees and the not so well known.

Bamberg

And top of the pops, the place to be that others also go, at least for me is Bamberg. If you go and see one piece of art in Germany, make it the Bamberger Reiter. Yes, I know that the Nazi used him as an archetype of the Nordic race and national ideal. Which makes it even more ironic that he may or may not depict a Hungarian and was likely made by a French artist.

Put all this away in a box and just look at it. The serenity of the figure, the elegance of the shapes, the mystery of its meaning and the unusual position of an equestrian statue inside a church, all makes this wonderfully bewildering and captivating.

And the Dom is full of other wonders, the marble sarcophagus of pope Clement II that appears more Roman than medieval, the stunning carvings of Tilman Riemenschneider on the grave of Henry II and Cunigunde and the modest box that holds the remains of Konrad III stuffed into a corner of the crypt by his ungrateful nephew Frederick Barbarossa. And more 13^th century sculptures that take your breath away.

The city below too is stunning, one of the few that survived intact, including a town hall on a bridge across the river. There is an episcopal palace by Balthasar Neumann, not as breathtaking as the one in Würzburg, but still impressive. And in the Bamberg Museum you can see what may be the absolute pinnacle of Ottonian illuminated manuscripts, the Bamberg apocalypse.

And since you are in the area, nip across to Bayreuth, not necessarily for Richard Wagner, but to see the theatre, built for the wedding of a daughter of the Margrave in 1750 and still standing, almost unchanged in all its epic gold and red splendour. A unique survivor.

Weikersheim

And now for the very, very last place, Weikersheim. If we talk about tiny states with artistic and architectural ambitions far beyond its resources, Weikersheim takes the biscuit.

The state its capital had once been, Hohenlohe-Weikersheim ended to far beyond the border of the princely park. But still, they built themselves a palace in the finest 16^th century style. Its great knight’s hall sports a 40 metre long ceiling, decorated with hunting scenes by Balthasar Katzenberger, whose skill lay more in colouring in, than actual painting . On the walls count Wolfgang II ordered his hunting trophies to be displayed as part of plaster reliefs of the actual animals they belonged to. Once seen, you will never forget the  Weikersheim elephant.

In the 18^th century another count of Weikersheim remodelled the castle again. This time it was brought up to the latest fashions of aristocratic living, complete with a defile of rooms for him and her and a mirror cabinet to show off their collection of Chinese porcelains.

What makes a visit so spectacular is that literally nothing had been changed inside and  out since the line of Hohenlohe Weikersheim died out in 1760. The house became a secondary residence for another branch of the family and remained that until the family had to sell it to the state of Baden-Württemberg in 1967.  

One consequence of 200 years as a secondary residence was, that the place was never heated in winter. The furniture and artworks have become so used to the seasonal changes in temperature and relative humidity that heating the castle would now result in the destruction of the decorations. So when you visit in winter, you very much keep your coat on.

For me Weikersheim epitomises so much about Germany. The fragmentation into so many smaller entities has led on the one hand to political insignificance followed by overcompensation in the 19^th and 20^th century, but at the same time has massively enriched the country. A place the size of Weikersheim in France or Britain would not harbour quirky works of art and a history all of its own.

I hope me droning on about places, gardens, cathedrals and coal mines has given you an idea of how diverse Germany is and maybe you found something you feel you want to visit…and in case you cannot join me on this year’s History of the Germans Tour and glide down the Main and Rhine Rivers this summer, there may be another tour in 2027.

Thanks for listening and usual service will resume on January 8^th when we find out how Maximilian of Habsburg fares as King of the Romans.

32 destinations chosen entrely subjectively

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Transcript

A very, very merry Christmas to you all.

As you are still awaiting your presents, mine has already arrived, which is the chance to make this show. Despite all my occasional moaning and groaning about how much work it is, I have never enjoyed anything as much this. Who could have imagined that digging through often dusty books and articles and trying to put together an interesting and compelling narrative together for a discerning audience was that much fun. And the reason I can do all this is you, the listeners and patrons of the History of the Germans Podcast. So thank you, thank you and thank you.

