Marburg
Marburg is a city in Hesse, Germany, 604 feet above sea-level, and situated in a semicircle round the precipitous Schlossberg. The town area spreads along the valley of the river Lahn. It received Burgh privileges in 1222. To separate it from Marburg an der Drau (Maribor), the city was officially called "Marburg an der Lahn" or "Marburg a. d. Lahn" until 1974 and then called "Marburg (Lahn)" until the end of 1976.
History
Marburg's university was founded by the Protestant Landgrave Philip 'the Generous' in 1527, without Papal privileges. The university library contains over 650,000 volumes. The chief boast of Marburg is the Church of St. Elizabeth of Thuringia, erected in 1235-83 in the early Gothic style. It was restored in 1860. The towers are 310 feet high. Soon after the death of St. Elizabeth in 1231 (in her 24th year) the church was erected over he tomb, which attracted multitudes of pilgrims from every part of Europe. The Emperor Frederick II, one of these devotees (1236), cause a crown of gold to be placed on the head of the saint, whose remains were deposited in a richly decorated copper-gilt sarcophagus. The Landgrave Philip (founder of the university) in order to put an end to the pilgrimages, caused the bones to be removed and interred below the tomb of Conrad of Thuringia, where they were discovered in 1554. The sarcophagus, which was much injured by the French in 1810-14, is now preserved in the sacristy. The mortuary chapel is adorned with a carved representation of the Coronation of the Virgin, and winged pictures. The High Altar is a noble Gothic work of 1290; the Screen dates from the 14th century.
Adjacent to the Elizabeth church is a walled closure of the Teutonic Order, divided into various sections, with connecting gates to the town. Surviving buildings include the herrenhaus (1252), the Brothers House (1234 with additions c1572), the Commandery (c1483) and the bakehouse (c1515).
The Rathaus (Town Hall) was erected between 1512-27. The extensive Schloss (castle), to which a steep road ascends from the church of St. Elizabeth, was built in the 13th century and was a residence of the Princes of Hessen in the 15th and 16th centuries. It was restored in 1864-84 and contained the valuable Hessian archives as well as those of Fulda and Hanau. The fine Gothic chapel (1288) and Rittersaal are noteworthy. In this castle the famous disputation between Martin Luther, Zwingli, Melanchthon, and other Reformers took place in 1529. They met on the invitation of the above-mentioned Landgrave Philip. The city's Lutheran Church (as it became) dates from the 13th & 14th centuries. It contains several large monuments of Landgraves and other princes.
From 1942 to 1945, during World War II, the whole city of Marburg was turned into a military hospital city (Lazarettstadt), with schools and government buildings turned into wards to augment the existing hospitals. By the spring of 1945, there were over 20,000 patients – mostly wounded German soldiers. As a result of its designation as a hospital city, and because of a lack of important industrial sites, there was not much comparable damage from Allied bombings except along the railroad tracks.
Coat of arms
The Marburg city coat of arms in its current form was established in 1895. The form of the late medieval city seals was used. The oldest city seal can be traced back to between 1244 and 1258 and can be typologically identified as the city lord or city founder's seal. The coat of arms of the city of Marburg is defined by the following description (blazon): In red on a white horse the armored Hessian landgrave with a top helmet and blue tunic, in his right hand a gold three-lobed flag with a blue Gothic M, on his left holding the Hessian lion shield.
Sources
- Baedeker, Karl, Northern Germany, Fourteenth Revised Edition, Leipzig, 1904, p.369.
- Phaidon Cultural Guide to Germany, English-language edition, Munich & London, 1985, pps:472-476, ISBN: 0-7148-2354-6
