Staufenmauer

The Staufenmauer is an ancient city wall in Frankfurt am Main, from the few remains are still preserved.

It was built under the Hohenstaufen (1138-1254) in 1180 to protect the town from raids, and enveloped in, say, modern Frankfurt's Old Town. At about seven meters high and two to three meters thick walls of rubble was a parapet, to the outside of a dry ditch was upstream. She had only three goals, from west to east, the Mainz Gate, also guilders gate called at the western end of White Woman Lane, Bockenheimer Gate ( later called Katharinenpforte ) between wood and Hirschgraben and Bornheimer Gate at the northernmost point of the tramline. The Staufenmauer followed approximately the present-day streets Big Hirschgraben, Holzgraben and tramline / Börnestraße.

In 1333 the city received from the Emperor Louis of Bavaria for permission to urban expansion. Until the mid-15th century, the New Town was thus created gradually covers with a new wall. The old Staufenmauer was initially continue to maintain, so you could change only through their doors from the old town to the new town. The street name Zeil indicated today out because this scale in the new town in the 14th century road was built by the end of the 16th century only on the north side. There was the digging of Staufenmauer On its south side.

As of 1462, the Frankfurt Jews had to settle in the Jewish street, outside the Staufenmauer went directly to their north-eastern part.

Until the 16th century the doors of the gates were closed in the Staufenmauer at night, so that at night no traffic between the Old and New Town was possible. From 1582 Staufenmauer was gradually dragged, first in the west along the Great Deer Moat and wooden trench. End of the 18th century, the Katharinenpforte was canceled, which had served as a municipal prison since 1700. The most famous prisoner is likely to be Susanna Margaretha Brandt been the historical model for Goethe's Gretchen.

In the eastern part of the Staufenmauer other hand, remained. 1711 and 1719 it was damaged by two fires - the Great Fire Jews in the ghetto and the Great Fire Christians in the district along the Töngesgasse and tramline.

This section of the Wall, which also includes the still existing 15 blind arches along the tramline belong, has been restored to the burned Bornheimer gate again. The Staufenmauer served the houses located here as a firewall and only came after the air strikes in 1944 revealed. Another rest of Staufenmauer can still be seen on the west side of the Church of Our Lady, whose steeple was originally a tower of Hohenstaufen city wall.

At number 120 at the Unicorn cookies on the tramline, which is also bordered with the back to the Staufenmauer, the painter Adam Elsheimer was born on March 18, 1578. In the resulting 1900 historical photo, this house is the back left corner. The perspective is almost the same as in the first picture showing the current view.