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Posts tagged ‘Romantic Germany’

Worms: Holy Sand, Europe’s oldest surviving Jewish cemetery

I’m looking for a “thousand-year history” in the city of Worms located in southwest Germany. This has nothing to do helminthology or nematology, as the town’s name is derived from “Warmaisa”, the former Jewish name of the city. This is about an important part of Jewish-German history and peaceful coexistence of the Judeo-Christian communities within Europe. The town’s fame and reputation is also partly derived from Martin Luther; I’ve already visited the site where Luther was on trial to answer charges of heresy, as well as the world’s largest Reformation monument.

This part of the Rhein river area is considered the “cradle of European Jewry”, known also as “little Jerusalem on the Rhine.” In medieval times, flourishing Jewish communities in the cathedral cities of Speyer, Worms, and Mainz facilitated the creation of a common Jewish league with the name ShUM (SchUM), spelled out by the first letters of the Hebrew names for the three cities. As emphasis on the influence of Jewish heritage in Europe and the ongoing process of preservation and education, the Holy Sand cemetery is one of four constituents in the newly inscribed UNESCO World Heritage Site (2021).

On a breezy late-autumn afternoon, light fades quick, casting solemn shadows on this ground. In the town’s old Jewish cemetery, I’m the only person present, and I’ve placed a small stone on top of a number of gravestones. I’m surrounded by apparitions over an millennium’s age and by the remaining physical traces in various shapes, stones, and size.

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Koblenz: 1st and 2nd Deutsches Eck (German Corner)

Above: West view to Deutsches Eck from Ehrenbreitstein. 2015 photo by Taxiarchos228 (Wladyslaw Sojka). I’ve added the following labels: (1) Seilbahn/Gondola, (2) St. Kastor Basilica, (3) Deutschherrenhaus, (4) first Deutsches Eck, (5) Memorial to German Unity (Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial), (6) reclamation in the late 19th-century, (7) second Deutsches Eck.

Many will know, have seen, or have read about the Deutsches Eck (German Corner) in the German city of Koblenz. The river city has plenty to provide: visitors wander into the vineyards to sip on crisp white wine from local grapes, vacation on long cabin-boats to enjoy the river scenery, or explore the surrounding Upper Rhine River Valley.

But Koblenz is also well known by virtue of its name after the junction where the rivers Moselle and Rhine meet. By the first-century AD/CE, the Romans had built for strategic protection a fort1 called “Castellum apud Confluentes“, Latin for “the castle at the confluence”. What most commonly acknowledge as the Deutsches Eck (German corner) is not the original location. Half concealed among the trees some 200 metres back near the Deutschherrenhaus is the first location of the Deutsches Eck.

What follows:

  • a map to the area and my photos from the present-day,
  • a short history of the “Deutsches Eck,” and
  • archival images from the mid-16th century to early 20th century.

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Martin Luther, Diet of Worms, Emperor Charles V, Reformation, Reformation 500, Luther 2017, Worms, Rheinland-Pfalz, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, fotoeins.com

Worms: Martin Luther on trial in 1521

For anybody strolling around a German town, a natural point of visual gravity is the spire associated with the town’s cathedral. That’s no different in the town of Worms on the Rhine river between Mainz and Mannheim. What is different in a walk through the gardens next to the cathedral is that “Martin Luther was here” and that events here put his life in danger.

2021 marked the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther’s trial at the Imperial Parliament (Diet) in Worms.

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Worms: world’s largest Reformation Monument

Arriving by German rail or on Rhine river cruises, visitors to the city of Worms (pronounced ‘VOHRmz’) will likely sample the crisp wine from the surrounding Rheinhessen region; learn about the 5th-century Nibelung saga; see important religious symbols including the “crown” that is St. Peter’s Cathedral, and remaining structures from the once-thriving Jewish community which along with Speyer and Mainz formed a medieval league of Jewish communities. Many will retrace Martin Luther’s steps in the city.

