RhinejourneymoduleC

Module C. Some Sacred Spaces Along the Rhine: From Roman to Romanesque to New Style (“Gothic”)

On our cruise we’re going to be seeing some spectacular examples of sacred architecture such as the Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Strasbourg (the sixth-tallest church in the world and still the world’s highest extant structure built entirely in the Middle Ages).

We’ll visit the Imperial Cathedral at Speyer (also dedicated to Our Lady, Notre Dame = Mary, the Mother of Christ, and similar cathedrals in Worms and Mainz. In Mainz we hope to attend a high mass with choirs and organ at 10 am on Sunday. That evening, in nearby Rüdesheim, we hope to hear the nuns sing their evening prayers, the Vespers or the Vigils, at their medieval cloister founded by the famous St. Hildegard of Bingen.

And we’ll admire the magnificent Cologne Cathedral (dedicated to Mary and to St. Peter), possibly the most spectacular and remarkable house of worship north of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.

(Important definition: a cathedral is the principle church of a bishop’s or archbishop’s diocese containing the episcopal throne or seat. The word is derived from cathedra, Latin for seat or chair. In German a cathedral is called a Dom, short for domus dei, house of God. Cathedrals are typically the grandest churches of all.)

We began our first module with the Romans on the Rhine, so let’s begin again with them. In this module we want to examine how the basic Roman basilica evolved into Romanesque – “Roman-like” – sacred architecture such as that we’ll see in Speyer, Worms, Rüdesheim, and Mainz.

The basilica, a Greek word meaning house of the king, referred in ancient Greece and Rome to a tribunal or kind of courthouse, where justice and other secular business was administered on behalf of the king (king = βασιλέως – basiléos). This plan shows the typical structure of a basilica with a central hall and side aisles:

http://www.mmdtkw.org/AU0554BasilicaPlan2.JPG

There was no tradition of Christian church architecture to begin with. The first Christians simply met in homes. They were familiar with the synagogue and the temple, but did not adopt or adapt them as meeting houses. The Emperor Constantine, the first Roman/Byzantine Emperor to embrace Christianity, is said to have adopted and fostered the use of the basilica style for the erection of the very first Christian churches. It just made sense to adopt this traditional, useful form of building:

http://wwolfram.com/theology/images/visual_art.png

Sliced open and seen from the front, the side aisles are obvious, as in this drawing of the original (old) St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome:

http://www.rosaryworkshop.com/BASILICA-FirstSTPeters-Rome.gif

After basilicas evolved into “Romanesque” churches, they often added a cross in the floor plan, symbolic, of course, of the crucifixion of Jesus. The main hall retained from the original basilica is called a nave (related to the words navy, navigate...etc., possibly because the nave resembles an upside-down ship; in German it is called das Schiff), and a kind of smaller perpendicular nave called a transept formed the crossing of the nave. (Some churches had two crossings, just as some Christian crosses have something resembling a footrest near the bottom.)

http://www.norwich-churches.org/glossary/Images/churh-plan.gif

A tower is often found over the crossing of the nave, but there are also often towers at the corners of the west (portal) side. Radiating chapels make up the apse, on the east, which on a floor plan also look a bit like petals on a flower.

Cathedrals are typically oriented east to west for the following symbolic reason: mortals enter from the west side, the side of the setting sun, signifying that our light is going away, but the immortal light of Christ, that of the rising sun, enters from the east, through the windows of the apse, through the little chapels called apsidiols. There is no mortal entrance on the east; only the Light of Christ and the immortal Spirit enter there.

https://classconnection.s3.amazonaws.com/178/flashcards/924178/png/sandecomp1322770671584.png