Now let’s get to your Christmas present. I had promised you 5 to 10 places I particularly love and that are not on the standard itinerary for a trip to Germany. But when I shortlisted the places I particularly like, I noticed a bit of a pattern. They were all within a limited range, basically near places I had lived or that have some link to my family. That is human, but not exactly helpful. Because if you want to go to Germany and for some inexplicable reason choose not to spend all your time in either Hamburg or the sunniest, most beautiful and culinarily attractive area that is Baden, then this episode would be profoundly useless to you.

I clearly needed some discipline. The plan is now to go through each Bundesland and point out two places, one that is a genuine must-see, and the other a place fewer people go and that is still interesting in its own right. That makes it 32 locations plus 2 bonus ones where I will fully indulge myself by dragging you into deepest Tauberfranken. And I know that still leaves room for enormous bias, in particular when it comes to the larger or richer Lands. But note, this is my Podcast and a choose when I want to.

Still it is a lot. And I can imagine that you may want to play sections on one or two places you really like to your friends of family as a way to convince them of the wisdom of going to Germany. So to make it easier to find, I will set up chapters for each Bundesland. If you listen on a podcast app like Spotify, you can go to the episode details, find the chapters and navigate to the bit you want to listen to. Alternatively, you can go to the episode webpage on my website at historyofthegermans.com, where you find the transcript again with headlines for each Bundesland. The order of progress is alphabetically, again hoping this helps you find things.

Baden Württemberg – Heidelberg and Freiburg

And so, without any further ado, let’s begin with the alphabetically and in any other aspect first Bundesland on the list, Baden Württemberg.

Heidelberg

And the must see place there, no ifs, no buts, is Heidelberg. As I had mentioned before, it is here where I went to school, went through the trials and tribulations of adolescence and am therefore completely unable to be objective. But then, this is objectively one of the 10 most beautiful cities in Germany, its settings, architecture, history is just stunning.

Sure, it is an absolute tourism hotspot. But most of them are day trippers who leave for Frankfurt airport before nightfall. In the evenings this is still a city for the locals and students and you can get a decent meal and lovely glass of the excellent Palatinate wine even on the central square and the street that leads down to the Alte Brücke. We did talk about Heidelberg, its castle and university in episode 189 and 190 already, so check those out before you go.

If you happen to stay a bit longer in the city, you may want to go up the Heiligenberg the hill opposite the town. You can follow the Philosophenweg, a 2km walk that provides stunning views of the city and holds reminders of the 19^th century philosophers and writers who had made Heidelberg famous.

If you climb further up, you come past the monasteries that once owned the surrounding lands before the counts Palatine arrived and built their capital here, and finally you get to see the Thingstaette. Opened by Joseph Goebbels in 1935 as the home to the Reichsfestsiele, the Nazi equivalent to the Salzburger Festspiele. It is an open air stage, allegedly inspired by Greek and Roman theatres. But that is where the comparison ends. The acoustics were terrible and complex amplification systems had to be installed so that the actors could be understood. The plays and events staged there were meant to induct the people into the National Socialist faith. It is much smaller than the Reichsparteitagsgelande in Nurnberg, but it still conveys some of that mishmash of Greco-Roman, medieval and Nordic elements that were used and abused to foster the Nazi ideology. Post war the place fell into disrepair and staged some of the coolest raves in the eighties and nineties…home to a very different German spirit.

And since we are here, you could also take a short train ride to Schwetzingen. The palace there was one of the houses the counts palatine moved to once the Schloss in Heidelberg had been destroyed in the War of the Palatine Succession. Its park, rather than the palace itself is the main attraction, featuring the classic far reaching baroque axes you would expect but also a more natural garden in the English style with dozens of follies, including bathhouses, temples, pavilions and of course the famous Schwetzinger Mosque.

