Lübeck

Lübeck as illustrated in the Nuremberg Chronicle, 1493

Around 1200, the port became the main point of departure for colonists leaving for the Baltic territories conquered by the Livonian Order, and later, by the Teutonic Order. In 1226, Emperor Frederick II elevated the town to the status of an Imperial free city, by which it became the Free City of Lübeck.

In the 14th century, Lübeck became the "Queen of the Hanseatic League", being by far the largest and most powerful member of that medieval trade organization. In 1375, Emperor Charles IV named Lübeck one of the five "Glories of the Empire", a title shared with Venice, Rome, Pisa, and Florence.

Several conflicts about trading privileges resulted in fighting between Lübeck (with the Hanseatic League) and Denmark and Norway – with varying outcome. While Lübeck and the Hanseatic League prevailed in conflicts in 1435 and 1512, Lübeck lost when it became involved in the Count's Feud, a civil war that raged in Denmark from 1534 to 1536. Lübeck also joined the pro-Lutheran Schmalkaldic League of the mid-16th century.

After its defeat in the Count's Feud, Lübeck's power slowly declined. The city remained neutral in the Thirty Years' War of 1618–1648, but the combination of the devastation from the decades-long war and the new transatlantic orientation of European trade caused the Hanseatic League – and thus Lübeck with it – to decline in importance. However, even after the de facto disbanding of the Hanseatic League in 1669, Lübeck still remained an important trading town on the Baltic Sea.

In the course of the war of the Fourth Coalition against Napoleon, troops under Marshal Jean Baptiste Bernadotte (who would later become King of Sweden) occupied Lübeck after a battle against Prussian General Gebhard Blücher on 6 November 1806 due to the latter's illegal use of the city as a fortress, in violation of Lübeck's neutrality, following the French pursuit of his corps after the Battle of Jena-Auerstadt. Under the Continental System, the State bank went into bankruptcy. In 1811, the French Empire formally annexed Lübeck as part of France but the anti-Napoleonic allies liberated the area in 1813.

After Napoleon's defeat, the Congress of Vienna of 1815 recognised Lübeck as an independent free city. The city became a member of the German Confederation (1815–1866), the North German Confederation (1866–1871) and the German Empire (1871–1918).

Entry of the Fusilier battalion on June 18, 1871, in Lübeck

During the Franco-Prussian War, the battalion de Fusilier of Lübeck was part of the "2nd Hanseatic Infantry Regiment No. 76". On the day of the Battle of Loigny the commander of the 17th Division, Hugo von Kottwitz, of the morning advanced in front of the Fusilier battalion of the regiment, urging them to "commemorate the bravery of the Hanseatic League". his attack in the north while the other battalions turned towards Loigny.

This shock surprised the French so much that they were invaded by their flank. They fled to the Fougeu place and were kicked out of this. The battle was to become the founding myth of the last Lübeck regiment, 3rd Hanseatic Infantry Regiment No. 162, which was founded in 1897. When the battalion commander returned to Lübeck with his battalion, he was appointed regimental commander.

At the end of the First World War and the fall of the German Empire, Lübeck became a member state of the Weimar Republic (1919–1933). After the Nazi seizure of power, Lübeck, like all other German states, was subjected to the process of Gleichschaltung (coordination). Subsequent to the enactment of the "Second Law on the Coordination of the States with the Reich" on 7 April 1933, Friedrich Hildebrandt was appointed to the new position of Reichsstatthalter (Reich Governor) of Lübeck on 26 May 1933.[4] Hildebrandt installed Otto-Heinrich Drechsler as the Bürgermeister, displacing the duly-elected Social Democrat, Paul Löwigt.

Additionally, on 30 January 1934, the Reich government enacted the "Law on the Reconstruction of the Reich," formally abolishing all the state parliaments and transferring the sovereignty of the states to the central government. With this action, the Lübeck popular assembly, the Bürgerschaft, was dissolved and Lübeck effectively lost its rights as a federal state. Under the provisions of the Greater Hamburg Act, Lübeck was absorbed into the Prussian Province of Schleswig-Holstein, effective 1 April 1937, thereby losing its 711-year status as an independent free city.