Romanesque church construction is based on the arch invented by the Romans and used by them for everything from aqueducts to the Colosseum:

http://www.makingthemodernworld.org.uk/learning_modules/maths/02.TU.03/img/IM.1470_zl.jpg

http://f.tqn.com/y/goitaly/1/S/q/4/-/-/roman-colosseum-arches.jpg

When such an arch is repeated or lengthened, it yields a barrel vault. Two barrel vaults at right angles yield a groin vault. Since the weight of the arch or vault pushes to the sides, a heavy buttress is required to prevent the arch or vault from collapsing outward:

https://xaradesign3.files.wordpress.com/2010/06/roman-arch.jpg

When a church is constructed from Roman arches, the heavy, thick walls required for buttressing mean that any windows must by necessity be quite small:

http://36.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m21f0rQuBC1qbljvvo1_500.jpg

http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/fnart/arch/romanesque/souillac13.jpg

http://www.cathedralquest.com/images/romanesque1.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/03/St_Michaels_Church_Hildesheim.jpg

Not that the churches themselves remained small. Speyer Cathedral, one of our important stops, is grand indeed:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8d/Speyer---Cathedral---South-View---(Gentry).jpg

A side aisle in Speyer:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1c/Speyer_Dom_Seitenschiff.jpg

From the air:

http://www.traumflieger.de/forum/files/dom_zu_speyer.jpg

West entrance showing small windows and rounded arches, lots of wall space:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/89/Speyer_Dom_Front_pano.jpg

The space over the entrance is known as the tympanum. In Romanesque it’s still relatively simple:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/02/SpeyererDom_WestPortal_DomPatrone.JPG

Classical “Corinthian” column capitals adorned with angelic musicians:

http://static.zoonar.de/img/www_repository3/81/2e/af/10_c9d7b6fc027a4fda6537a9607c4e628f.jpg

Speyer is one of the few places between Strasbourg and Cologne where the river banks were high enough to put the cathedral this close to the Rhine:

http://static.panoramio.com/photos/large/21141522.jpg

On this near-by model of the church you can see the features very well:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dd/Modell_Dom_zu_Speyer.jpg

Looking eastward along the nave toward the apse:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/Speyer_Dom_BW_3.JPG

Relatively small, relatively simple rose window with Christ at the center:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b0/Speyer_Dom_BW_1_(edit).jpg

Cathedrals have subterranean crypts typically used for burials, etc. My family and I escaped into this crypt at Speyer one day in 1998 when the outside temperature broke all records for Germany at over 40̊ Celsius (104̊ Fahrenheit), and our rental car had no air-conditioning:

http://www.djott.de/wp-content/uploads/MG_0383.jpg

Despite the fact that Romanesque churches have small windows, as we have seen, and they tend to have subdued light inside, it turns out this is no accident; it is perfect, in some ways, for a house of worship, a peaceful sanctuary, a place of mysterious unification of the soul with God.

If we are able to attend as planned a service in St. Hildegard’s Abbey in Rüdesheim, for example, which is a cloister in Romanesque style, we will have the rare opportunity to hear these devoted women sing in plainsong (often called Gregorian Chant) some of their daily prayers, such as the Vespers at 5:30 pm or the Komplet & Vigils at 7:20 pm.

We will hear, I anticipate, based on some other cloisters I’ve been privileged to visit, that as the worshipers sing, their song creates echos resounding down out of the vaulted ceiling, as though angelic choirs were joining them in a form of celestial antiphony. The acoustics of the Romanesque churches remain unexcelled for worship, in my ears at least. Here’s St. Hildegard Abbey outside and inside (notice that St. Hildegard does not have vaulted ceilings, however, but rather the older basilica-style wooden roof):

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/Abtei_St._Hildegard,_R%C3%BCdesheim,_Southwest_view_20140922_1.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/Abtei_St._Hildegard,_R%C3%BCdesheim,_Nave_and_Sanctuary_b_20140922_1.jpg

With their round Roman arches and vaults, Speyer and similar huge Romanesque cathedrals like Mainz and Worms pushed the limits of engineering. The weight of the stones grew so massive and the need for heavy buttressing so great that eventually a brand new way of building needed to be discovered to allow churches to be even higher, and, perhaps more importantly, with larger windows to let in more light.

This revolutionary and brilliant solution came in the form of the so-called New Style, later disparagingly called “Gothic” by people of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. (These were the same people who coined the equally disparaging term “dark ages” or the only slightly less negative “middle ages” to describe the era between the ancient Greeks and Romans and the Renaissance, that “rebirth” of the classical ancient world. Goths were viewed by the classical world as frightening barbarians who burst into the Roman Empire, bringing an end to the Greco-Roman golden age, hence the cathedrals erected by the descendants of these “Goths” were decried as “Gothic”.)

