Augsburg (; bar , Augschburg , links=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swabian_German , label=Swabian German, , ) is a city in
Swabia, Bavaria
Swabia ; german: Schwaben , colloquially ''Schwabenland'' or ''Ländle''; archaic English also Suabia or Svebia is a cultural, historic and linguistic region in southwestern Germany.
The name is ultimately derived from the medieval Duchy of ...
, Germany, around west of Bavarian capital
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...
. It is a
university town
A college town or university town is a community (often a separate town or city, but in some cases a town/city neighborhood or a district) that is dominated by its university population. The university may be large, or there may be several s ...
and regional seat of the ''
Regierungsbezirk
A ' () means "governmental district" and is a type of administrative division in Germany. Four of sixteen ' ( states of Germany) are split into '. Beneath these are rural and urban districts.
Saxony has ' (directorate districts) with more res ...
'' Schwaben with an impressive Altstadt (historical city centre). Augsburg is an
urban district
Urban district may refer to:
* District
* Urban area
* Quarter (urban subdivision)
* Neighbourhood
Specific subdivisions in some countries:
* Urban districts of Denmark
* Urban districts of Germany
* Urban district (Great Britain and Ireland) (his ...
and home to the institutions of the Landkreis Augsburg. It is the third-largest city in Bavaria (after
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...
and
Nuremberg
Nuremberg ( ; german: link=no, Nürnberg ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the second-largest city of the German state of Bavaria after its capital Munich, and its 518,370 (2019) inhabitants make it the 14th-largest ...
) with a population of 300,000 inhabitants, with 885,000 in its metropolitan area.
After
Neuss
Neuss (; spelled ''Neuß'' until 1968; li, Nüss ; la, Novaesium) is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located on the west bank of the Rhine opposite Düsseldorf. Neuss is the largest city within the Rhein-Kreis Neuss district. It ...
,
Trier
Trier ( , ; lb, Tréier ), formerly known in English as Trèves ( ;) and Triers (see also names in other languages), is a city on the banks of the Moselle in Germany. It lies in a valley between low vine-covered hills of red sandstone in the ...
,
Cologne
Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...
and
Xanten
Xanten (, Low Rhenish: ''Santen'') is a town in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located in the district of Wesel.
Xanten is known for the Archaeological Park, one of the largest archaeological open air museums in the wo ...
Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pr ...
. It was a
Free Imperial City
In the Holy Roman Empire, the collective term free and imperial cities (german: Freie und Reichsstädte), briefly worded free imperial city (', la, urbs imperialis libera), was used from the fifteenth century to denote a self-ruling city that ...
Fugger
The House of Fugger () is a German upper bourgeois family that was historically a prominent group of European bankers, members of the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century mercantile patriciate of Augsburg, international mercantile bankers, and ven ...
and
Welser
Welser was a German banking and merchant family, originally a patrician family based in Augsburg and Nuremberg, that rose to great prominence in international high finance in the 16th century as bankers to the Habsburgs and financiers of C ...
families that dominated European banking in the 16th century. According to Behringer, in the sixteenth century, it became "the dominant centre of early capitalism", having benefitted from being part of the
Kaiserliche Reichspost
''Kaiserliche Reichspost'' (, ''Imperial Mail''), originally named ''Niederländische Postkurs'' (Low Countries' postal route), was the name of the international postal service of the Holy Roman Empire, founded in 1490. It was the first modern ...
system as "the location of the most important post office within the Holy Roman Empire" and the city's close connection to Maximilian I. The city played a leading role in the
Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
as the site of the 1530
Augsburg Confession
The Augsburg Confession, also known as the Augustan Confession or the Augustana from its Latin name, ''Confessio Augustana'', is the primary confession of faith of the Lutheran Church and one of the most important documents of the Protestant Re ...
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international coope ...
recognized the Water Management System of Augsburg as a
World Heritage Site
A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for ...
because of its unique medieval canals and water towers and its testimony to the development of hydraulic engineering.
Geography
Augsburg lies at the convergence of the
Alpine
Alpine may refer to any mountainous region. It may also refer to:
Places Europe
* Alps, a European mountain range
** Alpine states, which overlap with the European range
Australia
* Alpine, New South Wales, a Northern Village
* Alpine National P ...
Wertach
Wertach is a small town in the Oberallgäu district, southern Bavaria, (Germany), in the German Alps. It is situated on the river Wertach, southeast of Kempten. The town was the childhood home of the writer W. G. Sebald.
History
Wertach wa ...
and on the
Singold
Singold is a river of Bavaria, Germany. It flows into the ''Fabrikkanal'', an artificial branch of the Wertach, near Augsburg.
See also
*List of rivers of Bavaria
A list of rivers of Bavaria, Germany:
A
* Aalbach
*Abens
* Ach
* Afferbach ...
. The oldest part of the city and the southern quarters are on the northern foothills of a high terrace, which has emerged between the steep rim of the hills of Friedberg in the east and the high hills of the west. In the south extends the Lechfeld, an
outwash plain
An outwash plain, also called a sandur (plural: ''sandurs''), sandr or sandar, is a plain formed of glaciofluvial deposits due to meltwater outwash at the terminus of a glacier. As it flows, the glacier grinds the underlying rock surface and c ...
of the post
ice age
An ice age is a long period of reduction in the temperature of Earth's surface and atmosphere, resulting in the presence or expansion of continental and polar ice sheets and alpine glaciers. Earth's climate alternates between ice ages and gre ...
between the rivers Lech and Wertach, where rare primeval landscapes were preserved. The Augsburg city forest and the Lech valley heaths today rank among the most species-rich middle European habitats.
Augsburg borders on the
nature park
A nature park, or sometimes natural park, is a designation for a protected natural area by means of long-term land planning, sustainable resource management and limitation of agricultural and real estate developments. These valuable landscape ...
Augsburg Western Woods - a large forestland. The city itself is also heavily verdant. As a result, in 1997 Augsburg was the first German city to win the Europe-wide contest
Entente Florale
The Entente Florale Europe (, "Flowery Alliance of Europe") is an international horticultural competition established to recognise municipalities and villages in Europe for excellence in horticultural displays. Trophies are presented annually by t ...
for Europe's greenest and most livable city.
Suburbs and neighbouring municipalities
Augsburg is surrounded by the counties Landkreis Augsburg in the west and
Aichach-Friedberg
Aichach-Friedberg is a ''Landkreis'' (district) in Bavaria, Germany. It is bounded by (from the northwest and clockwise) the districts of Augsburg, Donau-Ries, Neuburg-Schrobenhausen, Pfaffenhofen, Dachau, Fürstenfeldbruck and Landsberg ...
in the east.
The suburbs of Augsburg are Friedberg,
Königsbrunn
Königsbrunn ( Swabian: ''Kenigsbrunn'') is the largest town in the district of Augsburg, in Bavaria, Germany. It is situated on the left bank of the Lech, approx. 10 km south of Augsburg.
History
Königsbrunn is one of the youngest sett ...
,
Stadtbergen
Stadtbergen ( Swabian: ''Staberga'') is a town in the district of Augsburg, in Bavaria, Germany. It is situated in the outskirts of Augsburg, west of Augsburg city centre. Stadtbergen was granted town privileges in May 2007.
Mayors
* Ludwig ...
Kissing
A kiss is the touch or pressing of one's lips against another person or an object. Cultural connotations of kissing vary widely. Depending on the culture and context, a kiss can express sentiments of love, passion, romance, sexual attraction, ...
,
Mering
Mering is a municipality in the district Aichach-Friedberg, in Bavaria, Germany. It is located on the river Paar.
First mentioned in records in 1021, Mering has a long history.
The growing town with its nearly 15,000 inhabitants (2021) profits f ...
Bobingen
Bobingen ( Swabian: ''Boobenge'') is a town in Bavaria, Germany. It lies on the rivers Wertach and Singold, on the edge of the Augsburg-Westliche Wälder Nature Park, in Augsburg District, some 13 km south of Augsburg itself.
History ...
,
Gessertshausen
Gessertshausen is a municipality in the district of Augsburg in Bavaria
Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the lar ...
.
History
Early history
The city of Augsburg was founded in 15 BC on the orders of
Emperor
An emperor (from la, imperator, via fro, empereor) is a monarch, and usually the sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife ( empress consort), mother ( ...
Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pr ...
. Emperor Augustus conducted extensive military campaigns and established administrative settlements. The settlement that became Augsburg was known as ''Augusta Vindelicorum'', meaning "the Augustan city of the
Vindelici
The Vindelici (Gaulish: ) were a Gallic people dwelling around present-day Augsburg (Bavaria) during the Iron Age and the Roman period.
Name
They are mentioned as by Horace (1st c. BC), as (; var. ) by Strabo (early 1st c. AD), as and (va ...
". The settlement was established at the convergence of the
Alpine
Alpine may refer to any mountainous region. It may also refer to:
Places Europe
* Alps, a European mountain range
** Alpine states, which overlap with the European range
Australia
* Alpine, New South Wales, a Northern Village
* Alpine National P ...
Wertach
Wertach is a small town in the Oberallgäu district, southern Bavaria, (Germany), in the German Alps. It is situated on the river Wertach, southeast of Kempten. The town was the childhood home of the writer W. G. Sebald.
History
Wertach wa ...
. In 120 AD Augsburg became the administrative capital of the Roman province
Raetia
Raetia ( ; ; also spelled Rhaetia) was a province of the Roman Empire, named after the Rhaetian people. It bordered on the west with the country of the Helvetii, on the east with Noricum, on the north with Vindelicia, on the south-west ...
. Augsburg was sacked by the
Hun
The Huns were a nomadic people who lived in Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Eastern Europe between the 4th and 6th century AD. According to European tradition, they were first reported living east of the Volga River, in an area that was part ...
s in the fifth century AD, by
Charlemagne
Charlemagne ( , ) or Charles the Great ( la, Carolus Magnus; german: Karl der Große; 2 April 747 – 28 January 814), a member of the Carolingian dynasty, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and the first E ...
