Sélestat (name adopted in 1920, before 1871 Schlestadt or
Schlettstadt; Alsatian: Schlettstàdt) is a French commune, in the
department of Bas-Rhin, in Alsace (Grand Est region).
Chief
town of district and canton, seat of the community of communes of
Sélestat, it had 19,794 inhabitants at the last census in 2012
(legal population in force on January 1, 2015), which makes it the
fifth municipality in the Lower Rhine and the eighth Alsatian
municipality in terms of number of inhabitants. Its inhabitants are
called the Sélestadiens and Sélestadiennes. The town is located in
the Alsace plain, at the foot of the Vosges. It is crossed by the
Ill and its territory is largely covered by the wetlands of Grand
Ried. It is under the direct influence of the metropolis of
Strasbourg, barely thirty kilometers away.
Selestat is
mentioned for the first time in the 7th century. Free city of the
Holy Empire, member of the Decapolis, Sélestat experienced very
rapid development at the end of the Middle Ages and during the
Renaissance. It also becomes a hotbed of humanism. It was then the
third Alsatian city, with a port on the Ill and a belt of ramparts.
She nevertheless suffered from the troubles linked to the
Reformation, the Peasants 'War and then the Thirty Years' War, after
which she became French.
During the French period, Sélestat
was a military town, fortified by Vauban. It was besieged twice by
the Coalition during the Napoleonic wars. The ramparts were
destroyed in 1874, shortly after the annexation of Alsace-Moselle by
Germany. Population growth is only really noticeable after World War
II. Having become an industrial center, Sélestat is also a secondary
commercial center, thirty kilometers from the metropolis of
Strasbourg, seventy kilometers from Mulhouse and around twenty
kilometers from Colmar.
Sélestat is the third largest city in
Alsace for its rich heritage, behind Strasbourg and Colmar. The city
has, for example, two large churches, a medieval urban complex, as
well as a very rich collection of Renaissance works kept at the
Humanist Library. Sélestat is also endowed with an important natural
heritage since the municipal territory is largely included in the
regional nature reserve of Illwald. Finally, the town is close to
the Alsace wine route and the Haut-Kœnigsbourg castle.
Sélestat has been awarded the City of Art and History label since
February 19, 2016.
The village is about 40 kilometers southwest of Strasbourg and about 40 kilometers northwest of Freiburg im Breisgau on the Ill, a left tributary of the Rhine, at 180 m above sea level. NHN.
middle Ages
Sélestat (Latin: Selestadium) was a royal property
during the Carolingian period, where the later Emperor Charlemagne
celebrated Christmas in 775. At that time, the place consisted of little
more than a small settlement around a Carolingian royal palace. The
first church, a central building on the site of today's St. George's
Church, also dates from this period.
The medieval town history is
closely linked to the Staufer. Hildegard von Büren, widow of the Staufer
Friedrich von Büren and great-grandmother of Barbarossa, founded a Holy
Sepulcher chapel here around 1087, which her sons donated to the Conques
monastery in 1094. The monastery founded a provost in 1095 and brought
the relic cult of St. Fides from Agen (Ste. Foy) to Alsace. The provost
ruled the city until Frederick II, at whose behest a city wall was built
in 1216, gave it the status of a free imperial city in a contract with
the provost. The early Gothic parts of the parish church of St. George
also date from this period. A new treaty with King Rudolf von Habsburg
assigned city rule, which had previously been divided between the empire
and the provost, to the empire alone. Sélestat prospered, became a
member of the Ten-City League in 1354, expanded its fortifications,
received monastic orders within its walls, and engaged in trade.
In two contracts in 1498 and 1503, ownership and rights of the provost
passed to the Bishopric of Strasbourg. The provost, occupied by French
monks throughout the Middle Ages, ceased to exist.
heyday of the
imperial city
The Renaissance is the epoch in which the city became a
capital of humanism. Her Latin school and her humanist college, whose
library is still preserved today, were famous throughout Europe.
The Schlettstadt Latin school had existed since the High Middle Ages
and, following the example of other schools such as those in Passau,
Braunschweig or Heilbronn, prepared students for a clerical profession
or later university studies. The achievements of students at a Latin or
convent school brought fame and prestige to a city. From the second half
of the 15th century, the reputation of the imperial city of Sélestat as
an important training center for talented students and as a center of
humanistic thinking spread far beyond the borders of the country. At
that time, students who knew Latin and local scholars were in regular
contact with one another and thus formed a talent factory for the rulers
of the time, including the emperor or the city elite, in which they
recruited their secretaries, advisers, lawyers, translators or
treasurers.
Most of the students from Sélestat who continued
their studies graduated from the universities of Basel, Heidelberg,
Strasbourg or Freiburg, where some of them taught. Some students also
studied outside of the Upper Rhine region, for example at the
Universities of Paris or Kraków.
In his song of praise "Encomium
selestadii carmine elegiaco" from 1514 to 1515, Erasmus of Rotterdam
expresses his admiration for Sélestat as a place of training and a
stimulating place of residence or meeting place for numerous well-known
scholars and clever minds: "Tot pariter gemmas, tot lumina fundis in
orbem. Quot multis aliis vix genuisse datum est".
The imperial
city made a name for itself through these thinkers, pedagogues or
theologians, some of whom were born or lived in Schlettstadt, as well as
through the officials in the service of the imperial administration or
the emperor himself. Some worked more or less in the background at some
imperial diets, such as that at Worms in 1521. As secret secretaries or
legal experts, former students of this Latin school had direct insight
into what was happening in the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation at
that time.
The Reformation, the Peasants' War and finally the
Thirty Years' War marked the decline of the city. The Swedes besieged
and conquered it in 1632 and ceded it to the French in 1634, who ceded
it back to the empire in the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. In 1673, Louis
XIV usurped the city and had the old city walls torn down; two years
later he had more modern fortifications built here.