Landshut

Landshut is a city of the south-east of the Bavaria, seat of the government of Low-Bavaria, regional court of the district of Low-Bavaria. Moreover it is the administrative center of the district of Landshut. With more than 60.000 inhabitants, it is, in front of Passau and Straubing, more the big city of the district, and right behind Ratisbon the second town of Eastern Bavaria. At December 31st, 2005, it is the twelfth town of Bavaria.

The old downtown area, on the Isar is called the three-helmets by allusion to the armorial bearings of the city. The Weddings of Landshut, between the duke of Bavaria Georges the Rich person and Hedwige Jagellon (1475) are commemorated every four years. The city is also famous for its preserved Gothic architecture, including/understanding the Trausnitz castle and the Saint Martin's day church which dominates the town of its brick turns.

The city profits today from a privileged geographical position, connected well by the highway to Munich and especially to the international airport Franz Josef Strauß.

Geography

Landshut is in the center of the small valley of Low-Bavaria, which extends from the the Danube in north, until the the Bavarian Alps in the south: it belongs thus to the Préalpes. The tertiary plate is started at this place by the Isar. The built-up area extends primarily on the alluvial plain from this river, which divides Landshut in three great entities: in north the valley the Isar-Danube, in the south the valley Isar- In - finally the history “island-with-mills” which forms the downtown area. The southern suburbs are surrounded by hills to the slopes sometimes rather stiff, the such Hofberg (dimension of 505 m), culminating point of the city. In south-west, in the direction of Moosburg is the natural reserve of the lake of the reserve of the means Isar, one of most important the protected areas for the avifauna in Bavaria. Along lower Isar, to the east, other lakes extend, like the reserve of Altheim, of Niederaichbach, or the lake of bathe of Gretlmühle. A Polder was arranged in the north of Isar, which can receive part of water of the river in the event of raw in order to preserving the agglomeration.

History

First inhabitants

Neolithic age until -7000, of the tribes come from the “black cotton soils” of the lower Danube migrated towards the middle price of the Isar. Thus one found in the district of the northern cemetery of the traces of a habitat of the Age of the stone gone back to 4700 av. J. Chr. The archaeological excavations carried out into 2006 put at the day of the clay shards and the tools out of stones which make it possible to specify that this village was rested by men from Bohemia. This influence continued during approximately a century but little by little the indigenous culture of the Oberlauterbach took the top. This habitat persisted during three centuries on the whole. During the 3500 years which followed, one finds no trace of human occupation on the other hand. Only a funeral Urn ceramics, gone back to approximately 900 av. J. Chr. About this time, there was in the north of the current city one of the largest agglomerations of Bavaria. Starting from 15 av. J. Chr. this deserted region of Rhétie, covered with forests, becomes a province of the Roman empire. While new cities occurred on the Danube, like Ratisbon (in Latin: Castrated Regina ) or Passau (Latin: Batavia ), the area remained relatively calm.

After towards 500 of our era, the Bavarii , trained people come from various areas of Germany, were sédentarisèrent, the first boroughs of the area, such Ergolding and Eching occurred, and one started to cultivate the ground. Until the XIIe century the families lived food crops. But with the Early middle ages several families started to specialize: the trade and the craft industry developed. Members of these new corporations started to group in agglomerations, in order to have broader customers. Future Landshut owes its development with an important bridge crossing Isar, in overhang of which it was built.

Birth of the city

Before even the foundation of the city with the site of the current Trausnitz castle a feudal Motte was, which one named about the year 1150 Landeshuata (Landeshut = chef<-lieu> and place-strong of the country). The rise of the trade in Bavaria took place under the reign of the second duke of the house of the Wittelsbach: however there was a conflict of influence between Louis de Kelheim, wire of Othon Ier of Bavaria, which was secured by Frederic Barberousse by the duchy by Bavaria, and the bishop of Ratisbon. Following these disorders, the duke made destroy the “Strassburg” episcopal located at the North-East of current Landshut. It is generally estimated that the castle was built to supervise an important bridge on Isar. Shortly after these events, in 1204, the duke decided to base a city a few kilometers upstream on the edge of Isar, and to throw a bridge at this place. This camping, from now on named Landshut , represents the first city rested by Louis de Kelheim in Low-Bavaria. One does not know the exact date of the foundation of the city; as for the date of construction of the Trausnitz castle, this one is known only by annals of the Hermann abbot of Niederaltaich, where one can read: “ Luduuicus dux Bauuariæ castrum and oppidum in Lantshut construere cepit ”.