Many New Style cathedrals in Europe began life as Romanesque churches which, when they happened to burn down, or were deemed too small, as in the case of Cologne, with its crowds of pilgrims wishing to see the venerated bones of the Three Wise Men believed buried there, were rebuilt in the new “Gothic” style.

Strasbourg cathedral is one of those churches which actually started out Romanesque. There are said to be a number of Romanesque features still visible (I’m looking forward to finding them, having not necessarily specifically looked for them, unfortunately, on a previous visit).

The site on which Strasbourg Cathedral stands was originally occupied by a Roman temple, then a Romanesque church built in 1015 and later destroyed by fire.

The present cathedral was completed in 1284, but the north spire was not finished until 1439. The south spire was never completed, a common fate of many Gothic churches, which went out of style before all the spires could be finished, such as Notre-Dame in Paris, which lacks both finished spires (a fact hotly contested by some Parisians today who claim it was never intended to have taller spires. Here’s a picture of Notre Dame in Paris):

http://1p6ep31f32pvjrml246jyq31.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/The-religious-hot-spot-of-Paris-La-Notre-Dame-4.jpg

Here’s Strasbourg:

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~margaretsimpson/images/Day6.Strasbourg%20Cathedral1.JPG

Of course the floor plan of  Strasbourg cathedral still shows the nave and the transept forming a cross, as in typical Romanesque churches:

http://www.planetware.com/i/map/F/strasbourg-cathedral-map.jpg

One big difference between Romanesque and the New Style is that in New Style a pointed arch is used, rather than a rounded arch. Here’s a Gothic groin vault compared to a round Romanesque (Domical) vault:

http://media.lanecc.edu/users/plunkettm/Moodle/Art-202/Images/Gothic-Vaults.gif

One would not think that this difference would matter much, but notice that the pointed nature of these New Style arches thrusts the weight of the stone more directly downward into the ground and less to the side, requiring significantly less buttressing.

Also, these New Style vaults are ribbed vaults, that is, the narrow ribs hold all the weight allowing the space around the ribs to be filled in by lighter materials.

All the buttressing these lighter pointed vaults do require is provided from the sides by buttresses which are said to “fly” over the side aisle roofs and transfer the push from the arches laterally onto great buttressing pillars erected outside the cathedral, rather than having to have great thick walls to push back against the force. So they’re called flying buttresses, and the other nice thing about them is that they push between the windows and do not interfere with the light streaming into the large windows:

http://architecturaldictionary.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Buttress_01.jpg

All these revolutionary innovations allowed the New Style architects to create thin, breath-takingly tall walls and to open up vast windows which could be filled with sacred images in colored glass. The best example of nearly all-glass walls is probably the beautiful little jewel-box called Sainte Chapelle in Paris:

http://hipparis.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/stechappelle.jpg

But whereas Sainte Chapelle’s glass is mostly decorative, in the vast majority of cathedrals the glass tells the stories of the Bible (except where it has been destroyed by bombing and replaced by decorative glass; we have no craftsmen nowadays capable of recreating the original windows, nor could we afford them).

As a general rule, the northern windows (on the “dark” side of the building), are devoted to the Old Testament, that time before the coming of Christ. The sunny south-facing windows, on the other hand, tell the story of the coming of Christ, the Light of the World. The great rose window over the western entrance is largely decorative, as these examples from Chartres Cathedral, probably the best surviving example of fine stained glass, show. Notice the annunciation, the nativity, the Three Wise Men, etc:

http://www.paradoxplace.com/Photo%20Pages/France/Chartres/West_Windows/Incarnation_Images/800/IncarnationA-Sept07-D7239sA.jpg

Here’s the great rose window of Chartres:

http://www.chartrescathedral.net/images/rose%20window.jpg

A fish-eye lens can only begin to capture the remarkable achievement of Gothic architecture. This happens to be St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City:

http://prometheus.med.utah.edu/~bwjones/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/St-Patricks-Cathedral.jpg