Free Imperial City
In the Holy Roman Empire, the collective term free and imperial cities (german: Freie und Reichsstädte), briefly worded free imperial city (', la, urbs imperialis libera), was used from the fifteenth century to denote a self-ruling city that ...
on 9 March 1276 and from then until 1803, it was independent of its former overlord, the
Prince-Bishop of Augsburg
The Prince-Bishopric of Augsburg (german: Fürstbistum Augsburg; Hochstift Augsburg) was one of the prince-bishoprics of the Holy Roman Empire, and belonged to the Swabian Circle. It should not be confused with the larger diocese of Augsburg, ...
. Frictions between the city-state and the prince-bishops were to remain frequent however, particularly after Augsburg became
Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
and curtailed the rights and freedoms of
Catholics
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
. With its strategic location at an intersection of trade routes to Italy, the Free Imperial City of Augsburg became a major trading center.
Augsburg produced large quantities of woven goods, cloth and textiles. Augsburg became the base of two banking families that rose to great prominence, the
Fugger
The House of Fugger () is a German upper bourgeois family that was historically a prominent group of European bankers, members of the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century mercantile patriciate of Augsburg, international mercantile bankers, and ven ...
s and the
Welser
Welser was a German banking and merchant family, originally a patrician family based in Augsburg and Nuremberg, that rose to great prominence in international high finance in the 16th century as bankers to the Habsburgs and financiers of C ...
s. The Fugger family donated the Fuggerei part of the city devoted to housing for needy citizens in 1516, which remains in use today.
In 1530, the
Augsburg Confession
The Augsburg Confession, also known as the Augustan Confession or the Augustana from its Latin name, ''Confessio Augustana'', is the primary confession of faith of the Lutheran Church and one of the most important documents of the Protestant Re ...
was presented to the
Holy Roman Emperor
The Holy Roman Emperor, originally and officially the Emperor of the Romans ( la, Imperator Romanorum, german: Kaiser der Römer) during the Middle Ages, and also known as the Roman-German Emperor since the early modern period ( la, Imperat ...
at the
Diet of Augsburg
The Diet of Augsburg were the meetings of the Imperial Diet of the Holy Roman Empire held in the German city of Augsburg. Both an Imperial City and the residence of the Augsburg prince-bishops, the town had hosted the Estates in many such sessi ...
. Following the Peace of Augsburg in 1555, after which the rights of religious minorities in imperial cities were to be legally protected, a mixed Catholic–Protestant city council presided over a majority Protestant population; ''see Paritätische Reichsstadt''.
Leading European centre of capitalism of the sixteenth century
Augsburg's economic boom years occurred during the 15th and 16th centuries thanks to the
bank
A bank is a financial institution that accepts Deposit account, deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital m ...
and
metal
A metal (from ancient Greek, Greek μέταλλον ''métallon'', "mine, quarry, metal") is a material that, when freshly prepared, polished, or fractured, shows a lustrous appearance, and conducts electrical resistivity and conductivity, e ...
businesses of the merchant families
Fugger
The House of Fugger () is a German upper bourgeois family that was historically a prominent group of European bankers, members of the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century mercantile patriciate of Augsburg, international mercantile bankers, and ven ...
,
Welser
Welser was a German banking and merchant family, originally a patrician family based in Augsburg and Nuremberg, that rose to great prominence in international high finance in the 16th century as bankers to the Habsburgs and financiers of C ...
and Hochstetter. These families held a near total monopoly in important industries. Monopolies were considered criminal in contemporary laws and these families' practices were criticized by
Martin Luther
Martin Luther (; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, theologian, author, hymnwriter, and professor, and Augustinian friar. He is the seminal figure of the Protestant Reformation and the namesake of Lutherani ...
himself, but as
Emperor Charles V
Charles V, french: Charles Quint, it, Carlo V, nl, Karel V, ca, Carles V, la, Carolus V (24 February 1500 – 21 September 1558) was Holy Roman Emperor and Archduke of Austria from 1519 to 1556, King of Spain ( Castile and Aragon) fr ...
needed their financial assistance, he cancelled the charged in the 1530s. In the 16th century Augsburg became one of Germany's largest cities. Augsburg was a major
manufacturing
Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to ...
center for
textile
Textile is an Hyponymy and hypernymy, umbrella term that includes various Fiber, fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, Staple (textiles)#Filament fiber, filaments, Thread (yarn), threads, different #Fabric, fabric types, etc. At f ...
s,
armor
Armour (British English) or armor (American English; see spelling differences) is a covering used to protect an object, individual, or vehicle from physical injury or damage, especially direct contact weapons or projectiles during combat, or f ...
,
scientific instrument
A scientific instrument is a device or tool used for scientific purposes, including the study of both natural phenomena and theoretical research.
History
Historically, the definition of a scientific instrument has varied, based on usage, laws, a ...
s, as well as gold- and silver-smithing. The prolific printers of Augsburg also made the city the largest producer of German-language
books
A book is a medium for recording information in the form of writing or images, typically composed of many pages (made of papyrus, parchment, vellum, or paper) bound together and protected by a cover. The technical term for this physic ...
in the
Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire was a political entity in Western, Central, and Southern Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its dissolution in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars.
From the accession of Otto I in 962 unt ...
. Like other free imperial cities, Augsburg was an independent entity, and had authority over its tax policies.
Augsburg's wealth attracted artists seeking
patron
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings, popes, and the wealthy have provided to artists su ...
s. The city rapidly became a creative centre for
sculptor
Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...
s and
musician
A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who wr ...
s. Augsburg became the base of the Holbein family, starting with Hans Holbein the Elder. The composer
Leopold Mozart
Johann Georg Leopold Mozart (November 14, 1719 – May 28, 1787) was a German composer, violinist and theorist. He is best known today as the father and teacher of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and for his violin textbook ''Versuch einer gründlichen ...
was born and educated in Augsburg.
Rococo
Rococo (, also ), less commonly Roccoco or Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and theatrical style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpted moulding, ...
became so prevalent that it became known as "Augsburg style" throughout Germany.
Augsburg benefitted majorly from the establishment and expansion of the
Kaiserliche Reichspost
''Kaiserliche Reichspost'' (, ''Imperial Mail''), originally named ''Niederländische Postkurs'' (Low Countries' postal route), was the name of the international postal service of the Holy Roman Empire, founded in 1490. It was the first modern ...
in the late 15th and early 16th century. This postal system, which was the first modern postal service in the world, was created through negotiations and agreements between the Taxis family represented by and the early Habsburgs monarches, notably Maximilian I, his son Philip the Handsome and grandson Charles V. Even when the Habsburg empire began to extend to other parts of Europe, Maximilian's loyalty to Augsburg, where he conducted a lot of his endeavours, meant that the imperial city became "the dominant centre of early capitalism" of the sixteenth century, and "the location of the most important post office within the Holy Roman Empire". From Maximilian's time, as the "terminuses of the first transcontinental post lines" began to shift from
Innsbruck
Innsbruck (; bar, Innschbruck, label=Austro-Bavarian ) is the capital of Tyrol and the fifth-largest city in Austria. On the River Inn, at its junction with the Wipp Valley, which provides access to the Brenner Pass to the south, it had a p ...
to
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
and from
Brussels
Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...
to
Antwerpt
Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,
, in these cities, the communication system and the news market started to converge. As the Fuggers as well as other trading companies based their most important branches in these cities, these traders gained access to these systems as well.(Despite a widely circulated theory which holds that the Fuggers themselves operated their own communication system, in reality they relied upon the imperial posts, presumably from the 1490s onwards, as official members of the court of Maximilian I).
Witch hunts
Several witch hunts occurred in Augsburg in the late 16th century. Following the 1585–1588
plague
Plague or The Plague may refer to:
Agriculture, fauna, and medicine
*Plague (disease), a disease caused by ''Yersinia pestis''
* An epidemic of infectious disease (medical or agricultural)
* A pandemic caused by such a disease
* A swarm of pes ...
epidemic, southeast Germany was shattered by the 1589–1591 witch hunts. Following the 1592–1593 plague epidemic, cities in southeast Germany entered a period of
inflation
In economics, inflation is an increase in the general price level of goods and services in an economy. When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services; consequently, inflation corresponds to a reduct ...
, marked by brutal witch hunts in urban areas.
Thirty Years' War
Religious peace in the city was largely maintained despite increasing tensions up to the
Thirty Years' War
The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history, lasting from 1618 to 1648. Fought primarily in Central Europe, an estimated 4.5 to 8 million soldiers and civilians died as a result of batt ...
(1618–1648). In 1629, the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II issued the
Edict of Restitution
The Edict of Restitution was proclaimed by Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor in Vienna, on 6 March 1629, eleven years into the Thirty Years' War. Following Catholic League (German), Catholic military successes, Ferdinand hoped to restore control ...
, which restored the legal situation of 1552. However, the edict was revoked in April 1632, when
Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden
Gustavus Adolphus (9 December Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates">N.S_19_December.html" ;"title="Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="/nowiki>Old Style and New Style dates">N.S 19 December">Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="/now ...
occupied Augsburg.
In 1634, the Swedish army was defeated at the nearby Battle of Nördlingen. By October 1634, Catholic troops had surrounded Augsburg. The Swedish army refused to surrender and a
siege
A siege is a military blockade of a city, or fortress, with the intent of conquering by attrition, or a well-prepared assault. This derives from la, sedere, lit=to sit. Siege warfare is a form of constant, low-intensity conflict characteriz ...
ensued through the winter of 1634/35 and thousands died from hunger and disease. During the Swedish occupation and the siege by Catholic troops, the population of the city was reduced from about 70,000 to about 16,000. Diseases such as
typhus
Typhus, also known as typhus fever, is a group of infectious diseases that include epidemic typhus, scrub typhus, and murine typhus. Common symptoms include fever, headache, and a rash. Typically these begin one to two weeks after exposure. ...
and the plague ravaged the city.
