Lüneburg is a beautiful Hanseatic city in Lower Saxony, southeast
of Hamburg. The historic city center with numerous monuments and
museums invites you to visit. The Lüneburg Heath begins about 30 km
west of the city.
Lüneburg as a Hanseatic city
The
Hanseatic city of Lüneburg is located on the Ilmenau, a small river
that flows into the Elbe at Stöckte a few kilometers northwest. The
wealth of the city and its citizens was based in the time of the
Hanseatic League on the occurrence of salt, which u. a. was sold to
the nearby Hanseatic city of Hamburg and was transported over the
Ilmenau by boat type Salzewer. Even today, many buildings in the
unique old town of Lüneburg testify to this wealth - the more than
1300 listed brick houses in the old town are the main attraction for
tourists today.
Lüneburg Heath
The Lüneburg Heath, about
30 km west of the city, was created as a deforestation area, among
other things through overgrazing and because of Lüneburg's large
demand for wood for the saltworks. It was once the largest military
training area in the German Empire and is now a popular holiday and
recreational area. During the heather bloom in August, Lüneburg also
has a very large influx of visitors.
Filming location for the
series 'Rote Rosen'
Lüneburg is the location of the television
series "Rote Rosen". The outdoor scenes of the series are filmed
here and in surrounding locations such as Deutsch Evern. The studio
is located in the Neu-Hagen district of Lüneburg. Lüneburg's
popularity with tourists has increased significantly since the
series began. The Rote Rosen Studios, Lilienthalstr. 1, 21337
Lüneburg, can also be visited from time to time.
University
City
Leuphana. Since 2005 Lüneburg has had the university that
emerged from the teacher training college. There is a new
architectural attraction with the central building and auditorium of
the university: It was designed by star architect Daniel Libeskind
and has become the university's new landmark. In addition to the
architecture, it is above all the exploding financial volume that is
controversial, not an easy topic for Lüneburg, the university and
the Lower Saxony State Audit Office.
By plane
The nearest major airports are Hamburg Airport (IATA:
HAM), Hanover Airport (IATA: HAJ) and Bremen Airport (IATA: BRE)
Lüneburg Airport (ICAO: EDHG), Zeppelinstraße 27, 21337 Lüneburg (in the
port industrial area). Phone: +49 (0)4131 854 92 14, email: info@edhg.de
. Engine, glider, motor glider and microlight operations take place at
the site.
By train
Lüneburg Central Station, Bahnhofstrasse
10, 21337 Lüneburg (east of downtown) . Lüneburg has a central train
station. The train station is divided into the (eastern) long-distance
train station and the west train station in Lüneburg, where the RE to
Dannenberg and the regional Metronom to Hamburg stop.
ICE and
continuous IC stop here. Other connections make the city accessible via
Hanover and Hamburg.
As a regional railway company, the Metronom runs
to Hamburg every half hour. The journey time is around 30 minutes
(metronome) and around 50 minutes (regional metronome). The metronome
goes south to the Hundertwasser station in Uelzen, from there connecting
trains run to Hanover and Göttingen, some trains also go through to
Hanover. The RE of DB-Regio travels east to Dannenberg (Elbe).
In
the street
From the northwest: Lüneburg can be reached from Hamburg
via the A39, which continues as a four-lane B4 from Lüneburg and is
known as the eastern bypass.
From the north: The B404 coming from
Geesthacht connects to the north with the A39. The B209 coming from
Lauenburg and Hohnstorf an der Elbe leads directly into the city.
From the east: Via the B216 from Dannenberg via Dahlenburg
From the
south: Via the A39 or B4 from Uelzen, Gifhorn and Braunschweig.
From
the southwest/west: Via the A7 symbol: AS Soltau-Ost, then the B207 via
Amelinghausen
By boat
Lüneburg has no connection to a port for
passenger traffic. The Ilmenau is z. B. for yachts not navigable to
Lüneburg.
Industrial port of Lüneburg. The industrial port can be
approached via the Elbe Lateral Canal.
By bicycle
Numerous
regional or long-distance cycle paths start, end or cross Lüneburg:
The Weser-Harz-Heide Cycle Path starts and ends here from the Weser in
Hann. Münden over the Harz Mountains, through Wolfenbüttel and the
Lüneburg Heath.
the 120 km long Ilmenau cycle path from Bad
Bodenteich via Uelzen to Lüneburg, from where it runs to Hoopte at the
confluence of the Ilmenau and the Elbe (route information Ilmenau cycle
path)
the Alte Salzstraße leads in about 116km from Lüneburg via
Lauenburg to Lübeck (route information Alte Salzstraße)
On foot
The 145 km long Hermann Billung hiking trail leads from Lauenburg via
Lüneburg to Amelinghausen, then via Soltau and Visselhövede to Verden.
the Via Scandinavica, a Scandinavian Way of St. James, leads on its
German section from Fehmarn via Lübeck and Lüneburg to its end point in
Göttingen.
Public transport
The city and regional bus company is the KVG.
Lüneburg is a member of the Hamburger Verkehrsverbund (HVV). There are
two important bus transfers in Lüneburg:
Central bus station
(ZOB). Changeover mainly for regional lines.
At the train station is
the ZOB (Zentrale Omnibusbahnhof), which serves both city and regional
buses and creates the transition to rail transport.
Changeover on the
sand. Changeover mainly for inner-city lines.
For many, mostly
inner-city lines, the Am Sande square in the middle of the city center
offers transfer options.
There are several taxi ranks at the ZOB and
Am Sande.
Park
Access to the city center of Lüneburg is only
possible to a very limited extent. If you don't want to do without your
car, you have the following options for parking:
Multi-storey car
park Am Klinikum - at the Städtisches Klinikum
Multi-storey car park
Am Graalwall/Rathaus - Am Graalwall (including disabled and women's
parking spaces)
Parking garage Stadtmitte/Am Wasserturm - At
Ratsmühle 17
Parking garage at the train station - Am Altenbrücker
Ziegelhof
Authorities center Reichenbachstrasse
City car park -
new brawn
Karstadt multi-storey car park - on the desert site
Lünepark - Bockelmannstrasse
Parking lot - Kalandstrasse
Sülzwiesen car park / Am Bargenturm - Sülzwiesen
By bicycle
The city is easy to explore by bike, some of the streets have coarse
cobblestones. There are no major differences in altitude to overcome in
the urban area, there are longer climbs out of town, especially towards
the east.
Rental bikes are available from the following
providers:
StadtRAD Lüneburg. Phone: +49 (0)40 82218810-0, fax:
+49 (0)40 82218810-9, email: info@stadtradlueneburg.de. has seven rental
points, is identical to Deutsche Bahn's Call-a-bike, contacts via their
hotline.
RadspeicheR, Bahnhofstr. 4, 21337 Lüneburg (directly at the
train station). Tel.: +49 (0)4131 266350, fax: +49 (0)4131 266351,
e-mail: info@radspeicher.de. offers around 30 rental bikes, including
pedelecs.
Heiderad. Has no station in Lüneburg, but you can order
bikes by phone.
bikes and repairs
RadspeicheR (at the train
station). Bicycle sales, repairs without prior notice, rental, bicycle
parking garage.
Radhaus Lüneburg, Neue Sülze 23 21335 Lüneburg (in
the city center).
BOC, in front of the Bardowicker Tore 27 21339
Lüneburg (close to downtown).
bike park Käthe-Krüger-Straße 8,
Kaltenmoor, about 3 km from the city centre.
KonRad,
Scharnhorststrasse, Building 28, 21335 Lüneburg. very well-equipped
self-help workshop, opening times depend on the semester breaks.
1 Michaelis Church . Former monastery church of the Benedictines in
Lüneburg. It is one of the three main churches in Lüneburg. The hall
church was built between 1376 and 1436 and, like the other main
churches, was made of brick due to the lack of sandstone in the area.
The church is usually open, so you can also visit it from the inside.
The monastery had a school whose most famous student was Johann
Sebastian Bach, who was 15 when he entered the monastery in 1700-1702.
2 Lüne Monastery
3 St. Stephen's Ecumenical Community Center .
Interesting, modern church building with a combination of exposed
concrete and wood from the 1970s, in the middle of the 1st district of
Kaltenmoor wikipedia, which is characterized by immigrants and socially
disadvantaged people.
4 St. John's Church . Main Church of Lueneburg.
It represents the center of the city. It was built in the brick Gothic
style and is considered one of the most important buildings in this
style. The Evangelical Lutheran Church was built between 1289 and 1440.
5 St. Nicolai Church . A brick Gothic style evangelical church. It was
built between 1407 and 1440 but was not completed until much later. The
church is usually open and can be visited. The church is the smallest of
Lüneburg's three main churches and was built as a three-nave basilica
Old Town Hall. Tel: (0)800 - 220 5005 . at the Ochsenmarkt − created
around 1230. The court arbor, prince's hall, old archive, chancellery
and mayor's chamber all date from the Gothic period. Masterful woodwork
adorns the large council chamber, which is one of the largest
Renaissance halls in Germany. The homage hall and the market facade date
from the Baroque period. In the tower there is a clock mechanism with a
carillon made of Meissen porcelain. Price €5/€4 reduced Open: Guided
tours Tue. - Sun.
Council water art and water tower wikipediacommons.
They were mainly used to supply the salt works with fresh water.
Monuments
Memorial in the Tiergarten. Around 1.5 km from the city
center there is a memorial in the Tiergarten for concentration camp
prisoners who were killed by bombs and their guards during an air raid.
A walk there from the city center leads e.g. B. along the Ilmenau over
the 5 Teufelsbrücke in a varied area with forest and a wetland.
Museums
Lueneburg Museum. Modern museum of culture and nature of the
city and region. With a chic cafe!
German Salt Museum,
Sülfmeisterstrasse 1. Tel.: (0)4131-720 65 13 . in the former Saline
Lüneburg. Shows the importance of salt for the city, work and the place
of production of the salt, namely the saltworks.
Brewery Museum,
Heiligengeiststrasse 39. in the old Kronenbrauerei.
East Prussian
State Museum. Actually a "homeland museum" for the expellees from East
Prussia, it focuses on the former German culture there, but is in
exchange with the regions in the Baltic States, rebuilt and reopened in
2019.
Museum for the Principality of Lüneburg. (was combined with the
Lüneburg Museum, see there).
Lüne Monastery, Am Domain Court, 21337
Lüneburg. Textile museum and nice short trip from downtown.
Streets and squares
Note: Some of the names of streets and squares in
the TV series Rote Rosen are fictitious.
Stint market at the Ilmenau
Lamberti Square, where the Lamberti Church once stood
Johann-Sebastian-Bach-Platz, near the Michaeliskirche.
Old crane at
the Ilmenau
Ilmenaustraße / corner of Abtspferdtränke - square in
front of Hotel Bergström (frequent filming location of "Red Roses")
Brausebrücke (frequent location of "Red Roses")
Parks
Spa
park. with graduation tower and concert shell.
Love reason. Somewhat
neglected park on the edge of the historic city wall.
Kreidebergsee .
Beautiful lake in the city area, but without bathing facilities,
surrounded by a park and with "chalk cliffs"
Kalkberg. Inner-city
nature reserve, with a beautiful view of the city.
Clamart Park .
Park in downtown, nice for rest.
Train journey in historical trains of the Heide-Express
Pedal boat
ride on the Ilmenau from Schröder's garden beer garden
Canoe tour on
the Ilmenau, from Melbeck
Bathe
Salt thermal baths in Lüneburg
Hagen outdoor pool
Ilmenau
weekly markets
Weekly market on the market square, every Wednesday
and Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m
Thorner Straße, on Thursday
in the Kreideberg district from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m
Stephanus-Platz, on
Friday in the Kaltenmoor district from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m
Pedestrian zone
Lüneburg has a beautiful pedestrian zone in the
center of the old town with a wide range of modern central areas. The
pedestrian zone exudes a nice serenity, but is also heavily frequented
by tourists on weekends. It's just fun to be inspired by the flair of
the city in the narrow streets and alleys.
Local dishes in Lüneburg include:
The smelt is a small fish, about
the size of a sardine, which is only available regionally in spring and
which is then prepared in various ways in many of the city's
restaurants, often fried as a full smelt.
Due to the proximity to the
Lüneburg Heath, Heidschnucke is of course also on the menu.
Labskaus
is not prepared here like in Hamburg, but more in a Danish style.
Lüneburg used to be known for its numerous breweries. Today the number
of breweries is limited to a few small pub breweries.
Mälzer's,
Heiligengeiststrasse 43, 21335 Lüneburg. Phone: +49 (0)4131 47777,
email: info@maelzer-brauhaus.de. Brewery and table house with a rustic
restaurant and vaulted cellar. The Lüneburger Pilsener (Lüpi), once the
city's flagship, is produced in Hamburg at the Holsten brewery. last
change: Aug. 2018 (information may be out of date)
Cheap
Piccanti, Am Sande 9, Italian restaurant, also with domestic and Chinese
specialties, including homemade noodles
Middle
Bierstein
restaurant
India Haus, Heiligengeiststraße 9. Excellent restaurant
with Indian cuisine. Table reservation advisable. Open: Mon closed.
Price: Lunch €6.50-6.90.
Upscale
Sabacca, Am Markt 4.
Restaurant in a vaulted cellar with very good Spanish tapas cuisine.
Also steaks, burgers and seafood. Price: e.g. B. Tapas for 2, 34.50€.
Soraya, Lünertorstraße 18. Tel.: +49(0)4131 99 80 373. The fine cuisine
of Persia. lunch table. Open: Mon - Fri. Price: Main courses
€10.50-18.90.
Zum alten Brauhaus, Grapengiesserstrasse 11.
Traditional restaurant with a rustic ambience that offers hearty German
cuisine in interesting modern versions. Rated the best restaurant in
town (TrivAdvisor). Price: main courses €15.90-27.90.
There are two pub miles:
At the Stintmarkt
Pesel, Am Stintmarkt
12, 21335 Lüneburg. Phone: +49 (0)4131 33297, email:
info@pesel-lueneburg.de. Legendary, located on the Stintmarkt, with
alternative music and a great basement atmosphere. It doesn't really get
crowded until 4 a.m. when the other nightclubs close
Schroederstrasse
There are various hotels and inns spread all over Lüneburg. Many of
them are also very close to the center. There are also many holiday
apartments in Lüneburg and the surrounding area. Many guests from big
cities enjoy the tranquility of a holiday apartment in one of Lüneburg's
many suburbs.
Cheap
DJH youth hostel, Soltauer Str. 133, 21335
Lüneburg. Tel.: +49 (0)4131 41864, fax: +49 (0)4131 45747, e-mail:
lueneburg@jugendherberge.de. Top youth hostel with 148 beds, on the
southern outskirts, right next to the university and the city forest.
Features: free wifi, wheelchair accessible. Open: all year (except
Christmas): 07:00-22:00. Check-in: 15:00-21:45. Price: from €29.80/BB
(HB and FB possible).
Middle
Edit Hotel Heidpark
Upscale
Selection of some hotels:
Bergstrom. Inspiration and more
frequent location of the series "Red Roses"
park hotel. Phone:
(0)4131-41125.
uniqueinfoedit
4 seminars
Camping
Camping Rote Schleuse, Rote Schleuse 4. 21335 Lüneburg. Phone: +49 4131
791500, email: kontakt@camp-rote-schleuse.de. In a wooded area about 5km
to the city center, the course is open all year round. Gastronomy,
swimming pond. Neat sanitary facilities. Pitches for tents under trees.
Rather noisy due to the nearby bypass road.
Melbeck canoe station.
almost 10km to the city center, good starting point for a canoe tour.
The Leuphana University of Lüneburg is spread over several locations. They result from the campuses of the former University of Applied Sciences Northeast Lower Saxony and the university in the former Scharnhorst barracks.
Since the end of the zone border funding and the downsizing of the Bundeswehr and federal police base in Lüneburg (up until the end of the last century there were four barracks spread across the entire city area), there has been a structural change towards a medium-sized economy with companies in the service and manufacturing sectors . There are many commuters to the nearby Hanseatic city of Hamburg.
Due to the high level of tourism, pickpockets are increasing in the
city center. In the area of the Am Stint bar row, violent clashes often
occur late in the evening due to drunk people.
Lüneburg/Lüchow-Dannenberg/Uelzen police station (operational and patrol
service in Lüneburg), Auf der Hude 1, 21339 Lüneburg. Tel.: +49 (0)4131
83062203, +49 (0)4131 83062215, Fax: +49 (0)4131 83062250. Open: 24/7.
In the spa town of Lüneburg there are no problems finding a suitable
doctor.
There are also several hospitals and day clinics
In the
Kurpark there is the 12 Lüneburg graduation tower, where you can breathe
salt-enriched air.
Tourist Information, Rathaus / Am Markt, 21335 Lüneburg (in the historic Lüneburg Town Hall). Phone: +49 (0)4131 2076620, phone free of charge: 0800 2205005, e-mail: touristik@lueneburg.info. From booking accommodation and organizing the city tour to tips and suggestions on site.
Prehistory
The first evidence of human presence in the
Lüneburg area is dated to the time of the Neanderthals. There are 58
hand axes found at the beginning of the 1990s when the motorway
between Ochtmissen and Bardowick was being built. They are around
150,000 years old. The Ochtmiss site is probably a Neanderthal
hunting camp, where the early humans cut up their prey. At that time
there could be no talk of a continuous settlement of the later urban
area; Thousands of years of cold ages prevented this.
The
first archaeological evidence of a settled peasant culture was
discovered not far from the aforementioned site in the Ilmenau
between Lüne and Bardowick. It is an ax that is known as a “shoe
last wedge” due to its shape. It is dated to the 6th millennium BC
and was part of the Lüneburg museum collection as early as the 19th
century.
Since the Bronze Age, the Lüneburg tent mountain has
had a number of prehistoric and early historical burial sites that
were established by people living in the area of the city of
Lüneburg. One of the oldest finds is an "Aunjetitz Edge Ridge Ax".
It dates from around 1900 BC. A number of Iron Age urn finds, which
are mentioned as early as the 18th century, also come from the city
itself. Like those from Lüneburg's Kalkberg, these have found their
way into the private collections of some scholars of the 18th
century and, with a few exceptions, have perished with them.
Worth mentioning in this context are the Lombard urn grave fields of
Lüneburg Zeltberg and von Oedeme from the first centuries AD.There
are also a number of sites from the early Middle Ages in the area of
the later city, for example in the area of the old town of
Modestorpe not far from Johanniskirche, the Lambertiplatz near the
saltworks and in the former water district.
The place
Leuphana, mentioned by the Greek geographer Claudius Ptolemäus
around 150 AD, could be identical with Lüneburg.
Development
from a village to a trading town
The first documentary mention of
Lüneburg in the Middle Ages can be found in a document dated August
13, 956, in which King Otto I donated the customs revenue from the
Lüneburg salt works to the “monastery built in honor of St. Michael”
(teloneum ad Luniburc ad monasterium sancti Michahelis sub honore
constructum). An older mention of the place in the Frankish imperial
annals (to the year 795 ad fluvium Albim pervenit ad locum, qui
dicitur Hliuni) is related to one of the three cores of Lüneburg;
probably on the later, from 951 occupied as seat of the Billunger
castle Lüneburg on the Kalkberg. The Elbe-Germanic name Hliuni
corresponds to the Lombard word for "refuge".
Due to
archaeological finds, some of which are exhibited in the Museum for
the Principality of Lüneburg, it is certain that the area around
Lüneburg was already settled at that time and that the saltworks had
started operating at that time.
According to legend, the salt
was discovered more than a thousand years ago by a hunter who shot a
white wild boar. Salt crystals in the fur of the dead animal are
said to have drawn his attention to the salt works.
Despite
the saltworks, Lüneburg was originally subordinate to Bardowick,
just a few kilometers to the north. Bardowick was older and an
important trading post with the Slavs. Bardowick's wealth - it had
seven churches - also stemmed from the fact that no further trading
centers were tolerated. It was only when Bardowick did not want to
submit to Heinrich the Lion that it was destroyed by him in 1189.
Thereupon Lüneburg got the city charter and developed in place of
Bardowick to the central trading place of the area.
The
Polish name for Lüneburg is Glain (written as Chlein or Glein in
older German sources), probably derived from glaino (Slavic: glina)
"clay". In Latin texts, Lüneburg appears not only as a Latinized
Lunaburgum, but also as a Graecized Selenopolis (moon city), an
allusion to an etymology that has been popular since the late Middle
Ages, which connects Lüneburg with the moon goddess Luna. Coins from
this time and the Luna fountain on the market square take up this
motif.
Hanseatic period
Due to its long monopoly as a salt
supplier in northern Germany, which was only weakened late by salt
imports from France, Lüneburg was an early member of the Hanseatic
League: Started as a union of individual merchants in Lübeck in
1158, it came to in 1356 (on the first general Hanseatic League)
Federation of commercial cities. The Lüneburg salt was necessary to
pickle the herring caught in the Baltic Sea and off Norway and to
offer it preserved as a fasting food inland.
The herring market at the Skåne Fair played a major role.
Lüneburg, together with Bergen and Visby (the fish suppliers) and
Lübeck (the central trading point between the Baltic Sea and
inland), quickly became one of the most important and richest cities
of the Hanseatic League. In the Middle Ages, the salt was initially
transported overland to Lübeck via the Old Salt Road. With the
opening of the Stecknitz Canal in 1398, transport by water to the
Lübeck salt storage facility prevailed.
Around 1235, the
Duchy of Braunschweig-Lüneburg was established, which was repeatedly
divided into different lines and brought together again. The
sub-states that emerged again and again, which were in the rank of
principalities under constitutional law, were usually named after
their respective residence. Thus between 1267 and 1269 a
principality of Lüneburg was created for the first time, with
Lüneburg as the residential city. In the course of the War of the
Lüneburg Succession in 1371, rebellious citizens threw the princes
out of the city and destroyed the lordly castle on the Kalkberg and
the nearby monastery. The rights won through this and with the peace
in 1392 hardly differed from those of a free imperial city,
especially in the 15th century; but there has never been any legal
recognition of imperial immediacy. These extensive rights could be
defended until 1637. The money stayed in the city, the rich houses
and churches were built.
In 1392, Lüneburg was granted
stacking rights. It forced traveling merchants to go to Lüneburg
with their wagons and to “stack” their goods there, that is, to
offer them for sale. So that the merchants could not bypass
Lüneburg, an impassable landwehr was built around 1397 to the west
of the city, and a landwehr to the east was built around 1479.
The Lüneburg Prelate War from 1446 to 1462 meant a crisis, which
could only be resolved due to the intervention of the Danish King
Christian I, the Bishop of Schwerin and the Lübeck Bishop Arnold
Westphal. In 1454, in the catalog of demands of the sixties, more
influence of the citizens in public life was called for. Since the
end of 2007, Lüneburg has again been given the title of Hanseatic
City.
Modern times
Reformation time
During the
Reformation, the city turned to the Protestant creed in 1529/1530,
which was intensively promoted by Duke Ernst 'the Confessor' of
Braunschweig-Lüneburg.
The oldest trace of the Reformation
movement comes from the petition of March 25, 1525 to Elisabeth von
Geldern (a daughter of Heinrich the Middle) of Johann Funke, a
citizen exiled from Lüneburg, who had to leave the city because he
sang German psalms with others and how others too, had read
spiritual and secular Lutheran scriptures. At that time the city
still adhered to the old Catholic faith. Troubled years followed, in
which the supporters of Rome and the followers of Martin Luther
competed against each other.
However, that changed in the
years 1529 and 1530, when Urbanus Rhegius was called to Lüneburg as
a reformer, where he arrived in the spring of 1531 and at the
request of the citizens worked out new school and church
regulations. Rhegius soon returned to Celle, but traveled to
Lüneburg again and again until 1534 to establish the Reformation,
which was confirmed by the signing of the Lutheran formula of
concord by the mayor and council in 1580.
This was followed
by a period of highest economic and cultural prosperity for
Lüneburg, which has never been reached before and for at least two
and a half centuries afterwards.
In 1562 a peace agreement
was reached between Lüneburg and the sovereign, to which the dukes
Heinrich and Wilhelm, the latter with his wife Dorothea of
Denmark, appeared in the city in the height of the summer of that
year. Lush feasts were celebrated with the city leaders in the dance
hall of the town hall, a parade was held and gifts were presented to
the dukes.
At that time the city became an ornate building
with ramparts and ditches, gates and towers up to the Kalkbergveste,
guarded by huge guards and grim dogs, with neat streets and squares,
the sand with its beautiful tower fountains, the memorable churches
(among them the most noble Church of St. Michaelis with its golden
plaque) and cemeteries, the hospitals, the six-tower town hall with
the wine cellar, the princely house, the inexhaustible brine well,
the harbor, the department store with the crane, the water mills and
the water art and general prosperity.
With the decline of the Hanseatic League - and the lack of
herrings around 1560 off Falsterbo in Skåne - the big customers for
the city's salt broke away; the city rapidly became impoverished. In
the following period of economic stagnation hardly any new houses
were built.
Thirty Years' War
The Thirty Years War did not
affect Lüneburg until 1623, when the city was confronted with troops
moving through the country. The council stepped up the guarding of
the gates and walls, stored additional food and repaired the
parapets of the city wall. War commissioners and men were paid. In
1625/1626 the number of troops passed through, although the city was
spared in contrast to the rural areas.
The first plague
epidemic flared up relatively mildly in 1624, another broke out at
the end of 1625 and raged until 1626. During the most violent phase
of expansion in 1626, the maximum number of those buried daily was
50 dead, the mourning bells began in the early morning and only
ended in the dark evening. Overall, the number of deaths in the
three years is given as 6000, i.e. almost half of the population of
Lüneburg, whereby it should be noted that at this time a large
number of people from the surrounding area had fled to the city.
Despite marching through troops like General Tilly's in 1627,
Lüneburg was spared, but had to pay 33,600 Reichstaler war
contribution from 1628 to 1629 alone. At the same time the income
from the brawn and, for example, from the beer excise sank, so that
the city treasury noted that it had never had such low income
before.
The city council rejected the request of Duke Georg
von Braunschweig and Lüneburg-Calenberg to set up a princely
garrison in 1631, or of the Swedish General Tott to accept an
occupation. In 1635, General Banér bought himself free from the
Swedish occupation by General Banér for 10,000 Reichstaler, who,
however, again included the city with troops in the following year
and coveted the city for himself. After initial resistance, the city
gave in and was forced to meet further tough conditions. For
example, a looting of Lüneburg by soldiers had to be replaced with
34,000 Reichstalers. In order to raise this high sum, more than 200
pieces of the council silver treasure had to be turned into money.
Since the sale had to take place at the worst possible times and in
a hurry, the 5,000 Reichstaler achieved for this would hardly have
corresponded to the pure material value.
In addition, since
the beginning of the Thirty Years' War, an internal dispute had
arisen within Lüneburg's walls and council, in which the supremacy
of the traditional patrician upper class had on the one hand become
weaker and the craft guilds and simple citizens demanded access to
the council. There were old tensions between the Council and the
Citizens' Committee for various reasons. The council consisted of
the rich upper class, who mostly provided the soup and bar masters,
and was not freely elected. This class, which represented the
municipal regiment, had inherited its position like the nobility,
while the civil council was composed of craftsmen and guilds.
Charitable status, especially in foundations and the like, for which
the previous patriciate and the Sülfmeister were responsible, was
thwarted in favor of personal enrichment, the income and prosperity
of the city continued to decline.
When the main Swedish
troops finally left Lüneburg, they left only a few soldiers behind
to protect the city. At the same time, imperial, Electoral Saxon and
Kurbrandenburg troops craved the city. When the situation for the
drained city became threatening in August 1637, the desperate
citizens of Lüneburg decided to open the gates to Duke Georg von
Braunschweig-Lüneburg in order to avoid enemy capture and pillage.
Lüneburg was never a free imperial city in the sense of
constitutional law, although the emperors themselves and their
chancellery were in the dark, but in fact still had this status and
in its freedom and in its wealth it was the dukes of
Braunschweig-Lüneburg since the loss of their castle Kalkberg 1371 a
thorn in the side. On September 3, 1637, the Duke and three
companies entered Lüneburg, which was handed over to him without a
fight by the Swedish Colonel Stammer (who was executed in Wismar on
the orders of General Banér).
In December 1637, the duke deposed the patrician council of
Lüneburg, "because he acted to capture the Swedes without the
participation of the citizens and to the displeasure of the princely
house." The new council, however, did not prove to be capable of
action, so that the citizens again demanded the establishment of the
old patrician council. Tough negotiations followed between the
mayors and the council of Lüneburg on the one hand and the Princely
House on the other, until Duke Georg von Braunschweig-Lüneburg fully
enforced his new position in May 1639:
Mayors and councilors,
old and new, the three ordines and all guilds, guilds and guilds
with the entire citizenry had to swear submissiveness and obedience
to the princes of Braunschweig-Lüneburg as their immediate high
authorities superposed by God. The shift in the balance of power in
favor of the Princely House of Braunschweig-Lüneburg became
clearest, on the one hand, in the stationing of a city governor and
75 men assigned to him, who were committed to both the regional
prince and the civil parish, and, on the other hand, in the cession
of the Kalkberg, which he received in 1371 princely festivals had
been conquered by the citizens of the city and "to which the
proudest memories of every citizen adhered, whom the city once
conquered with cunning and violence, but then honestly bought with
large sums". All of the city and wall towers that blocked the
unobstructed view of Lüneburg from the Kalkberg had to be torn down.
The craftsmen were admitted to the city council, but the
long-established patrician families were still entitled to half of
the council seats and the first two mayors were also appointed from
their ranks.
Lüneburg suffered the loss of its freedom and
the supremacy of the previously ruling patriciate was broken
forever, which is still reflected in the buildings of the city,
which displayed the wealth of the patrician families of Lüneburg
until around 1620, after which they were hardly ever of this size
and splendor have been erected. In addition, the city was extremely
heavily in debt, so that in 1682 taxes had to be increased "to pay
off war debts and other debts". The city of Lüneburg still minted
coins into the 18th century. 2/3 thalers were still minted in 1702,
their own copper small change, the Scherf, until 1777.
19th
and 20th centuries
In 1810, Lüneburg was annexed to France; the
French era began. When a general popular uprising broke out in
northern Germany after the French defeat in Russia in March 1813,
the Lüneburgers chased the French officials out of their city. The
result was the battle near Lüneburg on April 2, 1813.
Heinrich
Heine, whose parents lived in today's Heinrich-Heine-Haus in
Lüneburg from 1822 to 1826, called it his "residence of boredom".
Towards the end of the 19th century, Lüneburg became a garrison
town, which it remained (Theodor-Körner barracks).
The
synagogue on the corner of Schifferwall and Reichenbachstrasse was
inaugurated in 1894 by the Jewish community in Lüneburg for 200
Jewish citizens of Lüneburg. Jewish residents of Lüneburg were
actively involved in the economic and cultural development of
Lüneburg.
Lüneburg had an active labor movement. After the
dissolution of the Lüneburg Workers 'and Soldiers' Council in 1919,
they took on leading positions in the unions. In 1922, the unions
founded their own center - Volkshaus - for the labor movement at
Schröderstrasse 16, which served as an inn, restaurant, social and
meeting rooms, and traffic bar for the free unions, the SPD and
associations. One of the founders was Ernst Braune, after 1945 Lord
Mayor of Lüneburg.
After Hitler came to power, the
participation of all Jews in public life was boycotted. Jews were
expelled, deported to concentration camps and murdered. In Lüneburg,
26 stumbling blocks remind of the fate of victims of the Nazi
regime. City tours of the Lüneburg history workshop lead to some of
the former places of residence, study and work of Lüneburgers who
were victims of National Socialism, as well as to places in Lüneburg
that played an important role during the National Socialist era.
In the children's department in Lüneburg, part of the Lüneburg
State Sanatorium and Nursing Home, over 300 children were probably
killed as part of "child euthanasia" during the Second World War.
Air raids on Lüneburg only caused relatively little damage. In
the night of August 12th to 13th, 1941, bombs fell on Lüneburg for
the first time, with various houses in the Im Grimm district being
destroyed and others damaged and two people injured. On April 2,
1944, scattered bombs hit Lüneburg at night, killing several people
and destroying two residential buildings on Bleckeder Landstrasse
and one on Lüner Weg. A memorial in the zoo near the train station
reminds of a mass grave of 256 concentration camp prisoners, whose
transport from a satellite camp of Neuengamme concentration camp in
Wilhelmshaven was bombed here on April 7, 1945. Victims of April 11,
1945 are also buried here. Up to 80 of the injured and weakened but
living prisoners who were not to be transported were shot dead by
marines in a mass murder. At noon on April 18, 1944, the air base
was attacked by around 30 aircraft and severely damaged. A total of
43 houses were completely destroyed in Lüneburg during World War II.
270 apartments became uninhabitable, which corresponds to a degree
of destruction of 2.6%. A total of 11,200 m³ of rubble was removed.
On the evening of May 4, 1945, an authorized delegation of the
last Reich government in Flensburg-Mürwik at the headquarters south
of Lüneburg on the Timeloberg (near the village of Wendisch Evern)
signed the partial surrender of the German troops in Northern
Germany, Denmark, Norway and the northern Netherlands, i.e. by far
the largest part of the territory still held by German troops at
that time, which in fact ended the fighting there. The site is
inaccessible to the public in a restricted military area; a small
memorial stone on a nearby dirt road commemorates the surrender.
Shortly afterwards the unconditional surrender of the Wehrmacht
followed. On May 23, 1945, Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler
committed suicide while in British captivity in Lüneburg by chewing
a cyanide capsule.
post war period
Even before the
Nuremberg trial of the main war criminals, the first war criminals
trial began in Lüneburg on September 17, 1945, the so-called
Bergen-Belsen trial, in which 45 people were charged.
The
deterioration of the building structure after the end of the Second
World War led to various considerations as to how the quality of
living could be improved. A seriously discussed proposal was to tear
down the entire old town and replace it with modern buildings. As a
result of the public protest that followed, Lüneburg became one of
the focal points for a new idea: monument protection. The city has
been systematically restored since the early 1970s. In the late
1960s, Curt Pomp made a special contribution: Against numerous
opposition from politics and administration, he campaigned for the
preservation of historical buildings in the Lüneburg Old Town
working group that he founded. His commitment was rewarded with the
German Prize for Monument Protection and the Federal Cross of Merit.
As a result of these restorations - 1300 brick houses are listed -
the Lüneburg old town is a tourist attraction; important parts of
the economy are geared towards tourism.
As part of the
Bundeswehr reform, two of the city's three Bundeswehr barracks have
been closed since 1990 and the remaining one has been reduced in
size. In addition, the Federal Border Guard barracks, which are
partly used by the state riot police of Lower Saxony (4th deployment
hun- dred), were closed. The Lünepark is being built on the site of
the former Federal Border Guard barracks with new commercial space
for start-ups. Business development and many companies from the IT
sector have already settled here. Nearby, the Johannes Westphal
Bridge was opened to traffic in May 2006. This connects the newly
created Lünepark with the Goseburg district on the other side of the
Ilmenau.
The University of Lüneburg was moved to the site of
the former Scharnhorst barracks. The University of Lüneburg
developed from the University of Education (PH), which in 1978 was
converted into an independent academic university with the right to
qualify as a professor and renamed "University of Lüneburg" in May
1989. Since moving to the former barracks, the university has
attracted more and more students. The expansion of the university is
an important contribution to the restructuring of the city into a
service center.
As a result of the regional reform of 1972, Lüneburg lost its
status as an independent city and was incorporated into the Lüneburg
district. On October 5, 2007, the name was changed from the city of
Lüneburg to the Hanseatic city of Lüneburg and thus the only
Hanseatic city in Lower Saxony alongside Stade.
On September
23, 2008, the city received the title “Place of Diversity” awarded
by the federal government.
Incorporations
1943: Hagen and
Lüne
1974 (March 1): Häcklingen, Ochtmissen, Oedeme and Rettmer
as well as parts of Alt-Hagen and Pflegerdorf / Gut Wienebüttel
1974 (April 1): Ebensberg and Olm parts of the municipality of
Adendorf
Population development
Lüneburg already had
around 14,000 inhabitants in the late Middle Ages and at the
beginning of the modern era, making it one of the major cities of
that time. With the economic decline, the population fell to 9,400
by 1757, and rose to 10,400 by 1813. With the onset of
industrialization in the 19th century, population growth
accelerated. In 1855 only 13,000 people lived in the city, by 1939
there were already 35,000. Shortly after the Second World War,
refugees and displaced persons from the German eastern areas brought
the city an increase of 18,000 people to 53,000 inhabitants in
December 1945. In 2003, the population of the city exceeded the
limit of 70,000. The city of Lüneburg as well as its district and
the neighboring district of Harburg are among the few areas in
Germany that are characterized by strong population growth. Reasons
for this include the growth in and population shifts to the
outskirts of the Hamburg city region. The Lower Saxony State Office
for Statistics has predicted a population of 89,484 for the city of
Lüneburg by 2021.
On December 31, 2015, the official
population for Lüneburg was 74,072 according to an update by the
Lower Saxony State Office for Statistics (only main residences and
after comparison with the other state offices) - a historic high.
Furthermore, Lüneburg has particularly close relationships with the
immediately neighboring communities that are growing together with
the core city, with which it forms an agglomeration. With the towns
of Adendorf, Bardowick, Deutsch Evern and Reppenstedt as well as
Vögelsen and Wendisch Evern, the city has a population of around
108,000 and, together with these localities, would have the
population required for a large city. Lüneburg is currently the
eleventh largest city in Lower Saxony.
The following overview
shows the population figures according to the respective territorial
status. Up to 1813 it is mostly an estimate, then census results (1)
or official updates from the State Statistical Office. From 1871 the
information relates to the “local population”, from 1925 to the
resident population and since 1987 to the “population at the place
of the main residence”. Before 1871, the number of inhabitants was
determined according to inconsistent survey procedures.
Lüneburg lies on the lower reaches of the Ilmenau, about 30 km
before its confluence with the Elbe. The Lüneburg Heath stretches to
the south and west, an area of around 7,400 km², which has been
deforested since the Neolithic Age through slash-and-burn and
overgrazing of the formerly widespread forests on barren sandy soils
and large amounts of wood being felled. The often quoted statement
that the heather was created by logging for the operation of the
Lüneburg salt works is historically not confirmed. Lüneburg's old
town is also located above a salt dome, which established the city's
wealth and whose plaster cap, the Kalkberg, also represented an
excellent building site for the refuge that gave Lüneburg its name.
City structure
The formula Mons, Pons, Fons ('mountain,
bridge, source') characterizes the development of the city since the
8th century through the merging of initially three and later four
settlement areas. These were the refuge on the Kalkberg - at that
time still much higher - with the adjacent branch (Marktviertel),
the village of Modestorpe between the bridge over the Ilmenau and
the large square Am Sande (Sandviertel) as well as the saltworks
with the closed settlement of the workers employed there
(Sülzviertel). It was not until the 13th century that the harbor
settlement (water district) was formed between Marktplatz and
Ilmenau. The shape of the city that emerged from this persisted
until the urban area was expanded in the late 19th century and is
still clearly recognizable. Lüneburg's six historical city gates
were the Altenbrücker Tor, the Bardowicker Tor, the Rote Tor, the
Sülztor, the Lüner Tor and the Neue Tor.
Districts
Lüneburg is divided into the districts of Altstadt, Bockelsberg,
Goseburg-Zeltberg, Kaltenmoor, Kreideberg, Lüne-Moorfeld,
Mittelfeld, Neu Hagen, Rotes Feld, Schützenplatz, Weststadt and
Wilschenbruch as well as the villages of Ebensberg, Häcklingen,
Ochtmissen, Oedeme and Rettmer.
Jüttkenmoor, Klosterkamp,
Bülows Kamp, In den Kämpen, Krähornsberg, Schäferfeld,
Volgershall, Hanseviertel, Ilmenaugarten and Zeltberg are names for
individual building areas within a district or a town.
The
subsidence area
The historic quarter between the Lüneburg
Saltworks (German Salt Museum) and the Kalkberg is a special
feature. The houses in this area are located above the salt dome,
which is drawn off by the groundwater. This gradually lowered the
surface of the earth above the salt dome. After intensification
through increased pumping of brine from the middle of the 19th
century, the reduction reached 3–5 cm / year (today up to 3 mm) in
changing places. The "subsidence area" was created. Houses and
churches on the edge of this area lost their stability and had to be
torn down (the Marienkirche in 1818 and the Lambertikirche in 1861).
The lowering and, above all, the unprofitable salt production were
the reasons for the closure of the salt works in 1980. Only small
amounts of brine are now being promoted for the spa operation in the
Salztherme Lüneburg (SaLü). The saltworks building houses the German
Salt Museum and a supermarket.
The subsidence has been
monitored at around 240 measuring points every two years since 1946.
The subsidence has not stopped, the site has been rebuilt and some
historic buildings that have been saved have now been restored. The
subsidence can still be seen clearly. Visitors who walk from Am
Sande to the end of Grapengießerstraße can guess the extent of the
subsidence. The depression in front of them used to be level with
Grapengießerstrasse.
Further evidence of the earth's
movements can be seen in Frommestrasse: the “Gate to the
Underworld”, two iron gate wings that have pushed one over the
other. Because of the subsidence, two houses in this area were again
demolished in 2012. The gate to the underworld was damaged during
the demolition work on the row of houses and was rebuilt in 2014. In
the center of the subsidence, the area sagged by 78.5 centimeters
from 2010 to 2014. The rate of subsidence has been slowing since
2014. Nevertheless, a house in Egersdorffstrasse had to be
demolished in 2016, which became unstable overnight due to sudden
earth movements.
The consequences of the subsidence can also
be seen at Michaeliskirche, on crooked columns and in the tower
hall. Further earth movements can currently be observed on the
Ochtmisser Kirchsteig.