Lichtenfels is a

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than city, cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares ...

in the

Upper Franconia Upper Franconia (german: Oberfranken) is a '' Regierungsbezirk'' (administrative 'Regierungs''region 'bezirk'' of the state of Bavaria, southern Germany. It forms part of the historically significant region of Franconia, the others being Middle ...

n region of

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 ...

, Germany, the administrative seat of Lichtenfels district. It is chiefly known as the German "

Basket A basket is a container that is traditionally constructed from stiff fibers and can be made from a range of materials, including wood splints, runners, and cane. While most baskets are made from plant materials, other materials such as horsehai ...

City".

Geography

It is situated on the upper course of the river

Main Main may refer to: Geography *Main River (disambiguation) **Most commonly the Main (river) in Germany * Main, Iran, a village in Fars Province *"Spanish Main", the Caribbean coasts of mainland Spanish territories in the 16th and 17th centuries * ...

, about southeast of

Coburg Coburg () is a town located on the Itz river in the Upper Franconia region of Bavaria, Germany. Long part of one of the Thuringian states of the Wettin line, it joined Bavaria by popular vote only in 1920. Until the revolution of 1918, it ...

, and northeast of

Bamberg Bamberg (, , ; East Franconian: ''Bambärch'') is a town in Upper Franconia, Germany, on the river Regnitz close to its confluence with the river Main. The town dates back to the 9th century, when its name was derived from the nearby ' castl ...

. The hilly landscape is called ''Gottesgarten am Obermain'' ("God's garden on the upper Main"), referring to the Basilica of the Fourteen Holy Helpers and

Banz Abbey Banz Abbey (german: Kloster Banz), now known as Banz Castle (german: Schloss Banz), is a former Benedictine monastery, since 1978 a part of the town of Bad Staffelstein north of Bamberg, Bavaria, southern Germany. History The abbey was found ...

. The Maintal (valley of the Main) goes from East to West. The most important cities of the district are

Burgkunstadt Burgkunstadt is a town in the district of Lichtenfels, in northern Bavaria, Germany. It is situated on the right bank of the Main, 15 km west of Kulmbach, and 24 km southeast of Coburg. History The earliest archeological evidence of ...

Bad Staffelstein Bad Staffelstein is a small town in the Bavarian Administrative Region of Upper Franconia in Germany. It has around 10,000 inhabitants. Bad Staffelstein is known for several landmarks, such as the Basilica of the Vierzehnheiligen designed by B ...

and the district city of Lichtenfels. The Rodach river, a tributary of the Main, runs through the area and reaches its greatest width in the northern part between Hochstadt am Main and Lichtenfels. The district of Lichtenfels lies in the western part of the government region (''Regierungsbezirk'') of

Oberfranken Upper Franconia (german: Oberfranken) is a '' Regierungsbezirk'' (administrative 'Regierungs''region 'bezirk'' of the state of Bavaria, southern Germany. It forms part of the historically significant region of Franconia, the others being Middle ...

(Upper Franconia). It is surrounded by (from the north and clockwise) the districts of

Kronach Kronach ( East Franconian: ''Gronich'') is a town in Upper Franconia, Germany, located in the Frankenwald area. It is the capital of the district Kronach. Kronach is the birthplace of Lucas Cranach the Elder and Maximilian von Welsch, as well ...

Kulmbach Kulmbach () is the capital of the district of Kulmbach in Bavaria in Germany. The town is famous for Plassenburg Castle, which houses the largest tin soldier museum in the world, and for its sausages, or ''Bratwürste''. Geography Location K ...

, Bayreuth and

. The southern bank of the Main stretches up to the mountain range of the

Franconian Jura The Franconian Jura ( , , or ) is an upland in Franconia, Bavaria, Germany. Located between two rivers, the Danube in the south and the Main in the north, its peaks reach elevations of up to and it has an area of some 7053.8 km2.Emil Meyne ...