Guilds
In the first half of the 17th century Augsburg was pivotal in the European network of
goldsmith
A goldsmith is a metalworker who specializes in working with gold and other precious metals. Nowadays they mainly specialize in jewelry-making but historically, goldsmiths have also made silverware, platters, goblets, decorative and servicea ...
s. Augsburg attracted goldsmith journeymen from all over Europe and in the 18th century a large number of
silversmith
A silversmith is a metalworker who crafts objects from silver. The terms ''silversmith'' and ''goldsmith'' are not exactly synonyms as the techniques, training, history, and guilds are or were largely the same but the end product may vary grea ...
s and goldsmiths became
master craftsman
Historically, a master craftsman or master tradesman (sometimes called only master or grandmaster) was a member of a guild. The title survives as the highest professional qualification in craft industries.
In the European guild system, only ma ...
in Augsburg.
Nine Years' War
In 1686 the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I formed the ''League of Augsburg'', also known as the "Grand Alliance" after England joined in 1689. The
coalition
A coalition is a group formed when two or more people or groups temporarily work together to achieve a common goal. The term is most frequently used to denote a formation of power in political or economical spaces.
Formation
According to ''A Gui ...
consisted at various times of Austria,
Bavaria
Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total l ...
,
Brandenburg
Brandenburg (; nds, Brannenborg; dsb, Bramborska ) is a state in the northeast of Germany bordering the states of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Saxony, as well as the country of Poland. With an area of 29,480 squ ...
, England, the
Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire was a political entity in Western, Central, and Southern Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its dissolution in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars.
From the accession of Otto I in 962 unt ...
, the
Electorate of the Palatinate
The Electoral Palatinate (german: Kurpfalz) or the Palatinate (), officially the Electorate of the Palatinate (), was a state that was part of the Holy Roman Empire. The electorate had its origins under the rulership of the Counts Palatine o ...
, Portugal,
Savoy
Savoy (; frp, Savouè ; french: Savoie ) is a cultural-historical region in the Western Alps.
Situated on the cultural boundary between Occitania and Piedmont, the area extends from Lake Geneva in the north to the Dauphiné in the south.
Sa ...
,
Saxony
Saxony (german: Sachsen ; Upper Saxon German, Upper Saxon: ''Saggsn''; hsb, Sakska), officially the Free State of Saxony (german: Freistaat Sachsen, links=no ; Upper Saxon: ''Freischdaad Saggsn''; hsb, Swobodny stat Sakska, links=no), is a ...
, Spain, Sweden, and the
Dutch Republic
The United Provinces of the Netherlands, also known as the (Seven) United Provinces, officially as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands ( Dutch: ''Republiek der Zeven Verenigde Nederlanden''), and commonly referred to in historiograph ...
. The coalition was formed to defend the Electorate of the Palatinate and fought against France in the
Nine Years' War
The Nine Years' War (1688–1697), often called the War of the Grand Alliance or the War of the League of Augsburg, was a conflict between Kingdom of France, France and a European coalition which mainly included the Holy Roman Empire (led by t ...
.
End of Free Imperial City status
The
Reichsdeputationshauptschluss
The ' (formally the ', or "Principal Conclusion of the Extraordinary Imperial Delegation"), sometimes referred to in English as the Final Recess or the Imperial Recess of 1803, was a resolution passed by the ' (Imperial Diet) of the Holy Roman Em ...
or the Final Recess of 1803, saw the annexation of nearly all of the 51 Free Imperial Cities, excepting Augsburg and five others. However, when the
Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire was a political entity in Western, Central, and Southern Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its dissolution in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars.
From the accession of Otto I in 962 unt ...
was dissolved in 1806, Napoleon encouraged his German allies to mediatize their smaller neighbours, and Augsburg lost its independence. It was annexed to the
Kingdom of Bavaria
The Kingdom of Bavaria (german: Königreich Bayern; ; spelled ''Baiern'' until 1825) was a German state that succeeded the former Electorate of Bavaria in 1805 and continued to exist until 1918. With the unification of Germany into the German ...
. In 1817, the city became an administrative capital of the ''Oberdonaukreis'', then administrative capital in 1837 for the district Swabia and Neuburg.
Industrial revolution
During the end of the 19th century, Augsburg's textile industry again rose to prominence followed by the machine manufacturing industry.
Second World War and Cold War
Augsburg was historically a militarily important city due to its strategic location.
During the German re-armament before the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...
, the Wehrmacht enlarged Augsburg's one original Kaserne (barracks) to three: Somme Kaserne (housing Wehrmacht Artillerie-Regiment 27); Arras Kaserne (housing Wehrmacht Infanterie Regiment 27) and Panzerjäger Kaserne (housing Panzerabwehr-Abteilung 27 (later Panzerjäger-Abteilung 27)). Wehrmacht Panzerjäger-Abteilung 27 was later moved to
Füssen
Füssen is a town in Bavaria, Germany, in the district of Ostallgäu, situated one kilometre from the Austrian border. The town is known for violin manufacturing and as the closest transportation hub for the Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau ca ...
.
The
MAN
A man is an adult male human. Prior to adulthood, a male human is referred to as a boy (a male child or adolescent). Like most other male mammals, a man's genome usually inherits an X chromosome from the mother and a Y chromo ...
factory at Augsburg was the largest German manufacturer of engines for U-boats in
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
and became the target of the
Augsburg Raid
Augsburg (; bar , Augschburg , links=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swabian_German , label=Swabian German, , ) is a city in Swabia, Bavaria, Germany, around west of Bavarian capital Munich. It is a university town and regional seat of the ...
. When the
Avro Lancaster
The Avro Lancaster is a British Second World War heavy bomber. It was designed and manufactured by Avro as a contemporary of the Handley Page Halifax, both bombers having been developed to the same specification, as well as the Short Stir ...
bomber was new in service, the RAF sent 12 at low level to bomb the factory in daylight, on 17 April 1942. The bombers were intercepted en-route and only five returned, all damaged. The factory was damaged but production continued; the factory was repeatedly bombed later. A subcamp of the
Dachau concentration camp
,
, commandant = List of commandants
, known for =
, location = Upper Bavaria, Southern Germany
, built by = Germany
, operated by = ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS)
, original use = Political prison
, construction ...
outside Augsburg supplied approximately 1,300 forced labourers to local military-related industry, especially the
Messerschmitt
Messerschmitt AG () was a German share-ownership limited, aircraft manufacturing corporation named after its chief designer Willy Messerschmitt from mid-July 1938 onwards, and known primarily for its World War II fighter aircraft, in parti ...
AG military aircraft firm, headquartered in Augsburg.
In 1941,
Rudolf Hess
Rudolf Walter Richard Hess (Heß in German; 26 April 1894 – 17 August 1987) was a German politician and a leading member of the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. Appointed Deputy Führer to Adolf Hitler in 1933, Hess held that position unt ...
, without
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and the ...
's permission, secretly took off from a local Augsburg airport and flew to Scotland, crashing in
Eaglesham
Eaglesham ( ) is a village in East Renfrewshire, Scotland, situated about south of Glasgow, southeast of Newton Mearns and south of Clarkston, and southwest of East Kilbride.
The 2011 census revealed that the village had 3,114 occupants, do ...
. His objective was to meet the
Duke of Hamilton
Duke of Hamilton is a title in the Peerage of Scotland, created in April 1643. It is the senior dukedom in that peerage (except for the Dukedom of Rothesay held by the Sovereign's eldest son), and as such its holder is the premier peer of Sco ...
in an attempt to mediate the end of the European front of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
and join sides for the upcoming Russian Campaign.
The Reichswehr Infanterie Regiment 19 was stationed in Augsburg and became the base unit for the Wehrmacht Infanterie Regiment 40, a subsection of the Wehrmacht Infanterie Division 27 (which later became the Wehrmacht Panzerdivision 17). Elements of Wehrmacht II Battalion of Gebirgs-Jäger-Regiment 99 (especially Wehrmacht Panzerjäger Kompanie 14) was composed of parts of the Wehrmacht Infanterie Division 27. The Infanterie Regiment 40 remained in Augsburg until the end of the war, finally surrendering to the United States when on 28 April 1945, the
U.S. Army
The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...
occupied the city. The city and its Messerschmitt works were bombed on three occasions during the war. Collateral damage included the destruction of just under 25% of all homes in the city and the deaths of several hundred people.
Following the war, the three Kaserne would change hands confusingly between the
American
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, pe ...
and Germans, finally ending up in US hands for the duration of the
Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...
. They became the three main US barracks in Augsburg: Reese, Sheridan and FLAK. US Base FLAK had been an anti-aircraft barracks since 1936 and US Base Sheridan "united" the former infantry barracks with a smaller Kaserne for former
Luftwaffe
The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German '' Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the '' Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabt ...
communications units.
The American military presence in the city started with the U.S. 5th Infantry Division stationed at FLAK Kaserne from 1945 to 1955, then by
11th Airborne Division
The 11th Airborne Division ("Arctic Angels") is a United States Army airborne formation, first activated on 25 February 1943, during World War II. Consisting of one parachute and two glider infantry regiments, with supporting troops, the di ...
VII Corps 7th Corps, Seventh Corps, or VII Corps may refer to:
* VII Corps (Grande Armée), a corps of the Imperial French army during the Napoleonic Wars
* VII Corps (German Empire), a unit of the Imperial German Army prior to and during World War I
* VII R ...
artillery,
USASA Field Station Augsburg
United States Army Security Agency (USASA) Field Station Augsburg was the site of a Wullenweber AN/FLR-9 (V8) radio direction finder, established during the Cold War. Field Station Augsburg was located on Gablingen Kaserne, near the village of ...
and finally the 66th Military Intelligence Brigade, which returned the former Kaserne to German hands in 1998. Originally the Heeresverpflegungshauptamt Südbayern and an Officers' caisson existed on or near the location of Reese-Kaserne, but was demolished by the occupying Americans.