It is here, that in 1668 the Count Palatine Carl Ludwig ordered his gardeners to plant white asparagus for the princely table. This king of vegetables was a delicacy only available to the very rich who could afford the complex process of growing the plants under mounts of sand.  It became more widely available when Max Basserman, a local entrepreneur established large scale agricultural production and found a way to keep them fresh in tins. White Asparagus is a German obsession, with various locations claiming to produce the highest quality, though of course Schwetzinger has to be the best. As I said, this is an entirely biased and subjective episode. So if you have never tried it and you are coming between Mid April and St. Johannis or June 24^th, give it a go. Not everyone gets why it is so special, but once you have fallen for it, you will wait every year for Spargelzeit.

As for my second recommendation in Baden-Württemberg, I was torn simply because there is so much. We talked about Stuttgart and Tübingen in episode 190 and 192, Karlsruhe in 191, Ravensburg in episode 193  and of course Constance and its council in episodes 171 to 174. It then boiled down to the monastery in Maulbronn, one of the best preserved Cistercian abbeys in Europe and the city of Freiburg. And as this is an entirely subjective show, Freiburg it is.

Freiburg im breisgau

The city founded by the dukes of Zähringen in the 12^th century (see episode 15) became the administrative center of the Habsburg ancestral lands, known as Further Austria. It has its university, which as you may have heard me mention, I attended, and which is still going strong.

Freiburg does not impress with oversized castles or dramatic location. Its charms are on a more human scale. Its main square, the Münsterplatz is pure delight. In its center rises its gothic Cathedral, that had been built as a parish church and hence has just one, not two towers. Nor is it the tallest steeple, but, according to Jacob Burckhart, the most beautiful spire in all of Christendom. It is so compelling that when the church of St. Lamberti in Munster, one of the city’s most venerable and largest, needed a new church tower, they built an almost 1:1 replica of the Freiburg Minster. It is also one of the few major gothic church towers in Germany that were completed during the Middle Ages.  Cologne, Ulm and Regensburg all sport 19^th century spires.

The interior is of course impressive with its high Altar by Hans Baldung Grien and the gothic sculptures inside and out. But is again the human scale of everything that makes Freiburg so lovely. Sitting outside in one of the wine bars on the Münsterplatz, preferable the stalwart, Oberkirch and drinking a glass of the truly excellent Baden wine is hard to beat. We would go there as students, nursing a tiny glass and hoping one of these old duffer would turn out to be an alumni of the university who would happily foot the bill for the evening in exchange for reminiscing of his or her student days. And today, when I go, I am that old duffer and I pay for drinks and tell stories that only I find really interesting. It’s the circle of Life…

And do noy forget, you are in the epicenter of German fine dining. Baden cuisine can easily hold its own against the Alsatians on the opposite shore of the Rhine. The climate that provides more days of sunshine than anywhere else in Germany provides the produce needed to satisfy a demanding clientele. The city itself boosts 5 Michelin star restaurants and the surrounding area another 20 or so. If you go north from there to the small town of Baiersbronn, which can claim to be amongst the places in the world with the highest density of Michelin stars per head in the world, including  two three star restaurants. I personally do not care that much about going to 3 star restaurants. But I do believe their presence elevates standards across a whole region. And that results in restaurants that receive what I believe to be the much more desirable Michelin award, the Bip Gourmand. That is given to restaurants that offer excellent quality food at reasonable prices, which is right up my street. If I could pass on one tip that makes life better, it is to download the Michelin guide app and seek out restaurants with the Bip Gourmand. It has never failed me and brought me to truly exceptional places. I am not paid to advertise this, this is simply a tip  from me to you. And – you may have guessed – Freiburg and the Black Forest is chocker block full of Bip Gourmand restaurants.

Bayern – München and Regensburg

Enough about what Americans would call “my home state” and go across to Bavaria. You may know by now that my relationship with Bavaria is, to say it politely, ambivalent. But that may be nothing but envy of this blessed land.  Or, to be more historically accurate, Bavaria is at least two lands, Bavaria and Franconia, and arguably the Upper Palatinate and Upper Swabia are also under Bavarian occupation.

Munich

When it comes to the absolute must sees in Bavaria – Bavaria, the answer has to be, as much as it pains me – Munich. If like me your spiritual homeland in Hamburg, then Munich is just wrong in any conceivable way. The ostentation, the language, the fashion, the undisguised arrogance… up here in Hamburg we look down on people in a much more sophisticated manner.

That being said, Munich is stunningly beautiful. My favourite thing is to go for a run early in the morning through the Englischer Garten and finish off under the arcades of the Hofgarten giggling at the pomp and pathos with which the 19^th century frescoes depicted the high points in the history of the House of Wittelsbach. The rest of the Residenz, one of Europe’s largest palace complex is definitely well worth visiting, in particular the treasury.

And once you are worn out of courtyards, state rooms, corridors and theaters, take a quick look around the corner at the Old Court, where my favorite Wittelsbach, Ludwig the Bavarian lived. Whilst he was really powerful, interesting and consequential, his palace is positively minuscule compared to those of his lesser descendants. Just saying…

I would not dare making a list of places to go in Munich, simply this is ultimately down to your interests and style, all possible variations thereof can be catered for. The Old Pinakothek hosts the art collection of the Bavarian rulers, who had been buying, inheriting and stealing stuff for centuries, the Lenbachhaus is home to masterpieces by the German expressionists and the Deutsches Museum is where you can hear all about Fortschritt durch Technik.

There is one art museum I would add to the list that few people go to, and that is the Villa Stuck. Franz von Stuck, whose house and atelier the villa was, was Germany’s most celebrated artist in the late 19^th century. His art oscillated between Jugendstil, the German version of Art Nouveau and symbolism. These striking pictures often diving into mild eroticism and dark myths has gone quite comprehensively out of fashion. But that may not last forever. Fashion changes, even when it comes to older art. I can remember a world where hardly anyone had heard about Caravaggio. And these late 19^th century artists, the Pre-Raphaelites, the Nazarener and Symbolists might be on the way up. So grab the chance to be able to say that you had been to Villa Stuck long before everybody else went.

Ok where to go after Munich. Of course none of you would dare – or dare to admit –to visit that abomination in the foothills of the alps, that cardboard grandeur built by a pseudo absolutist who sold his country to fund his architectural fever dreams. There are 20,000 castles in Germany and you go for that one? Cinderella’s castle in Disneyworld is more authentic.

Ok, if it isn’t Neuschwanstein, then where. We have already covered a number of must-sees in Bavaria in separate episodes, Nürnberg in episode 153, Rothenburg ob der Tauber in episode 193,  Augsburg in Episode 194 and Landshut in episode 197.

Regensburg

Let me break a lance for Regensburg. When I said Heidelberg is one of and not the most beautiful city in Germany, the place I thought about was Regensburg. Like Heidelberg, it old town suffered only little damage in World War II, which is a rarity. What you will find very often in Germany is that the area around the great cathedral or town hall is made up of late 20^th century structures, not all of which have aged well. The reason for that is not that Germans were keen to tear down the old and build the new in its stead, but that almost all cities had been bombed to the ground. Not the worst impact fascism had, but probably its most constant reminder.  

In Regensburg you can see what a grand late medieval city looked like. Its stone bridge, built in the middle of the 12^th century had seen first Konrad III and then Barbarossa setting out for their respective crusades. Its cathedral is another masterpiece of Gothic art. And from 1594 onwards the estates of the Holy Roman Empire gathered here in the town hall of Regensburg, from 1663 in a permanent session.

This is where imperial laws were passed and conflicts between the different sates resolved, probably more effectively than they are given credit for. And there is the palace of the Thurn and Taxis family, the imperial postmasters, who gave their name to my favorite means of transport.

But the reason Regensburg is special is not the individual attractions, but the coherence of the whole city. There are so many corners that have literally remained unchanged for 500 years allowing you to fully immerse yourself in the world of the medieval free cities. And if you take into account how much bigger and richer Nürnberg or Augsburg were at the time, you can get an idea of the scale and beauty of these late medieval trading hubs.

Another interesting aspect of Regensburg is that the city, despite remaining the seat of a catholic bishop and home to three imperial abbeys, was a major center of the protestant faith offering sanctuary from religious prosecution and spearheading missionary activities. The two communities lived side by side for centuries which  led to a duplication of institutions like schools, churches, hospitals and the like. There were several free imperial cities that operated on that basis, a sign that religious tolerance isn’t solely an invention of the 18^th century and thrived even in Bavaria.

Since we go about these things in alphabetical order, our next stop is as far as you can get from Bavaria, not geographically, but culturally, and that is of course Berlin, the home of people Bavarians call ”Saupreiß”.

berlin

What is there to see in Berlin? Pointing things out in the capital is a real problem for me, or more precisely two interrelated problems.

The first issue is that my favorite places in Berlin have closed. one permanently, the other temporarily. The Pergamon Museum where you can go through the market gate of the roman city of Millet and then the Ishtar gate of Babylon before hitting the Altar of the Hellenistic city of Pergamon, well that museum is closed at least until 2027 and only scheduled to fully reopen in 2030.

My other favorite was the Tacheles, an artist community that squatted in a former department store and proudly displayed a Mig 21 Russian fighter jet in the courtyard and other not quite health and safety compliant works. That lasted for a surprisingly long time, but closed in 2012 and has now been turned into luxury apartments, one of which recently sold for a cool 10 million Euros. Another sign that the times when artists and tech firms came to Berlin for its cheap rents and amazing spaces are over.

But even without the Pergamon and the Tacheles, there is no shortage of world class art in Berlin. From Nefertiti to Bruce Naumann, everybody is in Berlin. Check out not just the Museums but also the private galleries that make Berlin the capital of contemporary art in Europe.

The other problem I have with Berlin is that things move so fast. In most German cities not just the main historic sites, but even the restaurants and bars barely change. The top nightclub in Munich is still the same it was in the 1980s. In Berlin though, things move far to fast for me to keep up.  

But I have a solution to this problem. Its name is Jonny Whitlam. He is a tour guide in Berlin and a fellow podcaster and on whose show, History Flakes, I have appeared before. Jonny really knows his stuff and is great fun to have around. I put a link to his website in the show notes.

Brandenburg

Surrounding Berlin is Brandenburg, and again the must see place here is without a doubt Potsdam, the true capital of Prussia. Yes Berlin was the official capital, but Potsdam is where Frederick II spent his evenings chatting with Voltaire and the intellectuals of the Berlin Academy and his mornings in very different exchanges with his strapping guardsmen.

As you travel from Berlin to Potsdam you cross the Glieniker Bruecke, the place where the US and Soviets exchanged their spies. There you enter a landscape of interconnected lakes and royal and imperial palaces from the forbidding Neues Schloss built solely to prove that Prussia was not bankrupt after the 7-years war,  Sansouci, Friedrich II’s pleasure palace, Babelsberg a 19^th century beauty and Cecilienhof, where  the Potsdam conference consigned Prussia to the scrap heap of history.

Having seen this, the most appropriate thing to do then would be to seek the very beginnings of the state of Brandenburg-Prussia. So head for the Spreewald, famous for its intricate network of natural canals, lush forests, and wetlands, often called Germany’s “bayou”. It is also home to the Sorbs, one  of the few remaining communities of Slavic peoples who once occupied the entirety of the lands between the Elbe and the Polish border. You can visit the Slavic castle of Raddusch, a replica of the circular fortresses that Albrecht the Bear found so hard to overcome, he had to resort to murder and complex back room dealing to get in, as we have learned in episode 106.

The other things you should do in the Spreewald is go on a boat trip through the canals, buy some of the exceptional pickled cucumbers, as regularly featured on my favourite Instagram account, DDR Mondbasis.

Bremen

Still stuck with the letter B, we are moving on to the smallest of the Bundesländer, Bremen. Small, but perfectly formed. The Rathausplatz with the ginormous statue of Roland, the Dom, the town hall and the Schütting is one of the greatest ensembles of Hanseatic architecture.

Do not be fooled by the peace and serenity of the location. Bremen’s history is a ruthless and bloody one, as we have seen in episode 126.