Back in Strasbourg, seen from outside the cathedral, the effect is no less stunning. Here’s Strasbourg’s rose window with its fine pink stone tracery:

http://djtravel.homestead.com/files/strasbourg_cathedral_08.jpg

The great south windows showing the flying buttresses:

http://djtravel.homestead.com/files/strasbourg_cathedral_07.jpg

An aerial view is the only way to appreciate all the features, the tower over the crossing of the nave, the two west towers, and the massive size:

http://trialx.com/curetalk/wp-content/blogs.dir/7/files/2011/05/cities/Strasbourg-2.jpg

Now let’s discuss Cologne. The place in which the cathedral is situated today was the place where the first Christians assembled in Cologne since late Roman times. Several churches –  each one in turn larger than its predecessors – were built on this site near the city walls.

The first of these churches of which we have some knowledge was the Carolingian cathedral (Carolingian refers to the great Frankish Emperor Charlemagne, Latin: Carolus Magnus) finished around 800. It had a transept on each end of the nave. The altar to the east was consecrated to the Virgin Mary and the western altar was consecrated to St. Peter. Under archbishop Bruno a northern and a southern side aisle were added to the nave. This cathedral stood until the 13th century and underwent only small changes during this time.

In Cologne, as we have mentioned, it is believed the sacred bones of the Three Wise Men, the sacred Three Kings – Kaspar, Balthasar, and Melchior –  are preserved, hence it was a major destination for pilgrims all during the Middle Ages. At some point, the older church simply could not contain the throngs of pilgrims coming to see the sacred relics, hence it was decided to build a new, bigger cathedral.

When construction was to begin in the New Style in 1248, parts of the old church were torn down to get them out of the way. Someone thought it would be a good idea to burn a certain portion of the church to speed up demolition, but the whole church caught on fire (the old churches had wooden roofs).

The new cathedral got only one story high by 1473, (with a huge crane left standing on the north tower for 400 years) when the New Style fell out of favor and people started calling it Gothic. A makeshift roof was placed over the church.

Building was resumed during the period called Gothic Revival in 1842 when nationalistic fervor caused a gigantic outpouring of funds from all over Germany (and after the original plans were discovered). (More about this in a later module.)

Cologne cathedral was completed in 1880, 632 years after its commencement. I suppose it could be called Neo-Gothic or Gothic Revival, though those terms usually refer to newer buildings completely constructed in the old “New Style.” Here’s how we will see it from the river:

http://trinitycountrystudy.weebly.com/uploads/2/7/8/7/27874649/3639438_orig.jpg

Obviously it has all the towers finished.  Here’s an evening view:

http://media-1.web.britannica.com/eb-media/25/99625-004-BDC242E4.jpg

A night view:

http://www.lovethesepics.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Cologne-Cathedral-at-night-in-K%C3%B6ln-Germany-8th-place-Wikimedia-Commons-POTY.jpg

Of course the plan is cruciform:

http://www.planetware.com/i/map/D/cologne-cathedral-map.jpg

Some interior views:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/be/Cologne_Cathedral_(6654448109).jpg

http://www.daily-hdr.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Cross-on-the-Eastern-Side-of-the-Cologne-Cathedral.jpg

https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8147/7276382634_9876210384.jpg

http://koelner-dom.de/typo3temp/pics/abfc20ca7c.jpg

The west façade:

http://raredelights.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Cologne-Cathedral-4.jpg

The eastern apse:

http://classconnection.s3.amazonaws.com/736/flashcards/524736/jpg/cologne_cathedral1330310922776.jpg

Notice that one of the bells, named Peter, weighs 24 metric tons:

http://www.anicursor.com/dom/dom_glocke.jpg

Aerial views show the towers which are over 157 meters tall, more than 510 feet:

http://en.academic.ru/pictures/enwiki/75/K%C3%B6lner_Dom004_(Flight_over_Cologne).jpg