The place is arranged in relai of trade: there on a side the hill of the Hofberg was sufficiently wide to be able to build a fortress, other it was relatively easy to cross Isar there, since while passing by the island with the mills one could build small bridges instead of only one bridge of great range. During the first fifteen years of its existence, Landshut was organized around three districts: the old city, which was crossed of the street which was a long time largest and most commercial of Bavaria; the castle extremely perched above the agglomeration, and finally, starting from 1232 the monastery of Seligenthal, founded by Ludmilla, the widow of Louis de Kelheim, with the memory of its husband. Several dukes of Bavaria are buried in the vault of this monastery. Starting from 1253 Landshut became the stronghold of Wittelsbach, and thus de facto the capital of Bavaria. However, this same year, it was necessary to divide the duchy for the succession between two wire of the duke, High Bavaria, whose Munich became the capital, and Low Bavaria with Landshut. They are only hundred years later, in 1340 that Louis the Bavarian joins together the two crowns with for single Munich capital. But the duchy was again divided nine years later: this time the wire of the duke divided the duchy between Straubing-Holland, High-Bavaria and Basse Bavaria-Landshut. This last area échut with Etienne II of Bavaria, which managed to reunify in its stronghold with that of High-Bavaria, his/her brother being deceased. During these years Landshut posted a sustained high growth, so that it was necessary to increase the walls of the city on several occasions: a first took place only fifteen years after its foundation. Towards the end of the XIIIe century one parallel to built the “Altstadt”, the old city, the district of “Neustadt”. Towards 1340 one extended the walls to a district called Freyung i.e. City-frank (the middle-class men were exonerated from taxes during ten years). One pushed finally the walls until Isar, and one bored several doors. After a large fire in 1342, the city, initially of wood, was rebuilt entirely out of stone. The old Romance church being now three meters under the level of the center town, one considered the construction of a new church, but nothing was undertaken before 1380.

The golden age of Landshut

With died of Etienne II of Bavaria there was a new division of the duchy (1392): the three duchies of Bavaria-Munich were created, Bavaria-Ingolstadt and of Bavaria-Landshut. The first duke of the richest area, that of Bavaria-Landshut, was Frederic Wise the, which reigned of 1375 with 1393 and which inaugurated the era of the rich person dukes of Landshut. Under his reign one undertook a building whose construction would finish 120 years later, the cathedral Saint Martin's day de Landshut, inaugurated in 1500. Less than one hundred meters in the North-East, the middle-class men built in their turn the church of the Holy Spirit. The successors of Frederic, who carried all “the Rich person” epithet, took a great interest with the development of their capital. The first of the “rich person dukes”, Henri XVI of Bavaria controlled with an iron hand, throwing in prison the council of the aldermen in his fortress of Trausnitz, and filling the cases by confiscating the goods of the 49 richest middle-class men. It was sufficiently powerful to allow it, because it extended the terminals of its duchy by overcoming his cousin Louis VII of Bavaria of Bavaria-Ingolstadt, obtained in 1429 part of the Straubinger Ländchen then into 1447 whole the duchy of Bavaria-Ingolstadt, the line being itself extinct.

The following years, Landshut imposed itself, not only like one political center, but also like an economic and cultural pole of the center of Bavaria. It exceeded Munich in opulence, the “white gold” not being its least asset: one understood by there salt, that one extracted in quantity around several cities from the duchy, such as Bad Reichenhall, Kitzbühel, Rattenberg or Kufstein. The successor of Henri, Louis the Rich person, who reigned on the duchy as from 1450, started by repressing the Juif S of Landshut which, unless being made baptize and to pay 30.000 books, were driven out. The culminating point of the prosperity of the city took place at the time of the weddings of his/her Georges son with Hedwige Jagellon in 1475, which gave place to festivities, known under the name of “Weddings of Landshut”, which count among most imposing of the end of the Middle Ages. Georges of Bavaria-Landshut succeeded four years later (in 1479), with his father with the head of the duchy. It is under its reign that was completed the medieval city. All the built districts of the city, to the island with the mills, were now girdled of an imposing wall. These walls were passable only by eight doors: Ländtor , Äußere Isartor and In Isartor , supervised by the Spitalerturm ; in the east, the Kapuzinertor and the Hagrainertor , in the west the Münchnertor and the Hutertor . Among the active artists at that time, one can quote Hans Leinberger or Mair von Landshut.