In April 1521, Luther was ordered to appear at the Diet (Imperial Parliament) convening in Worms. In the presence of Holy Roman Emperor Charles the Fifth, Luther held firm against charges of heresy and refused to recant. What’s amazing is that Luther survived the triumphant journey from Wittenberg to Worms and, with his subsequent status as “outlaw” from the imperial edict following the Diet, Luther survived departure from Worms because his benefactor, Friedrich III, secretly arranged for Luther to be “kidnapped” and brought to safety at the Wartburg Castle in Eisenach.

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Juedischer Friedhof, Heiliger Sand, Jewish Cemetery, Holy Sand, Worms, Rheinland-Pfalz, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, fotoeins.com

Worms’ Holy Sand: The Rabbi and the Patron

From Worms to Rothenburg, and back to Worms.

Located near the entrance to Worms’ old Jewish cemetery are gravestones of two important figures in medieval Jewish-German history. The cemetery is also called “Holy Sand”1, and is one of many places of interest in the medieval ShUM league of Jewish cities. The gravestones for Rabbi Meir ben Baruch (centre) and Alexander ben Salomo (right) are shown in the picture below.

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ShUM, SchUM, medieval Jewish cities, Speyer, Shpira, Worms, Warmaisa, Mainz, Magenza, Germany, Ashkenaz, Rheinland-Pfalz, Rhineland-Palatinate, fotoeins.com

ShUM, Jerusalem on the Rhine: Speyer, Worms, Mainz

When threats of destruction to property and life follow and linger over a group of people through no fault of their own over centuries, there’s something to be said about an eternal need to keep a watchful eye. Words like Verfolgung, Vernichtung, and Vertreibung1 have been etched into memory. I have all this in mind as I explore Jewish history in Germany as part of my need to answer the following question:

How did a nation of people which fostered composers Bach, Beethoven, Handel, Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, Strauss; and writers Goethe, the Brothers Grimm, Heine, Hesse, Heinrich and Thomas Mann, and Schiller sink to the worst depths of human atrocity and depravity in the first half of the 20th-century?

It’s easy to forget Jewish people have lived in what is now Italy and southern Europe since the middle of the 2nd-century BCE and inhabited southern Germany from the late 10th-century AD/CE2. During the High Middle Ages, three important bishopric (and cathedral) cities of Speyer, Worms, and Mainz along the Rhine river formed an important league or federation of Jewish communities (Kehillot) from the end of the 10-century to about the mid-to-late 14th-century. The word שו”ם or ShUM (SchUM in German)4 is an acronym consisting of the first letters of the Hebrew names for the three cities:

•   Shin (ש), Sh for Shpira (שפירא) → present-day Speyer;
•   Waw or Vav (ו), U for Warmaisa (וורמש) → present-day Worms;
•   Mem (ם), M for Magenza (מגנצא) → present-day Mainz.

The ShUM cities became centres for learning, training, religion, culture, and trade within medieval Germany (Ashkenaz3) and throughout Europe. Today, the three ShUM cities establish key destinations for historical travel, provide rich examples for continuing research on medieval Jewish life, and add up to a comprehensive project in recognizing an important chapter of the history of Jews in Germany.

The ShUM/SchUM was inscribed as World Heritage Site by UNESCO at the 44th meeting of the World Heritage Committee in July 2021. ShUM is Germany’s 1st all-Jewish world heritage site, a big acknowledgement to the centuries-long presence of the Jewish community along the Rhine river.

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Kaiser-Wilhelm-Denkmal, Rhine river, Rhein, Moselle river, Mosel, Deutsches Eck, Koblenz, Germany, fotoeins.com

Fotoeins Friday: Koblenz’s Deutsches Eck at night

Koblenz lies at the confluence of the Rhine and Mosel rivers, which respectively are at the far-left and -right in the picture above. The present-day Deutsches Eck or “German Corner” includes the towering Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial (at centre in the picture above). Flags placed at the Deutsches Eck represent the Federal Republic of Germany, each of the 16 German federal states (Bundesländer), the European Union, and the United States of America (in place since late-2011). The monument and surroundings are a part of the designated UNESCO World Heritage Site for the Upper Rhine River Valley.

However, this city landmark is the second version of the Deutsches Eck, and that’s the subject for subsequent explanation.