( Fränkische Alb) beneath the

Staffelberg The Staffelberg is a hill in Bavaria, Germany. It is part of the Franconian Switzerland and one of the most important landmarks in Franconia. First settlements date from the Neolithic. Romans, Celts and Franconians followed. During the La Tèn ...

close to

. The northern bank of the Main stretches up to the Itz-Baunach Highlands.

Administrative division

The town is divided into several districts: Buch am Forst, Degendorf, Eichig, Gnellenroth, Hammer, Isling, Klosterlangheim, Kösten, Köttel, Krappenroth, Lahm, Mistelfeld, Mönchkröttendorf, Oberlangheim, Oberwallenstadt, Reundorf, Roth, Rothmannsthal, Schney, Schönsreuth, Seehof, Seubelsdorf, Stetten, Stöcken, Tiefenroth, Trieb, Unterwallenstadt und Weingarten.

History

Lichtenfels was first mentioned in 1142 and chartered in 1231. That was titled and conferred from

Otto III, Count Palatine of Burgundy Otto is a masculine German given name and a surname. It originates as an Old High German short form (variants ''Audo'', ''Odo'', ''Udo'') of Germanic names beginning in ''aud-'', an element meaning "wealth, prosperity". The name is recorded fro ...

. After the expiration of the Meranians (Meranier) in 1248 Lichtenfels became part of the

Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg The Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg (german: Hochstift Bamberg) was an ecclesiastical State of the Holy Roman Empire. It goes back to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bamberg established at the 1007 synod in Frankfurt, at the behest of King Henry II ...

(Hochstift Bamberg). With those and with the

Secularization In sociology, secularization (or secularisation) is the transformation of a society from close identification with religious values and institutions toward non-religious values and secular institutions. The ''secularization thesis'' expresses t ...

in 1802 incorporate to the

Prince-elector The prince-electors (german: Kurfürst pl. , cz, Kurfiřt, la, Princeps Elector), or electors for short, were the members of the electoral college that elected the Holy Roman Emperor, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. From the 13th century ...

ate ( Kurfürstentum) and later 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 E ...

(Königreich Bayern). The Lichtenfelser are also called, in a sneering kind of way, the scoopers of the pool (Tümpelschöpfer). This name they obtained from 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 battl ...

(1618–1648), from attempting to retrieve hidden sunken treasures in a pond, which they could not empty out due to rapidly running groundwater.

Economy

Owing to the success of numerous local middle class enterprises, the town of 20,000 has an above average occupational quota. The backbone of the local economy is formed by businesses in various industry sectors such as manufacturing, with an upholstery industry and its suppliers as well as

wood processing Wood processing is an engineering discipline in the wood industry comprising the production of forest products, such as pulp and paper, construction materials, and tall oil. Paper engineering is a subfield of wood processing. The major wood ...

and the production of foamed material. Other businesses include machine and tool fabrication, laser technology and one international cargo carrier.

Basket making

Lichtenfels became a centre of basket making in the middle of the 19th century. The basket makers in the surrounding upper Maintal area brought their products to trade in Lichtenfels, which was and is the biggest retail market. The leading entrepreneur was the basket dealer Joseph Crinkly. Since 1904, there has been a technical basket college, and as of 1912 there was also a braiding course for women. Those fashioned and very frequent

outwork An outwork is a minor fortification built or established outside the principal fortification limits, detached or semidetached. Outworks such as ravelins, lunettes (demilunes), flèches and caponiers to shield bastions and fortification curtai ...

baskets came from the whole family. After the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fig ...

Lichtenfels became known as the seat of the German wicker or basket-making industry. The period saw the gradual extinction of basket making in Germany. After 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 World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

Lichtenfels was the main remaining basket dealer and today as an exclusive exporter of the braiding manufactures. Lichtenfels is the basket-making capital of Germany and has the only college which still teaches the old craft skills. Each year at the end of September the Korbmarkt (Basket Market) is held when the town is filled with stalls selling baskets from many countries and one can watch many craftspeople at work. On the Market Place in front of the town hall there is the World's largest gift basket.