During World War II (1939–1945), Lübeck became the first German city to suffer substantial Royal Air Force (RAF) bombing. The attack of 28 March 1942 created a firestorm that caused severe damage to the historic centre. This raid destroyed three of the main churches and large parts of the built-up area; the bells of St Marienkircke plunged to the stone floor.[5] Nearly 1,500 houses were completely destroyed, 2,200 heavily damaged and 9,000 slightly damaged.[6] More than 320 people lost their lives. The industrial area of Lübeck was bombed on 25 August 1944 and 110 people were killed. In total, nearly 20% of the city centre was entirely destroyed, with particular damage in the Gründungsviertel neighborhood, where the rich merchants from the Hanseatic League had once lived.[3] Germany operated a prisoner-of-war camp for officers, Oflag X-C, near the city from 1940 until April 1945. The British Second Army entered Lübeck on 2 May 1945 and occupied it without resistance.

On 3 May 1945, one of the biggest disasters in naval history occurred in the Bay of Lübeck when RAF bombers sank three ships: the SS Cap Arcona, the SS Deutschland, and the SS Thielbek – which, unknown to them, were packed with concentration-camp inmates. About 7,000 people died.

Lübeck's population grew considerably, from about 150,000 in 1939 to more than 220,000 after the war, owing to an influx of ethnic German refugees expelled from the former eastern provinces of Germany in the Communist Bloc. Lübeck remained part of Schleswig-Holstein after World War II (and consequently lay within West Germany). It stood directly on what became the inner German border during the division of Germany into two states in the Cold War period. South of the city, the border followed the path of the river Wakenitz, which separated Germany by less than 10 m (33 ft) in many parts. The northernmost border crossing was in Lübeck's district of Schlutup. Lübeck spent decades restoring its historic city centre. In 1987, UNESCO designated this area a World Heritage Site.

On the night of 18 January 1996, a fire broke out in a home for foreign refugees, killing 10 people and severely injuring more than 30 others, mostly children. Most of the shelter's inhabitants thought it was a racist attack, as they stated that they had encountered other overt hostility in the city.[7] The police and the local court were criticized at the time for ruling out racism as a possible motive before even beginning preliminary investigations.[8] But by 2002, the courts found all the Germans involved[9] not guilty; the perpetrators have not been caught.

In April 2015, Lübeck hosted the G7 conference.[10]

In 2019, Lübeck reached 2 million overnight stays. Lübeck is famous for its medieval city centre with its churches, Holstentor, and small alleys. Lübeck has been called "Die Stadt der 7 Türme" (the city of seven towers) because of its seven prominent church towers. Like many other places in Germany, Lübeck has a long tradition of a Christmas market in December, which includes the famous handicrafts market inside the Heiligen-Geist-Hospital (Hospital of the Holy Spirit), located at the northern end of Königstrasse.

Over 80% of the old town has preserved its medieval appearance, with historic buildings and narrow streets. The rest has been and is currently in a process of restoration and reconstruction. At one time, the town could only be entered by any of four town gates, two of which remain today, the well-known Holstentor (1478) and the Burgtor (1444).

The old town centre is dominated by seven church steeples. The oldest are Lübeck Cathedral and the Marienkirche (Saint Mary's), both dating from the 13th and 14th centuries.

Built in 1286, the Hospital of the Holy Spirit at Koberg is one of the oldest existing social institutions in the world and one of the most important buildings in the city. The Hospital functions both as a retirement and a nursing home. Some historical parts have been made available for public viewing.

Other sights include:

• The City Hall
• St. Catherine's Church, a church that belonged to a former monastery, now the Katharineum, a Latin school
• Thomas Mann's house
• Günter Grass's house
• Church of St Peter
• Church of St Lawrence, located on the site of a cemetery for people who died during the 16th-century plague
• Church of St James, 1334
• Church of the Sacred Heart
• Church of St Aegidien
• the Salzspeicher, historic warehouses where salt delivered from Lüneburg awaited shipment to Baltic ports
• The City of Travemünde on the Coast of the Baltic Sea.

The composer Franz Tunder was principal organist in the Marienkirche, Lübeck, when he initiated the tradition of weekly Abendmusiken. In 1668, his daughter Anna Margarethe married the Danish-German composer Dieterich Buxtehude, who became the new organist at the Marienkirche. Some of the rising composers of the day travelled to Lübeck to witness his performances, notably Handel and Mattheson in 1703, and Bach in 1705.[13][14]

Writer and Nobel laureate Thomas Mann was a member of the Mann family of Lübeck merchants. His well-known 1901 novel Buddenbrooks made readers in Germany (and later worldwide, through numerous translations) familiar with the manner of life and mores of the 19th-century Lübeck bourgeoisie.