It’s a miracle that the cathedral, though damaged, withstood the saturation bombing of World War Two:

https://stevehickey.wordpress.com/files/2009/07/cologne-cathedral-wwii.jpg

So much for a brief introduction to sacred architecture along the Rhine beginning with the Romans and ending with late Neo-Gothic or the Gothic Revival. If we were in Southern Germany and Austria, we would want to talk about Baroque and Rococo church architecture, later forms identified with the Counter-Reformation, which are largely missing from the Rhine, such as this, one of my favorites, the little Rococo Wieskirche in a meadow in Bavaria (with cows):

http://www.monumente-online.de/__generated/09/06/images/by_steingaden_wieskirche_innen_florian_monheim_krefeld_3_452x.jpg

http://s2.germany.travel/media/content/staedte___kultur_1/unesco_welterben_2013/wallfahrtskirche_diewies_pfaffenwinkel_1/Wieskirche_Konzerte_RET.jpg

http://www.via-claudia-camping.de/up/bilder/kuhparade_vor_der_wieskirche_pressebild.jpg

Or how about this Baroque beauty, the Abbey of Melk, on the Danube, not far outside Vienna:

http://trainingindevotion.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/melk-abbey-church.jpg

http://www.private-city-hotels.com/uploads/tx_pchhotels/240_PCH_POI-aeusflugsziel_Wien_Stift-Melk_2.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9b/Ceiling_painting_of_the_Marble_Hall_-_Melk_Abbey_-_Austria.jpg

Even the library at Melk is stunning:

http://travelioo.com/img/Melk-Abbey-Photo3.jpg

We cannot end this module, however, without looking ahead to Amsterdam. I have not yet mentioned the churches of Amsterdam, in part because I don’t know them very well, and in part because they are in some ways quite different from the churches on the Rhine, though they have many similarities as well. Here’s a brief overview:

The Nieuwe Kerk (new church), the most important church in Amsterdam, was commenced in 1408 after the Oude Kerk (old church) was deemed too small. Nieuwe Kerk is no longer used as a church (Nor is Oude Kerk.)

Nieuwe Kerk has a Gothic flavor, much of which was added after the church burned nearly to the ground in 1645. More Neo-Gothic was added during a major renovation from 1892-1914. Another renovation from 1959-1980 proved so costly that the Dutch Reformed Church was forced to turn Nieuwe Kerk over to a non-profit foundation:

http://europaenfotos.com/amsterdam/nieuwe-kerk-8698.jpg

The original stained glass window over the (now closed) western portal had to be bricked up when the organ was installed:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Nkerk2.jpg

Here’s a view of that organ:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/53/Amsterdam_nieuwe_kerk_interieur.jpg

There’s a great sundial on the south end of the transept:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/14/Sundial_on_church.jpg/640px-Sundial_on_church.jpg

It’s above the present main entrance to the church:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/Amsterdamnieuwekerk.jpg

Dutch churches were almost all stripped of their decorations during the Reformation, as the more radical Protestant reformers – known as iconoclasts (image destroyers) – believed “graven images” of any kind to be blasphemous. Stained glass was considered a mass of graven images as well, so the present stained glass windows depict innocent things like rulers receiving tribute from their devoted followers:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/53/P1020916Nieuwe_Kerk_Amsterdam.JPG/640px-P1020916Nieuwe_Kerk_Amsterdam.JPG

Beautiful pulpits were still ok:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bc/P1020914Preekstoel.JPG/640px-P1020914Preekstoel.JPG

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/ac/P1020913Detail_Preekstoel.JPG/640px-P1020913Detail_Preekstoel.JPG

Also ok was this beautiful gate to the choir of the church (the choir is that place in the nave just west of the altar. Singers sat facing each other on either side of the nave.):

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/59/P1020907Nieuwe_Kerk_Amsterdam.JPG/1024px-P1020907Nieuwe_Kerk_Amsterdam.JPG

The overall effect of these Dutch churches is of plain, white, simple walls with just a small amount of tasteful decor:

https://learningeuropeanandchinesesinging.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/nieuwe-kerk-amsterdam.jpg

http://thewanderingscot.com/photos/2010%20Baikonur-Frankfurt/EU/midis/IMG_3006.JPG

http://tettero.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/CF036245-1.jpg