And underneath the Rathaus, in the Ratskeller you find one of the oldest wine cellars in Germany, which you would not expect so far north. All that goes back to a privilege from 1330, that reserved the right to sell wine for the city council. Like all monopolies, it did not initially strive for quality, so for centuries the citizens of Bremen could only choose between two kinds of wines, the common and the better. That may explain why Bremen turned into the home of world famous breweries like Becks and the main Coffee traders in the country. Still, things improved over time and now you will be offered the choice of 650 different German wines in the Ratskeller and you can gaze at the oldest still unopened wine barrel in the country, containing some I am sure delicious 1653 Rüdesheimer Riesling.

Bremen is, as I mentioned small and perfectly formed, which means everything is close by. So do not miss the Boettcherstrasse, just around the corner from the Rathaus. Built between 1922 and 1931 on the initiative of Ludwig Roselius, a coffee trader, it is a rare example of architectural expressionism, a structure that tries to replicate the ideas and aesthetics of the Blaue Reiter in a three dimensional medium.

The state of Bremen is actually two cities, Bremen and Bremerhaven. Now I cannot honestly recommend a visit to Bremerhaven, unless you want to see the place where some of your ancestors embarked on their journeys to New York, Rio de Janeiro or Buenos Aires.

What makes Bremen really special – at least for me – are the people. They have that Hanseatic openness with a brilliant dry sense of humor and charm.

Hamburg

As much as I love Bremen, if I ever were to move back to Germany, I would move to Hamburg, no two ways about it. Germany’s second city fits me like a glove. It has the space and the sky, the doorways are made for people of stature, they drive nice but not ostentatious cars, their sensibly sized houses are decorated in the best possible, not the latest fashion and they sport that healthy glow that comes from summer holidays spent on bracing walks on the north sea beaches.

The downside of all that style and restraint is that Hamburg cannot offer much in terms of splendid palaces, massive art collections or cathedrals with Puttos dripping from the ceiling. Tourists come and walk through the Speicherstadt, the world’s largest warehouse district, built along canals, entirely from brick between 1883 and 1927. At its end you find the Hafen City, one of Europe’s largest urban regeneration projects that culminates in the Elbphilharmony, a truly spectacular concert hall overlooking one of the five largest harbors in the world.

Much of the old city that once must have looked like Lübeck or Bremen vanished in a massive city fire in 1842 and then in the Hamburg Firestorm in July 1943. But what you see today has been built in the 19^th century and then again in the late 20^th, all – as one would imagine – in discreet elegance.

The best way to enjoy the true beauty of the place is by taking an Alsterdampfer, a passenger boat that takes you round the two lakes in the center of the city. You get to see canals and bridges, of which Hamburg claims to have more than Venice, the graceful white washed villas where perfect children playing on the grass that leads down to the water’s edge. Get off at Alte Rabenstrasse and grab a seat at Bodo’s Bootssteg, a waterside bar, order an Alsterwasser, beer with lemonade, stare into the sun and feel happiness.

Hessen – Kassel and Marburg

This is where I would love to end on, but the tyranny of the alphabet pushes us on. We have barely covered 6 of the 16 Bundesländer and the next one is Hessen.

If you come by plane, you will most likely arrive in Frankfurt, making this city an inevitability. But not a bad one at all. Frankfurt was one of the three “capitals” in inverted commas of the Holy Roman Empire. The Golden Bull determined that all emperors had to be elected in Frankfurt, a process that took place in a side chapel in the church of St. Bartholomew nowadays called the Kaiserdom. This goes back even further to the Franks of Merovingian and Carolingian times who elected their kings on the hallowed ground of their homeland, Franconia. The election was followed by a celebratory dinner in the Kaisersaal of the Römer, the houses that form the medieval town hall, whilst the people were given the greatest of delicacies, the sausage that became known as the Frankfurter.

And in 1848 Frankfurt witnessed the very first freely elected German parliament holding its constituent session in the Paulskirche. This first stab at democracy did not succeed, but at least we tried.

There are some great museums in Frankfurt, but if you want to go a bit further afield, I recommend two cities, Marburg and Kassel.