Lübeck became the scene of a notable art scandal in the 1950s. Lothar Malskat was hired to restore medieval frescoes of the Marienkirche, which were unearthed as a result of severe bomb damage during World War II. Instead, he painted new works, which he passed off as restorations, fooling many experts. Malskat later revealed the deception himself. Writer and Nobel laureate Günter Grass featured this incident in his 1986 novel The Rat; from 1995 he lived close to Lübeck in Behlendorf, where he was buried in 2015.

Lübeck has many small museums, such as the St. Anne's Museum Quarter, Lübeck, the Behnhaus, the European Hansemuseum, and the Holstentor. Lübeck Museum of Theatre Puppets is a privately run museum. Waterside attractions are a lightvessel that served Fehmarnbelt and the Lisa von Lübeck, a reconstruction of a Hanseatic 15th century caravel. The marzipan museum in the second floor of Café Niederegger in Breite Strasse explains the history of marzipan, and shows historical wood molds for the production of marzipan blocks and a group of historical figures made of marzipan.

Niederegger marzipan

Lübeck is famous for its marzipan industry. According to local legend, marzipan was first made in Lübeck, possibly in response either to a military siege of the city or a famine year. The story, perhaps apocryphal, is that the city ran out of all food except stored almonds and sugar, which were used to make loaves of marzipan "bread".[15] Others believe that marzipan was actually invented in Persia a few hundred years before Lübeck claims to have invented it. The best known producer is Niederegger, which tourists often visit while in Lübeck, especially at Christmas time.[16]

The Lübeck wine trade dates back to Hanseatic times. One Lübeck specialty is Rotspon (listen^ⓘ), wine made from grapes processed and fermented in France and transported in wooden barrels to Lübeck, where it is stored, aged and bottled.[17]

Like other coastal North German communities, Fischbrötchen and Brathering are popular takeaway foods, given the abundance of fish varieties.

Lübeck is twinned with:[18]

• Kotka, Finland (1969)
• La Rochelle, France (1988)
• Wismar, Germany (1987)
• Klaipėda, Lithuania (1990)
• Gotland, Sweden (1999)

Lübeck also has friendly relations with:[18]

• Venice, Italy (1979)
• Kawasaki, Japan (1992)
• Shaoxing, China (2003)

Ephraim Carlebach, 1936

• Laurentius Surius (1522–1578), Carthusian monk[19] and hagiographer
• August Hermann Francke (1663–1727), pedagogue,[20] theologian, founded the Francke Foundations
• Johann Lorenz von Mosheim (1693–1755), Lutheran[21] church historian
• Lübeck Martyrs Three Roman Catholic priests and one Evangelical Lutheran clergyman were executed by beheading on 10 November 1943 less than 3 minutes apart from each other at Hamburg's Holstenglacis Prison (1943)
• Ephraim Carlebach (1879–1936), rabbi and founder of the Higher Israelite School in Leipzig
• Joseph Carlebach (1883–1942), rabbi, victim of the Holocaust
• Felix Carlebach (1911–2008), rabbi

Willy Brandt, 1980

• Johann Wittenborg (1321–1363), Mayor of Lübeck, lost the Battle of Helsingborg
• Jürgen Wullenwever (c.1492–1537), burgomaster of Lübeck from 1533 to 1535
• George Wulweber, 16th-century Protestant who was tortured on the rack
• Friedrich Krüger (1819–1896), diplomat for the Hanseatic cities of Lübeck, Hamburg and Bremen
• John Rugee (1827–1894), politician in Wisconsin, USA
• Gustav Radbruch (1878–1949), legal scholar and politician
• Hermann Lüdemann (1880–1959), CDU politician
• Otto-Heinrich Drechsler (1895–1945), Mayor of Lübeck 1933 to 1937, set up the Riga ghetto
• Haim Cohn (1911–2002), Israeli jurist and politician
• Willy Brandt (1913–1992), SPD politician,[22] German chancellor
• Björn Engholm (born 1939), SPD politician
• Robert Habeck (born 1969), writer and politician of the Alliance 90/The Greens
• Birgitt Ory (born 1964), diplomat
• Beatrix von Storch (born 1971), AfD politician, former MEP

