Northern Beauties
Apr. 29th, 2010 06:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakYesterday I had my first non-rain or -windridden day in Hamburg for ages (seriously, I visit the city every two years or so, and in ten years, the sun shone only once for me; now twice), followed today by a similarly beautiful day in Winsen an der Luhe, which is a small town about half an hour away from Hamburg, far enough so it wasn't bombed in WWII, which meant the old town centre is intact. My camera was busy in both places, though I had less time in Hamburg, for real life reasons. Again, a taste of what's to come:
Hamburg, at its best, has a cool, elegant beauty. Case in point, and one of the images I associate most with the city:
It's the Binnenalster and the Jungfernstieg. You can see the city hall lurking at the left. Here it is in close up:
What made Hamburg one of the most important trade cities of Europe back in the day - the storage houses of the big shipping companies:
Today, the city is equally famous for all the press having their brains of operations there:
Now, I was staying far from there, in one of the other quarters of the city, to be precise, Eppendorf. Which was pretty:
But enough about the patrician belle of the north. On to a little cousin named Winsen an der Luhe. It used to be a ducal residence until the dukes decided the local population didn't make them enough money anymore and moved their residence to Celle. Winsen doesn't have many claims to fame - some business during the Thirty-Years-War, as the dukes were among the first to convert to Protestantism - one was a nephew of Luther's patron Friedrich the Wise, so he was practically raised by Martin L., and when coming to power, did the then usual thing of changing everyone else's religion in his territory as well. A hundred years later, the then current duke, Christian was the son of a Danish princess, and a leader of the Protestant league, but after getting caught at coin-clipping and a very embarrassing chat with the Emperor, he found himself allied with the Catholics against the Danes anyway. Which led to a very curious battle which is one of the two things this town is famous for.
The other thing is that this is the birthplace of Johann Peter Eckermann. Who basically is what James Boswell is to English-speaking people - mostly famous for recounting his conversations with a genius. However, as opposed to Boswell, who had a vivid personality of his own and made it his mission in life to gate-crash as many famous people as he could, poor Eckermann was so overwhelmed by Goethe that he became the exploited sidekick to end all exploited sidekick, preparing the grand edition of Goethe's collected works, being his secretary in chief, and even taking care of poor August, Goethe's son, when the later went to Italy to die. Rather fittingly, the two houses with where he was born and grew up respectively don't stand anymore, and you only find plates mentioning where they once were.
Otherwise, quite a lot of old houses are still intact. Like many North German buildings, they're made of red brick. Which has these pretty results:
If you're wondering, that was what the local provider of anything with wheels could afford in the Renaissance. Meanwhile, the local clerk was given the former headquarters of the Franciscans post- wholesale conversion to Protestantis:
The local river, the Luhe:
And today's streets:
Here's St. Mary's (still named that, even as a Lutheran church):
The house on the left side was where the clergyman used to live until this century. As for those dukes with their Danish connections:
The place where they used to keep their coaches isn't half bad, either:
And thus I close:
Hamburg, at its best, has a cool, elegant beauty. Case in point, and one of the images I associate most with the city:
It's the Binnenalster and the Jungfernstieg. You can see the city hall lurking at the left. Here it is in close up:
What made Hamburg one of the most important trade cities of Europe back in the day - the storage houses of the big shipping companies:
Today, the city is equally famous for all the press having their brains of operations there:
Now, I was staying far from there, in one of the other quarters of the city, to be precise, Eppendorf. Which was pretty:
But enough about the patrician belle of the north. On to a little cousin named Winsen an der Luhe. It used to be a ducal residence until the dukes decided the local population didn't make them enough money anymore and moved their residence to Celle. Winsen doesn't have many claims to fame - some business during the Thirty-Years-War, as the dukes were among the first to convert to Protestantism - one was a nephew of Luther's patron Friedrich the Wise, so he was practically raised by Martin L., and when coming to power, did the then usual thing of changing everyone else's religion in his territory as well. A hundred years later, the then current duke, Christian was the son of a Danish princess, and a leader of the Protestant league, but after getting caught at coin-clipping and a very embarrassing chat with the Emperor, he found himself allied with the Catholics against the Danes anyway. Which led to a very curious battle which is one of the two things this town is famous for.
The other thing is that this is the birthplace of Johann Peter Eckermann. Who basically is what James Boswell is to English-speaking people - mostly famous for recounting his conversations with a genius. However, as opposed to Boswell, who had a vivid personality of his own and made it his mission in life to gate-crash as many famous people as he could, poor Eckermann was so overwhelmed by Goethe that he became the exploited sidekick to end all exploited sidekick, preparing the grand edition of Goethe's collected works, being his secretary in chief, and even taking care of poor August, Goethe's son, when the later went to Italy to die. Rather fittingly, the two houses with where he was born and grew up respectively don't stand anymore, and you only find plates mentioning where they once were.
Otherwise, quite a lot of old houses are still intact. Like many North German buildings, they're made of red brick. Which has these pretty results:
If you're wondering, that was what the local provider of anything with wheels could afford in the Renaissance. Meanwhile, the local clerk was given the former headquarters of the Franciscans post- wholesale conversion to Protestantis:
The local river, the Luhe:
And today's streets:
Here's St. Mary's (still named that, even as a Lutheran church):
The house on the left side was where the clergyman used to live until this century. As for those dukes with their Danish connections:
The place where they used to keep their coaches isn't half bad, either:
And thus I close:
