Bryggen

Bryggen (Norwegian, the quay, the jetties, pier) or Tyskebryggen ( the German Wharf ) were the trading posts of the Hanseatic merchants in Bergen / Norway. The former Hansekontor takes the whole east side of the bay a Vågen.

History

After the city of Bergen, founded in 1070, is an increasingly important hub for dried fish from the north of the country and cereals had become of the Baltic, the Hanseatic League was built there in 1343 its first trading office. Since counting houses could not be a self-employed members of the Hanseatic League, the establishment of the Hanseatic City of Lübeck was subordinated. 1365 Tyskebryggen was subordinated to the Hanseatic Days. The Hansekontor, composed of about twenty adjacent courtyards, quickly became a complete residential and commercial district. In its heyday, the German merchants ( climber ) and artisans made ​​up one- quarter of the urban population of Bergen. To prevent fires in the district closely built, all buildings were unheated. The only heated rooms were located in the rear located Schøtstuene, which were used by the Hanseatic merchants as assembly and court room. In the great fire in 1702 almost all of the buildings that were mostly built of wood, were destroyed. However, it was followed by a reconstruction of the old style. 1901, a part of the southern row of houses was demolished and rebuilt in brick construction but with the gables in the old style. Since the Second World War, as a result everything German was quite unpopular in Norway, Tyskebryggen is generally only called Bryggen. In the postwar period the district was neglected and in a fire in 1955 destroyed large parts of Bryggen again. About half of the building from 1712 originating lost. After years of discussion - the debate was also an outline of the surviving 62 houses - it came from 1965, however, the restoration by the architect Hans Jacob Hansteen, also a first box-shaped planned hotel project of the architect Øivind Maurseth was ultimately externally angleichender design (similar to the realized the reconstruction of Warsaw's Old Town )

Main church of the German merchants at Bryggen was St. Mary's Church on the northeastern edge of the merchants' houses.

Presence

Since 1979, Bryggen is with its about 60 buildings on the List of World Heritage by UNESCO and is considered as the most important historical site of Bergen. In the erected in 1704 Handelshof Finnegården is the Hanseatic Museum, decorated in the style of 17th and 18th century, gives an insight into the life of the Hanseatic merchants of the time.