J. F. Overbeck, self portrait with family, 1820

• Benjamin Block (1631–1690), German-Hungarian Baroque[23] painter
• Sir Godfrey Kneller (1646–1723), court painter[24] of several British monarchs
• Catharina Elisabeth Heinecken (1683–1757), artist and alchemist
• Carl Heinrich von Heineken (1707–1791), art historian
• Friedrich Overbeck (1789–1869), painter[25] and head of the Nazarenes
• Johann Wilhelm Cordes (1824–1869), landscape painter
• Gotthardt Kuehl (1850–1915), painter
• Maria Slavona (1865–1931), impressionist painter, sister of Cornelia Schorer
• Erich Ponto (1884–1957), actor
• Walter D. Asmus (born 1941), theatre director
• Justus von Dohnányi (born 1960), actor
• Jonas Nay (born 1990), actor

Dieterich Buxtehude

• Franz Tunder (1614–1667), organist and composer
• Thomas Baltzar (c. 1631–1663), violinist[26] and composer.[27]
• Rüdiger Bohn (born 1960), conductor and professor
• Dieterich Buxtehude (c.1637–1707), composer and organist
• Andreas Kneller (1649–1724), composer and organist
• Friedrich Ludwig Æmilius Kunzen (1761–1817), composer
• Anja Thauer (1945–1973), cellist

Robert Christian Ave-Lallemant, 1851

• Joachim Jungius (1587–1657), mathematician, physicist, and philosopher
• Heinrich Meibom (1638–1700), medical expert, discovered the Meibomian gland
• Hermann von Fehling (1811–1885), chemist[28]
• Robert Christian Avé-Lallemant (1812–1884), physician and research traveler
• Ernst Curtius (1814–1896), classical archaeologist[29] and historian
• Georg Curtius (1820–1885), philologist[30]
• Friedrich Matthias Claudius (1822–1869), anatomist
• James Behrens (1824–1898), entomologist[31]
• Friedrich Matz (1843–1874), archaeologist
• Friedrich Wilhelm Gustav Bruhn (1853–1927), invented the taximeter
• Cornelia Schorer (1863–1939), one of Germany's first female physicians
• Heinrich Lüders (1869–1943), orientalist and indologist
• Justus Mühlenpfordt (1911–2000), nuclear physicist
• Wolfgang Luthe (1922–1985), physician, psychotherapist and autogenic training pioneer

Heinrich (left) and Thomas Mann, 1902

• Erasmus Finx (1627–1694), polyhistorian, author and church writer
• Christian Adolph Overbeck (1755–1821), mayor and poet
• Johann Bernhard Vermehren (1777–1803), romanticist and lecturer
• Emanuel Geibel (1815–1884), poet[32]
• Gustav Falke (1853–1916), author
• Heinrich Mann (1871–1950), novelist
• Thomas Mann (1875–1955), novelist, Nobel Prize for Literature in 1929
• Friedrich Ranke (1882–1950), a German medievalist, philologist, folklorist and writer
• Jörg Wontorra (born 1948), sport journalist
• Nicolai Riedel (born 1952), philologist, author and an editor

• Sandra Völker (born 1974), swimmer, won three medals at the 1996 Summer Olympics
• Marie-Louise Dräger (born 1981), five-time world champion lightweight sculler
• Tobias Kamke (born 1986), professional tennis player
• Maximilian Munski (born 1988), rower, silver medallist at the 2016 Summer Olympics

C. F. Heineken, 1726

• Adam Brand (c. 1692–1746), merchant and researcher
• Christian Friedrich Heinecken (1721–1725), "the infant scholar of Lübeck", a child prodigy[33]
• Kurd von Schlözer (1822–1894), diplomat and historian
• Hermann von der Hude (1830–1908), architect
• Hermann Blohm (1848–1930), shipbuilder and company founder
• Hermann Pister (1885–1948), Nazi SS commandant of Buchenwald Concentration Camp
• Walter Ewers (1892–1918), flying ace of WWI
• Hans Blumenberg (1920–1996), philosopher
• Jörg Ziercke (born 1947), chief commissioner of the Federal Criminal Police Office 2004–2014

• Colvin, Ian Duncan (9 July 2012). The Germans in England 1066–1598. Forgotten Books. ASIN B008QQ2ZGC.
• Nicolle, David (20 April 2014). Forces of the Hanseatic League. Osprey Publishing. ISBN 978-1782007791.
• Zimmern, Helen (30 November 2005). Hansa Towns. Adamant Media Corporation. ISBN 1402184832.