Now a note on the Oude Kerk, an unusual church indeed: It was originally a wooden church from about 1213. And even though the ground under it was swampy (and had been used as a cemetery), in 1306 a stone church was somehow built on the site. It became a kind of permanent work in progress, as side aisles, apse, and other features were added piecemeal to the original simple church over the centuries:

http://www.planetware.com/i/map/NL/oude-kerk-in-amsterdam-st-nicolaas-map.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/35/Amsterdam_oude_kerk2.jpg

http://theplectraconspiracydotcom.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/amsterdam-the-oude-kerk-old-church.jpg

http://www.refdag.nl/polopoly_fs/anp_22664258_1_761453!image/712452370.jpg

The floor consists entirely of gravestones from the cemetery. Local citizens continued to be buried on the site within the confines of the church until 1865. There are 2500 graves in the Oude Kerk, under which are said to be buried 10,000 Amsterdam citizens, including the famous artist Johannes Vermeer:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/72/Amsterdam_-_Oude_Kerk_-_View_of_the_nave.JPG

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/04/Oude_Kerk_(Amsterdam)_-_a_church_with_a_wodden_roof.jpg

The roof of the Oude Kerk is the largest medieval wooden vault in Europe. The planking from Estonia dates to 1390 and gives the church some of the best acoustics in Europe. It has four organs, including the Vater-Müller organ, one of the finest (sounding and looking) in Europe:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/df/Orgel_Oude_Kerk.jpg/1024px-Orgel_Oude_Kerk.jpg

Rembrandt was a frequent visitor to the Oude Kerk and his children were all christened here. It is the only building in Amsterdam that remains in its original state since Rembrandt walked its halls. In the Holy Sepulchre is a small Rembrandt exhibition, a shrine to his wife Saskia van Uylenburgh who was buried here in 1642. Each year on 9 March (8 March in leap years), at 8:39 am, the early morning sun briefly illuminates her tomb.

Like the Nieuwe Kerk, the Oude Kerk is no longer a functioning church. In addition, the Oude Kerk is located in what has become Amsterdam’s red-light district, where prostitutes display themselves for sale in what are essentially show-room windows:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/eb/Old_Church_-_Old_Profession.jpg/1024px-Old_Church_-_Old_Profession.jpg

We have not discussed synagogues in much detail (though in Speyer there is a wonderful original mikveh – a ritualistic washing pool – remaining from the old synagogue there, which I describe in more detail in the next module). This is in part because the Nazis destroyed most of them in Germany. (Some, of course, like the magnificent New Synagogue in the Oranienstrasse in Berlin, have been rebuilt since World War Two.):

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Berlin_Neue_Synagoge_2005.jpg

http://www.landmarktours.eu/userfiles/image/cimg_1240.jpg

There are quite a number of surviving synagogues in Amsterdam; in fact, the Jewish Historical Museum was created from four adjoining Ashkenazi synagogues (as the community grew they kept building new ones nearby), combining them with the Great Synagogue (built in 1671). The museum presents the history of Jewish life in the Netherlands, but is also an important Jewish cultural center presenting contemporary art exhibitions and concerts.

The Great Synagogue was the largest synagogue of its time and one of the biggest buildings of Amsterdam. A model of the Temple of Salomon in Jerusalem is said to have inspired the architects:

http://www.jhm.nl/beeld/cultuurgeschiedenis/gebouw/_300/gs-103n030.jpg

In Amsterdam the most famous synagogue is the Portuguese Synagogue, which also survived the Nazis. It is also known as the Esnoga or Snoge, Ladino words for synagogue. (Ladino is a Romance language derived from Old Spanish, incorporating elements from all the old Romance languages of the Iberian Peninsula, plus Hebrew, Aramaic, and incorporating in some places Ottoman Turkish, Arabic, Greek, Bulgarian, and Serbo-Croatian vocabulary.)

This is a Sephardic synagogue completed in 1675. The Amsterdam Sephardic community was one of the largest and richest Jewish communities in Europe during the Dutch Golden Age, and their very large synagogue reflected this. (The Sephardim are the Ladino-speaking Jews of Spain. Sepharad means Spain in Hebrew. They are in contrast to the Ashkenazi Jews, also known as Ashkenazim, literally “The Jews of Germany”. The traditional language of Ashkenazi Jews consisted of various dialects of Yiddish – cf. German: Jüdisch, Jewish. The Great Synagogue was Ashkenazi.)

