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WA?rzburg
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Capital of Lower Franconia, local wine metropolis and northern terminus of Germany's most famous tourist route, the Romantic Road,
WA?RZBURG
straddles the River Main some 80km southeast of Aschaffenburg and 50km southwest of Schweinfurt. During the night of March 16, 1945 it got the same treatment from Allied bombers that NA?rnberg had received two months earlier. The 1200-year-old city had no important war industries but the presence of a busy rail junction provided a tenuous rationale for its destruction. Unfortunately, WA?rzburg has been less successful in rebuilding itself: gone is much of the Altstadt, leaving individual surprises of Baroque and Gothic beauty sandwiched between modern supermarkets and the new town. For all that, the city's location on both banks of the Main, a number of really outstanding sights and a marvellous range of places to eat and drink easily justify a visit of several days.
WA?rzburg has been one of Germany's most influential episcopal cities for many centuries, and some of the greatest architects and artists were employed by the prince-bishops, bequeathing an exceptionally rich legacy. Prominent among them was the sculptor
Tilman Riemenschneider
, whose hauntingly characterized carvings, executed in the heady years leading up to the Reformation, decorate so many churches throughout Franconia. A later period saw patronage of
Balthasar Neumann
, who was then totally unknown and untried, but who duly developed here into the most inventive and accomplished architect of eighteenth-century Europe. Other useful information
for tourists (each section contains more specific sub-sections): |
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Germany,
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