Kassel – Wilhelmshohe

Let’s start with Kassel, once capital of the landgraves of Hessen-Kassel. Whilst their old palace had disappeared in 1811, the grandest of the monuments of these otherwise monumentally awful rulers draws all the views, the Bergpark Wilhelmshoehe. 2.5 square kilometers of baroque and English garden design on a hillside that is overlooked by a 40 metre tall pyramid on its summit, which in turn is crowned with an 8.5m tall golden statue of Hercules. Beneath it runs a water feature that comprises a Baroque water theatre, grottos, fountains, two hydraulic organs, and several waterfalls. Water tumbles down the 350m long great cascade into the of course great pond, from where the once tallest fountain in the world sprays water 50 metres into the sky. That is what selling your soldiers to the highest bidder gets you.

The best time to visit Kassel is during the Documenta, an art exhibition that takes place every 5 years, always creates all sorts of controversies with resignations and accusations as only the art world can produce. Visitors and artists give this otherwise rather sedate town a particular buzz, a counterpoint to the overwhelming impression the Bergpark gives you.

MArburg

At the other end of the spectrum is Marburg, like Kassel once a capital of the Landgraviate of Hessen. Some cities have a university, Marburg is a university. During term time ancient medieval streets have a much more youthful flair than the surroundings would suggest.

And it was also once the home of Saint Elisabeth of Hungary, wife of Landgrave Ludwig of Thuringia. Those of you who support the show can listen to a whole episode about Elisabeth of Thuringia, whose life story of persistent abuse by her confessor is amongst the saddest stories about medieval piety I can think of. The Teutonic knights built a magnificent church over her grave, the Elisbethenkirche, and in 1236 once the apse was constructed her body was translated there. Emperor Friedrich II served as one of her pallbearers, a sign of the recognition she enjoyed a mere 5 years after her death.

We covered her daughter’s fight for her son’s inheritance and the creation of the state of Hessen in episode 186. Another descendant of Saint Eisabeth, landgrave Philipp, in the spirit of the reformation had her remains dug up and sold them off to catholic princes.

Niedersachsen – Hildesheim and Rammelsberg/Goslar

The next Bundesland on the list is Niedersachsen, Lower Saxony, or as we would call it, Saxony. Now in most cases the capital of the state is often a must see destination or at least in the top 10. Niedersachsen is the exception. Hannover, apart from a claim to speak the cleanest form of Hochdeutsch is sadly not very exciting.

Hildesheim

What is exciting, at least for history geeks like us is Hildesheim, the see of my favourite ballsy bishop, Bernward of Hildesheim.  He was the tutor and later advisor of Otto III and rescued his lord when he rushed into an angry mob of Romans, brandishing the Holy Lance.

But beyond personal bravery he was also an enormously cultured man. From high nobility he advanced quickly through the ranks of the church but his true passion was mathematics, painting, architecture and the manufacturing of liturgical objects in silver and gold. And once placed on the bishops’ throne he embarked on a massive building program.

He left behind two masterpieces of Ottonian architecture, the cathedral of St. Mary and the church of St. Michael. St. Mary holds the greatest treasures, namely the St. Bernward doors, coast in Bronze around 1015 and completely unique in scale and quality of decoration.

And the column of St. Michael, where Bernward had Trajan’s column replicated in Bronze only that instead of Imperial armies, loot and prisoners of war, it depicts scenes of the old testament.

St Michael’s cannot offer the same level of treasures, despite featuring a rare ceiling made from 1300 pieces of wood and again extremely rare. But since St, Mary was rebuilt after Bernward’s death, St, Michael is clearer expression of the bishop’s architectural ideas. As the Unesco World Heritage convention acknowledged, quote: St. Michael’s is one of the rare major constructions in Europe around the turn of the millennium which still conveys a unified impression of artistry, without having undergone any substantial mutilations or critical transformations in basic and detailed structures. The harmony of the interior structure of St Michael’s and its solid exterior is an exceptional achievement in architecture of the period. Of basilical layout with opposed apses, the church is characterised by its symmetrical design: the east and west choirs are each preceded by a transept which protrudes substantially from the side aisles; elegant circular turrets on the axis of the gable of both transept arms contrast with the silhouettes of the massive lantern towers located at the crossing. In the nave, the presence of square impost pillars alternating in an original rhythm with columns having cubic capitals creates a type of elevation which proved very successful in Ottonian and Romanesque art.” End quote