Politics
Municipality
From 1266 until 1548, the terms ''Stadtpfleger'' (head of town council) and ''
Mayor
In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilities of a mayor as well ...
'' were used interchangeably, or occasionally, simultaneously. In 1548 the title was finally fixed to ''Stadtpfleger'', who officiated for several years and was then awarded the title for life (though no longer governing), thus resulting confusingly, in records of two or more simultaneous ''Stadtpfleger''.
After the transfer to
Bavaria
Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total l ...
in 1806, Augsburg was ruled by a
Magistrate
The term magistrate is used in a variety of systems of governments and laws to refer to a civilian officer who administers the law. In ancient Rome, a '' magistratus'' was one of the highest ranking government officers, and possessed both judic ...
with two mayors, supported by an additional council of "Community Commissioners": the ''Gemeindebevollmächtige''.
As of 1907, the Mayor was entitled
Oberbürgermeister
Burgomaster (alternatively spelled burgermeister, literally "master of the town, master of the borough, master of the fortress, master of the citizens") is the English form of various terms in or derived from Germanic languages for the chie ...
, as Augsburg had reached a population of 100,000, as per the Bavarian Gemeindeordnung.
Mayor
The current mayor of Augsburg is Eva Weber of the Christian Social Union (CSU) since 2020. The most recent mayoral election was held on 15 March 2020, with a runoff held on 29 March, and the results were as follows:
! rowspan=2 colspan=2, Candidate
! rowspan=2, Party
! colspan=2, First round
! colspan=2, Second round
, -
! Votes
! %
! Votes
! %
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Eva Weber
, align=left, Christian Social Union
, 41,534
, 43.1
, 63,762
, 62.3
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Dirk Wurm
, align=left,
Social Democratic Party
The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology.
Active parties
For ...
Alliance 90/The Greens
Alliance 90/The Greens (german: Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, ), often simply referred to as the Greens ( ), is a green political party in Germany. It was formed in 1993 as the merger of The Greens (formed in West Germany in 1980) and Alliance 90 (for ...
Alternative for Germany
Alternative for Germany (german: link=no, Alternative für Deutschland, AfD; ) is a right-wing populist
*
*
*
*
*
*
* political party in Germany. AfD is known for its opposition to the European Union, as well as immigration to Germany. ...
Free Voters of Bavaria
The Free Voters of Bavaria (German: ''Freie Wähler Bayern'') is a conservative political party in Bavaria. It has served as part of the governing coalition there since the 2018 state election under the leading Christian Social Union. The term ...
, 3,053
, 3.2
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Frederik Hintermayr
, align=left, The Left
, 2,564
, 2.7
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Lisa McQueen
, align=left,
Die PARTEI
(''Party for Labour, Rule of Law, Animal Protection, Promotion of Elites and Grassroots Democratic Initiative''), or Die PARTEI (''The PARTY''), is a German political party. It was founded in 2004 by the editors of the German satirical magazi ...
, 1,896
, 2.0
, -
,
, align=left, Bruno Marcon
, align=left, Augsburg in the Citizens' Hands
, 1,478
, 1.5
, -
,
, align=left, Anna Tabak
, align=left, We are Augsburg
, 1,261
, 1.3
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Lars Vollmar
, align=left, Free Democratic Party
, 1,249
, 1.3
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Christian Pettinger
, align=left, Ecological Democratic Party
, 1,183
, 1.2
, -
,
, align=left, Claudia Eberle
, align=left, Pro Augsburg
, 941
, 1.0
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Florian Betz
, align=left,
V-Partei³
V-Partei3, known officially as V-Partei³ – Party for Change, Vegetarians and Vegans (german: V-Partei³ – Partei für Veränderung, Vegetarier und Veganer), is a German political party that was founded in April 2016 in Munich, Bavaria. The ...
The Augsburg city council governs the city alongside the Mayor. The most recent city council election was held on 15 March 2020, and the results were as follows:
! colspan=2, Party
! Votes
! %
! +/-
! Seats
! +/-
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Christian Social Union (CSU)
, 1,653,781
, 32.3
, 5.4
, 20
, 3
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left,
Alliance 90/The Greens
Alliance 90/The Greens (german: Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, ), often simply referred to as the Greens ( ), is a green political party in Germany. It was formed in 1993 as the merger of The Greens (formed in West Germany in 1980) and Alliance 90 (for ...
Social Democratic Party
The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology.
Active parties
For ...
Alternative for Germany
Alternative for Germany (german: link=no, Alternative für Deutschland, AfD; ) is a right-wing populist
*
*
*
*
*
*
* political party in Germany. AfD is known for its opposition to the European Union, as well as immigration to Germany. ...
Free Voters of Bavaria
The Free Voters of Bavaria (German: ''Freie Wähler Bayern'') is a conservative political party in Bavaria. It has served as part of the governing coalition there since the 2018 state election under the leading Christian Social Union. The term ...
(FW)
, 230,952
, 4.5
, 0.9
, 3
, 1
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, The Left (Die Linke)
, 189,034
, 3.7
, 0.5
, 2
, ±0
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Free Democratic Party (FDP)
, 117,201
, 2.3
, 0.7
, 1
, ±0
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left, Ecological Democratic Party (ÖDP)
, 114,119
, 2.2
, 0.3
, 1
, ±0
, -
,
, align=left, Generation AUX (GenAUX)
, 108,956
, 2.1
, New
, 1
, New
, -
,
, align=left, Augsburg in the Citizens' Hands (AiB)
, 96,690
, 1.9
, New
, 1
, New
, -
,
, align=left, Pro Augsburg (PRO A)
, 94,346
, 1.8
, 3.3
, 1
, 2
, -
,
, align=left, We are Augsburg (WSA)
, 77,189
, 1.5
, New
, 1
, New
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left,
Die PARTEI
(''Party for Labour, Rule of Law, Animal Protection, Promotion of Elites and Grassroots Democratic Initiative''), or Die PARTEI (''The PARTY''), is a German political party. It was founded in 2004 by the editors of the German satirical magazi ...
, 76,557
, 1.5
, New
, 1
, New
, -
, bgcolor=,
, align=left,
V-Partei³
V-Partei3, known officially as V-Partei³ – Party for Change, Vegetarians and Vegans (german: V-Partei³ – Partei für Veränderung, Vegetarier und Veganer), is a German political party that was founded in April 2016 in Munich, Bavaria. The ...
Augsburg is located in the ''Wahlkreis 253 Augsburg-Stadt'' constituency, which includes
Königsbrunn
Königsbrunn ( Swabian: ''Kenigsbrunn'') is the largest town in the district of Augsburg, in Bavaria, Germany. It is situated on the left bank of the Lech, approx. 10 km south of Augsburg.
History
Königsbrunn is one of the youngest sett ...
and parts of the District of Augsburg ( Landkreis Augsburg).
Volker Ullrich of the
CSU
CSU may refer to:
* Channel service unit, a Wide area network equivalent of a network interface card
* Chari Aviation Services, Chad, by ICAO airline code
* Christian Social Union (UK), an Anglican social gospel organisation
* Christian Social ...
was directly elected to the
Bundestag
The Bundestag (, "Federal Diet") is the German federal parliament. It is the only federal representative body that is directly elected by the German people. It is comparable to the United States House of Representatives or the House of Comm ...
Ulrike Bahr
Ulrike Renate Martina Bahr (; born 25 April 1964) is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and since 2013 MP in the Bundestag. She belongs to the left party wing of the SPD, the Parliamentary Left ('' Parlamentarische Linke''). ...
Claudia Roth
Claudia Benedikta Roth (born 15 May 1955) is a German politician ( Alliance 90/The Greens). She was one of the two party chairs from 2004 to 2013 and previously served as one of the vice presidents of the ''Bundestag''. She is also currently se ...
for
Bündnis 90/Die Grünen
Alliance 90/The Greens (german: Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, ), often simply referred to as the Greens ( ), is a green political party in Germany. It was formed in 1993 as the merger of The Greens (formed in West Germany in 1980) and Alliance 90 (for ...
.
Climate
Augsburg has an
oceanic climate
An oceanic climate, also known as a marine climate, is the humid temperate climate sub-type in Köppen classification ''Cfb'', typical of west coasts in higher middle latitudes of continents, generally featuring cool summers and mild winters ...
(
Köppen climate classification
The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, nota ...
: ''Cfb'') or, following the 0 °C isotherm, a
humid continental climate
A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freez ...
(''Dfb'').
Main sights
*
Town Hall
In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or a municipal building (in the Philippines), is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses ...
, built in 1620 in the
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ide ...
Perlachturm
The 70-metre-tall Perlachturm is a belltower in front of the church of St. Peter am Perlach in the central district of Augsburg, Germany. It originated as a watchtower in the 10th century. The existing Renaissance structure was built in the 161 ...
, a bell tower built in 989
* Fuggerei, the oldest social housing estate in the world, inhabited since 1523
*
Fuggerhäuser
The Fuggerhäuser (''Fugger houses'') is a complex of houses on the Maximilianstraße in Augsburg, built for the Fugger family of businessmen. It is now owned by the Fugger-Babenhausen branch of the Fugger family who resides at Wellenburg castle ...
(Fugger houses), restored renaissance palatial homes of the Fugger banking family
*Bishop's Residence, built about 1750 in order to replace the older bishop's palace; today the administrative seat of
Swabia
Swabia ; german: Schwaben , colloquially ''Schwabenland'' or ''Ländle''; archaic English also Suabia or Svebia is a cultural, historic and linguistic region in southwestern Germany.
The name is ultimately derived from the medieval Duchy of ...