Transport

Road

Coburg can be reached by car via B 173 Lichtenfels- Hof-

Dresden Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label=Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth ...

or motorway A 73

Suhl Suhl () is a city in Thuringia, Germany, located SW of Erfurt, NE of Würzburg and N of Nuremberg. With its 37,000 inhabitants, it is the smallest of the six urban districts within Thuringia. Together with its northern neighbour-town Zella- ...

-Lichtenfels-Nuremberg.

Railways

Lichtenfels station is on the Eisenach–Lichtenfels and Bamberg-Hof main lines. The Franconian Forest Railway turns off from Bamberg-Hof railway near Lichtenfels. It is a regional rail hub and a former

ICE Ice is water frozen into a solid state, typically forming at or below temperatures of 0 degrees Celsius or Depending on the presence of impurities such as particles of soil or bubbles of air, it can appear transparent or a more or less opaq ...

stop.

Notable people

* Thomas Dehler (1897–1967), politician ( DDP, FDP), Federal Minister of Justice * Niklas Dorsch (born 1998), footballer *

Heinrich Faber Heinrich Faber (before 1500 – 26 February 1552) was a German music theorist, composer, and Kantor. Born in Lichtenfels, Bavaria, he was employed as a singer by Christian II of Denmark in Copenhagen, from 1515 to 1524. He later studied in ...

(c. 1490–1552), pedagogue and music theorist *

Reinhard Hütter Reinhard Hütter (born 1 November 1958 in Lichtenfels, Bavaria) is a Christian theologian and Professor of Fundamental and Dogmatic Theology at The Catholic University of America. During the 2012–2013 academic year, he held The Rev. Robert J. Rand ...

(born 1958), Christian theologian and professor *

Max Jüngling Max Jüngling (7 May 1903 in Lichtenfels – 14 February 1963) was a German politician. From 1946-1963 he was Landrat in the District of Lichtenfels, and from 1951 to 1963 he was a member of the Bavarian Parliament.Stefan Kießling Stefan Kießling (born 25 January 1984) is a German former footballer who played as a striker for Bayer Leverkusen and 1. FC Nürnberg. Born in Lichtenfels, West Germany, Kießling began playing football at a young age in the youth setup at 1. ...

(born 1984), footballer * Friedrich Myconius (1490–1546), reformer *

Andreas Röschlaub Andreas Röschlaub (21 October 1768 – 7 July 1835) was a German physician born in Lichtenfels, Bavaria. He studied medicine at the Universities of Würzburg and Bamberg, gaining his doctorate at the latter institution in 1795. In 1798 he beca ...

(1768–1835), physician and

natural philosopher Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe. It was dominant before the development of modern science. From the ancient wor ...

Emmi Zeulner Emmi Zeulner (born 27 March 1987) is a German politician who represents the Christian Social Union (CSU) in the Bundestag, the German federal parliament. Early life and education Born in Lichtenfels, Bavaria, Germany, Zeulner is the daughter o ...

(born 1987), politician ( CSU)

Twin towns – sister cities

Lichtenfels is

twinned Twinning (making a twin of) may refer to: * In biology and agriculture, producing two offspring (i.e., twins) at a time, or having a tendency to do so; * Twin towns and sister cities, towns and cities involved in town twinning * Twinning inst ...

with: *

Ariccia Ariccia (Latin: ''Aricia'') is a town and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Rome, central Italy, southeast of Rome. It is in the Alban Hills of the Lazio (Latium) region and could be considered an extension of Rome's southeastern suburbs. O ...

, Italy (2004) * Cournon-d'Auvergne, France (1992) *

Prestwick Prestwick ( gd, Preastabhaig) is a town in South Ayrshire on the west coast of Ayrshire in Scotland about southwest of Glasgow. It adjoins the larger town of Ayr to the south on the Firth of Clyde coast, the centre of which is about south, an ...

, Scotland, United Kingdom (1974) * Vandalia, United States (1975)

References

{{Authority control Lichtenfels (district) Populated places on the Main basin Populated riverside places in Germany