Simple province city

With the death of Georges the Rich person on February 1st 1503, the period of glare of the Gothic city ended: of his marriage with Hedwige, the duke had not had a male descent, and consequently Bavaria-Landshut was to be attached to the Bavaria-Inhabitant of Munich. Little time before its death, it tried well to make recognize his/her son-in-law, the voter Ruprecht de Palatinat, like its heir. The line of Munich did not hear it this ear, which started the war of succession of Bavaria. In the two years space, several boroughs around Landshut were set fire to, then Ruprecht and his Elisabeth wife were assassinated in 1505: the agreement took thus fine. An imperial judgment devoted the reunification of Bavaria-Landshut and Bavaria of Munich; gradually, Landshut lost of its importance. When in 1514 Louis X of Bavaria complaints against his/her brother Guillaume IV raised, all feared a return of the hostilities. Under the pressure of the emperor, Guillaume agreed to share the capacity: Louis would manage Landshut and Straubing since Landshut. He made build between the 1537 and 1543 first castle of Renaissance style in the north of the Alps. He died without heir in 1545 and of this moment, Munich definitively took the ascending one on the duchy. In spite of the disturbed years which followed, the city knew a relative peace. To support the Landshut catholic, Maximilien Ier of Bavaria transferred the episcopal college since Saint Kastulus, in Moosburg, in Landshut, then it raised Saint Martin's day with the row of Collégiale.

The Guerre Thirty Year old was not without consequences. The city was plundered with three recoveries (1632, 1634 and 1648) by the Swedes. The attack of 1634 was particularly testing: the generals authorized their troops to plunder the cities thirteen days of continuation. It followed an epidemic of Peste and a food shortage. After that, the city did not have any more to suffer from plundering until the War of succession from Austria in the years 1740. With the destruction of the Spitaltor in 1771 the period of the dismantling of the fortifications opens, engine of a new urban development.

Rebirth of the city

The year 1800 marked a turning for the city: in front of the increasing push of the French Armies, the king Maximilien IV Joseph transferred to Landshut the university from Bavaria, founded in 1472 in Ingolstadt. The war however struck in its turn the area a few years later, and the April 21st 1809 the troops of the marshal Bessières destroyed the Austrian cavalry (Bataille of Landshut). During the bombardment of the city which followed, three of the doors of the cities were reduced to a stone heap which it had well to be cleared, so that the contiguous walls were dismantled. Then it was, with the movement of secularization, the forfeiture of seven monasteries (1802, 1803) and the dissolution of the episcopal college. In 1826, the king Louis Ier decided that the university, the fifth of Germany with its 1000 registered students, would be established definitively in Munich. To compensate for this loss for Landshut, it transferred the court to it from call of Bavaria and made there open a college, college transferred besides little from time after (1834) to Freising where it became the School of Theology and philosophy of Freising. The railroad connected Landshut to Munich in 1858. The last part of the fortifications, that of the carries from Munich , was dismantled in 1874.

XXe century

The first thirty years of the twentieth century are remembered only by the increasing industrialization of the suburbs. The year preceding the coup d'etat by Hitler (1932), the Parliaments of Low-Bavaria and Haut-Palatinat were gathered, and the seat of the new district ( Regierungsbezirk ) was established with Ratisbon. The March 19th 1945, the station was destroyed under the bombs; the American army made its entry on May 1st 1945. Into 1956 the district of Eastern Bavaria was again divided and Landshut became again the administrative and political center of Low-Bavaria. From 1972 with 1974 within the framework of fusions of communes, the city passed from 19 km ² with 66 km ². The technical institute ( Fachhochschule Landshut ) of Landshut was open in 1978. A railway tunnel, inaugurated in 1999, was dug under Hofberg (the hill of the Trausnitz castle) to allow the crossing of the city along a East-West axis. The historical center town is now exclusively pedestrian.

Monuments

On the central place is Martinskirche (Saint Martin's day church), higher brick building of the world.
the hotel Rebirth of Louis X of Bavaria
the strong castle of Trausnitz
brick Gothic churches of Stethaimer-Schule, Holy Jodok the Holy Spirit (Heilig-Geist-Kirche)

Twinnings

The first twinning of Landshut was concluded in 1956 with the Scottish locality from Elgin; most recent is that passed in 2002 with Hermannstadt (in Rumanian: Sibiu ).

Personalities

Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach (1804-1872), philosopher post-hégélien criticized by Karl Marx
August von Heckel (1824-1883), painter
Count Konrad von Preysing (1880-1963), cardinal German
Romance Herzog (born in 1934), president of the German republic
Georg Hamel, mathematician, deceased in this city in 1954.

Random links: