Saturday, July 07, 2007
"You can not defeat me, I'm a Heidelberg fencing champion!"
Before I arrived in Germany, I had heard it said that Europeans and Americans approached the past differently, with the implication being that I, as a child of the New World, would be unable to comprehend the sheer antiquity of the various churches, castles, and plazas that supposedly lay scattered across the Bavarian countryside like salt on one of the region's famous pretzels. Up until this weekend, I had dismissed such concerns as foolish. After all, I had been in Munich a week and though I had to admit that the juxtaposition of medieval cathedrals and modern department stores such as one found in Marienplatz could be jarring, my trained historian's brain was able to reconcile such disparities without once feeling overwhelmed by the past. This was just another city, and if it had its share of centuries-old buildings, so did Boston, Philadelphia, and New York.
Prior to this weekend, I might have been tempted to attribute Europeans' "special" relationship with the past as merely another mechanism used to put those of us from across the pond back in our place. The implications of this attitude would extend beyond "We were here first." to include a more subtle reminder that "Unlike some people, we still remember the way things were."
But then, on the recommendation of a grad student friend back home, I decided to take a trip to Heidelberg. Until today, I knew very little about the town beyond the existence of its famous university and its reputation for competitive fencing matches courtesy of the episode of Batman: The Animated Series from which the title of this post is derived. Still, several others had mentioned that the town was worth seeing and a quick search on the web revealed a slew of worthwhile sights beyond the university. So it was that I woke up early this morning and slogged to Munich Central Station (the Hauptbahnhof) to catch a train to Heidelberg. Normally, I would have been more concerned with logistics concerning arrival and departure times, but since I had already purchased a Eurail pass, all I had to do was get it validated at the ticket window and I could then get on any train I wished.
After grabbing a quick breakfast, I caught the 8:24ICE train towards Berlin. I know the time because the train staff passed out a remarkably detailed brochure indicating not merely the stops on the route and expected arrival times but the distances between them and the departure times and track numbers of all relevant trains to which one might wish to transfer. I was therefore quickly able to ascertain that I needed to switch trains in Mannheim and catch the 11:34 residential train to Heidelberg on track 7b. Although I was briefly confused upon arrival in Mannheim, I was able to make my connection and arrived in Heidelberg shortly before noon.
I wandered around the Heidelberg train station for a short while, used the restroom (which were clean...and no wonder, it cost 1€ to enter!) and then, upon realizing that my hastily scrawled itinerary would not prove sufficient to navigate the city, stopped in a bookstore and purchased a guidebook to the city. The English translation was adequate as was the map of downtown, but it said very little about how to actually GET from the train station to the central part of the city. This led me to wander around aimlessly for a while until I found a bus stop with routes leading to "Universitätplatz," which I correctly surmised would drop me off near the university. This picture was taken within a few minutes of my arrival.
This is the university square. The building on the right is the Old University Building which was built between 1712 and 1728 by the Prince Elector Johann Wilhelm of the Palatinate, who was in turn a functionary of the Holy Roman Emperor. The symbol of the Palatinate, a lion, is perched on the central column in the center of the plaza and serves as a meeting place for students and tourists alike. As one can also see in this picture, despite the cobblestones, cars and buses also drive around the plaza.
Here's a better picture of the Palatine lion:
Before exploring the Old University Building's interior, I decided to stroll around the plaza a little bit. Nearby was the New University Building:
Notice the statue of Athena above the doors and the inscription underneath which reads "Dem Lebendigen Geist" ("To the Living Spirit"). During the 1930s, the Nazis, who were very popular in the town, changed the statue to a Nazi eagle and the inscription to read "Dem Deutschen Geist" ("To the German Spirit").
Thankfully, the original was restored in 1945 after the Allies set up shop in the relatively undamaged town as a base of operations.
After playing with the panoramic function of my camera in an attempt to take a picture of the entire university plaza, I decided it was time to go inside the Old University building, which in addition to administrative offices also held a museum outlining the school's history. Among the more interesting exhibits for an aspiring historian of science were the following:
1. A page from an edition of Vesalius's De humani corporis fabrica translated into German and published in 1551.
2. A spectrograph used by Gustav Kirchoff (later known for his electrical laws) and Robert Bunsen (yes...the burner guy) during investigations that would eventually result in the discovery of cesium and rubidium.
3. Assorted experimental equipment used by Hermann von Helmholtz including resonators, polarizers, and a siren to generate harmonic overtones. Helmholtz would build upon his early investigations into physiology to become a pioneer in the fields of thermodynamics and electromagnetism.
Sadly, the one thing I knew about the university before visiting, namely its reputation for Romantic philosophers with a penchant for swordplay, seemed to be lacking. Although I did find a nifty cartoon which showed what students during the 19th century were like. Just like today, there were jocks and there were nerds. And then, as now, the nerds had the cooler hats.
After strolling through the University Museum, I decided to visit the building's other major attraction: The Alte Aula (Old Hall). This large, lavishly decorated room is used today for lectures and readings. I almost got into trouble because I wanted to set up my camera on the podium up front to capture a picture of myself using the timer, but a friendly student warned me away from such foolishness. Instead, I took this (admittedly dark) picture of the hall.
Now here's the part of the story that connects back with that whole rumination on European attitudes towards history that I mentioned earlier. The Old Hall pictured above was given its current appearance in 1886 on the occasion of the university's 500th anniversary.
Yes. You read that right. 500th anniversary.
It's hardly surprising that right nearby, I found this seal commemorating the next major centennial.
Yes, 1386. Ruprecht I (a.k.a. "Rupert the Red") ordered the establishment of this university smack dab in the middle of the Hundred Years War making Heidelberg Germany's oldest university. To provide some context, when the first institution for higher learning was founded in the New World in 1636, this place was already 250 years old. That's older than the United States is right now. Students have been attending classes in philosophy, theology, law, and medicine consistently for over twice as long as there has been a United States. And they still walk around the same streets, visit many of the same restaurants and shops, and attend classes in the same buildings. There is literally nothing like this in America because America simply hasn't been around long enough for any comparable tradition to emerge!
Sobered by this revelation, I left the museum and wandered to the other side of the Old University building to the next stop on my tour, the Studentenkarzer--the student prison! Yet again, here was something that American educators could learn from our friends in Europe. It seems that students in Heidelberg were technically under the legal authority of the university administration rather than the town. Consequently, drunkenness, vandalism, or disturbing public order were punished through time served in a university-run series of cells. Between 1712 and 1914, hundreds of students spent time there, coming up with a variety of ways to pass the time. They painted each other's silhouettes:
They wrote poetry. (This one is actually a parody of Goethe!)
And they decorated their rooms and named them after palaces. (Not pictured: Versailles)
Honestly, the graffiti reminded me of the walls of my old cabins at summer camp except we tended to avoid the use of German. And our handwriting wasn't nearly as neat.
After spending half an hour or so in the prison, I left the Old University building and proceeded on an expedition around campus which led to my nearly getting trapped inside the New University building's courtyard and then on a walk towards the traditional center of town. I mosied through the marketplace where vendors had set up stands selling fresh produce, weaving around a fitness-themed event for the local kids, and slowly made my way towards the city's other famous attraction:
This is Schloss Heidelberg...arguably the most famous castle in Germany. Constructed between the 13th and 18th centuries, this fortress weathered the Baden-Palatine War, the Thirty Years War, and the War of the Grand Alliance before it was abandoned by the Palatinate electors in favor of a new palace at Mannheim. The castle's dwindling political fortunes were soon forgotten, however, as authors and artists affiliated with the Romantic movement traveled to Heidelberg to capture the deeper essence of what was now Europe's most famous ruin. The guest list included such notables as Victor Hugo, Goethe, and Mark Twain who wrote the following about his 1878 trip to the castle in A Tramp Abroad:
Out of a billowy upheaval of vivid green foliage, a rifle-shot removed, rises the huge ruin of Heidelberg Castle, with empty window arches, ivy-mailed battlements, moldering towers — the Lear of inanimate nature — deserted, discrowned, beaten by the storms, but royal still, and beautiful. It is a fine sight to see the evening sunlight suddenly strike the leafy declivity at the Castle's base and dash up it and drench it as with a luminous spray, while the adjacent groves are in deep shadow. (text found here)
Though an inopportune dose of cloudiness robbed me of the chance to view the castle in the full "luminous spray" of evening sunlight as Twain recommended, it was still an awesome site, perched there over the town and I resolved to hike to the top of the summit. If I were in more of a rush, I could have taken a cable car, but instead I hiked. And what a hike it was! By the time I got to the top, I was exhausted. Whether this was due to my poor stamina, the humidity, or the fact that it was actually a steep path, I can not be certain. But I do know that it was completely worth the trip...if for no other reason than for this view from one of the castle's observation towers which I took with my camera's panorama function.
After snapping that photograph and signing up for an afternoon tour of the castle (in German so that I could practice), grabbed a beer at the nearby Schloss Heidelberg restaurant, and visited an exhibit on apothecaries where cameras were verboten. The castle tour was fascinating, especially since one of the main figures referenced was a character in Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle. (If the name Liselotte doesn't mean anything to you, that's perfectly fine, but I geeked out slightly...both as a historian and a fan of good historical fiction.) And then, since I still had time, I decided to visit the Heidelberg Tun.
And what, you may be asking yourself, is the Heidelberg Tun? The short answer is that it's a barrel. The longer answer is that it's a VERY BIG BARREL. How big?
How about 221,725 liters? That's 58,000 US gallons! Constructed from 130 oak trees in 1751 by the elector Carl Theodor, this is the largest barrel ever to have been filled with wine. This is a barrel big enough to have its own dance floor constructed on the top!
So yeah, we're talking about a large barrel!
Sadly, my camera ran out of batteries right after capturing the image of this mighty barrel for all to see. And so I descended from the castle and grabbed dinner at one of the town's oldest and most famous student taverns (the Red Ox).
Considering how so much of my time in Heidelberg had centered around the question of history and how we, as Europeans and Americans, relate to the past, I could think of no better conclusion to my day trip than gorging on bratwurst, saeurkraut, and beer at a restaurant which has been in continuous operation since 1703! (Other Americans who had the same idea while they were in town: John Foster Dulles and John Wayne.) And as twilight began to settle in, I could stroll along the cobbled streets of Heidelberg one last time before catching the bus to the train station, my stomach full of fine food, my camera's memory card filled with images, and my mind consumed by the glories of this beautiful town and the richness of its history.
Before I arrived in Germany, I had heard it said that Europeans and Americans approached the past differently, with the implication being that I, as a child of the New World, would be unable to comprehend the sheer antiquity of the various churches, castles, and plazas that supposedly lay scattered across the Bavarian countryside like salt on one of the region's famous pretzels. Up until this weekend, I had dismissed such concerns as foolish. After all, I had been in Munich a week and though I had to admit that the juxtaposition of medieval cathedrals and modern department stores such as one found in Marienplatz could be jarring, my trained historian's brain was able to reconcile such disparities without once feeling overwhelmed by the past. This was just another city, and if it had its share of centuries-old buildings, so did Boston, Philadelphia, and New York.
Prior to this weekend, I might have been tempted to attribute Europeans' "special" relationship with the past as merely another mechanism used to put those of us from across the pond back in our place. The implications of this attitude would extend beyond "We were here first." to include a more subtle reminder that "Unlike some people, we still remember the way things were."
But then, on the recommendation of a grad student friend back home, I decided to take a trip to Heidelberg. Until today, I knew very little about the town beyond the existence of its famous university and its reputation for competitive fencing matches courtesy of the episode of Batman: The Animated Series from which the title of this post is derived. Still, several others had mentioned that the town was worth seeing and a quick search on the web revealed a slew of worthwhile sights beyond the university. So it was that I woke up early this morning and slogged to Munich Central Station (the Hauptbahnhof) to catch a train to Heidelberg. Normally, I would have been more concerned with logistics concerning arrival and departure times, but since I had already purchased a Eurail pass, all I had to do was get it validated at the ticket window and I could then get on any train I wished.
After grabbing a quick breakfast, I caught the 8:24ICE train towards Berlin. I know the time because the train staff passed out a remarkably detailed brochure indicating not merely the stops on the route and expected arrival times but the distances between them and the departure times and track numbers of all relevant trains to which one might wish to transfer. I was therefore quickly able to ascertain that I needed to switch trains in Mannheim and catch the 11:34 residential train to Heidelberg on track 7b. Although I was briefly confused upon arrival in Mannheim, I was able to make my connection and arrived in Heidelberg shortly before noon.
I wandered around the Heidelberg train station for a short while, used the restroom (which were clean...and no wonder, it cost 1€ to enter!) and then, upon realizing that my hastily scrawled itinerary would not prove sufficient to navigate the city, stopped in a bookstore and purchased a guidebook to the city. The English translation was adequate as was the map of downtown, but it said very little about how to actually GET from the train station to the central part of the city. This led me to wander around aimlessly for a while until I found a bus stop with routes leading to "Universitätplatz," which I correctly surmised would drop me off near the university. This picture was taken within a few minutes of my arrival.
This is the university square. The building on the right is the Old University Building which was built between 1712 and 1728 by the Prince Elector Johann Wilhelm of the Palatinate, who was in turn a functionary of the Holy Roman Emperor. The symbol of the Palatinate, a lion, is perched on the central column in the center of the plaza and serves as a meeting place for students and tourists alike. As one can also see in this picture, despite the cobblestones, cars and buses also drive around the plaza.
Here's a better picture of the Palatine lion:
Before exploring the Old University Building's interior, I decided to stroll around the plaza a little bit. Nearby was the New University Building:
Notice the statue of Athena above the doors and the inscription underneath which reads "Dem Lebendigen Geist" ("To the Living Spirit"). During the 1930s, the Nazis, who were very popular in the town, changed the statue to a Nazi eagle and the inscription to read "Dem Deutschen Geist" ("To the German Spirit").
Thankfully, the original was restored in 1945 after the Allies set up shop in the relatively undamaged town as a base of operations.
After playing with the panoramic function of my camera in an attempt to take a picture of the entire university plaza, I decided it was time to go inside the Old University building, which in addition to administrative offices also held a museum outlining the school's history. Among the more interesting exhibits for an aspiring historian of science were the following:
1. A page from an edition of Vesalius's De humani corporis fabrica translated into German and published in 1551.
2. A spectrograph used by Gustav Kirchoff (later known for his electrical laws) and Robert Bunsen (yes...the burner guy) during investigations that would eventually result in the discovery of cesium and rubidium.
3. Assorted experimental equipment used by Hermann von Helmholtz including resonators, polarizers, and a siren to generate harmonic overtones. Helmholtz would build upon his early investigations into physiology to become a pioneer in the fields of thermodynamics and electromagnetism.
Sadly, the one thing I knew about the university before visiting, namely its reputation for Romantic philosophers with a penchant for swordplay, seemed to be lacking. Although I did find a nifty cartoon which showed what students during the 19th century were like. Just like today, there were jocks and there were nerds. And then, as now, the nerds had the cooler hats.
After strolling through the University Museum, I decided to visit the building's other major attraction: The Alte Aula (Old Hall). This large, lavishly decorated room is used today for lectures and readings. I almost got into trouble because I wanted to set up my camera on the podium up front to capture a picture of myself using the timer, but a friendly student warned me away from such foolishness. Instead, I took this (admittedly dark) picture of the hall.
Now here's the part of the story that connects back with that whole rumination on European attitudes towards history that I mentioned earlier. The Old Hall pictured above was given its current appearance in 1886 on the occasion of the university's 500th anniversary.
Yes. You read that right. 500th anniversary.
It's hardly surprising that right nearby, I found this seal commemorating the next major centennial.
Yes, 1386. Ruprecht I (a.k.a. "Rupert the Red") ordered the establishment of this university smack dab in the middle of the Hundred Years War making Heidelberg Germany's oldest university. To provide some context, when the first institution for higher learning was founded in the New World in 1636, this place was already 250 years old. That's older than the United States is right now. Students have been attending classes in philosophy, theology, law, and medicine consistently for over twice as long as there has been a United States. And they still walk around the same streets, visit many of the same restaurants and shops, and attend classes in the same buildings. There is literally nothing like this in America because America simply hasn't been around long enough for any comparable tradition to emerge!
Sobered by this revelation, I left the museum and wandered to the other side of the Old University building to the next stop on my tour, the Studentenkarzer--the student prison! Yet again, here was something that American educators could learn from our friends in Europe. It seems that students in Heidelberg were technically under the legal authority of the university administration rather than the town. Consequently, drunkenness, vandalism, or disturbing public order were punished through time served in a university-run series of cells. Between 1712 and 1914, hundreds of students spent time there, coming up with a variety of ways to pass the time. They painted each other's silhouettes:
They wrote poetry. (This one is actually a parody of Goethe!)
And they decorated their rooms and named them after palaces. (Not pictured: Versailles)
Honestly, the graffiti reminded me of the walls of my old cabins at summer camp except we tended to avoid the use of German. And our handwriting wasn't nearly as neat.
After spending half an hour or so in the prison, I left the Old University building and proceeded on an expedition around campus which led to my nearly getting trapped inside the New University building's courtyard and then on a walk towards the traditional center of town. I mosied through the marketplace where vendors had set up stands selling fresh produce, weaving around a fitness-themed event for the local kids, and slowly made my way towards the city's other famous attraction:
This is Schloss Heidelberg...arguably the most famous castle in Germany. Constructed between the 13th and 18th centuries, this fortress weathered the Baden-Palatine War, the Thirty Years War, and the War of the Grand Alliance before it was abandoned by the Palatinate electors in favor of a new palace at Mannheim. The castle's dwindling political fortunes were soon forgotten, however, as authors and artists affiliated with the Romantic movement traveled to Heidelberg to capture the deeper essence of what was now Europe's most famous ruin. The guest list included such notables as Victor Hugo, Goethe, and Mark Twain who wrote the following about his 1878 trip to the castle in A Tramp Abroad:
Out of a billowy upheaval of vivid green foliage, a rifle-shot removed, rises the huge ruin of Heidelberg Castle, with empty window arches, ivy-mailed battlements, moldering towers — the Lear of inanimate nature — deserted, discrowned, beaten by the storms, but royal still, and beautiful. It is a fine sight to see the evening sunlight suddenly strike the leafy declivity at the Castle's base and dash up it and drench it as with a luminous spray, while the adjacent groves are in deep shadow. (text found here)
Though an inopportune dose of cloudiness robbed me of the chance to view the castle in the full "luminous spray" of evening sunlight as Twain recommended, it was still an awesome site, perched there over the town and I resolved to hike to the top of the summit. If I were in more of a rush, I could have taken a cable car, but instead I hiked. And what a hike it was! By the time I got to the top, I was exhausted. Whether this was due to my poor stamina, the humidity, or the fact that it was actually a steep path, I can not be certain. But I do know that it was completely worth the trip...if for no other reason than for this view from one of the castle's observation towers which I took with my camera's panorama function.
After snapping that photograph and signing up for an afternoon tour of the castle (in German so that I could practice), grabbed a beer at the nearby Schloss Heidelberg restaurant, and visited an exhibit on apothecaries where cameras were verboten. The castle tour was fascinating, especially since one of the main figures referenced was a character in Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle. (If the name Liselotte doesn't mean anything to you, that's perfectly fine, but I geeked out slightly...both as a historian and a fan of good historical fiction.) And then, since I still had time, I decided to visit the Heidelberg Tun.
And what, you may be asking yourself, is the Heidelberg Tun? The short answer is that it's a barrel. The longer answer is that it's a VERY BIG BARREL. How big?
How about 221,725 liters? That's 58,000 US gallons! Constructed from 130 oak trees in 1751 by the elector Carl Theodor, this is the largest barrel ever to have been filled with wine. This is a barrel big enough to have its own dance floor constructed on the top!
So yeah, we're talking about a large barrel!
Sadly, my camera ran out of batteries right after capturing the image of this mighty barrel for all to see. And so I descended from the castle and grabbed dinner at one of the town's oldest and most famous student taverns (the Red Ox).
Considering how so much of my time in Heidelberg had centered around the question of history and how we, as Europeans and Americans, relate to the past, I could think of no better conclusion to my day trip than gorging on bratwurst, saeurkraut, and beer at a restaurant which has been in continuous operation since 1703! (Other Americans who had the same idea while they were in town: John Foster Dulles and John Wayne.) And as twilight began to settle in, I could stroll along the cobbled streets of Heidelberg one last time before catching the bus to the train station, my stomach full of fine food, my camera's memory card filled with images, and my mind consumed by the glories of this beautiful town and the richness of its history.
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