*
Cathedral
A cathedral is a church that contains the ''cathedra'' () of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral" are usually specific to those Christian denominations ...
, founded in the ninth century
* St. Anne's Church, medieval church building that was originally part of a monastery built in 1321
*St. Mary's
Syriac Orthodox Church
, native_name_lang = syc
, image = St_George_Syriac_orthodox_church_in_Damascus.jpg
, imagewidth = 250
, alt = Cathedral of Saint George
, caption = Cathedral of Saint George, Damascus ...
on the Zusamstraße in Lechhausen, built 1998 by Suryoye ( Assyrians)
*Augsburg Synagogue, one of the few German synagogues to survive the war, now restored and open with a Jewish museum inside
*
Augsburg textile and industry museum
The Augsburg textile and industry museum, known by its acronym tim, is a museum in Augsburg a city in the south-west of Bavaria, Germany. It is situated in the Augsburger Kammgarnspinnerei, a former worsted spinning mill.
The museum is an Ancho ...
-or just ''tim'', organises it displays under headings Mensch-Maschine-Muster-Mode.
*
Schaezlerpalais
The Schaezlerpalais is a baroque palace in Augsburg. The palace extends far back from the street, encompassing dozens of rooms, courtyards and gardens. The gilded mirrored ballroom was built between 1765-1770 and has survives intact. it is widely r ...
, a Rococo mansion (1765) now housing a major art museum
* St. Ulrich and St. Afra—one church is Roman Catholic, the other
Lutheran
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched ...
, the duality being a result of the Peace of Augsburg concluded in 1555 between Catholics and Protestants
*Mozart Haus Augsburg (where composer's father
Leopold Mozart
Johann Georg Leopold Mozart (November 14, 1719 – May 28, 1787) was a German composer, violinist and theorist. He is best known today as the father and teacher of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and for his violin textbook ''Versuch einer gründlichen ...
was born and
Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition r ...
visited it several times)
*
Augsburger Puppenkiste
The Augsburger Puppenkiste (German for: Augsburg Puppetchest) is a marionette theater in Augsburg, Germany.
It is located at the former Heilig-Geist-Spital in the historic center of Augsburg. Since 1948, the "Augsburger Puppenkiste" had been pr ...
, a puppet theatre
*Luther Stiege, museum located in a church, that shows Martin Luthers life and different rooms. (free admission)
* Eiskanal, the world's first artificial
whitewater
Whitewater forms in a rapid context, in particular, when a river's gradient changes enough to generate so much turbulence that air is trapped within the water. This forms an unstable current that froths, making the water appear opaque and ...
course (venue for the whitewater events of the 1972 Munich Olympics)
*
Dorint Hotel Tower
The Hotel Dorint An der Kongresshalle Augsburg is the best-known high-rise building in the German city of Augsburg and visible throughout the city. At 115 m (167 m with the antenna) it is the highest building in the Augsburg area and among the te ...
*Childhood home of
Bertolt Brecht
Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known professionally as Bertolt Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a p ...
*The Augsburg
Botanical Garden
A botanical garden or botanic gardenThe terms ''botanic'' and ''botanical'' and ''garden'' or ''gardens'' are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word ''botanic'' is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens, an ...
s (
Botanischer Garten Augsburg
The Botanischer Garten Augsburg (10 hectares) is a municipal botanical garden located at Dr.-Ziegenspeck-Weg 10, Augsburg, Bavaria, Germany. It is open daily; an admission fee is charged.
Today the garden contains a large Japanese garden, a med ...
Bahnpark Augsburg
The Augsburg Railway Park (''Bahnpark Augsburg'') is a railway museum in Augsburg on part of the former Augsburg locomotive shed owned by the Deutsche Bahn. Following reconstruction work, the park officially reopened on 13 April 2009. In the f ...
home of 29 historic locomotives, blacksmith, historic roundhouse
*3 magnificent renaissance fountains, the Augustus Fountain, Mercury Fountain and Hercules Fountain from the 15th century, build for the 1500th anniversary of city foundation
*Walter Art Museum at the ''Glas Palast'' ("Glas-Palace")
*Roman Museum located in the former Monastery of St. Margaret (closed at the moment due to risk of collapsing). Renovation is taking place and the museum is expected to reopen in 2017.
*Medieval canals, used to run numerous industries, medieval arms production, silver art, sanitation and water pumping
*
Kulturhaus Abraxas Kulturhaus Abraxas is a cultural institution of the city of Augsburg. Here, Abraxas is a backronym for ''Atrium, Bühne, Restaurant, Ateliers, experimentelle Musik in Augsburg an der Sommestraße''.
The Reese Barracks was formerly owned by the US ...
Fuenfgratturm1.JPG, ''Fünfgratturm'' tower
Germany Augsburg Dom-St-Maria Door Handle.jpg, Ring of Mercy on the Dom (Cathedral) St. Maria
Augsburg Synagoge.jpg, Augsburg Synagogue
Augsburg - st ulrich u afra.jpg, St. Ulrich and St. Afra Cathedral
Rechtfertigungslehre St.-Anna Augsburg rectified.jpg, Plaque commemorating the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification at St. Anne's Church
Water Management System
The water systems of Augsburg have been the site of innovations in hydraulic engineering for centuries. Augsburg was built on top of an aquifer fed by the Lech and Wertach rivers, which provided purified groundwater that ran through the city through springs and streams. The canals channeling this water through the city were first mentioned in 1276, and by 1416, waterworks, pumps, and water towers were added to effectively distribute this water. In 1545, Augsburg was one of the first European towns to separate drinking water from water used for industry, effectively preventing water-borne diseases. The pumps and waterwheels also generated power for fountains and food processing, such as a 17th-century butcher's hall that still stands today. In the 19th and 20th centuries, hydroelectic power plants were also installed. These power plants were some of the first in the world to generate electricity from water, and they are still in use today.
On 6 July 2019, the Water Management System of Augsburg was designated as a
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international coope ...
World Heritage Site
A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for ...
.
Urban legends
Goddess Cisa and the Stadtpir
The pagan goddess Cisa has been linked to the civic emblem of Augsburg, known as Stadtpir. Cisa and the Stadtpir came to represent the prosperity of the city. The Stadtpir was stamped on cloth that was approved by the town cloth inspector. Metalworks produced in the city were also stamped with the Stadtpir. The Stadtpir adorns the 17th century
town hall
In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or a municipal building (in the Philippines), is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses ...
.
The Stoinerne Ma
The "Stoinerne Ma" ("Stony Man") is a life-size stone figure on the eastern Augsburg city wall in the area of the so-called "Sweden staircase", which is located in the immediate vicinity of the Galluskirche and St. Stephan convent (on the outside of the city wall). It is probably a one-armed baker with a loaf of bread and a shield. In the area of the feet there is a helically twisted pedestal.
According to the legend, it is the baker "Konrad Hackher" who, during a long siege of the city, baked bread from sawdust and threw it into the ditch clearly visible for the besiegers over the city wall. The impression that Augsburg would still have so much bread that one could throw it over the wall is said to have demoralized the besiegers so much that they fired at him with a crossbow out of anger. A hit struck off his arm, and soon afterwards the siege was broken off. Historically, the event belongs to the Thirty Years' War, more precisely to the siege of Augsburg during the years 1634/35, when Catholic Bavarian troops under Field Marshal von Wahl wanted to recapture the city occupied by the Protestant Swedes. The baker's deed is not reliably proven.
The statue is often visited by walkers strolling along the city wall. As it is said to be a fortunate thing to touch the stone figure's iron nose. This custom is particularly popular with lovers.
=Bei den sieben Kindeln
=
In the wall of the property ''Bei den Sieben Kindeln 3'' ("At the seven infants 3") there is a recessed stone relief from the Roman period. Legend says that the commemorative plaque was commissioned by a
Roman
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
* Rome, the capital city of Italy
* Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lett ...
officer to commemorate the drowning of one of his children (therefore it is said to be "seven" children, although the plaque represents only six: the seventh child is drowned and lies in the coffin). According to current knowledge, the plate once formed the long side of a
Sarcophagus
A sarcophagus (plural sarcophagi or sarcophaguses) is a box-like funeral receptacle for a corpse, most commonly carved in stone, and usually displayed above ground, though it may also be buried. The word ''sarcophagus'' comes from the Gre ...
.
Lazarethe plague houses
The city of Augsburg had two civic plague houses. The two civic plague houses, called ''Lazarethe'', were established when the
black death
The Black Death (also known as the Pestilence, the Great Mortality or the Plague) was a bubonic plague pandemic occurring in Western Eurasia and North Africa from 1346 to 1353. It is the most fatal pandemic recorded in human history, causi ...
first appeared in Augsburg in 1349. Thereafter they were opened whenever a plague epidemic occurred in the city. As soon as a medical practitioner, such as a
barber surgeon
The barber surgeon, one of the most common European medical practitioners of the Middle Ages, was generally charged with caring for soldiers during and after battle. In this era, surgery was seldom conducted by physicians, but instead by barbe ...
, diagnosed the plague the patients were transferred to the plague houses by order of the city council. The transfer to the plague houses was publicly announced, so as to prevent panic and the breakdown of economic life. In the second half of the 18th century, the plague houses were used to treat other diseases, such as
smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by variola virus (often called smallpox virus) which belongs to the genus Orthopoxvirus. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (WHO) c ...
and
scurvy
Scurvy is a deficiency disease, disease resulting from a lack of vitamin C (ascorbic acid). Early symptoms of deficiency include weakness, feeling tired and sore arms and legs. Without treatment, anemia, decreased red blood cells, gum disease, ch ...
Inverness
Inverness (; from the gd, Inbhir Nis , meaning "Mouth of the River Ness"; sco, Innerness) is a city in the Scottish Highlands. It is the administrative centre for The Highland Council and is regarded as the capital of the Highlands. Histor ...
, Scotland, UK (1956)
*
Amagasaki
270px, Amagasaki Castle
270px, Aerial view of Amagasaki city center
270px, Amagasaki Station
is an industrial city located in Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 455,555 in 223812 households, and a population ...
Bourges
Bourges () is a commune in central France on the river Yèvre. It is the capital of the department of Cher, and also was the capital city of the former province of Berry.
History
The name of the commune derives either from the Bituriges, ...
, France (1963)
*
Dayton
Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Da ...
, United States (1964)
*
Liberec
Liberec (; german: Reichenberg ) is a city in the Czech Republic. It has about 103,000 inhabitants and it is the fifth-largest city in the country. It lies on the Lusatian Neisse, in a basin surrounded by mountains. The city centre is well prese ...
, Czech Republic (2001)
*
Jinan
Jinan (), Postal Map Romanization, alternately romanization of Chinese, romanized as Tsinan, is the Capital (political), capital of Shandong province in East China, Eastern China. With a population of 9.2 million, it is the second-largest city i ...
, China (2004)
*
Délegyháza
Délegyháza is a village in Pest county, Budapest metropolitan area, Hungary. It has a population of 2,930 (2007).
Since 2008 the village is the site of a Trail of the Whispering Giants sculpture, the first of Peter Wolf Toth
Peter Wolf To ...
, Hungary (2022)
Transport
Roads
The main road link is
autobahn
The (; German plural ) is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official German term is (abbreviated ''BAB''), which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word is 'Federal Auto(mobile) Track' ...
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...
and
Stuttgart
Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the Sw ...
.
Public transport
Public transport is very well catered for. It is controlled by the
Augsburger Verkehrs- und Tarifverbund
The ''Augsburger Verkehrs- und Tarifverbund'' (German for Augsburg Transport and Tariff Association) or AVV is the transit authority of the city of Augsburg, located in Swabia, Bavaria, Germany. Its jurisdiction covers the city and its surround ...
(Augsburg transport and tariff association, AVV) extended over central Swabia. There are seven rail Regionalbahn lines, five
tram
A tram (called a streetcar or trolley in North America) is a rail vehicle that travels on tramway tracks on public urban streets; some include segments on segregated right-of-way. The tramlines or networks operated as public transport ...
lines, 27 city bus lines and six night bus lines, as well as several taxi companies.
The Augsburg tramway network is now 35.5 km-long after the opening of new lines to the
university
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...
in 1996, the northern city boundary in 2001 and to the Klinikum Augsburg (Augsburg hospital) in 2002. Tram line 6, which runs 5.2 km from Friedberg West to Hauptbahnhof (Central Station), opened in December 2010.
Intercity bus
There is one station for intercity bus services in Augsburg: Augsburg Nord, located in the north of the city.
Railway
Augsburg has seven stations, the
Central Station
Central stations or central railway stations emerged in the second half of the nineteenth century as railway stations that had initially been built on the edge of city centres were enveloped by urban expansion and became an integral part of the ...
Oberhausen
Oberhausen (, ) is a city on the river Emscher in the Ruhr Area, Germany, located between Duisburg and Essen ( ). The city hosts the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen and its Gasometer Oberhausen is an anchor point of the European Rout ...
, Haunstetterstraße, Morellstraße, Messe and Inningen. The Central Station, built from 1843 to 1846, is Germany's oldest main station in a large city still providing services in the original building. It is currently being modernized and an underground tram station is built underneath it. Hauptbahnhof is on the Munich–Augsburg and Ulm–Augsburg lines and is connected by ICE and IC services to
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...
,
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitu ...
,
Dortmund
Dortmund (; Westphalian nds, Düörpm ; la, Tremonia) is the third-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia after Cologne and Düsseldorf, and the eighth-largest city of Germany, with a population of 588,250 inhabitants as of 2021. It is the la ...
,
Frankfurt
Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , " Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on it ...
,
Hamburg
Hamburg (, ; nds, label=Hamburg German, Low Saxon, Hamborg ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg (german: Freie und Hansestadt Hamburg; nds, label=Low Saxon, Friee un Hansestadt Hamborg),. is the List of cities in Germany by popul ...
and
Stuttgart
Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the Sw ...
. As of December 2007, the French
TGV
The TGV (french: Train à Grande Vitesse, "high-speed train"; previously french: TurboTrain à Grande Vitesse, label=none) is France's intercity high-speed rail service, operated by SNCF. SNCF worked on a high-speed rail network from 1966 to 19 ...
connected Augsburg with a direct High Speed Connection to
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...
. In addition EC and night train services connect to
Amsterdam
Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...
,
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...
and
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
and connections will be substantially improved by the creation of the planned Magistrale for Europe.
The AVV operates seven Regionalbahn lines from the main station to:
*
Mammendorf
Mammendorf is a municipality in Bavaria, Germany. It is located halfway between Munich and Augsburg.
Location
Mammendorf is part of the district of Fürstenfeldbruck, Upper Bavaria and lies about 6 kilometres northwest of the city of Fürstenfe ...
*
Schmiechen
Schmiechen is a municipality in the district of Aichach-Friedberg in Bavaria
Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the ...
(direction to
Ammersee
Ammersee (English: Lake Ammer) is a Zungenbecken lake in Upper Bavaria, Germany, southwest of Munich between the towns of Herrsching and Dießen am Ammersee. With a surface area of approximately , it is the sixth largest lake in Germany. The la ...
)
*
Aichach
Aichach (; Central Bavarian: ''Oacha'') is a town in Germany, located in the Bundesland of Bavaria and situated just northeast of Augsburg. It is the capital of the district of Aichach-Friedberg. The municipality of Aichach counts some 20,000 inh ...
Schwabmünchen
Schwabmünchen ( Swabian: ''Mingkchinga'' Schwabmünchen) is a town in Bavaria in the administrative region of Swabia south of Augsburg in the Augsburg district.
Geography
Location
Schwabmünchen lies about 20 km south of Augsburg betwee ...
* Klosterlechfeld
Starting in 2008, the regional services are planned to be altered to
S-Bahn
The S-Bahn is the name of hybrid urban-suburban rail systems serving a metropolitan region in German-speaking countries. Some of the larger S-Bahn systems provide service similar to rapid transit systems, while smaller ones often resemble c ...
frequencies and developed long term as integrated into the Augsburg S-Bahn.
Air transport
Until 2005 Augsburg was served by nearby
Augsburg Airport
Augsburg Airport is a regional airport in Affing, northeast of the city of Augsburg, the third largest city in the German state of Bavaria. It is used for business and general aviation with very little passenger airline traffic.
History
Th ...
(AGB). In that year all air passenger transport was relocated to
Munich Airport
Munich International Airport- Franz Josef Strauß (german: link=no, Flughafen München) is an international airport serving Munich and Upper Bavaria. It is the second-busiest airport in Germany in terms of passenger traffic after Frankfurt A ...
. Since then, the airport is used almost entirely by business airplanes.
Economy
Augsburg is a vibrant industrial city. Many global market leaders namely
MAN
A man is an adult male human. Prior to adulthood, a male human is referred to as a boy (a male child or adolescent). Like most other male mammals, a man's genome usually inherits an X chromosome from the mother and a Y chromo ...
,
EADS
Airbus SE (; ; ; ) is a European multinational aerospace corporation. Airbus designs, manufactures and sells civil and military aerospace products worldwide and manufactures aircraft throughout the world. The company has three divisions: '' ...
or
KUKA
KUKA is a German manufacturer of industrial robots and systems for factory automation. It has been predominantly owned by the Chinese company Midea Group since 2016.
The KUKA Robotics Corporation has 25 subsidiaries, mostly sales and servi ...
produce high technology products like printing systems, large diesel engines,
industrial robots
An industrial robot is a robot system used for manufacturing. Industrial robots are automated, programmable and capable of movement on three or more axes.
Typical applications of robots include welding, painting, assembly, disassembly, pic ...
or components for the
Airbus A380
The Airbus A380 is a large wide-body airliner that was developed and produced by Airbus. It is the world's largest passenger airliner and only full-length double-deck jet airliner.
Airbus studies started in 1988, and the project was annou ...
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...
, Augsburg is considered the high-tech centre for Information and Communication in Bavaria and takes advantage of its lower
operating cost
Operating costs or operational costs, are the expenses which are related to the operation of a business, or to the operation of a device, component, piece of equipment or facility. They are the cost of resources used by an organization just to main ...
s, yet close proximity to Munich and potential customers. In 2018 the Bavarian State Government recognized this fact and promoted Augsburg to ''Metropole''.
Major companies
*Boewe Systec
*
Faurecia
Faurecia SE is a French global automotive supplier headquartered in Nanterre, in the western suburbs of Paris. In 2018 it was the 9th largest international automotive parts manufacturer in the world and #1 for vehicle interiors and emission contr ...
*
Fujitsu Technology Solutions
Fujitsu Technology Solutions is a European information technology vendor with a presence in markets in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, as well as India. A subsidiary of Fujitsu Limited headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, FTS was founded in 2009 after ...
*
KUKA
KUKA is a German manufacturer of industrial robots and systems for factory automation. It has been predominantly owned by the Chinese company Midea Group since 2016.
The KUKA Robotics Corporation has 25 subsidiaries, mostly sales and servi ...
Robotics / Systems
*
MAN
A man is an adult male human. Prior to adulthood, a male human is referred to as a boy (a male child or adolescent). Like most other male mammals, a man's genome usually inherits an X chromosome from the mother and a Y chromo ...
Osram
Osram Licht AG is a German company that makes electric lights, headquartered in Munich and Premstätten (Austria). Osram positions itself as a high-tech photonics company that is increasingly focusing on sensor technology, visualization and t ...
*
Premium AEROTEC
Premium AEROTEC is a German aerospace manufacturing business, headquartered in Augsburg in Germany. It is a subsidiary of Airbus.
The company was created in September 2008 as a spin off from the multinational aerospace group EADS, which subse ...
*RENK AG (offshoot of
MAN SE
MAN SE (abbreviation of ''Maschinenfabrik Augsburg-Nürnberg'', ) was a manufacturing and engineering company based in Munich, Germany. Its primary output was commercial vehicles and diesel engines through its MAN Truck & Bus and MAN Latin Ame ...
)
*
Siemens
Siemens AG ( ) is a German multinational conglomerate corporation and the largest industrial manufacturing company in Europe headquartered in Munich with branch offices abroad.
The principal divisions of the corporation are ''Industry'', ''E ...
Amazon
Amazon most often refers to:
* Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology
* Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin
* Amazon River, in South America
* Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...
Augsburg is home to the following universities and colleges:
*
University of Augsburg
The University of Augsburg (german: Universität Augsburg) is a university located in the Universitätsviertel section of Augsburg, Germany. It was founded in 1970 and is organized in 8 Faculties.
The University of Augsburg is a relatively you ...
, founded in 1970
* Hochschule Augsburg (University of Applied Sciences, formerly Fachhochschule Augsburg)
Media
The local newspaper is the ''
Augsburger Allgemeine
The ''Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung'' is a major German regional daily newspaper published since 1945.
History
From 1807 to 1882, another paper named ''Allgemeine Zeitung'' was published in Augsburg but it is not connected to the later newspape ...
Erhard Ratdolt
Erhard Ratdolt (1442–1528) was an early German printer from Augsburg. He was active as a printer in Venice from 1476 to 1486, and afterwards in Augsburg. From 1475 to 1478 he was in partnership with two other German printers.
The first book ...
(1442–1528), Printer, famous for having produced the first known printers type specimen book
* Jakob Fugger (1459–1525), Noted banker and financial broker. An area within the city, called the Fuggerei was set aside for the poor and needy. Founded in 1519
* Hans Holbein the Elder (1460–1524), a pioneer in the transformation of German art from the
Gothic
Gothic or Gothics may refer to:
People and languages
*Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes
**Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths
**Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...
to the
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ide ...
style
*
Hans Holbein the Younger
Hans Holbein the Younger ( , ; german: Hans Holbein der Jüngere; – between 7 October and 29 November 1543) was a German-Swiss painter and printmaker who worked in a Northern Renaissance style, and is considered one of the greatest por ...
(1497–1543), portrait and religious painter
*
Matthäus Schwarz
Matthäus Schwarz (19 February 1497 – c.1574) was a German accountant, best known for compiling his ''Klaidungsbüchlein'' or ''Trachtenbuch'' (usually translated as "Book of Clothes"), a book cataloguing the clothing that he wore between 1520 ...
(1497–c. 1574), accountant and author
*
Paulus Hector Mair
Paulus Hector Mair (1517–1579) was a German civil servant fencing master from Augsburg. He collected Fechtbücher and undertook to compile all knowledge of the art of fencing in a compendium surpassing all earlier books. For this, he engaged the ...
(1517–1579), martial artist
*
Elias Holl
Elias Holl (28 February 1573 in Augsburg – 6 January 1646 in Augsburg)
was the most important architect of late German Renaissance architecture.
Life
Elias Holl was born in Augsburg, Werbhausgasse 2. He was descended from a master-builder- ...
(1573–1646), architect
*
Philipp Hainhofer
Philipp Hainhofer (21 July 1578 – 1647) was a merchant, banker, diplomat and art collector in Augsburg. He is remembered, among other things, for the curiosity cabinets (''Kunstschränke'') which he created with the assistance of a large num ...
(1578–1647), merchant, banker, diplomat and art collector
* Julius Schiller (1580–1627), lawyer and astronomer
*
Johann Georg Wirsung
Johann Georg Wirsung (July 3, 1589 Augsburg – August 22, 1643 Padua) was a German anatomist who was a long-time prosector in Padua.
He is remembered for the discovery of the pancreatic duct ("duct of Wirsung") during the dissection of a ...
(1589–1643), anatomist
*
Andreas Christoph Graf Andreas Christoph Graf (1701 in Augsburg – 1776 in Augsburg) was a German teacher, poet and writer of the etiquette book "The polite student" " Der höfliche Schüler" (1745).
Life
Magister Andreas Christoph Graf was a teacher
A teach ...
(1701–1776), German teacher, author and poet
*
Johann Jakob Haid
Johann Jacob Haid or Johann Jakob Haid (1704–1767) was a German engraver who worked in Augsburg.
Life and works
Haid came from a German family of artists and engravers and was known for large mezzotint portraits.
He worked in England, and it ...
(1704–1767), engraver
*
Leopold Mozart
Johann Georg Leopold Mozart (November 14, 1719 – May 28, 1787) was a German composer, violinist and theorist. He is best known today as the father and teacher of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and for his violin textbook ''Versuch einer gründlichen ...
(1719–1787), violinist-composer and father of
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition r ...
* Christoph Christian Sturm (1740–1786), preacher and author
* Eduard Bayer (1822–1908), composer and classical guitarist
* Rudolf Diesel (1858–1913), inventor of the diesel engine
* Albert Rehm (1871–1949), philologist who first understood the significance of the
Antikythera mechanism
The Antikythera mechanism ( ) is an Ancient Greek hand-powered orrery, described as the oldest example of an analogue computer used to predict astronomical positions and eclipses decades in advance. It could also be used to track the four-y ...
*
Hans von Euler-Chelpin
Hans Karl August Simon von Euler-Chelpin (15 February 1873 – 6 November 1964) was a German-born Swedish biochemist. He won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1929 with Arthur Harden for their investigations on the fermentation of sugar and enzy ...
(1873–1964), co-recipient of 1929
Nobel Prize in Chemistry
)
, image = Nobel Prize.png
, alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then "M ...
*
Karl Haberstock
Karl Haberstock (born 19 June 1878 in Augsburg; died 6 September 1956 in Munich) was a Berlin art dealer who trafficked in Nazi-looted art. Haberstock's name appears 60 times in the Art Looting Investigation Unit (ALIU) Reports 1945–1946 and ...
(1878–1956), Art dealer to the Nazis
*
Artur Lauinger
Artur Lauinger (23 August 1879, in Augsburg – 15 October 1961, in Frankfurt am Main) was a German business journalist of Jewish descent.,
Life
Artur Lauinger was the second son of the Jewish businessman Heinrich Lauinger. After earning the ...
(1879–1961), German journalist
*
Julius Streicher
Julius Streicher (12 February 1885 – 16 October 1946) was a member of the Nazi Party, the '' Gauleiter'' (regional leader) of Franconia and a member of the '' Reichstag'', the national legislature. He was the founder and publisher of the vir ...
(1885–1946), prominent Nazi prior to World War II, founder and publisher of anti-Semitic ''
Der Stürmer
''Der Stürmer'' (, literally "The Stormer / Attacker / Striker") was a weekly German tabloid-format newspaper published from 1923 to the end of the Second World War by Julius Streicher, the '' Gauleiter'' of Franconia, with brief suspensions ...
'' newspaper, executed for war crimes
*
Julius Schaxel
Julius Christoph Ehregott Schaxel (March 24, 1887 – July 15, 1943) was a German biologist who was a native of Augsburg.
He initially studied biology, philosophy and psychology at Jena under Ernst Haeckel (1834–1919), then continued his educat ...
(1887–1943), biologist
* Hans Loritz (1895–1946), Nazi SS concentration camp commandant
*
Bertolt Brecht
Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known professionally as Bertolt Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a p ...
(1898–1956), writer and theater director
*
August Schmidhuber
August Schmidhuber (8 May 1901 – 19 February 1947) was an SS-Brigadeführer who commanded two Waffen-SS divisions in occupied Yugoslavia and Albania during the latter stages of World War II who was executed by the post-war Yugoslav auth ...
(1901–1947), Nazi SS officer executed for war crimes
* Wilhelm Gerstenmeier (1908–1944), SS concentration camp officer executed for war crimes
*
Josef Priller
Josef "Pips" Priller (; 27 July 1915 – 20 May 1961) was a German military aviator and wing commander in the Luftwaffe during World War II. As a fighter ace, he was credited with 101 enemy aircraft shot down in 307 combat missions. All of his ...
(1915–1961),
Luftwaffe
The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German '' Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the '' Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabt ...
ace
*
Mietek Pemper
Mieczysław "Mietek" Pemper (24 March 1920 – 7 June 2011) was a Polish-born German Holocaust survivor. Pemper helped compile and type Oskar Schindler's now-famous list, which saved 1,200 people from being killed in the Holocaust during World Wa ...
(1920–2011), Polish-born Jew compiled and typed
Oskar Schindler
Oskar Schindler (; 28 April 1908 – 9 October 1974) was a German industrialist, humanitarian and a member of the Nazi Party who is credited with saving the lives of 1,200 Jews during the Holocaust by employing them in his enamelware and ...
's list, which saved 1,200 Jewish prisoners from the Holocaust.
* Günther Schneider-Siemssen (1926–2015), scenic designer
*
Werner Haas
Werner Haas (; 30 May 1927 – 13 November 1956) was a Grand Prix motorcycle road racer from Germany. He became Germany's first motorcycle world champion when he won the 1953
Events
January
* January 6 – The Asian Socialist ...
(1927–1956), Grand Prix motorcycle road racer
* Ulrich Biesinger (1933–2011), former German footballer, part of the team that won the
1954 FIFA World Cup
The 1954 FIFA World Cup was the fifth edition of the FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football tournament for senior men's national teams of the nations affiliated to FIFA. It was held in Switzerland from 16 June to 4 July. Switzer ...
*
Helmut Haller
Helmut Haller (; 21 July 1939 – 11 October 2012) was a German footballer who played as a forward. At international level, he represented West Germany at three World Cups. At club level, he played in both Germany and Italy, and won Italian l ...
(1939–2012),
footballer
A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugb ...
who represented
West Germany
West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 ...
Hans Henning Atrott
Hans Henning Atrott, also Hans Atrott, (born 12 January 1944 in Memel, East Prussia now Klaipéda, Lithuania - 2018) was notable for his commitment in the German right-to-die movement.
Biography
Descent and Childhood
His father was Protes ...
(born 1944), German author and theorist
*
Wolf Blitzer
Wolf Isaac Blitzer (born March 22, 1948) is an American journalist, television news anchor, and author who has been a CNN reporter since 1990, and who currently serves as one of the principal anchors at the network. He is the host of ''The Situa ...
(born 1948), American journalist and CNN reporter
*
Bernhard Langer
Bernhard Langer (; born 27 August 1957) is a German professional golfer. He is a two-time Masters champion and was one of the world's leading golfers throughout the 1980s and 1990s. In 1986, he became the sport's first official number one ran ...
(born 1957), professional golfer
* Günther K.H. Zupanc (born 1958), neurobiologist, researcher, university teacher, book author, journal editor, and educational reformer
* Bernd Schuster (born 1959),
football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ...
coach and former player
*
Armin Veh
Armin Veh (; born 1 February 1961) is a German football manager and former player who last managed Eintracht Frankfurt. He won the German championship with Bundesliga team VfB Stuttgart in 2007. Veh and his team also had the chance to win "the ...
(born 1961),
football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ...
coach
* Sheryl Lee (born 1967), actress, poet, and activist
*
Alexander Wesselsky
Alexander "Alexx" Wesselsky (born 18 November 1968) is a German singer. He is the lead vocalist of Neue Deutsche Härte band Eisbrecher and previously performed with Megaherz from 1993 to 2003.
Biography
In 1985, Dale Arden became Wesselsky' ...
(born 1968), lead singer of the German band
Eisbrecher
Eisbrecher (; German for " icebreaker") are a German Neue Deutsche Härte band that consists primarily of Alexander Wesselsky (vocals) and Noel Pix (lead guitar/ programming), with live support from Jürgen Plangger (guitar), Rupert Keplinger ...
*
Florian Hecker
Florian Hecker was born in 1975 in Augsburg, Germany. He was raised in Kissing, Germany and studied Computational Linguistics and Psycholinguistics at Ludwig Maximilian Universität, Munich and Fine Arts at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste, Vi ...
(born 1975), experimental electronic music composer
*
Marisa Olson
Marisa Olson is an artist, writer, curator, and former punk singer. In 2004 she auditioned for popular American television show American Idol as an artistic project. Over the course of three months of daily "training exercises," it is revealed th ...
(born 1977), artist
*
Benny Greb
Benny Greb (born 13 June 1980 in Augsburg, West Germany) is a German drummer, singer and clinician. He started playing the drums at age six and began taking lessons at age twelve. He plays a large variety of music and can be seen playing rock wit ...
(born 1980), solo drum artist
*
Andreas Bourani
Andreas Bourani (formerly Stiegelmair; 2 November 1983) is a German singer-songwriter.
Career
Bourani was born to Egyptian parents and adopted as an infant by a German family in Augsburg, in the southwest of Bavaria. As a youth, he attended hi ...
Bianca Voitek
Bianca Voitek (born 15 November 1985) is a German female bodybuilder
Female bodybuilding is the female component of competitive bodybuilding. It began in the late 1970s, when women began to take part in bodybuilding competitions.Maximilian Hornung (born 1986), cellist
*
Stefan Bradl
Stefan Bradl (born 29 November 1989) is a German professional motorcycle racer. Bradl is best known for winning the Moto2 World Champion. Then he made the move to MotoGP in 2012 with LCR Honda. While in MotoGP, Bradl is best known for his perfo ...
(born 1989), motorcycle racer
* Johnny Cecotto Jr. (born 1989), racing driver
*
Nico Sturm
Nico Sturm (born May 3, 1995) is a German professional ice hockey forward for the San Jose Sharks of the National Hockey League (NHL). Sturm won the Stanley Cup with the Colorado Avalanche in 2022.
Playing career Amateur
Sturm played as a yout ...
(born 1995), ice hockey player
Sports
FC Augsburg
Fußball-Club Augsburg 1907 e. V., commonly known as FC Augsburg () or Augsburg, is a German football club based in Augsburg, Bavaria. FC Augsburg play in the Bundesliga, the top tier of the German football league system. The team was founded ...
is a football team based in Augsburg and plays in the
WWK ARENA
Augsburg Arena, currently known commercially as the WWK Arena (; officially stylised as WWK ARENA) is a football stadium in Augsburg, Bavaria, Germany. It is used mostly for football matches and hosts the home matches of FC Augsburg.
The stadiu ...
to the south of the city centre. FC Augsburg secured promotion to
Bundesliga
The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footb ...
in 2011 and have remained there ever since, qualifying for the Europa League for the first time in 2015 and securing mid-table finishes across the last few seasons. The club, nicknamed the Fuggerstädter or simply as FCA, reached the last 32 in the 2015-16 Europa League with a 1-0 aggregate defeat to
Liverpool
Liverpool is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the List of English districts by population, 10th largest English district by population and its E ...
. The
WWK ARENA
Augsburg Arena, currently known commercially as the WWK Arena (; officially stylised as WWK ARENA) is a football stadium in Augsburg, Bavaria, Germany. It is used mostly for football matches and hosts the home matches of FC Augsburg.
The stadiu ...
, nicknamed the "Anfield of the B17 Highway" following the Liverpool UEL match, opened in July 2009 and also hosted games of the
2011 FIFA Women's World Cup
The 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup was the sixth FIFA Women's World Cup competition, the world championship for women's national association football teams. It was held from 26 June to 17 July 2011 in Germany, which won the right to host the event ...
. The 30,660 capacity arena is easily accessible from the city centre or the adjacent B17 dual carriageway.
The city is home to a
DEL
Del, or nabla, is an operator used in mathematics (particularly in vector calculus) as a vector differential operator, usually represented by the nabla symbol ∇. When applied to a function defined on a one-dimensional domain, it denotes ...
(first-division) ice hockey team, the
Augsburger Panther
The Augsburger Panther are a professional ice hockey team in the Deutsche Eishockey Liga. The team is based in Augsburg, Bavaria, Germany. They play their home games at the Curt Frenzel Stadion.
Founded in 1878, the team's name was Augsburger ...
. The original club, AEV, was formed in 1878, the oldest German ice sport club and regularly draws around 4000 spectators, quite reasonable for German ice hockey. Home games are played at the Curt Frenzel Stadion: a recently rebuilt (2012–2013) indoor rink and modern stadium and the club reached the 2018/19 DEL semi finals, eventually losing in the winner-takes-all game 7 to EHC Red Bull München (4-3 series defeat). Consequently, the Panthers qualified for the Champions Hockey League. Augsburg is also home to one of the most traditional German Baseball clubs, the Augsburg Gators and 2 American Football Clubs, the Raptors and Augsburg Storm, and in nearby
Königsbrunn
Königsbrunn ( Swabian: ''Kenigsbrunn'') is the largest town in the district of Augsburg, in Bavaria, Germany. It is situated on the left bank of the Lech, approx. 10 km south of Augsburg.
History
Königsbrunn is one of the youngest sett ...
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...
, a Lech dam protective diversionary canal for river ice was converted into the world's first
artificial whitewater
An artificial whitewater course (AWWC) is a site for whitewater canoeing, whitewater kayaking, whitewater racing, whitewater rafting, playboating and slalom canoeing with artificially generated rapids.
Course types
Main types of course:
Fl ...
slalom course: the Eiskanal and remains a world-class venue for whitewater competition and served as prototype for two dozen similar foreign courses.
Local city nicknames
While commonly called ''Fuggerstadt'' (Fuggers' city) due to the Fuggers residing there, within Swabia it is also often referred to as ''Datschiburg'': which originated sometime in the 19th century refers to Augsburg's favorite sweet: the ''Datschi'' made from fruit, preferably prunes, and thin cake dough. The ''Datschiburger Kickers'' charity football team (founded in 1965) reflects this in its choice of team name.Augsburger Stadtlexikon – ''Datschiburger Kickers'' accessed: 18 November 2008
Among younger people, the city is commonly called "Aux" for short.
See also
*
Augsburg University
Augsburg University is a private university in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. It was founded in 1869 as a Norwegian-American Lutheran seminary known as Augsburg Seminarium. Today, the ...
, a private
Lutheran
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched ...
College in Minneapolis, Minnesota (USA) that takes its name from the
Augsburg Confession
The Augsburg Confession, also known as the Augustan Confession or the Augustana from its Latin name, ''Confessio Augustana'', is the primary confession of faith of the Lutheran Church and one of the most important documents of the Protestant Re ...
*
League of Augsburg
The Grand Alliance was the anti-French coalition formed on 20 December 1689 between the Dutch Republic, England and the Holy Roman Empire. It was signed by the two leading opponents of France: William III, Stadtholder of the Dutch Republic and ( ...
*
List of civic divisions of Augsburg
This is a list of civic divisions of Augsburg, Bavaria, Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most popul ...
*
List of mayors of Augsburg
image:DEU Augsburg COA.svg, thumb
This is a list of holders of the office of mayor of the German city of Augsburg.
For simplicity they are all called mayors, although the title varied over the centuries.
On the head of the city Augsburg as chair ...
*''Die Chroniken der schwäbischen Städte, Augsburg'', (Leipzig, 1865–1896).
*Werner, ''Geschichte der Stadt Augsburg'', (Augsburg, 1900).
*Lewis, "The Roman Antiquities of Augsburg and Ratisbon", in volume xlviii, ''Archæological Journal'', (London, 1891).
*Michael Schulze, ''Augsburg in one day. A city tour'' Lehmstedt Verlag, Leipzig 2015, .