The Free State of Bavaria, or Bavaria for short, is the largest of
the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany and is located in the
south-east. With around 13.2 million inhabitants, it is the second most
populous German state. The state capital and most populous city is
Munich with around 1.5 million inhabitants.
In the south, the
Free State has a share in the high mountains of the Eastern Alps and in
the flat foothills of the Alps that reach as far as the Danube. North of
the Danube, low mountain ranges such as the Bavarian Forest or the
Fichtelgebirge determine the landscape.
Its constitutional order
is based on the constitution of the Free State of Bavaria. Bavaria has
been called a free state since 1918 when it was proclaimed a republic
and the associated end of the Kingdom of Bavaria.
The older
Bavarian tribal duchy, which became part of the Frankish dominion, is
documented as early as 555 AD, around 500 years before the term German
was used in the modern sense. A Bavarian kingdom was established for the
first time under the Carolingians. After the end of the Carolingian
rule, Bavarian autonomy increased in the younger Bavarian tribal duchy.
With the beginning of the Wittelsbach rule in 1180, the transition to a
territorial state followed. They ruled Bavaria for over 700 years until
1918. Bavaria was an electorate of the Holy Roman Empire and from 1806 a
kingdom. With the constitutions of 1808 and 1818, Bavaria became a
constitutional monarchy. At the Congress of Vienna in 1814, Bavaria, as
one of the victorious powers, was able to keep a large part of the
territorial gains; among other things, parts of Franconia, Swabia and
the newly created Palatinate on the left bank of the Rhine came to
Bavaria. In 1918 the Wittelsbach monarchy collapsed in the November
Revolution. In the Weimar Republic, Bavaria largely lost its reserve
rights in favor of the Reich. After the Nazi seizure of power, all
political possibilities in Bavaria, including the Bavarian state
parliament and Bavarian citizenship, were gradually eliminated. The
American occupation forces officially restored Bavaria as an independent
state in 1945. The Palatinate was separated from Bavaria in 1946 and is
now part of Rhineland-Palatinate. In 1949, the Free State co-founded the
Federal Republic with reservations.
Traditionally, it is divided
into the three parts and "tribes" of Old Bavaria (district and
administrative district of Upper Palatinate, Upper and Lower Bavaria),
Franconia (Upper, Middle and Lower Franconia) and Swabia. The expellees
from the former German eastern territories are referred to as the fourth
tribe.
Bayern love to
portray themselves as the best:
The Bavarians are the most
tradition-conscious among the Germans. Compared to other German tribes,
the locals preserve and maintain their roots and their traditions much
more strongly, which is why they are sometimes seen as conservative. It
is probably also the most idiosyncratic German federal state. Bavaria
has a very strong identity, since it is (initially) without Bavarian
Swabia and Franconia a country that is considered to be the oldest state
structure in the world that still exists within its traditional borders.
Many Bavarians see themselves first as Bavarians and only then as
Germans.
Culturally, the Bavarians the Old Bavarians (i.e.
Bavaria without Franconia and Bavarian Swabia) are most closely related
to the Austrians, who (except in Vorarlberg) also speak a Bavarian
dialect and are also mainly descendants of Bavarians.
Over 80% of
Bavarians are Catholic. Old Bavaria in particular (Upper, Lower Bavaria
and the Upper Palatinate) is almost entirely Catholic. In Franconia,
however, the denominations are fairly evenly represented. A significant
group of Protestants is also present in Bavarian Swabia, especially in
Augsburg, which has played a significant Protestant role since the
Reformation. An exception in Bavaria is the capital Munich, which is an
international city and has the highest percentage of foreigners in
Germany and is also home to a large number of non-Bavarians.
In
Bavarian communities with predominantly members of the Catholic Church,
the Assumption of Mary (August 15) is a public holiday according to the
law. This applies to all communities in Altbayern and about half of the
Franconian communities. For planned activities and shopping you should
inquire beforehand whether there is a public holiday at the holiday
destination.
Munich
Bayreuth
Augsburg
Bamberg
Landshut
Nuremberg
Passau
Regensburg
Würzburg
Bavarian Forest National Park
Berchtesgaden
National Park
Blutenburg Castle
Brennhausen
Castle
Ettal Abbey
Herrenchiemsee
Palace
Hohenschwangau
Castle
King's House on Schachen
Linderhof Palace
Luisenburg
Rock Labyrinth
Fortress Marienberg
Mespelbrunn
Castle
Neuschwanstein Castle
Nymphenburg Palace
Plassenburg Castle
Burg Rieneck
Burg Rotenhan
Schloss Johannisburg
Upper Bavaria, Lower Bavaria and
the Upper Palatinate share traditions and customs of the cultural area
of Old Bavaria on the area of the former Electorate of Bavaria.
The Franconian part of Bavaria has only belonged to political Bavaria
since the early 19th century and was until then politically and
culturally completely independent of Bavaria.
Bavarian Swabia
belongs to the Swabian-Alemannic language and culture area.
There
are customs that are widespread throughout Bavaria:
Maypole
The maypole and its erection is a
custom that is cultivated in Bavaria from the smallest hamlet to the
state capital of Munich.
The custom has Celtic and Germanic roots
in prehistoric times. The erection of the maypole usually takes place on
the day before the first of May as a large village or town festival with
a brass band and often a maypole parade beforehand and a May dance
afterwards.
Variants of the maypole are, for example, the simple,
often peeled spruce that is only used once, but which should then be as
large as possible, or the elaborately painted guild tree with the signs
of the local trades.
The traditional maypole stealing is carried
out according to strict rules: only the tree that is still lying is
stolen, the stolen goods are not redeemed by the robbed with money, but
with free beer and a snack and the maypole thieves then have to bring
the maypole back themselves.
In a deeper sense, the erection of
the maypole stands for cohesion and community and is therefore carried
out manually in the traditional form of fraternities and clubs, often
special "maypole clubs") without mechanical help. The tools used were
long so-called shear rods, tied in pairs to form pliers.
In
modern times, practical constraints have often led to exceptions to this
tradition. Many maypoles are now erected with mobile cranes for safety
reasons. Due to the lack of a metropolitan fraternity, the Munich
breweries put up the well-known Munich maypole on the Viktualienmarkt.
The solemn Corpus Christi processions are a widespread custom
throughout Catholic Bavaria, the Corpus Christi festival is always
celebrated on the Thursday of the second week after Pentecost. The first
procession in Germany took place in Benediktbeuern in 1273.
The
procession path is usually festively decorated with birch trees and the
paths are laid out with fresh grass and a carpet of flowers. In
addition, there are often elaborately designed pictures at the stations
with flower petals. Depending on the region, the procession is
accompanied by musicians, mountain gunners or firecrackers. The
participants are often dressed in traditional costume.
The
largest processions take place in the Bavarian cities, often with
several thousand visitors, the oldest documented here are those in
Munich (1343), Würzburg (1381), Bamberg (1390) and in Freising (1407).
The only Bavarian lake procession on the Staffelsee in Seehausen is
particularly atmospheric. The one in Schliersee also leads to the lake.
sheephead
The Schafkopf is a traditional card game and in
Bavaria, with its own Schafkopf language, is considered part of the
cultural heritage and part of the Bavarian way of life.
The card
game is cultivated by many private groups (men, women, often mixed) in
the village inns, the cliché of the Schafkopf round in the inn often
used in comedies about Bavaria comes closest to the truth. In addition
to the pub round, there are also many sheephead tournaments, including
prize sheephead or sheephead races, which are usually organized by the
local clubs. Extreme variants are permanent sheep-heading and underwater
sheep-heading.
The game also has a special legal status in
Bavaria: it is the only game of chance for money that is permitted in
public (§ 284 StGB does not apply here due to a special rule).
For all non-Bavarians: Skat is similar to Schafkopf in many aspects and
is also played with pleasure by convinced Schafkopf players in Bavaria
when the fourth player required for the Schafkopf is missing. If you can
play skat properly, you can usually get along very quickly with the
Schafkopf. Doppelkopf, on the other hand, is originally a Schafkopf
variant with a double leaf, but is almost completely unknown in Bavaria.
Participating in a card game in the tavern or in a Schafkopf race can
also be quite a nice holiday memory.
By plane
International airports in Munich are Munich Airport
"Franz Josef Strauss" (IATA: MUC) and Nuremberg Airport 2 (IATA: NUE).
As Nuremberg only has a limited number of international flights and
the ICE connection to Würzburg is excellent, it can also make sense to
fly to Frankfurt Airport (IATA: FRA) and take the train from there.
Rail&fly is particularly useful here.
The regional commercial
airport in Memmingen is 3 Memmingen internet wikipediacommons Airport
(IATA: FMM).
There are airfields in Augsburg, Ingolstadt and Hof.
By train
Bavaria is very well connected to the Deutsche Bahn
high-speed network. Several ICE lines start from Munich, including via
Stuttgart to Frankfurt am Main or via Nuremberg to Berlin or Hamburg.
International connections, e.g. B. to Vienna and recently by TGV (French
high-speed train) to Paris.
By bus
As in all of Germany,
long-distance bus transport in Bavaria is a relatively recent phenomenon
and the market is therefore still in motion. Apart from a few
exceptions, the infrastructure at the long-distance bus stops is
inadequate or overloaded. However, there are plans in many places to
change this. International lines go to the larger cities.
In the
street
Bavaria is excellently connected via the German and European
long-distance road network (e.g. from north to south via the A7 and A9,
from west to east via the A8).
In Bavaria, environmental zones
have been set up in accordance with the Fine Dust Ordinance. If you
don't have the appropriate badge, you risk a fine of €100 when entering
an environmental zone. This also applies to foreign road users.
In Bavaria, too, environmental zones have now been designated for
various cities, in which only vehicles with an environmental badge are
allowed. This applies to Munich, Augsburg and Neu-Ulm. An environmental
zone is planned for Regensburg. Violations are punished with a fine and
a point in Flensburg. The price for the sticker is usually 5 to 10
euros.
By boat
Since Bavaria is not exactly surrounded by
oceans, there are only a few options for arriving by ship.
A
small part of Lake Constance near Lindau borders on Bavaria. Here you
can translate with the Bodenseeschifffahrt.
Another option is the
navigable rivers Main and Danube with the Main-Danube Canal. Scheduled
services are not offered here, but river cruises and excursion services
can be found.
By train
With a few exceptions, the railways in Bavaria offer
at least hourly services in local transport. The fastest local
transport in Germany is even offered between Munich and Nuremberg
(200 km/h). There are also very good offers in the larger cities. In
rural areas, however, there are major gaps in the bus schedule.
The Bayernticket allows one-day use of regional trains
throughout Bavaria, many public transport services connected to the
cities (S-Bahn, U-Bahn, trams, buses) and almost all regular buses
in the country. For long-distance connections, about twice the
travel time must be expected compared to the ICE, which is not
permitted with the ticket.
Bayern-Ticket Single or
Bayern-Ticket Nacht €26 (2nd class) or €38.50 (1st class) (as of
2020, machine price, at the ticket office: €2 more). Up to 4
passengers pay only €8 each (night: €24, or €35.50 and €5);
Validity: Mon - Fri: 9.00 a.m. to 3.00 a.m. the following day,
weekends from midnight, Bayernticket night: 6.00 p.m. to 6.00 a.m.
the following day.
The Bavaria-Bohemia ticket for up to 5
people costs €30 for the 1st person and €9.60 for each additional
person (2023). This takes you to Pilsen or Budweis.
The sights of Upper Bavaria include the palace complexes (Nymphenburg
Palace, Schleißheim Palace, Herrenchiemsee Palace and Linderhof Palace)
and the numerous monasteries (Benediktbeuern, Wessobrunn, Andechs,
Ettal).
Lower Franconia's sights are the numerous medieval castles
and palaces built by the prince-bishops of Würzburg.
In Swabia, the
Allgäu with the foothills of the Alps is particularly worth seeing. The
royal castles of Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau are also in this
region. In addition, the Fugger city of Augsburg is worth mentioning
with its historic water system. Further north is the Nördlinger Ries
with its unique geology.
The Franconian in the north has a rather soft pronunciation and is in
many respects more similar to the Central German dialects in the west
and north than to the Bavarian in the south. In the (south-)west the
Swabian dialect is spoken and in the very south the Allgäu dialect (also
a Swabian dialect). In the far north, namely in Ludwigsstadt, Thuringian
is spoken.
In the east and south-east, the actual "typical
Bavarian" is spoken, namely Lower Bavarian and in Upper Bavaria Upper
Bavarian. In addition, the Upper Palatinate dialect is spoken in the
Upper Palatinate. Linguistically, Lower Bavarian, Upper Bavarian and
Upper Palatinate (all three together form Old Bavarian) belong to the
large Bavarian language family, which also includes almost all dialects
in Austria (only Vorarlberg speaks a Swabian dialect) and South Tyrolean
in Italy.
This is only a rough classification. These dialects
differ from each other depending on the region. The old Munich dialect,
which only very few speak, is different from that spoken by people from
Rosenheim.
In Franconia in particular there are (at least
historically) significant differences between the dialects of
neighboring villages, since these, as former parts of different
sovereign territories, had little contact with each other, also due to
the denominational division between Protestants and Catholics. However,
with the influx of people who were expelled from their homeland after
the Second World War and with recent labor migration, this has gradually
diminished. Erlangen is a good example of this, as thanks to Siemens and
the university, many "newcomers" speak little or only their native
dialect.
Bathe
The bathing ordinance in Bavaria expired in
autumn 2013 and was not extended further, so nude bathing is no longer
strictly prohibited in Bavaria. This is then regulated by ordinances of
the respective municipalities. Numerous lakes and rivers invite you to
swim. The Isar near Munich and Lake Starnberg are particularly well
known
rafting
White water rafting is possible in Bavaria on
the rivers Iller in Allgäu and Isar in Upper Bavaria.
canyoning
The only German region that allows canyoning tours is the Allgäu.
Hike
MTB
To ski
cross country skiing
Ride
Dive
Climb
Bavaria has one of the strictest shop closing laws in Germany. With a few exceptions in larger train stations (Nuremberg, Munich and some shops in other train stations) and petrol stations, all shops close by 8 p.m. at the latest. Saturdays may also be open until 8 p.m., but especially in the countryside there are many smaller shops that sometimes close much earlier. Some bakers are also open in the morning on Sundays and public holidays. If bakeries have seating, they can also be open all Sunday. From time to time there are Sunday shops. During such events, busy streets and parking lots must be expected. In some cases, however, a special timetable applies to public transport in order to get the traffic chaos under control.