Rammelsberg/Goslar

So where did all the money come from that allowed bishop Bernward to create his grand churches. For that we may want to go to Rammelsberg in the Harz Mountains where you can visit the silver mine that once provided the material wealth that propelled Otto the Great and his successors to the top of the political pyramid in western europe. The miners and engineers that worked there in the 10^th century passed their knowledge on to their sons who spread out across europe, bringing crucial skills to Saxony, Tyrol, Bohemia, Hungary, Sweden and, and, and; laying the foundation for the metal bashing industry that still forms the bedrock of the country’s economy.

And whilst there, you go to the other side of town and visit the Kaiserpfalz in Goslar, home of Emperor Henry III and his intended permanent capital.

Mecklenburg-Vorpommern – Schwerin and Mecklenburgische Seenplatte

And now we get to the 9^th Bundesland in the alphabet and last one for today, Mecklenburg Vorpommern. And here the capital is a must see, Schwerin.

Like Hamburg, there is a lake in the centre of town, but that is where the comparisons end. On an island sits a castle like no other. When the dukes of Mecklenburg commissioned a complete remodelling of their main residence in the middle of the 19^th century, they pulled out all the stops. This is often called the Neuschwanstein of the North, but that can only be an insult. Neuschwanstein was a stage designs inspired by the operas of Richard Wagner, Schwerin was built on the walls of an actual castle that dates back to the 10^th century and by some of the greatest historicist architects, Gottfried Semper, best known for the Semperoper in Dresden. The family that once reigned there is no less unusual.

As you enter, you pass underneath a giant statue of Niklot, the pagan Slavic leader of the Obodrites and opponent of Henry the Lion. We covered his life and story in episode 104 and the broader conflict between the Saxons and the Obodrites in episode 101. Niklot’s descendants once converted to Christianity, became the dukes of Mecklenburg who played a major role in Northern European history. And this was their home. Sure the 19^th century embellished things and the decorations are ludicrously over the top, but that is also its charm.

Wismar, Stralsund und rügen

What else is in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern? There are the Hanseatic cities of Wismar, Stralsund and Rostock that had made their regular appearances in the episodes about the Hanse and are well worth visiting for their brick gothic architecture. Wismar is the best preserved, whilst Stralsund gives you access to Rugen and its fantastic sandy beaches. By the way, Anglo-Saxons have a false impression of the Baltic, expecting its water to be very cold, they even use the term Baltic to denote freezing. Nothing could be further from the truth. Given the see is shallow and does not pull in much icy Atlantic water, it warms up quickly in summer, making Rügen, Hiddensee, Usedom, Heiligendamm and so forth ideal places for summer holidays by the seaside, in particular when you have small children to cater for.

And if you want a truly perfect holiday, charter a sailboat or bring your own. I did that two years ago and cannot wait to get back.

Mecklenburger Seenplatte

But there is one trip I have not done and that is still on my list, and that is sailing through the Mecklenburger Seenplatte, the system of interconnecting lakes between Berlin and the Baltic shore. There are allegedly over 1000 lakes and inland waters here, some quite busy, but also still many that are quieter. You can charter a sailboat or a motorboat from one of the dozens of charter companies and set off. The boats are tiny and not at all luxurious, but you can anchor in a secluded bay, go for a swim and sleep on deck looking at the stars. That would be my kind of thing.

So, we worked through 9 out of 16 Bundesländer, which means we are not yet finished. But I am. So, if you have been listening in bed whilst the kids are rustling about the living room in search of presents, get up and smell the Turkey.

As for me, I have already got my presents since we Germans do it on the evening of the 24^th. All I have to do today is get up, pack the kids in the back of the car and drive to my lovely in-laws for Goose and even more presents. Though as I said, the greatest of them all has already arrived.

So, thank you all so much for listening and supporting the show. And have a very merry Christmas. I will be back with the second instalment next week.