Germany’s significant historic World Heritage sites
21.07.2023 - 07:53
/ roughguides.com
Simply put, this article is a list of superlatives. Visiting these six German World Heritage sites – from ancient buildings to mining regions and cracking culture – will open your eyes to Germany's history in a way like no other.
There's no better way to enter Trier than through the enormousPorta Nigra. This city gate – dating from the 2nd century – was built with huge stones that have been blackened by time. It is flanked by two towers, and was conceived as both fortification and palace, being converted into a double church 850 years later – making it a symbol of Europe’s historical development. Trier, on the Moselle river near the Luxembourg border, began as a Roman colony in the 1st century, went on to become a major Roman trading and administrative centre.
Today, it has the most and best-preserved Roman buildings north of the Alps. Other striking examples include the basilica, Emperor Constantine's throne room, which has the largest interior space dating from Classical times, the monumentalImperial Baths and a 30-metre-high Roman burial monument in nearby Igel. Trier's castle-like Cathedral was started in the 4th century, making it the oldest church in Germany, while next door the Gothic Basilica of Our Lady (from 1243) is the oldest Gothic church in the country; both are on the World Heritage List for their stunning old architecture.
Trier is 130km southwest of Koblenz (1.5 hours by train), best approached by rail or road along the looping Moselle Valley. The Igel Column is 15 minutes away by train.
Church of Our Lady and cathedral, Trier © GNTB/Francesco Carovillano
Watery locations allow for the perfect preservation of archeological material, and this World Heritage Site comprises the remains of dozens of small prehistoric pile-dwelling settlements strung along lakes and rivers around the Alps. Built around2500 to 7000 years ago, excavations of these stilt houses have revealed a wealth of information about early agrarian societies in the Neolithic and Bronze Age.
The study of the submerged pile stumps and finds like flint, gold, amber, pottery, tools, canoes, some of the oldest wooden wheels in the world and even Europe's oldest textile allow us to understand how the villages of various prehistoric cultural groups functioned, interacted with their environment and traded. The family-friendly Pile Dwelling museum (Pfahlbaumuseum) at Unteruhldingen, founded in 1922 and the oldest open-air museum in the world, has 23 reconstructed stilt houses built on the lake, 500 metres north of the most significant archeological site in Germany.
Unteruhldingen is on the north coast of Lake Constance and can be reached by ferry from Konstanz, with a dozen departures per day.
Unteruhldingen lake dwelling, Salem ©