Traditional Bavarian, Swabian and Franconian
cuisine is generally hearty, flavorful and hearty. This is mainly due to
the rural, farming past of the people, who needed nutritious meals after
strenuous physical work. In addition to the inns, the beer cellars in
Franconia offer an opportunity to get to know Franconian cuisine better,
where there are usually at least cold dishes, but often also warm dishes
at fair prices. Since the Bavarians are a very "baroque" people, they
are very attached to physical pleasures and the taste and pleasure is a
firmly anchored part of the culture, especially in the Catholic areas. A
refined version of Bavarian cuisine developed very early on in the
cities. So e.g. In Regensburg, for example, the many guests from all
over Europe were treated to upscale gastronomy due to the perpetual
Reichstag in Regensburg (1663 – 1806). And the Bavarian dukes and later
kings were also very fond of physical pleasures and gave important
impetus to Bavarian cuisine, such as the Bavarian Crème. Today there is
a strong movement to lighten traditional recipes to adapt to changing
lifestyles. A well-known representative of the "new Bavarian cuisine" is
the well-known star chef Alfons Schuhbeck.
An overview of the
Bavarian products and specialties protected by the EU can be found at
www.spezialitaetenland-bayern.de (Bavarian State Ministry for Food,
Agriculture and Forestry).
nightlife
Ban on dancing on quiet
days
The current regulation dates back to 2012: According to Bavarian
law, silent holidays are Ash Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday,
Holy Saturday, All Saints' Day, the day of mourning, the day of
repentance and prayer, the Sunday of the Dead and Christmas Eve from 2
p.m. According to the regulation, it is allowed to dance during the
nights on these silent holidays from the day before until 2 a.m. on the
silent holiday. Exceptions are the all-day protected Good Friday and
Holy Saturday with a complete ban on dancing. In contrast to Hesse and
Baden-Württemberg, there is no ban on dancing on Corpus Christi in
Bavaria.
On the silent holidays, public entertainment events are
only permitted if they are of a serious nature: discreet background
music is therefore permitted. On Good Friday, "musical performances of
any kind" are also prohibited in rooms with a bar.
Accommodation
There are many ways to stay overnight in the tourist region of Bavaria,
from five-star hotels to hay on a farm. There will be something for
every taste and every budget. The local tourist offices can provide
information about accommodation.
Learn
Despite Pisa, Bavaria
has a good reputation in the school landscape in Germany.
The
universities, from large universities like in Munich to small
universities like in Deggendorf, offer a variety of training
opportunities.
Work
Along with Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria has
the lowest unemployment rate in Germany. Many employees from other
regions are drawn to Munich in particular. Important global corporations
have their headquarters or at least important branches in Bavaria and
Franconia, such as: Allianz and BMW in Munich, Adidas Puma and INA
Schäffler in Herzogenaurach, Siemens in Erlangen. The universities and
research institutes in Erlangen, Nuremberg, Munich and elsewhere also
attract workers from all over the world. The headquarters of the Federal
Employment Agency is also located in Nuremberg.
Security
Bavaria is considered the safest region in Germany, if not in all of
Europe. Non-Bavarians often notice the stronger presence of the police
on Bavarian streets. The biggest danger for your wallet is only the high
prices, especially in Munich.
Nevertheless, pickpockets can also
occur here, especially in heavily frequented tourist hotspots (Christmas
markets, Oktoberfest ...). As in the whole world, you should always
exercise the necessary care and not leave your pockets open and stow
valuables well.
A word about the Bavarian police: Be it because
of the prevailing conservative political mood or because of "boredom"
because of the low crime rate, they are - even by German standards -
extremely strict and rigorous, which, for example, prohibits small
amounts of cannabis for personal use or conspicuous behavior under the
influence of alcohol in concerns the public. Laws such as the
aforementioned ban on dancing are also rigorously enforced in Bavaria.
Much of what in Hamburg or Berlin - if at all - gets a reprimanding look
from the police is pursued in Bavaria with the full force of the state.
Also and especially in big cities like Munich or Nuremberg.
nationwide on-call service number 116 117 (free of
charge)
Large areas of Bavaria are classified as TBE risk areas.
These are areas in which between 1985 and 2004 at least five cases of
tick-borne encephalitis or at least 2 TBE cases were registered within
one year. The only exception is the Allgäu.
There are a large number
of spas and health resorts that invite you to take a cure or take a
vacation.
Practical hints
Smoking
After some political
confusion and a referendum in July 2010, the most stringent smoking ban
in Germany without exception applies to all public areas in Bavaria:
Smoking is no longer allowed in discotheques, pubs (including side
rooms, corner pubs and clubhouses) and also in the festival tents at the
Oktoberfest .
According to climatic zones, the southern part of
Bavaria consists of the regions close to the Alps, the low mountain
range regions throughout Bavaria and the sheltered river valleys on the
Main, Danube and Lake Constance. At the edge of the Alps in the south of
Upper Bavaria, Bavaria reaches alpine climate zones. In some places in
the Berchtesgaden Alps, in the Karwendel and in the Wetterstein, the
high alpine zone is even exceeded by over 2000m.
The main
influence on the whole of Bavaria is exerted all year round by the
almost unchecked stagnation of the Atlantic lows with cold North Sea air
and the Mediterranean lows shielded by the Alpine barrier with their
foehn areas, mainly in the southern part of Bavaria.
The
consequences of a disturbance from a low-pressure area are heavy
precipitation on the side of the mountains facing the weather (Alps and
low mountain ranges) and significantly lower precipitation or even foehn
on the side of the mountains averted from the weather. Foehn also occurs
in the Bavarian and Franconian low mountain ranges, but is then usually
only of short duration ("half a day"), compared to the often multi-day
foehn conditions in the foothills of the Alps as a result of a
pronounced Mediterranean low.
Overall, uniform weather conditions
in Bavaria are rather rare. It is often the case that there is sun in
the south of Bavaria and cloudy in the north or vice versa.
In
general, the south of Old Bavaria, located in the reservoir of the high
Alpine barrier, receives significantly more precipitation than the drier
Franconia. The western and Atlantic region near Aschaffenburg am
Untermain is considered to be rather mild, while the eastern part of
Upper Franconia with its severe winters is sometimes dubbed Bavarian
Siberia.
On average, the sun shines 1750 hours a year in Bavaria.
In Germany as a whole, the Free State is in second place. The annual
precipitation in Bavaria is around 700 mm and is thus almost at the
level of the national average (730 mm).
Recommended destinations are z. B. Salzburg, which is right on the Bavarian border and of course the whole of Austria. From Munich it is not far to Italy. Bolzano and South Tyrol, Lake Garda or Venice seem to be just a stone's throw away. In the east, golden Prague and the Czech Republic also beckon.
From the 3rd century BC Celtic tribes founded the first fortified,
city-like settlements in the foothills of the Alps. At that time, around
5,000 to 10,000 Celts were already living in the oppidum of Manching
within a city fortification. At the time of Emperor Augustus, the Celtic
area of Old Bavaria south of the Danube became part of the Roman Empire
and its provinces of Raetia and Noricum. After the collapse of Roman
rule, the Bavarian people formed. The Bavarians probably formed from
different ethnic groups:
from remains of the Celtic population
(Vindeliker, Boier),
from local Romans,
Alemannic, Franconian or
Thuringian, Ostrogothic and Longobard fragments of the people,
from
Germanic mercenaries of the Roman border troops.
It is assumed that
the Bavarians formed a tribe in their own country, i.e. the country
between the Danube and the Alps.
The existence of a Bavarian tribal duchy based in Freising and
Regensburg under the Agilolfingers is documented for the year 555 AD,
which became part of the Frankish dominion of Austrasia under the
Merovingians. The Lex Baiuvariorum was the first codified Bavarian
tribal law (around 741/743). The victory of Charlemagne over the
Bavarian Duke Tassilo III. 788 marks the end of the so-called older
tribal duchy. From 788 to the beginning of the 10th century there was no
Bavarian duke. The Carolingians ruled as Bavarian kings or sub-kings and
sometimes appointed governors (prefects) to exercise their power.
Younger tribal duchy
The decline of the Carolingians made it
possible for the Bavarian dukes to revive their independence in the
so-called younger tribal duchy. After the end of the Carolingian period
of rule, the independence of the individual areas gradually increased
again. This was supported by the external threat of Hungarian incursions
from around 862. Margrave Luitpold of Bavaria fell in 907 at the Battle
of Pressburg in defeat by the Hungarians, but the date is coincident
with the accession of his son Arnulf I as Duke of Bavaria seen as the
beginning of the younger Bavarian tribal duchy. After the victory in the
Battle of Lechfeld, a second wave of Bavarian eastern settlements took
over areas in today's Lower Austria, Istria and the Carniola. The
dispute with the Ottonians again led to a strong dependence on the
German kingdom. In 976 the southeast of Bavaria was separated as part of
a newly created Duchy of Carinthia. In addition, the Babenberg family
ruled increasingly independently of the Bavarian duke in the Marcha
Orientalis (Ostarrichi). In 1014 Duke Heinrich IV from the Bavarian line
of the Ottonians became Holy Roman Emperor as Heinrich II.
From
1070, the Guelphs saw the power of the Bavarian dukes regain strength.
In 1156 the Mark of Austria was separated and raised to a duchy under
the Babenbergs, who had briefly ruled all of Bavaria after the fall of
the Guelph Henry the Proud. In 1180, at the instigation of the princes,
Frederick I Barbarossa overthrew the Welf Henry the Lion, Duke of
Bavaria and Saxony. The Duchy of Bavaria was further reduced by the
separation of Styria and the Andechsian Margraviate of Istria. The
Counts of Tyrol also acted increasingly independently of the Bavarian
duke and later, like the Wittelsbachs, benefited from the extinction of
the Counts of Andechs, who had recently also owned the Duchy of Merania,
which had been separated from Bavaria.
From 1180, the reduced Bavaria was ruled as a territorial duchy by
the Wittelsbach dynasty, who remained in power until the end of the
monarchy in 1918. In 1214 the Palatinate fell from the Guelphs to the
Wittelsbachs. The ducal suburb had moved several times during this
period, first from Regensburg to Kelheim by 1231 and then to Landshut by
1255.
From 1255 to 1503, Bavaria experienced a period of numerous
divisions into individual duchies. Shortly before the first
reunification, Ludwig IV was the first Wittelsbach to become emperor in
1328, which meant a new peak in power for Bavaria. At the same time,
however, the archbishopric of Salzburg finally broke away from the
mother country of Bavaria. In the house contract of Pavia of 1329,
Ludwig divided the property into a Palatinate line with the Rhine
Palatinate and what later became known as the Upper Palatinate, and into
an old Bavarian line. The newly acquired areas of Brandenburg, Tyrol,
the Dutch provinces of Holland, Seeland and Friesland, as well as
Hainaut, were soon lost again by his successors. Tyrol fell to the
Habsburgs in 1363, and Brandenburg to the Luxemburgs in 1373. With the
Golden Bull of 1356, the electoral dignity for the old Bavarian line was
lost to that of the Palatinate.
In 1429, after the
Straubing-Holland line had died out, the Duchy of Bavaria-Straubing was
divided between the Munich, Ingolstadt and Landshut lines. In 1447,
Bavaria-Ingolstadt fell to Bavaria-Landshut, which in turn was won by
Bavaria-Munich in the Landshut War of Succession. With the Cologne
arbitration that ended the war, Bavaria lost the area around Kufstein,
Kitzbühel and Rattenberg as well as the Zillertal and Mondseeland to the
Habsburgs in 1505. At that time, an independent principality arose from
other Landshut areas with Pfalz-Neuburg. With the primogeniture law of
Duke Albrecht IV of 1506, the division of the land came to an end.
The Duchy of Bavaria opened up to the Renaissance under the rule of
Wilhelm IV and Albrecht V and became a hotbed of the
Counter-Reformation. The free imperial cities of Nuremberg and Augsburg,
which border on Bavaria, were important trading and economic centers
from the beginning of modern times to the end of the Renaissance, which
in Augsburg was mainly due to the influence of the merchant families
Fugger and Welser. At this time, both places, together with Cologne and
Prague, were among the four largest cities of the Holy Roman Empire and
had caught up with Regensburg, which was also a free imperial city.
In 1583, Duke Wilhelm V successfully took part in the war against
the Archbishop of Cologne, who had become a Protestant. For almost 200
years, Bavarian princes have provided the Elector of Cologne and ruled
numerous other bishoprics in north-west Germany.
During the Counter-Reformation, Bavaria continued to play a leading
role and emerged from the Thirty Years' War with territorial gains and
the rise to electorate status: In 1620, the troops of the Catholic
League led by the Bavarian general Tilly defeated the Protestants in the
Battle of the White Mountain near Prague. Then Tilly had the Palatinate
occupied. As a thank you, Maximilian I received the electoral dignity in
1623 and in 1628 the parts of the Upper Palatinate that he occupied as
war reparations. Through various reforms, Maximilian rehabilitated the
country financially and made it economically efficient. By eliminating
the participation rights of the estates, he became the actual founder of
absolutist rule in Bavaria. He created an effective state
administration, a new collection of laws (Codex Maximilianeus) and was
ahead of his time in mercantilist measures. New financial leeway was
also created for art policy and princely patronage. After the war, his
successor, Elector Ferdinand Maria, devoted himself to rebuilding the
devastated country and pursued a cautious policy of neutrality. A
glorious period of baroque art began both in old Bavaria and especially
in the Franconian bishoprics of Würzburg and Bamberg.
During the
Spanish and Austrian War of Succession and in the course of the great
power politics of Maximilian II Emanuel and later his son Karl Albrecht,
absolutist Bavaria was temporarily occupied by Austria several times. In
1705 the Bavarian people rose up against the imperial occupation. The
Bavarian uprising encompassed large areas of Lower Bavaria, the
Innviertel and eastern Upper Bavaria. A state defense congress met in
December 1705 in Braunau am Inn, which was still Bavarian at the time.
Only the Battle of Aidenbach on January 8, 1706 ended with the complete
defeat of the uprising. After Karl Albrecht was crowned emperor, large
parts of the electorate were occupied again until 1744. Karl Albrecht's
son Maximilian III. Joseph finally ended the great power politics of his
predecessors in 1745 and devoted himself to internal reforms.
After the old Bavarian line of the Wittelsbachs had died out, the dual
electorate of Electoral Palatinate-Bavaria (currently Churpfalz-Baiern
or Pfalz-Baiern), which also included the duchies of Jülich and Berg,
came into being at the end of 1777 under the reign of Elector Karl
Theodor from the Palatinate line the Wittelsbacher. In the War of the
Bavarian Succession and with the League of Princes, Prussia prevented
Bavaria from being annexed to Austria and in return was able to secure
claims to the two Hohenzollern margraviates of Ansbach and Bayreuth for
the Bavarian Innviertel that had fallen to Austria, which later fell to
Bavaria. Count Rumford began further reforms under Karl Theodor,
including in the Bavarian army. From 1794 Electoral Palatinate-Bavaria
was also involved in the coalition wars against revolutionary France.
At the time of Napoleon, Bavaria was initially on the side of France
and was able to record large territorial gains through secularization
and mediatization. Thus Tyrol, Vorarlberg and the Innviertel, which had
been lost in 1779, fell to Bavaria, and later to Salzburg. In the Peace
of Pressburg, which was concluded between France and the German Emperor
Franz II on December 26, 1805, Bavaria, an ally of Napoleon, was
proclaimed a kingdom. King Max I Joseph's minister Maximilian Graf von
Montgelas is regarded as the creator of the modern Bavarian state. The
new kingdom eliminated all relics of serfdom left by the old kingdom.
The religious edict of 1803 gave all three Christian denominations equal
rights - Catholics, Reformed and Lutherans. In 1807 the corporate tax
privileges were abolished. In 1805 all hereditary and venal offices were
abolished due to the great service pragmatism. The Munich regulations of
1805 and the Jewish edict of 1813 granted the Israelites the first
freedoms in the new Bavaria. On August 27, 1807, Bavaria was the first
country in the world to introduce a smallpox vaccination. In 1812 the
Bavarian Gendarmerie was founded. Torture was abolished in 1813 by a new
penal code drafted by Anselm von Feuerbach. The Principality of Ansbach
fell to the Kingdom of Bavaria in 1806 as a result of a territorial
exchange forced by Napoleon, and the Protestant Principality of Bayreuth
was sold to Bavaria by Napoleon in 1810. By switching to the side of
Napoleon's opponents in the Treaty of Ried in good time, Bavaria, as the
victorious power, was able to retain part of the territorial gains at
the Congress of Vienna in 1814. It was compensated for the loss of Tyrol
and the Palatinate on the right bank of the Rhine by economically more
developed areas around Würzburg and Aschaffenburg. The newly created
Rheinkreis on the left bank of the Rhine came to Bavaria in exchange for
Salzburg in 1816 through the Treaty of Munich and from 1837 was the
Bavarian Rhine Palatinate.
King Ludwig I, who ruled since 1825,
developed the Bavarian capital of Munich into an art and university
city. During his reign, Bavaria turned to Greece and numerous art
collections and classical buildings were set up. From 1830 he
reintroduced censorship and abolished freedom of the press. The Hambach
Festival in 1832 in the Palatinate at the Hambach Castle near Neustadt
an der Weinstraße had its roots in the dissatisfaction of the Palatinate
population with the Bavarian administration. Because of an affair with
the dancer Lola Montez, he had to abdicate in 1848 during the March
riots. Under his son and successor Max II Joseph, there was a gradual
liberalization but also the Palatinate uprising. The king was a
supporter of the Triassic policy, which envisaged developing the German
central states under the leadership of Bavaria to become the third force
alongside the two great powers of Prussia and Austria. In 1861, with the
abolition of the old regional courts, the separation of judiciary and
administration took place internally; ministerial responsibility had
already been introduced.
In 1864 Ludwig II was proclaimed King of
Bavaria. He went down in history as the fairytale king because of the
construction of Neuschwanstein and other castles. In the German War of
1866, Bavaria suffered a defeat against Prussia on the side of Austria.
In 1868 the conservative Greater German Patriots' Party was founded
(renamed Bayerisches Zentrum in 1887).
In 1871, Bavaria became
part of the newly founded German Empire and was given so-called reserve
rights (its own postal, railway and army services as well as its own
diplomacy). In 1886 Prince Regent Luitpold took over the regency. Due to
Luitpold's political passivity, the "Prince Regent period", as Prince
Luitpold's era is often referred to, is considered an era in which
Bavarian interests gradually took a back seat to those of the Reich. In
1893, the SPD entered the Bavarian state parliament for the first time,
and in 1906 the state election law was aligned with the national
electoral law. In 1913 Ludwig III. King, the First World War broke out
the following year. On November 2, 1918, there was a reform of the
electoral law and parliament. During the November Revolution of 1918,
however, the Wittelsbach monarchy was deposed shortly thereafter.
In the course of the November Revolution, on November 8, 1918, Kurt
Eisner, writer and journalist, founding member of the USPD, proclaimed
Bavaria as a people's state or free state, the Free People's State of
Bavaria. According to the Basic Law of the Republic of Bavaria of
January 4, 1919, the Bamberg Constitution of August 14, 1919 became
Bavaria's first democratic constitution and ended the Kingdom of
Bavaria, which had been founded in 1806. (In the meantime, however,
socialist groups were still able to install the "Munich Soviet Republic"
for four weeks from April 7, 1919.)[24]
Through a referendum on
July 1, 1920, the Free State of Coburg became part of Bavaria (→ Coburg
district). Due to the provisions of the Versailles Treaty, on January
10, 1920, the district office of St. Ingbert and parts of the district
offices of Homburg and Zweibrücken had to be ceded to the newly created
Saar region, which was administered by the League of Nations. It was not
until 1930 that the French garrison left and the Palatinate was
completely reassigned to Bavaria.
After the suppression of the
"Munich Soviet Republic", Bavaria became a stronghold of
ultra-conservative and reactionary forces and was referred to as a "cell
of order" in the early years of the Weimar Republic. On November 8th and
9th, 1923, Bavaria was the scene of the Hitler putsch, which was put
down by the Bavarian state police. The strongest party was the Bavarian
People's Party, which usually also provided the prime minister.
Bavaria also existed as an administrative unit during the National
Socialist period (1933 to 1945), but was largely meaningless. The city
of Munich, where Adolf Hitler had lived for a long time since 1913 and
had begun his political rise, was stylized by the National Socialists as
the capital of the movement for propaganda purposes. With the Dachau
concentration camp, the Nazi regime set up the first continuously
operated concentration camp just a few weeks after the so-called seizure
of power. From 1933 to 1938, the NSDAP held their Nazi Party Rallies and
other propaganda events on the Nazi Party Rally Grounds in Nuremberg,
Franconia; In 1935 the Nuremberg Laws were announced here. Hitler had
the Berghof built on the Obersalzberg near Berchtesgaden, which served
as his second seat of government and developed into a central place of
power in the National Socialist German Reich. In 1939, the
administrative district of Lower Bavaria-Upper Palatinate was expanded
to include an area that had belonged to Czechoslovakia until the Munich
Agreement in 1938, the districts of Bergreichenstein, Markt Eisenstein
and Prachatitz, which was separated again in 1945.
During the
Second World War, Bavarian cities such as Aschaffenburg, Augsburg,
Munich, Nuremberg and Würzburg suffered severe destruction (see air
raids on Aschaffenburg, Augsburg, Munich, Nuremberg and Würzburg).
The occupying powers purposefully directed expellees from Silesia and
the Sudetenland to sparsely populated Bavaria. As a result, the
population grew by a quarter by 1949. Several displaced towns emerged.
General Eisenhower officially restored Bavaria as a state with
Proclamation Number 2 of September 28, 1945; executive power was in the
hands of US military governors between 1945 and 1952. After the
occupation by US troops, Bavaria became part of the American occupation
zone, while in 1946 the heavily industrialized Rheinpfalz, located in
the French occupation zone, was incorporated into the newly formed state
of Rhineland-Palatinate. On the other hand, Ostheim before the Rhön fell
to Bavaria in 1945.
Since the US military government was firmly
opposed to the restoration of a monarchy, it banned the re-established
Bavarian Homeland and King's Party in 1946. (After the end of the
military government in 1949, however, the party could be reconstituted.)
From June 30, 1946, a Constituent Assembly met in Munich. A new,
republican constitution for the Free State of Bavaria was approved by
the people in 1946 with a large majority (for more information, see the
article Bavarian Constitutional History).
In 1948, at the request of the state government, the state parliament
decided to reject the Basic Law, but to recognize it as binding if two
thirds of the federal states accepted it. In 1949, Bavaria became part
of the Federal Republic of Germany as a state on this basis. The
district of Lindau was reassigned to Bavaria on September 1, 1955.
The long-lasting economic upswing ("economic miracle") contributed
to the fact that a deep structural change followed in Bavaria.
Education, infrastructure and industry were modernized in the 1960s and
1970s: new high schools and universities were opened; Many roads in
rural areas have been asphalted, sectors that appear to have a promising
future, such as vehicle and mechanical engineering, aerospace and
nuclear industries, have been promoted. This made Bavaria, which was
characterized by agriculture, a leading industrial location within the
Federal Republic of Germany; In 1971, regional reform began in Bavaria.
From 1962 to 2008 and from 2013 to 2018, the CSU held the absolute
majority in Bavaria. In 1987, Bavaria switched from recipient country to
donor country for the first time in the inter-state financial
equalization and has been the largest donor country without interruption
since 2008.
In the south, the Free State has a share in the high mountains of the Eastern Alps and in the flat foothills of the Alps that reach as far as the Danube. North of the Danube, low mountain ranges such as the Bavarian Forest or the Fichtelgebirge determine the landscape. In the west, Bavaria also has parts of the Swabian Alb, also known as Riesalb, between Nördlinger Ries and Donauried near Dillingen an der Donau. The Franconian Jura stretches east of the Nördlinger Ries. With Mainfranken, Bavaria also has one of the most important wine regions in Germany.
As a landlocked country, Bavaria borders on the following countries:
in the east on the Czech Republic, in the south-east and south on
Austria, in the south-west across Lake Constance on Switzerland and on
the German federal states of Baden-Württemberg (in the west), Hesse (in
the north-west), Thuringia (in the north) and Saxony (to the
north-east). The state border of Bavaria is 2705 kilometers long.
Beginning in the west, Bavaria borders clockwise with Baden-Württemberg
(829 km border length), Hesse (262 km), Thuringia (381 km), Saxony (41
km), the Czech regions of Karlovy Vary, Pilsen and South Bohemia (357
km) , to the Austrian federal states of Upper Austria, Salzburg, Tyrol
and Vorarlberg (816 kilometers) and to the Swiss canton of St. Gallen
(19 kilometers), whereby the border in Lake Constance is not defined.
Until 1990, the border with Thuringia, Saxony and what was then
Czechoslovakia formed a section of the Iron Curtain. Due to the border
security systems, it represented a physically almost insurmountable
separation between NATO and the Warsaw Pact. At Prex there was a border
triangle. The Saalforsten in Austria, which are privately owned by
Bavaria, do not belong to Bavarian national territory and therefore not
to German federal territory. On the other hand, the Egerer Stadtwald,
which historically belongs to the Bohemian town of Eger (Czech Cheb), is
part of Bavarian national territory and is managed by a foundation.
Bavaria is located in southern Germany and includes:
the Bavarian
Alps to the south
north of it the foothills of the Alps to the Danube
with the three large lakes of Upper Bavaria
the East Bavarian low
mountain range and
the stepped landscape of the Swabian and
Franconian Jura.
The Bavarian Alps in the extreme south of
Bavaria belong to the Northern Limestone Alps. Bavaria is the only
German federal state that shares part of the Alps. The Bavarian Alps are
usually only understood to mean the parts of the mountains between the
rivers Lech and Saalach. In this narrower sense, the Allgäu Alps, to
which Bavarian territory has only recently extended, and the
Berchtesgaden Alps are not part of the Bavarian Alps, not to be confused
with the term Bavarian Pre-Alps, which border on the mountains to the
north. The latter include the Bavarian part of the foothills of the Alps
between the Loisach in the west and the Inn in the east. While the
foothills of the Alps only have distinctive limestone walls, the Alps
are characterized by cirques, lakes and the typical U-shaped valleys
formed by glaciers in the late Pleistocene. Deposits from Ice Age rivers
and, above all, glaciers created a hilly landscape with lakes and moors,
especially in the foothills of the Alps. The Chiemgau, the Fünfseenland
and the Allgäu are located there.
While the terrain is flat to
hilly between the Alps and south of the Danube, to the north there are
several mountain ranges that reach a height of over a thousand meters,
including, for example, the Bavarian Forest with the Großer Arber as the
highest mountain in Bayen outside the Alps and the Fichtelgebirge with
the Schneeberg, the highest mountain in Franconia. The Franconian Jura,
as a geological continuation of the Swiss Jura and the Swabian Jura,
curves through northern Bavaria and shields parts of Franconia from Old
Bavaria. To the north are numerous witness mountains such as the
Hesselberg. The extreme south-west of the Alb borders on the Nördlinger
Ries, the remains of an impact crater that formed during the Ries event
about 14.6 million years ago. The Franconian Keuper-Lias region, which
includes Aischgrund, Steigerwald and Frankenhöhe, transitions into the
Main Franconian Plateau. Southwest of it are the low mountain ranges of
Odenwald, Spessart and Rhön. The eastern half of Bavaria is
characterized by low mountain ranges such as the Bavarian Forest or the
Franconian Forest. There is the largest, undivided forest area in
Central Europe. Parts of the Vogtland are also in Bavaria. The western
part of Lower Franconia as part of the Rhine lowlands belongs to the
Bavarian Lower Main.
The lowest point in Bavaria is about 100 m
above sea level. NHN on the banks of the Main at Kahl am Main (Lower
Franconia), the highest in the Wetterstein Mountains at the summit of
the Zugspitze (2962 m above sea level), the highest German mountain. All
30 highest mountain peaks in Germany are in the Bavarian Alps,
concentrated in the Wetterstein Mountains, in the Berchtesgaden Alps and
the Allgäu Alps. The highest Bavarian peak in the Berchtesgaden Alps is
the Watzmann (2713 m) and the highest Bavarian peak in the Allgäu Alps
is the Hochfrottspitze (2649 m).
The geographic center of Bavaria
is about 500 meters east of the market town of Kipfenberg in the
district of Eichstätt (♁Lage). Historically, several places in Bavaria
considered themselves the center of Europe. Since Croatia joined the EU
on July 1, 2013, the geographic center of the European Union has been in
the district of Aschaffenburg, in the district of Oberwestern in the
Bavarian municipality of Westerngrund (♁Lage). Since the United Kingdom
left on January 31, 2020, the center of the EU has been in the district
of Würzburg, in the district of Gadheim in the municipality of
Veitshöchheim (♁Lage).
See also: List of mountains in Bavaria,
List of landscapes in Bavaria and List of menhirs in Bavaria
The most important river in the country is the Danube, which flows in
the southern half of the country from west to east, enters the state at
Ulm and crosses into Austria at Passau. Their major tributaries are
(downstream):
Iller, Lech, Isar, Inn (from the south)
Wörnitz,
Altmühl, Naab and Regen (from the north)
The four southern
tributaries have their source in the Alps and are richer in water. The
Inn and Lech usually have a little more water than the Danube at their
confluence (because of the long upper reaches).
In local history
lessons, the following mnemonic is said in many places about the Danube:
“Brigach and Breg are bringing the Danube away. Iller, Lech, Isar, Inn
flow to the right towards the Danube. Wörnitz, Altmühl, Naab and Regen
flow on the left."
Most of Franconia is drained by the Main from
east to west into the Rhine. In its strikingly curved course it forms
the so-called Main triangle and Main square. Its largest tributaries are
the Regnitz and Tauber from the left and the Franconian Saale from the
right. The left tributaries of the Elbe, the "Saxon" Saale, the Eger and
the Kalte Moldau, originate in the north-east of Upper Franconia and
Lower Bavaria as the headwaters of the Moldau.
In the terminal
moraine landscapes in the southern part of the northern foothills of the
Alps there are many lakes, some of which extend into the mountains, such
as Lake Tegernsee, Lake Starnberg and Lake Schliersee. Bavaria shares
part of Lake Constance, the largest lake in western Central Europe. The
largest lake in Bavaria is the Chiemsee. The reservoirs of the
Franconian Lake District were formed north of the Franconian Jura. They
serve to regulate the water in Northern Bavaria, in particular the water
supply of the Main-Danube Canal, an important waterway in Northern
Bavaria. The Walchensee power plant was put into operation in the Alps
in 1924, which uses the natural gradient between the Walchensee, which
acts as the "upper reservoir", and the "lower reservoir", Kochelsee, to
generate electricity.
The main European watershed runs through
parts of Bavaria. It separates the river system belonging to the Rhine
from that of the Danube.
Details are described in the list of
rivers in Bavaria and in the list of lakes in Bavaria.
The Bavarian Forest National Park and the Berchtesgaden National Park
are located in Bavaria. Biosphere reserves recognized by UNESCO are the
Berchtesgadener Land biosphere reserve and the Rhön biosphere reserve.
There are 18 nature parks in Bavaria, the oldest being the Altmühltal
nature park, which was founded in 1969.
In Bavaria, 603 nature
reserves, 702 landscape protection areas, 674 fauna-flora habitat areas,
84 European bird sanctuaries, 160 natural forest reserves and over 3,400
geotopes have been designated by the Bavarian State Office for the
Environment (as of March 2017). One hundred geotopes that are
particularly worth seeing have been identified as Bavaria's most
beautiful geotopes. The largest nature reserve is the Allgäu High Alps,
the smallest is the Drabafelsen.
With 70,541.57 square kilometers, Bavaria is the largest German
federal state in terms of area and thus has almost 22,000 square
kilometers more area than Lower Saxony. The Free State corresponds to
about 19 percent of the German state area. The area of Bavaria is larger
than that of many European countries, such as the Netherlands or
Ireland.
The territory of Bavaria extends from 47° 16′ to 50° 34′
north latitude and from 8° 58′ to 13° 50′ east longitude. Bavaria
stretches a maximum of 260 kilometers from west to east and 366
kilometers from north to south. The southernmost town in Bavaria is
Einödsbach, the westernmost Großwelzheim, the northernmost
Weimarschmieden and the easternmost Breitenberg. The southernmost point
in Bavaria and all of Germany is the Haldenwanger Eck.
About 86.1
percent of the area is used for agriculture and forestry. 12.0 percent
are settlement and traffic areas.
The effects of global warming are also evident in Bavaria. The summer months tend to be hotter and drier. Most recently, June 2019 was the warmest June in Bavaria since observations began, and the winter of 2019/2020 was three degrees Celsius above the long-term average across Bavaria. On December 20, 2019, a record temperature of 20.2 °C was measured in Piding. The winter months tend to be rainier, with more precipitation falling in the form of rain instead of snow. Extreme weather conditions, such as the floods in Central Europe in 2013 or the heavy snow event in January 2019, are increasing. A consequence of the warming is u. the progressive melting of all Bavarian Alpine glaciers: Of the four Bavarian glaciers, only one will exist in the medium term, the Höllentalferner. For example, since the 1980s, the southern Schneeferner has completely disappeared, apart from remnants.
By nature, Bavaria would be mainly covered by forests.
Beech-dominated mixed forests would predominate in the lowlands and
hills, transitioning to mixed mountain forests in the mountains. In the
higher mountains there would be spruce forests and the rivers would be
accompanied by extensive alluvial forests. Only the bodies of water and
the mountains above the tree line and special locations such as raised
bogs would not be forested naturally. Through extensive clearing for
agricultural land and settlements, people pushed back the forest area in
Bavaria as early as the Middle Ages. With 2.6 million hectares, 36.9
percent of the Bavarian state area is currently forested. This means
that around a quarter of all German forests are in Bavaria. The tree
species composition of the forests in Bavaria is strongly influenced by
forestry use. The most common tree species in Bavaria's forests is the
Norway spruce with 41.8 percent of the area, followed by the Scots pine
with 17.9 percent, the common beech with 13.9 percent and the oak with
6.8 percent. Particularly large forest areas are still in the low
mountain ranges in northern and eastern Bavaria, such as in the
Spessart, in the Fichtelgebirge, in the Steigerwald and in the Bavarian
Forest, as well as in the Bavarian Alps.
On the other hand, the
areas with fertile soils in the foothills of the Alps, in the hills and
in the river valleys are characterized by predominantly agriculturally
used open landscapes with meadows, fields and only a few individual
trees and smaller forests. In some areas, Franconia has sandy habitats
that are unique in southern Germany and are protected as the Franconian
sand axis. In the river valleys along the Main and Tauber, the landscape
was redesigned for wine growing. Poor grassland, an extensively used
grassland in particularly nutrient-poor, “poor” locations, is
widespread. Especially the southern Franconian Jura with the Altmühltal
is characterized by such nutrient-poor grasslands. Many of these areas
are designated as protected areas.
As in other parts of Germany, only relatively few large animal species live in the forests of Bavaria. There are various species of marten, fallow and red deer, roe deer, wild boar and foxes. Lynx and capercaillie live in near-natural areas such as the Fichtelgebirge, but beavers and otters are also spreading again. There have been isolated sightings of animals in Bavaria that have long been extinct in Central Europe, for example wolves. The reintroduced alpine ibex and the alpine marmot live in high alpine regions. The chamois is less common in some low mountain ranges, such as the Franconian Jura. The golden eagle is found in the Bavarian Alps. 19 different amphibian species have been identified.
Around 13 million inhabitants or 16 percent of the German population
live in the Free State of Bavaria. After North Rhine-Westphalia, Bavaria
is the most populous sub-national entity in the European Union and one
of the most populous states in the western world.
Bavaria's
population is growing. The population of Bavaria has more than tripled
since 1840. The 1970 census counted more than ten million inhabitants
for the first time. As of December 31, 2016, the population was
12,930,751 people, around 50.5% of whom were women. Although more people
die in Bavaria than are born, the population has increased continuously
by more than 400,000 since 2012 due to significantly higher immigration
than emigration. At the end of 2012, the proportion of foreigners was
9.6 percent. With 1.55 children per woman in 2017, Bavaria had a
combined fertility rate that was slightly below the national average of
1.57.
At the beginning of 1778, the Electorate of Bavaria and the Electoral
Palatinate were reunited through succession to the Wittelsbach family.
While in Napoleonic times the Palatinate on the right bank of the Rhine
came under Baden, large parts of the Palatinate on the left bank of the
Rhine reverted to Bavaria in 1816 as the Rhine district. At the same
time, other Swabian areas and large parts of Franconia came to the
Kingdom of Bavaria through Napoleon. Until the Second World War, the
four tribes of Bavaria were understood to be the Old Bavarians,
Franconians, Swabians and Palatinate. Numerous monuments from this
period emphasize this fact.
After 1945, more than two million
refugees and people who had been expelled from their homes, above all
the German Bohemians, German Moravians and Sudeten Silesians known as
Sudeten Germans, arrived in Bavaria. The Sudeten Germans were described
by Franz Josef Strauss as the "fourth tribe", whereby the
German-Bohemian, Moravian and Sudeten-Silesian population came from
different dialect and cultural areas of the German-speaking area within
what was then Czechoslovakia and is therefore heterogeneous. Sinti and
Jenische also have a long tradition in Bavaria that has not yet been
recognized by the state.
Since the Second World War and the final
loss of the Rhine Palatinate in 1946, the originally resident and the
German-Bohemian population of Bavaria who immigrated immediately after
the Second World War has been divided into "four tribes" (see German
tribes for the word origin) and is made up of the three traditionally
resident tribes, the Franks, the Swabians and the Old Bavarians, who
gave the Free State its name, and the fourth tribe, the Sudeten Germans,
for whom Bavaria took over the "patronage".
Distinguishing
features of the three originally resident tribes are their own dialects
(Bavarian, East Franconian, Alemannic), their own cuisine (Bavarian,
Franconian, Swabian), their own traditions, costumes and sometimes
architectural styles. Occasionally, different mentalities are even
ascribed to the individual tribes, for example, according to the
Bavarian state government, the old Bavarians are cosmopolitan,
persistent and musically talented, whereas the Franconians are
characterized by a pronounced “sense of community, organizational
talent, cheerfulness and a quick comprehension”, while Swabians are
known as thrifty people sees who have a "tendency for understatement".
When a cabinet is formed, the offices are distributed according to the
tribes for reasons of proportional representation. The three CSU
ministerial posts in the Merkel III federal cabinet were also divided
between the three tribes of Franconia, Bavaria and Swabia.
Above
all, the long dispute between the Franks and the old Bavarians about the
alleged unequal treatment of the Franks by the Bavarians is well known.
According to some organizations, Franconia is underrepresented in party
structures and receives less tax revenue. In general, less attention is
paid to the concerns and problems of the Franconian administrative
districts. Occasionally, the return of so-called looted art, works of
art from Franconian cities and treasuries that were confiscated by the
Kingdom of Bavaria in the 19th century and brought to Munich, is also
demanded. However, many such complaints are considered unfounded. For
example, Franconian politicians are not underrepresented in the
structures of the major parties. The demand for the return of art
treasures is also problematic, since the Hofer Altar in Munich and some
Dürer paintings in the Alte Pinakothek were not stolen but given
voluntarily.
At 45.7% (as of 2021), Bavaria is the state with the highest Roman
Catholic population in Germany after Saarland. Another 16.8% (as of
2021) of the population are Evangelical Lutheran. These two
denominations are distributed unequally across the districts. Old
Bavaria and Lower Franconia are predominantly Catholic, while parts of
Middle Franconia and Upper Franconia are more Protestant.
The
number of Catholics and Protestants has decreased significantly since
the 1970s. Both the margraviates of Ansbach and Bayreuth and the
majority of the free imperial cities (such as Nuremberg or Rothenburg ob
der Tauber) were part of the Lutheran heartland and strongholds of the
Reformation.
The Bavarian state pays the Roman Catholic Church 65
million euros and the Protestant Church 21 million euros in state
endowments from the general budget. The Catholic parishes belong to the
diocese of Würzburg, the diocese of Eichstätt and the archdiocese of
Bamberg in the ecclesiastical province of Bamberg, as well as the
diocese of Regensburg, the diocese of Passau, the diocese of Augsburg
and the archdiocese of Munich and Freising in the ecclesiastical
province of Munich and Freising. Other Catholic parishes are under the
jurisdiction of Eastern Catholic Churches.
The Evangelical
Lutheran Church in Bavaria is a member church of the Evangelical Church
in Germany (EKD) and is divided into six church districts:
Ansbach-Würzburg, Augsburg, Bayreuth, Munich, Nuremberg and Regensburg.
The ten Bavarian congregations of the Evangelical Reformed Church also
belong to the EKD.
There are evangelical free churches mainly in
the metropolitan areas. The Old Catholic Church has a Bavarian deanery.
Until the 19th century, Jewish communities existed mainly in rural
areas of Franconia and Swabia and in the free imperial cities such as
Nuremberg (settlement ban from 1499 to 1850) and Regensburg. There were
almost no Jews in Wittelsbach's Old Bavaria, but since the emancipation
of the Jews there were more and more in Bavarian cities. Of the almost
200 Jewish communities before the Holocaust, 13 communities still exist
in Bavaria. They are organized in the IKG Munich and Upper Bavaria as
well as in the regional association of the Jewish religious communities
in Bavaria.
Islam is of growing importance, especially in large
cities. Many mosque communities are trying to replace their previous
courtyard mosques with representative new buildings. A study by the
Federal Ministry of the Interior puts the proportion of Muslims in the
total Bavarian population at around 4 percent in 2008 (about 13 percent
of Muslims living in Germany).
As in many areas of Germany, the
proportion of non-denominational residents is also growing in Bavaria.
The Humanist Association sees itself as an ideological community and
representation of the interests of non-religious people. The
association, which had around 2100 members in March 2019, is, among
other things, the provider of humanistic life skills lessons in Bavaria,
it has been running an independent primary school and more than a dozen
day-care centers since 2008. He maintains his own social work and the
Tower of the Senses in Nuremberg.
Especially in metropolitan
areas there are smaller Buddhist, Alevi, Hindu and Baha'i congregations,
Kingdom Halls of Jehovah's Witnesses and congregations of smaller
Christian churches such as the Seventh-day Adventist Church. In Munich,
the almost extinct religious community of the Mandaeans found refuge and
founded a community. Due to the conflict with the German state over
compulsory schooling, the Twelve Tribes near Nördlingen made negative
headlines. Since 1966, Bavaria has also had what is now a large
Assyrian-Aramaic community, most of which belong to the Syrian Orthodox
Church of Antioch. Most of these Suryoye come from the Tur Abdin
limestone mountains in southeastern Turkey.
The most populous city and the only metropolis in Bavaria is the state capital Munich with around 1.5 million inhabitants (December 31, 2021). It is the third largest city in Germany and the eleventh largest city in the European Union and is one of the world cities in the Beta+ category. It is the largest city in Germany that is not a city-state. In addition, Munich is the most densely populated municipality in Germany with 4788 inhabitants per square kilometer (December 31, 2021) and at 519 m above sea level. NHN its highest major city. With its 510,632 inhabitants (December 31, 2021), Nuremberg is the second largest city in the country, ranks 14th nationwide and 51st in the European Union and is one of the world cities in the Gamma− category. Due to the importance of Nuremberg, Munich is not a primate city in Bavaria. With 296,478 inhabitants (December 31, 2021), Augsburg is the third largest city in the state and ranks 23rd nationwide. There are a total of eight major cities in Bavaria. The youngest city (at least 100,000 inhabitants) in Bavaria is Fürth (since 1990), which was previously a city from 1951 to 1956 and from 1972 to 1976. Together with Erlangen, Fürth and Schwabach, Nuremberg forms a distinctive urban band with around 800,000 inhabitants. Metropolitan regions in Bavaria are the metropolitan region of Munich and the metropolitan region of Nuremberg. Parts also belong to the Rhine-Main area.
There are over 400 hospitals in Bavaria, five of which are university
hospitals. They have a total of around 73,000 beds and around 4,000
partially inpatients. About 60 percent of the hospitals are publicly
owned. There are also over 3,200 pharmacies and around 60,000 doctors in
Bavaria. The doctor density is 208 inhabitants per doctor, which means
that Bavaria has a top value among the non-city states after Saarland.
Nevertheless, there are warnings about the consequences of a shortage of
doctors in Bavaria, especially in rural areas and among specialists.
Most residents of Bavaria have health insurance with AOK Bayern.
The average life expectancy in 2017/19 was 79.5 years for men and 83.9
years for women. Men thus rank second among the German federal states,
while women rank third. Regionally, in 2013/15 Starnberg (expectation of
the total population: 83.39 years), Munich (city) (83.02) and the
district of Munich (82.97) had the highest, as well as Amberg (79.04),
Straubing (78, 80) and Hof (Saale) (78.75) had the lowest life
expectancy.
The official and lingua franca is German. Numerous other languages
are spoken by those who come from other language regions or have the
appropriate migration background.
In Bavaria, dialects of the
Upper German dialect family dominate. In addition, Central German
dialects are spoken in a spatially restricted area, especially in
western Lower Franconia.
The dialects in Bavaria can be assigned
to the following dialect groups (from north to south):
Rhenish Franconian as southern Hessian around Aschaffenburg (Lower
Franconia)
Thuringian-Upper Saxon as Southeast Thuringian in
Ludwigsstadt (Kronach district, Upper Franconia)
East Franconian as Main Franconian and Upper Franconian, especially
in the Franconian administrative districts
Bavarian as North and
Central Bavarian, on the edge of Tyrol South Bavarian, especially in Old
Bavaria
Alemannic as Swabian and Lower Alemannic, especially in the
administrative district of Swabia
Between these dialect areas
there are transitional areas that should not be underestimated, which
cannot be assigned to one of these areas without a break. There are
Bavarian-Franconian (e.g. Nuremberg and the surrounding area),
Bavarian-Swabian (including Lechrain) and Swabian-Franconian (area
around Dinkelsbühl and the Hesselberg area) transition areas, in some
places even Bavarian-Swabian-Franconian mixed dialects (e.g.
Treuchtlingen, Eichstätt) .
The dialects are very common among
the locals, especially outside of the big cities, with the dialects
dying out in metropolitan areas like Munich.
The Bavarian
dialects are lexicographically recorded in the Bavarian dictionary, the
Swabian in the Swabian dictionary and the East Franconian in the
Franconian dictionary, along with numerous dictionaries on local and
regional dialects. In terms of area linguistics, the dialects of Bavaria
are processed by the language atlas of Bavarian-Swabia, the language
atlas of Middle Franconia, the language atlas of Lower Bavaria, the
language atlas of Northeast Bavaria, the language atlas of Upper Bavaria
and the language atlas of Lower Franconia.
Numerous other German
and non-German dialects are spoken by those who come from other dialect
or language regions.
The basis of politics in Bavaria is the constitution of the Free
State of Bavaria, which was adopted by referendum on December 1, 1946.
The constitution came into force on December 8, 1946. Bavaria is
therefore a free state (republic) and people's state (democracy). A
unicameral parliamentary system has existed since January 1, 2000,
following the abolition of the Senate.
Legislative power lies
with the Bavarian State Parliament, whose deputies are elected every
five years (until 1998: every four years). Until the end of 1999, there
was a second chamber, the Senate, with which representatives of social
and economic interest groups were supposed to create a political
counterweight to the state parliament. In a referendum on February 8,
1998, the abolition of this chamber was decided. Until then, Bavaria was
the only German state with a second chamber. However, she only had
limited influence because she was not allowed to introduce any laws, but
only had the right to participate.
The state government is led by
the Bavarian Prime Minister. He manages business, determines political
guidelines, represents Bavaria to the outside world and appoints the
state ministers and secretaries.
In addition to the state
parliament, laws and constitutional amendments can be passed through
referendums and referendums in Bavaria. A referendum is mandatory for
every change to the Bavarian constitution.
The state government is the supreme authority of the Free State of Bavaria. The prime minister elected by the state parliament appoints and dismisses the state ministers and state secretaries with the consent of the state parliament. He assigns the ministers of state a business area or a special task, which they manage independently according to the departmental principle and the political guidelines (guideline competence) determined by the Prime Minister. The state secretaries are bound by the instructions of their state ministers. The Bavarian State Chancellery supports the Prime Minister and the state government in their constitutional tasks. The constitutional maximum of 18 members in the cabinet of the state government is usually fully utilised.
The supreme Bavarian court is the Bavarian Constitutional Court. There are also various higher regional courts, including three higher regional courts in Munich, Nuremberg and Bamberg, the Bavarian administrative court, two regional labor courts (Munich and Nuremberg), the Bavarian regional social court and the rest of the judiciary. The Bavarian Supreme Regional Court as the highest Bavarian court of ordinary jurisdiction was dissolved with effect from July 1, 2006, and re-established on September 15, 2018, but with fewer powers.
Compared to elections at federal level, Bavarian electoral law has
several special features: Direct candidates who have won the election in
their constituency (voting district) can only enter the state parliament
if their party has also reached the five percent hurdle.
In
addition, the distribution of seats in the state parliament results from
the sum of the first and second votes. In other federal states and in
federal elections, the first vote decides on the election of the direct
candidate in the constituency and the second vote alone determines the
number of seats in parliament, which usually means that first votes are
more often given to the major parties with promising direct candidates.
Anyone who votes for a smaller party with both votes in a Bavarian state
election does not give away their first vote, since both votes benefit
this party, even if the corresponding constituency candidate does not
make it into the state parliament. In addition, there is the possibility
of giving a second vote to a specific candidate of a party, so that the
ranking of the candidates can change compared to the lists drawn up by
the parties.
Another special feature can be found in local
electoral law. There is the possibility of cumulating ("piling up", up
to three votes can be cast for a candidate) and of splitting (votes can
be distributed among candidates on different lists).
There are numerous direct-democratic elements in Bavaria. In addition to referendums and referendums at state level, direct democracy at municipal level was introduced on October 1, 1995 through a referendum. Although the Bavarian Constitutional Court tightened the regulations in 1997 (among other things by introducing a voting quorum), the Bavarians still initiate around 100 referendums every year.
In local elections, the three largest forces are usually the CSU, SPD and Freie Wahler. Of the 71 district administrators, 50 are from the CSU, 6 from the SPD, 13 from the Free Voters and two from the Greens; five district administrators are female. Eleven of the mayors of the 25 urban districts are from the CSU and eleven from the SPD, including Nuremberg (Marcus König) and Munich (Dieter Reiter). In addition, one CDU member, one non-party member and one candidate from the Bayreuth Community voters' association were elected to office. The last Bavarian local elections took place on March 15, 2020.
The party landscape in the Free State of Bavaria has characteristics
that are not present in the rest of the Federal Republic: the CDU as a
people's party is not represented by its own state association and does
not take part in elections. Instead, she gives way to the sister party,
the CSU. It is also unusual for a large German state that the CSU has
provided the prime minister without interruption since 1957; often in
connection with an absolute majority in the state parliament.
The
SPD has the lowest popularity of all SPD state associations in Bavaria.
It was the largest opposition party with a fifth to a third of the votes
in state elections up to the state elections in Bavaria in 2018. In this
election it only achieved just under 10% and was thus after the CSU,
Greens (17.5%), the Free Voters and the AfD fifth strongest party. On
the other hand, in the past, the Bavarian Greens always entered
parliament with just under ten percent of the votes. In the last state
election, they received six direct mandates for the first time. In
contrast to other federal states and at the federal level, in Bavaria
the Free Voters are regularly elected to the state parliament, while Die
Linke, the Pirate Party and the FDP play hardly any political role and
have only rarely or never been elected to the state parliament. In 2018,
when it ran for the first time, the AfD managed to get into the new
Bavarian state parliament.
Several regional parties are active in
Bavaria. The Bavaria party B. advocates the possibility of a referendum
on Bavaria's exit from the German state association. While it entered
the state parliament and federal parliament in the 1950s and 1960s and
participated in the state government from 1962 to 1966, this party lost
all of its importance after leaving the state parliament. In 2009, the
Party for Franconia was founded in Bamberg, a small regional party that
campaigns, among other things, for better economic equality for
Franconia within the Free State. Except for the local elections in 2014,
this party has not had any particular electoral successes so far.
The public debt of the Free State of Bavaria increased over the long term, as it did at federal level and in other federal states. Debts have been repaid annually since 2011. In 1992 the debt was still around 15 billion, in 2010 it reached a high of 29 billion. In 2016 it was 19 billion euros in debt, at the end of 2018 15 billion euros and at the end of 2019 13 billion euros. The state government intends to repay all debts in the medium term by 2030.
The Bavarian Police is the largest police association in Germany. In 2007, 666,807 criminal offenses were recorded in Bavaria. 428,766 cases (64.3 percent) were cleared up and 305,711 suspects identified. This represents the highest clear-up rate in Germany. With the Bavarian Police Helicopter Squadron, the Bavarian police also maintains the largest police helicopter squadron of any state police force.
A Bavarian army existed as a standing army from 1682 until it was
dissolved in 1919. The Bavarian Reichswehr had a certain degree of
independence until 1924. The Bundeswehr currently has around 60
locations in Bavaria with a total of 50,700 posts. In the course of the
realignment of the Bundeswehr, three locations in Bavaria are closing
and the number of posts falls to 31,000. The largest barracks in Bavaria
are the Hochstaufen barracks in Bad Reichenhall.
Bundeswehr
technical schools are located in Munich and Würzburg. The Bundeswehr's
10th Panzer Division, which was formed from the Southern Division, is
based in Veitshöchheim. The Medical Academy of the German Armed Forces,
the Military Service Court South and the University of the German Armed
Forces are based in Munich, and the Military Research Institute for
Materials and Operating Materials is based in Erding. The highest
command authority in Bavaria is the Bavarian State Command. There are
over 150,000 organized reservists in the Free State.
There are
several US military bases in Bavaria. The Grafenwöhr military training
area is the third largest military training area in Europe.
The
mountain riflemen who were once responsible for national defense now
generally only perform representative tasks. At the request of the state
government, for example, they form an honorary formation during official
visits by foreign heads of state in Bavaria.
The Minister of State for European and International Affairs, Melanie
Huml, is responsible for the connection to European politics and
administration. The Bavarian State Chancellery has a representation at
the European Union in Brussels.
Bavaria has many relationships
and cooperations with neighboring European countries, including for the
coordination of Alpine and Danube policies. The Free State of Bavaria is
represented by politicians in the Committee of the Regions. The European
Parliament consists of twelve MPs from Bavaria: five from the CSU, three
from the SPD, one each from Alliance 90/The Greens, Free Voters, ÖDP and
Left Party.
The Free State of Bavaria receives numerous subsidies
from the European Union, around 495 million euros from the European
Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and almost 300 million euros from the
European Social Fund (ESF), each in the funding period 2014 to 2020.
In the Bundesrat, Bavaria, like Lower Saxony, Baden-Württemberg and North Rhine-Westphalia, has the highest possible number of six votes. Bavaria is represented by Prime Minister Markus Söder, Hubert Aiwanger, Florian Herrmann, Joachim Herrmann, Thorsten Faithr and Georg Eisenreich. The work in the Bundesrat is coordinated by the representation of the Free State of Bavaria at the federal level. In the Bavarian cabinet, Florian Herrmann, Minister of State for Federal Affairs and the Media, is responsible for federal affairs.
The economic importance of Bavaria for the foreign trade of the Federal Republic of Germany and its importance as an important center of industry, trade and logistics, as the headquarters of foreign companies and with a population in which numerous different nationalities are represented, has led to the fact that in the area of the Free State of Bavaria 127 states are represented with their consulates. These include 45 professional and 82 honorary consular representations (as of 2022). Most agencies are located in Munich and the surrounding area. There are also foreign agencies in Nuremberg, Fürth and Regensburg. The doyen of the Bavarian Corps Consulaire is the Hungarian Consul General Gábor Tordai-Lejkó.
The highest award bestowed by the Free State of Bavaria is the Bavarian Maximilian Order for Science and Art, established in 1853. The Bavarian Order of Merit, the Bavarian Constitutional Medal and numerous other orders, medals and decorations are awarded in recognition of outstanding services. At the suggestion of juries, the Free State awards numerous awards such as the Bavarian Film Prize or the Bavarian Print Prize.
The Bavarian state coat of arms consists of six heraldic components:
The golden lion, originally associated with the Wittelsbach Palatinate
on the Rhine, stands for the Upper Palatinate, the "Franconian rake" for
the three Franconian districts, the blue panther for the old Bavarians
and the three black lions for Swabia. The white and blue heart shield
indicates the entire state of Bavaria, the people's crown denotes the
people's sovereignty after the abolition of the royal crown. The small
state coat of arms shows the Bavarian lozenges and the people's crown.
The Bavarian lozenges and the Franconian rake function as heraldic
symbols.
The Free State of Bavaria has two equivalent state
flags, the white and blue diamond flag and the flag with horizontal
white and blue stripes. The diamond flag always has a truncated, white
rhombus (also in the coat of arms) and at least 21 (truncated) rhombuses
at the top left (heraldic right, upper corner) from the viewer's point
of view. The same white and blue diamonds can be found in many city and
district coats of arms in the areas of the historic Electoral
Palatinate, since the Wittelsbach family was also wealthy in the
Palatinate. There is a flag dispute about the Franconian flag.
The national anthem is the Bayernlied. The original text comprises three
stanzas and was written by Michael Öchsner, the melody comes from Konrad
Max Kunz. This historically correct text is still the official version
today (first two stanzas), is taught in schools and played at official
and state events. The Bayernlied (original version) has had the status
of an anthem of the Federal Republic of Germany since 1966.
Bavaria (the Latinized expression for Bavaria) is the female symbol of
Bavaria and appears as a personified allegory for the Bavarian state in
various forms and characteristics. She thus represents the secular
counterpart to Mary as a religious Patrona Bavariae. The Bavarian lion
is a symbol of the Free State of Bavaria, including on monuments and
awards. The national colors are white and blue.
The only spelling of the country name with "y" goes back to an order
by King Ludwig I of Bavaria on October 20, 1825, with which the spelling
"Kingdom of Bavaria" that had been in force since 1806 was replaced.
This order of the king to write with the "Greek" upsilon is related to
his philhellenism. Until then, the country name was often written with
an "i", although there are also many older examples of spelling with a
"y". During the Munich Soviet Republic, the spelling "Baiern" was
temporarily returned.
The spelling was not uniform throughout the
empire either: the Prussian Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck used the
old i-spelling in correspondence with Ludwig II around 1880, while the
Bavarian king used the y-spelling.
The tribe of the native
population of Old Bavaria (excluding Franconia and Bavarian Swabia) is
still referred to as the Bavarians (also called Old Bavarians in other
sections), as is the name of the dialect in Bavarian (in this spelling
the word also designates the dialects spoken in Austria ).
The
term Bavaria or Baiern can be traced back to the Bavarian people. The
full name of the Bavarians is derived from a putative Germanic compound
*Bajowarjōz (plural). This name has been handed down as Old High German
Beiara, Peigira, Latinized Baiovarii. It is assumed that this is an
endonym. Behind the first term Baio is the ethnic icon of the previously
inhabiting Celtic tribe of the Boii, which is preserved in the Old High
German landscape name Bēheima 'Bohemia' (proto-Germanic *Bajohaimaz
'home of the Boii', late Latin then Boiohaemum) and in the onomastic
connecting point (Baias, Bainaib, etc.). . The second term -ware or
-varii of the inhabitant name Bajuwaren comes from Proto-Germanic
*warjaz 'resident' (cf. Old Norse Rómverjar 'Roman', Old English
burhware 'town dweller'), which belongs to defend (proto-Germanic
*warjana-) (cf. also Welsh gwerin 'crowd'). The name 'Baiern' is
therefore interpreted as 'inhabitant of Bohemia'. However, the meaning
of the name remains controversial.
The territory of the Free State of Bavaria is divided into
administrative districts for the area of general and internal
administration, which are called government districts (according to the
constitution, districts). The administrative districts are headed by the
governments, each of which is headed by a district president who is
appointed by the Minister of the Interior. The governments are the
intermediate authorities of general and internal administration and
report to the State Ministry of the Interior. The administrative
districts are sorted below according to the Official Municipality Code
(AGS) and with the abbreviations of the Bavarian State Ministry of the
Interior.
In Bavaria, the districts of the same name are
geographically congruent with the government districts. Unlike the
administrative districts, which determine the local jurisdiction of the
governments, the districts are local authorities under public law. In
Bavaria, the district is the third municipal level above the
municipalities (first level) and rural districts (second level). They
are self-governing bodies and therefore have democratically elected
governing bodies, the district council, which is directly elected every
five years by the district's eligible voters, and a district council
president, who is elected from among the district council. Unlike the
administrative districts, they can use coats of arms and flags like a
municipality or a district.
Bavaria has 18 planning regions. They are regional planning areas in
which, according to the Bavarian state development program, balanced
living and economic relationships are to be maintained or developed. For
this purpose, a regional plan is drawn up for each region. The
Donau-Iller region (15) is the first cross-state planning region in
Germany with an eastern part in Bavaria and a western part in
Baden-Württemberg.
counties and independent cities
The seven
administrative districts are divided into 71 rural districts and 25
urban districts. The rural districts and urban districts are local
authorities with the right to self-government. The administrative bodies
of the districts are the district council and the district
administrator. The independent city acts through the city council and
the mayor. Both the district administrator or the mayor as well as the
district council or the city council are elected by those entitled to
vote for a period of six years (southern German council constitution).
At the same time, the districts form districts, which determine the
local jurisdiction of the sub-authorities of general and internal
administration. Unlike at the level of the administrative districts,
however, the state has not set up its own internal authorities here, but
makes use of the organs of the district administrator to fulfill the
tasks of the state administration; the district administrator is in this
respect the district administrative authority. In contrast to this, in
the case of the district-free towns, there is full municipalisation,
since the tasks of the lower state administrative authority are
transferred to them to be carried out independently.
The district
of Ansbach (Middle Franconia) is the largest district in Bavaria. With
349,837 inhabitants (December 31, 2021), the district of Munich (Upper
Bavaria) is the most populous district in the Free State. Schwabach
(Middle Franconia) is Bavaria's least populated independent city with
41,146 inhabitants (December 31, 2021).
The Free State of Bavaria consists of 2,056 politically independent
municipalities and 192 unincorporated areas, mostly lakes and forests
(as of February 13, 2013).[95] Of the 2,031 communities belonging to the
district, 985 are member communities in one of the 312 administrative
communities (as of February 12, 2013).
The communities are
distributed (as of February 12, 2013) in 25 urban districts and 29 large
district towns.[95] As of January 1, 2009, there were 262 other cities,
386 markets and 1,355 other municipalities. In addition, 13 places have
been appointed as efficient district-affiliated communities that take on
certain building supervision tasks. While independent towns take on the
same tasks as rural districts, large district towns only have a few
tasks that go beyond those of a "normal" municipality that belongs to a
district. Although market law has no legal significance today, larger
district communities can still be officially declared “market” by the
Bavarian state government upon application. The term "market community"
is not an official term for a municipality in Bavaria. It happens there,
however, that the term "market" is an official part of the community
name, for example Markt Berolzheim or Markt Einemsheim.
The
largest and most populous municipality in Bavaria is Munich, the
smallest municipality is Buckenhof in the district of
Erlangen-Höchstadt, and the municipality with the lowest population is
Chiemsee in the district of Rosenheim. Unterhaching is the most populous
community in Bavaria without its own market or city rights.
The only district reform in Bavaria took effect on July 1, 1972. All other county boundary changes are due to minor, non-fundamental reforms, which were mostly municipal area reforms. Sometimes churches were incorporated into existing churches, sometimes a new church was formed. From 1971 to 1980, the efficiency of the municipalities was greatly increased as a result of municipality mergers. The number of municipalities was reduced from around 7,000 to around 2,050, the number of rural districts fell from 143 to 71, and the number of urban districts fell from 48 to 25. At the same time, the administrative unit of the large district town was introduced.
Bavaria is considered to be a very economically strong and wealthy
state, it has developed from an agricultural to a technology location in
recent decades. Bavaria's share of German economic output was 18.5
percent in 2021. The economically strongest region is the greater Munich
area with the automotive industry (BMW, Audi, MAN, Knorr-Bremse), IT
sector (Siemens, Nokia Networks, Infineon, Microsoft, Nemetschek SE),
media and publishing houses (ProSiebenSat.1 Media, Vodafone Kabel).
Germany, Hubert Burda Media), armaments industry (Airbus, Krauss-Maffei)
and tourism (museums, Oktoberfest, congresses, trade fairs). Other
important business locations in southern Bavaria are Augsburg (Airbus,
Fujitsu Technology Solutions, MAN, KUKA, UPM-Kymmene, Weltbild
publishing group), Ingolstadt (Audi, MediaMarktSaturn Retail Group) and
the Bavarian chemical triangle between Chiemsee, Inn and Salzach.
Another important business location is the greater Nuremberg area
with industrial companies (Siemens, Leistritz Group, Dehn, Schmitt +
Sohn), sporting goods manufacturers (Adidas, Puma, uvex), toy
manufacturers (Playmobil, Simba-Dickie-Group, Trix, Herpa, Bruder),
stationery manufacturers (Faber-Castell, Lyra, Staedtler,
Schwan-Stabilo), automotive industry (Alcan/Nüral, Leoni, MAN,
Schaeffler), armaments companies (Diehl, RUAG Ammotec), service
providers (DATEV, Ergo Direkt, GfK, Nürnberger Versicherung), printers
and Publishers (Olympia-Verlag, Tessloff Verlag, Verlag Nürnberger
Presse) and tourism (museums, Christkindlesmarkt, congresses and trade
fairs).
In addition, the area between Aschaffenburg and
Würzburg/Schweinfurt in northern Bavaria can boast very good economic
data, such as unemployment averaging below six percent and a flourishing
economy. The same applies to Regensburg (Continental Automotive,
Maschinenfabrik Reinhausen, BMW, Siemens, Infineon, Osram Opto
Semiconductors), which has been growing in economic strength for years.
Another economic area is Upper Franconia. Nexans, Dennree, Scherdel and
Netzsch are represented there.
Some border regions are dependent
on subsidies due to competitive advantages in neighboring countries and
a lack of infrastructure. The Bavarian Forest in particular was not very
attractive as a location during the Cold War due to its remote location
on the edge of the zone. The iron curtain to Czechoslovakia fell there
after 1990, at the same time the zone border subsidy was lifted in
reunified Germany, and at the same time the neighboring Czech Republic -
from 2004 member of the European Union - often offered better investment
incentives.
Family businesses are of great importance in Bavaria.
In the ranking of the 1000 largest companies of this type, Bavaria, with
193 companies, is in second place in a comparison of the federal states
(after North Rhine-Westphalia). The largest companies in significant
entrepreneurial ownership are BMW, Schaeffler and Knauf.
In
comparison with the gross domestic product of the European Union,
expressed in purchasing power standards, Bavaria achieved an index of
151 in 2014 (EU-28: 100; Germany: 131). The unemployment rate is 3.2%
(May 2023). The city of Schweinfurt had the highest unemployment rate in
Bavaria in 2019.
Bavaria - especially the Nuremberg area - often
experienced plant closures and the relocation of jobs. The office
machine manufacturer Triumph-Adler began to decline in the mid-1980s; In
2003, Grundig AG dissolved. From 2005 to 2007, the AEG main plant was
closed and relocated abroad. The former world's largest mail order
group, Quelle GmbH, went bankrupt in 2009 and was dissolved.
Internationally important trade fairs are located in Munich and
Nuremberg.
Tourism is considered the "leading economy" due to its high
contribution to the Bavarian economy. The gross turnover of the tourism
industry in 2016 was almost 24 billion euros, with day trips accounting
for the largest share at 63 percent. The accommodation industry plays a
major role in Bavaria with 13,400 accommodation establishments with at
least nine beds and 548,000 guest beds. This means that about every
fourth German accommodation establishment is located in Bavaria. After
Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Bavaria was the second most popular
domestic German holiday destination in 2014 (measured by trips lasting
five days or more). In 2018, tourism in Bavaria achieved the eighth
consecutive arrival and overnight stay record with 39.1 million arrivals
and 98.7 million overnight stays. Bavaria was the most popular travel
destination for foreign guests in Germany in 2018.
In addition to
Munich, the regions around the Bavarian lakes and in the Alps, the
culturally and historically important cities of Nuremberg (with the
historic mile, Nazi party rally grounds and its museums), Augsburg (with
the Fuggerei, city wall, Renaissance buildings) and Regensburg (with the
historic old town) are particularly touristy as a UNESCO World Heritage
Site since 2007). With 38.0 million overnight stays, Upper Bavaria takes
a top position among the administrative districts, the second strongest
destination is Bavarian Swabia with 15.5 million. Bayern Tourismus
Marketing GmbH (Munich) has been the official marketing company for the
Bavarian tourism and leisure industry since the beginning of 2000. The
motto is: "Bavaria - traditionally different". The four regional tourism
associations are responsible for the tourist offers and the associated
quality assurance: Tourismusverband Allgäu/Bavarian Swabia,
Tourismusverband Franken, Tourismusverband Ostbayern and Tourismus
Oberbayern München.
Primary energy consumption in the country is fairly constant,
standing at 578.2 billion kilowatt-hours in 2010, down from 556.8
billion kilowatt-hours in 2009 and 566.6 billion kilowatt-hours in 2008.
This can be attributed to increasing energy productivity, i.e. improved
economics Productivity in relation to the energy used. This has risen
almost continuously since 1995, which is used as the base year. The
years 2008 and 2009 fall behind the best value in 2007.
The
largest energy consumers in 2010 were private households, which
accounted for 29 percent of final energy consumption. The areas of
industry and transport require 28 percent of the final energy and thus
only slightly less than households. The area of trade, commerce and
services lagged behind with a total of 15 percent of final energy
consumption.
In 2013, around 420 energy suppliers were based in Bavaria in one or more areas: around 350 of these suppliers were involved in the electricity supply, around 100 in the area of heating and cooling supply, and around 140 in the natural gas sector.
At 48.7 percent, nuclear energy accounts for the largest share of net electricity generation. Renewable energies follow in second place with 29.2 percent. Both proportions are thus above average compared to the national average (18 and 21 percent respectively). Conventional gases contribute 15.5 percent to the net electricity generation - this share is almost in the national average (14 percent). Electricity generation from coal-fired power plants is relatively insignificant, with a share of 4.1 percent (nationwide average for lignite and hard coal a total of 42 percent). Mineral oils, which are used less frequently nationwide on average (heating oil, pump storage and others here a total of 5 percent) (as of 2011) have an even smaller share at 2.6 percent.
There are nuclear power plants at two locations in Bavaria (NPP Isar and NPP Gundremmingen), and a research reactor is also operated in Garching near Munich (FRM II). A study by the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW) found in 2015 that the nuclear phase-out does not endanger the security of supply in Bavaria and Germany.
Renewable energies contributed 36.2% to gross electricity generation
in 2014. The high share of renewable energies in net electricity
generation is based primarily on the significant share of hydropower,
which has been in use for decades: its share of electricity generation
from renewable energies is 35.3 percent. The second most important
regenerative energy supplier is now photovoltaics, which accounts for
35.2 percent of the total share of renewable energies, which was greatly
expanded as part of the energy transition. Power generation from biomass
accounted for 25.4 percent. The use of wind energy is still rather
insignificant – the contribution amounts to 5.6 percent of renewable
electricity generation (as of 2014). In 2012, Bavaria took second place
after Brandenburg in the “Renewable Energies” comparison of federal
states. According to the Bavarian Energy Concept (2011), renewable
energies should account for 20 percent of final energy consumption and
50 percent of electricity consumption by 2021.
According to this
energy concept, wind energy should cover approx. 6 to 10 percent of the
electricity requirement by 2025, which roughly corresponds to the
construction of 1000 to 1500 additional wind turbines. Contrary to this
goal, significantly stricter, restrictive distance regulations were
introduced in the form of the 10-H regulation in 2014 and a year later
the wind energy expansion target was reduced to 5 to 6 percent of
electricity demand. As a result, the number of building permits fell
from 336 in 2014 to 25 in 2015. With a total height of 200 m, only 0.05%
of the land area is theoretically available for wind energy use; taking
into account that only some locations also have enough wind only
0.01%.[120] By mid-2018, 1159 wind turbines with a total output of 2510
MW had been installed.
Bavaria is the seat of several important media companies, especially
in the state capital Munich. There, or in the Munich area, there are
public media such as Bayerische Rundfunk and the program management of
the ARD joint program Das Erste and the ZDF state studio Bavaria as well
as private television and radio broadcasters such as Antenne Bayern,
ProSiebenSat.1 Media, Sport1 or Sky Germany. There are also around 250
resident publishers and large newspapers such as the Süddeutsche Zeitung
(SZ) in Munich. Nuremberg is one of the largest publishing locations in
Germany; there, for example, the nationwide sports magazine Kicker
published by the Nuremberg Olympia publishing house and the Nürnberger
Nachrichten, one of the largest German daily newspapers with a
circulation of around 300,000 copies, are published.
BavariaWLAN
The Free State of Bavaria operates an extensive network of over 40,000
free BayernWLAN hotspots with the WLAN SSID @BayernWLAN. In the area of
local public transport, the Free State of Bavaria provides financial and
organizational support to local authorities in setting up WLAN offers.
In international road and rail traffic, the connections from Germany to Austria and beyond to Italy and south-eastern Europe are of paramount importance. Examples include the connections from Nuremberg via Regensburg and Passau to Linz, the connections from Würzburg or Nuremberg and Munich via Rosenheim to Salzburg or Innsbruck and the connection from Munich via Lindau to Bregenz and Zurich. On the other hand, the traffic connections to the neighboring Czech Republic are by far not of comparable relevance, only the federal motorway 6 was realized after the political change in the Czech Republic. In particular, the rail connections to the Czech Republic are still not very efficient. Electrification has not yet been implemented on any connection leading to the Czech Republic. Before the Second World War there was a railway junction in the Czechoslovak town of Cheb (Eger), which was used by corridor connections in German domestic traffic. From its inception until the end of the Second World War it was subject to Bavarian and German railway administrations. During the Cold War, the connection from Nuremberg via Cheb to Prague was of comparatively important importance. Today there are only transfer connections from Nuremberg with regional trains via Cheb and Furth im Wald, while there is a direct connection from Munich with the Alex via Regensburg (change of direction), Schwandorf (change of direction again) and Furth im Wald to Prague. An electrification of the connection is planned for the future as part of the Danube-Moldau-Bahn project. Deutsche Bahn offers long-distance buses for long-distance travel from Nuremberg to Prague.
The A 3, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 70 motorways, as well as the A 71, which was
completed in autumn 2005, and the A 73, which was completed in August
2008, run through Bavaria and connect Bavaria with Thuringia. There is a
connection to the federal state of Hesse via the A 3, the A 7 and a
small section of the A 45. The A 72 connects to the Free State of
Saxony. Star-shaped from Munich, the A 95 leads to
Garmisch-Partenkirchen, the A 96 via Memmingen to Lindau, the A 93 via
Regensburg to Hof, the A 92 via Landshut to Deggendorf and the A 94 in
sections to Passau. The A 952 branches off the A 95 as a connection to
Lake Starnberg. To the south, a section of the A 93 connects the A 8
with the Brenner Autobahn. The A 94 from Munich via Altötting to Passau
has been planned since the 1970s, but has only been completed in
sections to date due to disputes about the routing. A large number of
federal highways also run through Bavaria. The Munich Ring is formed by
the A 99 motorway with the Eschenrieder Spange (also known as the A 99a)
and the A 995. These are supplemented by state, district and municipal
roads.
Bavaria is thus well developed in terms of road traffic.
Nevertheless, with 344 projects for federal motorways and federal roads,
18.5 percent of the applications for the Federal Transport
Infrastructure Plan 2030 come from Bavaria.
In the period from
2009 to 2018, Bavaria received increased investments from federal funds
from the Federal Ministry of Transport, which has been led by the CSU
since 2009. In terms of infrastructure and population, this was a
disproportionate amount of money, especially for trunk roads. From 2014
to 2019, for example, 243 bridges out of a total of around 4,700 were
renovated in Bavaria, and 100 out of almost 4,400 in North
Rhine-Westphalia. 2 billion euros were invested in the trunk roads in
Bavaria, and 1.4 billion euros in the most populous state of North
Rhine-Westphalia. Bavaria also received the highest allocation of funds
over the entire period and had the largest increase in funds. In Bavaria
(or, by comparison, in North Rhine-Westphalia), kilometers of newly
built roads were completed between 2011 and 2018: 13 km (24 km) for
motorways and 120 km (0 km) for federal roads.
In the south,
Bavaria is also often used as a shortcut in domestic Austrian traffic,
since due to the geographical conditions, the route through the Alps is
far longer than from Innsbruck via the A 8 or from Lofer via the B 21 or
B 305 to Salzburg ("big" or "Small German Corner").
Bavaria has a dense rail network with numerous train stations. The
Munich and Nuremberg main stations are two of the largest in Germany and
represent important hubs in trans-European traffic. The cities of Munich
and Nuremberg have underground and suburban railways with a wide
catchment area.
One of the largest European hubs for air traffic
is Munich Airport "Franz Josef Strauss". In addition to the
international airport Nuremberg "Albrecht Dürer", there is also the
airport Memmingen and numerous airfields. In 2018 there were four fuel
dumps over Bavaria. A total of 107 tons of kerosene were drained.
Most inland shipping takes place on the Danube, the Main and the
Main-Danube Canal. There are numerous freight ports for this. With an
annual throughput of around 15 million tons, the trimodal freight
transport center at the port of Nuremberg is the largest and most
important multifunctional freight transport and logistics center in
southern Germany.
Theatre, drama and opera
Bavaria has several state theaters. The Bavarian State Opera in the
National Theater in Munich is considered to be the most renowned house
in Bavaria, both nationally and internationally. The Bavarian State
Theater, the Munich Residence Theater, the Bavarian State Ballet and the
State Theater on Gärtnerplatz also play in Munich. In addition, there
are the Nuremberg State Theater and the Augsburg State Theater, which
emerged from the respective municipal theaters.
Sixteen theaters
are supported by Bavarian municipalities. The theaters in Regensburg,
Würzburg, Hof and Coburg are multi-sector houses. The ETA Hoffmann
Theater in Bamberg, the Theater Erlangen, the Stadttheater Fürth and the
Stadttheater Ingolstadt as well as the Munich Kammerspiele and the
Munich Volkstheater in the Bavarian capital offer mainly or exclusively
spoken theatre. The four state theaters are based in Memmingen,
Landshut/Passau/Straubing, Coburg and Dinkelsbühl.
In addition to
the children's and youth sections of the municipally funded houses,
theaters for children and young people include the Schauburg in Munich
or the Theater Pfütze and the Theater Mummpitz in Nuremberg. The
Augsburger Puppenkiste gained international fame through its television
productions, but the puppet theater also offers a program for adults.
There are also a large number of free and private theaters as well
as folk and rural theater groups.
The Bayreuth Festival, founded
by Richard Wagner, is an internationally important festival. The
Bavarian Theater Days take place in different cities every year.
Bavaria is traditionally regarded as the home of folk music,
yodelling and Schuhplattler. Well-known composers such as Max Reger,
Carl Orff, Wilfried Hiller, Richard Strauss and Christoph Willibald
Gluck come from Bavaria. The Regensburger Domspatzen, the Augsburger
Domsingknaben, the Tölz Boys' Choir and the Windsbach Boys' Choir as
well as the Munich Bach Choir are world-renowned choirs. The best-known
Bavarian classical orchestras include the Munich Philharmonic, the
Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Bamberg Symphony, the Bavarian
State Orchestra at the National Theater, the Augsburg Philharmonic at
the Augsburg State Theater, the Munich Bach Orchestra, the Bavarian
Chamber Philharmonic in Augsburg, the Munich Symphoniker, the Munich
Chamber Orchestra, the Georgian Chamber Orchestra in Ingolstadt, the
Nuremberg Philharmonic at the Nuremberg State Theater, the Nuremberg
Symphony and the Hofer Symphoniker, which are the only orchestras that
also train music students.
Among the music festivals, the
Bayreuth Festival and the Munich Opera Festival are outstanding. Another
highlight in the music scene is the Thurn and Taxis Castle Festival,
which has been held in Regensburg for several years under the patronage
of Gloria von Thurn and Taxis. In recent years, the number of visitors
has increased steadily. Also noteworthy is the Munich Kaiserball and the
Nuremberg Opera Ball.
Together with the city of Munich, the Bavarian Broadcasting
Corporation and the leading organization of the film industry, Bavaria
is a shareholder of the Internationale Münchner Filmwochen GmbH, which
organizes both the annual Munich Film Festival and the International
Festival of Munich Film Schools.
The Nuremberg International
Human Rights Film Festival and the German Human Rights Film Prize take
place in Nuremberg every year. In addition to the Türkiye/Germany film
festival, the city is also home to the Fantasy Filmfest.
The Hof
Film Days take place in Hof (Saale) every year. Its founder Heinz
Badewitz died in 2016, but the festival continues to exist. At the film
days, the focus is primarily on German, but also international world
premieres.
Due to the coexistence of the two Bavarian tribes of Old Bavaria and
Franconia, plus cultural parts of Swabia, Bavarian cuisine is very
diverse:
Roast pork, pork knuckle, Schäufele (pork shoulder), veal
knuckle, suckling pig
Bread dumplings, potato dumplings or Franconian
dumplings, liver dumplings and soup
Sauerkraut, cabbage rolls,
cabbage spaetzle, cabbage donuts
Liver spaetzle (soup), bacon
dumplings (soup), pancake soup (fädlesuppe)
Weißwurst, Wollwurst,
Stockwurst, Regensburg Sausage, Franconian Bratwurst, Blaue Zipfel, Hof
Beef Sausage
Steamed noodles, tube noodles, lard noodles, Bavarian
cream
Bavarian potato salad, Bavarian sausage salad
Obazda or
Franconian: plucked
meatloaf
Swabia and Allgäu: Kässpatzen
Finger noodles (Schupfnudeln)
Sour Lüngerl
Hofer Schnitz
(vegetable stew from eastern Upper Franconia)
Folk festivals and church consecrations are widespread in Bavaria.
Initially, this was used to commemorate the consecration of the church.
In many places there are many church fair traditions, such as putting up
a church fair tree. In larger cities, a folk festival is usually held
instead of a church fair. The largest folk festival in the world is the
Munich Oktoberfest (Wiesn) with 6.3 million visitors in 2014. Other
major folk festivals in Bavaria are the Gäuboden folk festival in
Straubing, the Erlangen Bergkirchweih, the Karpfham Festival, the
Nuremberg folk festival, the Augsburg Plärrer, the Würzburg Kiliani folk
festival, the Regensburger Dult, the Fürth Michaeliskirchweih and the
Hofer Schlappentag.
Bavaria does not officially have a state
festival, but the Day of the Franconians, which has been celebrated in
Franconia since 2006, has the character of a state festival. The
Nuremberg Christkindlesmarkt is a Christmas market on the main market
and, with over two million visitors a year, is one of the largest
Christmas markets in Germany and the most famous in the world.
The flagship among the traditional village church fairs is the
Limmersdorfer Lindenkirchweih in Thurnau in Upper Franconia (Kulmbach
district), which focuses on dancing in the lime tree crown. It has been
held uninterruptedly since at least 1729 as a Franconian plan church
fair. In 2014 it was therefore included in the National List of
Intangible Cultural Heritage as a symbol of village Franconian festival
culture as one of 27 customs in Germany.
With the Maxhütte (Sulzbach-Rosenberg), Bavaria has one of the most important industrial monuments in Europe. The system, which is unique in terms of technology and architecture, is being partially dismantled despite existing monument protection. Attempts are currently being made to save the industrial monument from final demolition.
Bavaria can look back on more than 1000 years of cultural and
intellectual history. According to Article 3 of the constitution of the
Free State of Bavaria, Bavaria is a cultural state. In its 2003 budget,
the Free State of Bavaria promotes art and culture with more than 500
million euros a year. In addition, there are significant contributions
from the Bavarian municipalities and private sponsors.
The first
stone buildings in Bavaria were built in Roman times. For example, a
Roman thermal bath was excavated in Weißenburg. There are only a few
testimonies from the early Middle Ages. An example, however, is the
crypt of Bamberg Cathedral from the time of Emperor Heinrich II. In the
High Middle Ages, Augsburg, Nuremberg, Würzburg and Regensburg became
prosperous trading cities. In Regensburg and Nuremberg, as in Italy,
powerful family towers arose. The Regensburg Cathedral is a major work
of Gothic architecture in southern Germany. Since the Stone Bridge was
the only bridge between Ulm and Vienna on the Danube for a long time, it
brought trade here. In addition to the large cities, the historical town
centers also include Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Dinkelsbühl, Straubing
and Nördlingen. The city of Landshut is known for the Martinskirche, the
largest brick tower in the world, and for the city residence with its
Renaissance paintings. In Augsburg, the Fuggers built the Fuggerei, the
oldest social settlement in the world. The town hall of the city is
considered the showpiece of this time. Sights in Munich include the
Siegestor and the antique collections. In Nuremberg, the most important
tourist attractions include the historic sights of the old town, the
Nazi Party Rally Grounds from the National Socialist era and the
Nuremberg Trials Memorial. Neuschwanstein Castle, Linderhof Castle and
Herrenchiemsee Castle were built under King Ludwig II.
The UNESCO World Heritage Site in Bavaria has included the Würzburg
Residence since 1981, a southern German baroque palace, complete with
courtyard garden and adjoining Residenzplatz. The remarkably
magnificently decorated Wieskirche near Steingaden was declared a World
Heritage Site in 1983. In 1993 the old town of Bamberg was declared a
World Heritage Site. Since 2005, the Upper Germanic-Raetian Limes, with
a total length of 550 kilometers the longest archaeological monument in
Europe, has been part of the World Heritage. Several buildings belonging
to the Limes, such as the thermal baths in Weißenburg, are part of the
world heritage. In 2006 the old town of Regensburg with the old town
hall, cathedral and stone bridge was included, in 2011 the prehistoric
pile dwellings around the Alps with several prehistoric settlements,
followed in 2012 by the Margravial Opera House in Bayreuth. The last
Bavarian addition to UNESCO World Heritage was the Augsburg Water
Management System in 2019.
Since 2003, the Bamberg Apocalypse, a
manuscript of the Reichenau monastery, and since 2013 the Lorsch
Pharmacopoeia have been part of the UNESCO World Document Heritage. Both
writings are kept in the Bamberg State Library. The Bavarian State
Library in Munich contains the pericopes of Heinrich II recorded in
2003, the Hohenems-Munich manuscript A recorded in 2009, the Gospels
from Bamberg Cathedral recorded in 2003, the Gospels of Otto III
recorded in 2003. and the Bibliotheca Corviniana, incorporated in 2005.
A Golden Bull (recorded in 2013) is stored in the Bavarian Main State
Archives, another in the Nuremberg State Archives.
With around 1,350 museums, Bavaria is the federal state in Germany
with the most museums and one of the regions on the continent with the
most museums. The diverse museum landscape includes collections,
castles, gardens and private collections. Among the largest and best
known are the Germanic National Museum in Nuremberg and the Bavarian
National Museum in Munich. The largest scientific and technical museum
in the world is the German Museum in Munich. The Franconian Open-Air
Museum in Bad Windsheim, which has existed since 1976, and the
Franconian Open-Air Museum in Fladungen, which has existed since 1990,
are among the largest and most important of their kind. The Bavarian
State Painting Collections look after a significant part of the painting
and art collection of the Free State of Bavaria.
libraries and
archives
The largest library in the Free State is the Bavarian State
Library in Munich. It is the central state library in Bavaria and one of
the most important European research and universal libraries with
international standing. With 10.22 million media units, it is the third
largest library in Germany and has one of the largest collections in the
German-speaking world. The largest university library is the University
Library of the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. The Nuremberg
City Library is the oldest public library and the Munich City Library is
the largest. The second largest library in Bavaria is the library of the
Friedrich Alexander University of Erlangen-Nuremberg. In order to ensure
the supply of scientific literature in all regions, there are ten state
regional libraries, the largest being the Bamberg State Library.
The Bavarian Main State Archive in Munich is the largest Bavarian state
archive and, due to Bavaria's long state existence, also one of the most
important archives in Europe. There are also numerous other state
archives.
The Federal Garden Show was held twice in Bavaria: the 1983 Federal
Garden Show, which coincided with the International Horticultural
Exhibition, and the 2005 Federal Garden Show, both of which were held in
Munich.
Bavaria was one of the first federal states to design its
own state garden show, which took place for the first time in 1980
together with the state of Baden-Württemberg in Neu-Ulm/Ulm.
Since 2006, 2-euro commemorative coins have been issued annually with a motif of the state that represents the President of the Bundesrat. In 2012 this was Bavaria, so around 30 million 2-euro coins with the Neuschwanstein Castle as a motif were minted on February 3, 2012, which are in circulation as official means of payment and are popular with coin collectors.
In addition to the national public holidays New Year's Day (January
1), Good Friday, Easter Sunday and Easter Monday, Labor Day (May 1),
Ascension Day, Whit Sunday and Whit Monday, German Unity Day (October 3)
and Christmas Day and Christmas Day (December 25th/26th) there are other
public holidays in the Free State of Bavaria in accordance with the law
on the protection of Sundays and public holidays. The Epiphany (January
6th), Corpus Christi and All Saints' Day (November 1st) are public
holidays throughout Bavaria. On the occasion of the 500th anniversary of
the Reformation in 2017, Reformation Day on October 31, 2017 was a
one-off public holiday. Assumption Day (August 15) is a public holiday
only in communities with a predominantly Catholic population. The
Augsburg Peace Festival (8 August) is a public holiday only in the city
of Augsburg. Likewise, the Schlappentag is only a public holiday in the
city of Hof. The Day of Repentance and Prayer was a public holiday until
1994. Since then, the day has been a working day, but students have no
classes.
With twelve national public holidays, Bavaria is the
federal state with the most public holidays, including the Assumption of
Mary there are 13 public holidays in Catholic areas and 14 in Augsburg.
In addition to public holidays, there are silent days on which
special restrictions must be observed. Public entertainment events that
do not correspond to the serious character of these days are prohibited,
for example, dancing is prohibited on Good Friday. The quiet days in
Bavaria are Ash Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday,
All Saints' Day, National Day of Mourning, Sunday of the Dead, Day of
Repentance and Prayer and Christmas Eve (December 24).
There are around 5,500 schools in the Free State of Bavaria that work
according to the Bavarian Law on Education and Teaching. After the
four-year elementary school, the three-tier school system follows with
middle school, junior high school and high school with the Abitur after
the 12th grade. From the 7th grade there is the opportunity to attend
the business school, and from the 10th grade, the vocational high school
(technical high school and vocational high school) with obtaining the
Bavarian Abitur after the 13th grade.
Pupils with a certificate
from the Realschule, the Wirtschaftsschule or the M-Bahn at secondary
schools can transfer to so-called introductory classes at selected
grammar schools and, if they pass successfully, to the 11th grade of the
grammar school. Under certain conditions, it is possible to transfer to
the 11th grade without attending the introductory class or to the
regular 10th grade of the Gymnasium. In addition, there are special
needs schools and schools for the sick. The school system is generally
permeable, and every student with every qualification obtained has the
option of moving on to the next higher school qualification.
There are five comprehensive schools in Bavaria that are of a special
kind. There are also numerous boarding schools, private schools and
institutions for second chance education in Bavaria. A special feature
of the Bavarian education system are preparatory institutions for
children with special educational needs, which do not exist in this form
in any other federal state. Other special features of the Bavarian
school system are grade level tests, absentee booklet guides and the
elite network of Bavaria for top academic training.
In the PISA
studies conducted by the OECD, Bavarian schoolchildren regularly achieve
top positions.
In the overall German education comparison,
Bavaria (as of 2019) is in second place behind Saxony.
In Bavaria there are nine state universities in the Free State as
well as the University of the Federal Armed Forces in Munich. Until 1962
there were only four universities in Munich (LMU, TU), Würzburg and
Erlangen (from 1966 Erlangen-Nuremberg). Between 1962 and 1975 five more
were founded by the Free State in Regensburg, Augsburg, Bamberg,
Bayreuth and Passau. In addition, in 1973, the newly founded Federal
Armed Forces University was established. Since 2018, the Technical
University of Nuremberg has been the tenth state university under
construction.
There are also 18 state universities of applied
sciences in Bavaria, such as those in Aschaffenburg, Hof, Landshut,
Kempten and Nuremberg, which were founded between 1971 and 1996. In
addition, there is a church university, the Catholic University of
Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, founded in 1980, as well as four other private or
church colleges and 10 art colleges.
ball sports
Soccer is one of the most popular sports. The Bavarian
Football Association has around 1.5 million members, making it the
association with the largest number of members in the German Football
Association. FC Bayern Munich is internationally known, it is the record
champion of the Bundesliga, to which it has belonged since 1965, and has
also won several international football competitions such as the UEFA
Champions League. FC Augsburg has also been playing in the top German
division since 2011. Three Bavarian clubs are currently playing in the
second highest division, the 2nd Bundesliga: nine-time German champions
and long-standing record champions 1. FC Nürnberg, three-time German
champions SpVgg Greuther Fürth and SSV Jahn Regensburg. In the 2022/23
season, the long-standing first division club TSV 1860 Munich, FC
Ingolstadt 04 and SpVgg Bayreuth will play in the 3rd football league.
1. FC Nürnberg occupies second place in terms of the number of
championship titles won.
The women's team from FC Bayern Munich,
German champions in 1976, 2015, 2016 and 2021, is also represented in
the Bundesliga.
In volleyball, the multiple German women's
champions Rote Raben Vilsbiburg and NawaRo Straubing as well as the men
from WWK Volleys Herrsching and TSV Unterhaching are active in the 1st
Bundesliga.
The basketball teams from Brose Bamberg, medi
Bayreuth, Bayern Munich and s.Oliver Würzburg play in the top German
division. Brose Bamberg was German champion in 2005, 2007, 2010, 2011,
2012, 2013 and 2015 and cup winner in 2010, 2011 and 2012. In women's
basketball, the TSV Wasserburg team, which plays in the 1st Bundesliga,
won the German championship title in the years 2004 to 2007 and was also
the German cup winner from 2005 to 2007.
Currently (season
2020/21) HC Erlangen and HSC 2000 Coburg (both Bundesliga) are the
top-class men’s handball clubs in the Free State of Bavaria. The
handball department of TV Großwallstadt from the district of Miltenberg
played in the 1st Bundesliga for many years and now plays in the 2nd
Bundesliga, in which DJK Rimpar is also represented. The Munich clubs
TSV Milbertshofen and MTSV Schwabing are well known, even if they are no
longer top notch.
In women's handball, 1. FC Nürnberg is the most
successful Bavarian team. In the recent past they were German champions
in 2005, 2007 and 2008 and advanced to the main round of the EHF
Champions League in 2007/2008.
The ATP Munich tennis tournament
takes place in Munich every year. The WTA Nuremberg has been held
annually in Nuremberg for female tennis players since 2013.
With
163 golf courses, Bavaria is at the top in Germany. As of 2008, 110,000
active golfers were registered.
In baseball, more and more teams
have played successfully in the 1st and 2nd baseball leagues in recent
years. This includes the German champions of the 2008, 2010 and 2011
season, the Regensburg Legionnaires. Other successful Bavarian teams
include the Gauting Indians, the Ingolstadt Schanzer and the Haar
Disciples. At the state association level, the Bavarian clubs include
the Augsburg Gators, the Erlangen White Sox, the Fürth Pirates, the
Deggendorf Dragons and the Garching Atomics. With around 60 registered
clubs, the Bavarian Baseball and Softball Association (BBSV) is one of
the largest in Germany.
In American football, too, Bayern is
represented with a number of teams in the top divisions. The Munich
Cowboys, the Ingolstadt Dukes and the Allgäu Comets from Kempten play in
the German Football League. In the second division, GFL2, three Bavarian
teams are represented, the Kirchdorf Wildcats, the Straubing Spiders and
the Fursty Razorbacks. In women's football, the Munich Cowboys Ladies
and the Munich Rangers Ladies are represented in the Bundesliga, as well
as the Allgäu Comets Ladies, the Nuremberg Rams Ladies and the
Regensburg Phoenix Ladies in the second division.
Basketball is
mainly played in Franconia, but also in the Allgäu. Schweinfurt has been
the center of netball since 1937. More than 80 clubs take part in game
operations in the region.
Winter sports are traditionally very important, especially in the
Alpine region. The Bavarian Alps offer favorable conditions for ski
racing. The outstanding representatives of this sport are Mirl Buchner,
Heidi Biebl, Rosi Mittermaier, Marina Kiehl, Christa Kinshofer, Martina
Ertl, Hilde Gerg, Maria Höfl-Riesch, Franz Pfnür and Markus Wasmeier.
Numerous winners of international competitions emerged from the Biathlon
National Training Center in Ruhpolding, the best known of whom are Fritz
Fischer, Michael Greis, Uschi Disl, Martina Glagow and Magdalena Neuner.
Tobias Angerer and Evi Dingebacher-Stehle achieved significant results
in cross-country skiing.
In Bavaria there are five ice hockey
clubs in the German Ice Hockey League; the Augsburg Panthers, the ERC
Ingolstadt, the EHC Red Bull Munich, the Nuremberg Ice Tigers and the
Straubing Tigers. The teams from EHC Bayreuth, EV Landshut, ESV
Kaufbeuren, EV Regensburg and Selber Wölfe play in the DEL2. In the
Oberliga Süd, all 13 teams are from Bavaria, although the Süd group
theoretically also includes Baden-Württemberg and southern Saxony. Other
clubs that are well-known for their youth work are the Starbulls
Rosenheim and EV Füssen.
Numerous sporting events, such as the
first two competitions of the Four Hills Tournament, take place in the
Oberallgäu region of Oberstdorf and in Garmisch-Partenkirchen in
particular. The 1936 Winter Olympics took place in Garmisch. Numerous
world and European championships, for example in the areas of luge,
figure skating, curling or ski flying, took place there.
The sport climbers Thomas and Alexander Huber became known to a
larger audience not least through the documentary Am Limit. Bavarians
used to be among the world's best summiteers, including Johann Grill,
Josef Enzensperger, Otto Herzog, Anderl Heckmair and Toni Schmid.
Bouldering was made famous by the Nuremberger Wolfgang Fietz, among
others, and is practiced indoors and in the northern Franconian Jura
climbing area and the Kochel climbing area.
In Bavaria, some
traditional sports such as finger hooking and curling have been
preserved, which are practiced in organized leagues. The Sautrog race is
also one of the traditional Bavarian sports. This sport is particularly
popular in southern Bavaria on the rivers Danube, Iller, Isar and Lech.
In Franconia, this sport is celebrated on the occasion of folk festivals
in the mostly still existing local village or extinguishing water ponds.
To the great amusement of the spectators, serious regional and national
championships are contested, since 2010 in Schwarzenbach an der Saale
there have even been real world championships.
In the field of
motorsport there is the annual touring car race for the DTM at the
Norisring in Nuremberg-Dutzendteich. There are speedway races in
Landshut, Pocking, Abensberg and Olching, sand track races in Mühldorf
am Inn, Pfarrkirchen, Vilshofen, Dingolfing and Plattling. International
ice speedway races take place in Inzell. Sport shooting is practiced
across the country in the disciplines of rifle, pistol, bow, clay
target, running target and crossbow. With the Bavarian Sportschützenbund
(BSSB), the sports shooters make up the fourth largest sports
association in the state. Many Bavarian participants in the Olympic
Games were able to achieve success.
In dance sport, the
Rot-Gold-Casino Nuremberg is one of the most successful clubs in the
world. The reigning individual world champion in Latin competes for the
RGC Nürnberg. In formation dancing, the club has the reigning European
Vice Champion in the standard category and the best team in Bavaria in
the Latin category. In addition, many other dancers are successful for
the club in various performance classes.
Many gymnastics clubs
have a long tradition in Bavaria. The state training center was in
Nuremberg, but was merged with the federal training center in Frankfurt
am Main. Centers are Augsburg, Würzburg, Schweinfurt, Nuremberg,
Landshut, Passau and Rosenheim. In the 1920s, Bavarian gymnasts often
occupied top positions worldwide. There has been a Bavarian Children's
Gymnastics Olympics for children since 2000.
In a Germany-wide comparison, Bavaria has a very low crime rate.
According to police crime statistics, 4,868 crimes per 100,000
inhabitants were registered in 2017. That was the lowest value among all
federal states.
Personal bankruptcies
In 2017, Bavaria had the
lowest rate of personal bankruptcies of all federal states. Only 86 out
of 100,000 citizens were insolvent. The Germany-wide average is 123
private insolvencies per 100,000 inhabitants. Bremen had the most with
212.