Travel Guide Erfurt

Erfurt, the capital of the Land of Thüringia, is a thriving city of 210 000 inhabitants. With its medieval character, but also very beautiful art nouveau achievement, its pléiade of historic monuments, its quiet banks, its restaurants and its museums, Erfurt is a necessity of the former GDR. A real treasure that this episcopal city houses 20 Gothic churches and hundreds of half-timbered houses! In the centre, moreover, it is worth imagining that years ago, this was a grey and bankrupt socialist city. Because the tourism success that Erfurt has been experiencing for about years, if it has perhaps made the central arteries a little too lashed, has brought prosperity to the whole city. Admittedly, in a few places, the phenomenon has made the old Erfurt similar to any western tourist city in Germany. But the diversity of neighbourhoods within the historic centre, the variety of architectural heritage and the uniqueness of some sites (including the hill of the cathedral with double church, or one of Europe's finest inhabited bridges, the Krämerbrücke) reveal to the visitor his identity.Its diocese, Erphesfurt, was founded in 742. Via Regia, Erfurt quickly became an important commercial place, especially as it was in the heart of a region of pastel, the only plant that could give the desired blue to the time. The trade in this rare commodity gave the city a great period of time in the th and th centuries, whose splendour can now be seen. With its 20 000 inhabitants, it was one of Germany's largest cities.This testifies to the foundation in 1392 of a university whose reputation persisted over the centuries - Luther y studied from 1501 to 1505 - until its closure ordered by Prussia in 1816. The movement of world trade and the import of the indigo signed the death stop of pastel and erfurtois trade.Only the birth of industrial horticulture allowed the city to pull itself together economically until the end of the th century. In the hands of the Dukes since 1802, Erfurt was occupied by the Napoleonic troops following the battle of Jena, and Napoleon met Goethe there…