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You are here: Home Leisure Travel & Tourism At the cutting edge of German history

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28/07/2003At the cutting edge of German history

Nuremberg is today a quiet town with a very noisy past. Marius Benson finds history, art and wine in abundant supply.

"Albrecht Durer must have been quite short."
 
That was the first coherent thought I formed as I reeled from one room to another after driving my head sharply into a heavy wooden door frame on the first floor of the German master painter's house. The house is one of the chief attractions of Nuremberg, the town Durer called home for much of his life. Sadly, five centuries after the artist lived there, Nuremberg has none of his works. They have all been scattered around the great galleries of the world. But his old home, one of the classic half-wood houses that are a chief attraction of medieval German towns, gives some sense of the man. Durer was not only a great artist but a revolutionary one. He is the bridge that links German medieval art and the Renaissance. He was the first artist north of the Alps to paint landscape for its own sake, rather than simply as a backdrop to a religious theme. And his masterful self-portraits were also the first such works painted in the lands beyond the Alps. Nuremberg itself has a strong claim to be at the cutting edge of German history. In 1525 it declared all its churches to be Protestant, becoming one of the first German towns to adopt the reformation and turn away from Rome. Four centuries later it was at the forefront of less lovely change when it, in common with the surrounding region of Franconia, took the lead in taking up National Socialism and cheering Hitler and his Nazis through the ancient cobbled streets. That gave Nuremberg a special place in history - and in early 1945 it gave the city a special place in the cross-hairs of British and American bombers as they rained destructive revenge on German towns and cities. Postcards on sale today show central Nuremberg reduced to a shattered shell. City block after city block of what had been baroque and medieval wonder, destroyed with only bare walls, half-demolished standing. Durer's house was lucky. A high explosive bomb detonated outside, taking off the roof and damaging the walls - but it remained standing and restoration was possible after the war. Nuremberg has been restored to a level where it is now one of the most visited German towns for tourists. But it is only an echo of its former glory with a mix of the old and new not really coalescing into a real sense of what was. But if history destroyed old Nuremberg, it has also left it a legacy which makes the city well worth a visit. Two sites in particular should be on the itinerary of anyone who wants a deeper understanding of the past century in Germany. One of the reasons the allied air strategists of 1945 circled Nuremberg on their target maps with such relish was the image of the Nuremberg Rallies. Massed ranks of troops and people gathering to pay quasi-religious homage to Hitler remain as one of the defining images of Nazism. Today the Nazi Party Rally Grounds house one of the most comprehensive and evocative exhibitions of the Hitler's rise and fall. After that fall, Nuremberg again established a special niche in history by being the city where the War Crimes Trials were held. The court room in which those trials - which resulted in the execution of a dozen of the Nazi high command - can be visited at the weekend. The historic room today is still a working court, which is a shame for students of history. None of the furniture or furnishings, beyond an ornate marble doorway and the wood panelling on the walls, remains from 1945. The failure to preserve the historic room probably reflects the continuing tension Germany feels between remembering its Nazi past, and putting all that behind it. None the less it is fascinating to sit in the court room and realise that 57 years ago Goering sat, a few metres from you, defiantly maintaining he had committed no crime and knew nothing of the Holocaust. Today the courtroom is overseen by an enormous crucifix, an ornament that was not present at the time of the war crimes trials. But crucifixes are one of the recurring and defining features of this area of Bavaria. Crosses and cigarette machines - both seem to be hanging from every wall. Motoring from Nuremberg soon takes you into rolling hills lined with vineyards, while every valley seems to be home to a picturesque dorf, made up of a cluster of cosy cottages with a church spire standing as the dominant feature in each. Nuremberg and the Franconia region generally are a perfect weekend destination for anyone interested in history, art, wine, medieval architecture and more. August 2002


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