Thanks to Koblenz Touristik and Romantic Germany for their advice and support. Koblenz is one of the cities in the Historic Highlights of Germany. I made the above photograph on 25 November 2015 with the Canon EOS6D, 24-105 zoom, and the settings: 1/10-sec, f/4, ISO25600, and 24mm focal length. This post appears on Fotoeins Fotopress at fotoeins.com as http://wp.me/p1BIdT-7Kd.

Ratskeller, Speyer, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany, fotoeins.com

Speyer: typically German in the Ratskeller

Normally, my passable handling of conversant German gets me far enough in a snack-joint (Imbiss) for a Döner or the gut-busting Dönerteller. On the infrequent occasion I’m inside a restaurant, it’ll be local German fare, much of which I’ve become accustomed while travelling within Germany since 2002.

The town or city hall in every city, town, or village is often accompanied by its own “Ratskeller” (Cellar) serving wine, beer, and food in an underground tavern. At the Speyer Ratskeller, a cold and wet Friday night is in full swing, the place packed with city residents filling all available tables and seats. My host apologizes for the wait, and I reply that it’s no problem. She suggests wine while I wait: definitely not a problem.

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Hygiea, Art Nouveau, Jugendstil, Firmungstrasse 11, Kulturdenkmal Rheinland-Pfalz, Altstadt, Koblenz, Germany, fotoeins.com

Fotoeins Friday: Koblenz “Hygiea” Jugendstil heritage

In Koblenz’s Altstadt, the building now at Firmungstrasse 11 between Jesuitenplatz and Josef-Görres-Platz is one of many in the list of “Kulturdenkmäler” or cultural monuments, as compiled by the Generaldirektion Kulturelles Erbe (General Directorate for Cultural Heritage) in the state of Rheinland-Pfalz.

Built in 1903 for the chemist/pharmacist Fritz Oetelshofen, the building is a three-story cladded row-house with mixed residential and commerical usage and surface decor in the Art Nouveau (Jugendstil) style. The top of the building is adorned with a woman’s head with flowing blonde hair. This is “Hygiea” (or Hygeia), the ancient Greek goddess of clean living and preventative health, and daughter to the god of medicine, Asklepios. Given her disposition to good “hygiene”, Hygiea is also the patron for apothecaries (pharmacists). The cultural monuments are also part of the 2002 UNESCO World Heritage Site listing for the surrounding Upper Middle Rhine Valley.

Listing of memorials in Koblenz: Denkmalverzeichnis Kreisfreie Stadt Koblenz (PDF, in German)

Koblenz Touristik and Romantic Germany for their advice and support. Koblenz is one of the cities in the Historic Highlights of Germany. I made the photo above on 26 November 2015 with the Canon EOS6D, 24-105 zoom, and the settings: 1/400-sec, f/10, ISO1000, and 60mm focal length. This post appears on Fotoeins Fotopress at fotoeins.com as http://wp.me/p1BIdT-7Tm.

West portal, Kaiserdom, Speyer Cathedral, Domplatz, Speyer, Germany, UNESCO World Heritage Site, fotoeins.com

Fotoeins Friday: Speyer’s Imperial Cathedral at night

In the German state of Rheinland-Palatinate, one thousand years of history are present in the shape of a Latin cross within one of the largest and most important examples of Romanesque architecture in the country. Under the directive of Salian emperor Konrad II. (Conrad the Second), construction for the Kaiserdom zu Speyer (Speyer Cathedral) began in 1030 AD/CE and consecrated in 1061. As a show of imperial power, Konrad II, seven other emperors and kings, four queens, and a series of bishops were buried in the cathedral’s crypt. Konrad II, founder of the Salian dynasty (1024-1125), was the great-great-grandson of Otto I who founded the Ottonian Dynasty (919-1024) and commissioned the construction of an abbey which would eventually become the Magdeburg Cathedral. In 1981, Speyer’s imperial cathedral received the high distinction of UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Kaiserdom, Speyer Cathedral, Domplatz, Speyer, Germany, UNESCO World Heritage Site, fotoeins.com

My thanks to the city of Speyer for providing access, and to Romantic Germany for their friendly advice and support in various cities along the Rhine river. I made the photos above on 20 November 2015. This post appears on Fotoeins Fotopress at fotoeins.com as http://wp.me/p1BIdT-86m.

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