While Columbus was “sailing the ocean blue,” the Jews were expelled en masse from Spain in 1492 by the Alhambra decree or Edict of Expulsion under Ferdinand and Isabella. Even those who fled to Portugal were forced to convert to Catholicism in 1496, and Jews who did not convert were expelled even from Portugal in 1497. For hundreds of years, the Inquisition continued to investigate the converts and their descendants in Spain and Portugal on suspicions that in secret they still practiced Judaism (which some of them did).

Some of those who wished to enjoy freedom of religion found refuge in Amsterdam. During a substantial migration that took place in the 17th century, these Jewish refugees from the Iberian peninsula called themselves Portuguese Jews, to avoid being identified with Spain, which happened to be at war with the Dutch Republic at the time.

The inscription above the entrance is from Psalm 5:8: “In the abundance of Thy loving kindness will I come into Thy house”. The sign also contains “1672", the year the building was intended to be completed – actually it took three years longer – and “Aboab”, the name of the chief rabbi who initiated the construction project:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f9/BlaDSCF7310.jpg/640px-BlaDSCF7310.jpg

Side view:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/Synagogo1.jpg

The building is free-standing and rests on wooden poles; it is said that the foundation vaults can be viewed by boat from the canal water underneath the synagogue.

The interior of the synagogue is a single, very high rectangular space retaining its original wooden benches. The floor is covered with fine sand, in the old Dutch tradition, to absorb dust, moisture and dirt from shoes and to muffle the noise. Only five synagogues in the world have a sand floor, and this is the only one with such a floor surviving outside the Caribbean region. Interior showing sandy floor:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0d/BlaDSCF7296Portuguese_Synagogue.jpg/1024px-BlaDSCF7296Portuguese_Synagogue.jpg

In conclusion, and thinking back now for a moment to the cathedrals on the Rhine, I’d like to wax philosophical for a moment.

As we visit these remarkable houses of worship along the Rhine, I hope we can better understand the magic, in fact the MIRACLE, of architecture’s power to draw our souls upward towards God. Imagine an illiterate person stepping out of the polluted streets of the middle ages (sewers disappeared with the Romans) into one of these magnificent structures. How could that person not feel that s/he had entered into the House of God, able to read the stories of salvation in the ultimate picture book of stained glass?

How could his or her soul not be drawn upward by the beautiful celestial echos of the singing (and later the organ), the otherworldly decor and the high vaulting? How could the miracle of making heavy stones appear to become weightless – especially in Gothic architecture – filled with colorful light and seeming to ascend to heaven, how could that not function to draw our light-filled souls up and away after them, up out of this heavy, burdensome earthly existence to a more glorious heavenly home?

And I hope we’ll appreciate the sheer dedication of countless faithful Christians who toiled and sacrificed so much over so many hundreds of years to help erect such buildings. How could anyone today call their faith into question? And how can we forget the faithful Jews who suffered in all these places so much persecution and abuse over so many centuries for their religion’s sake, yet managed to construct such wonderful houses of worship as they did?

Before we leave this module, since we began by discussing Romanesque, I’m tempted to make one more brief digression, in the form of a kind of footnote to Romanesque style, and talk about how the Romanesque style made its way to England, where it’s called the Norman style – the Tower of London is the earliest and best example of non-church Norman architecture – because this also gives us the opportunity to briefly mention the Normans, who they were, where they came from, and about the claims to the English crown of William the Conqueror who defeated King Harold in the Battle of Hastings in 1066. Bear with me a few moments more. Here’s the Tower of London:

http://i1-news.softpedia-static.com/images/news2/Thief-Steals-the-Keys-to-the-Tower-of-London-on-Guy-Fawkes-Night-2.jpg

Those very typical Norman “crenelations” on top of the tower’s walls (the word crenelation shares its origins with the common English word cranny, similarly meaning “a small opening, as in a wall or rock face; a crevice”) were used for protecting shooters on the tower from the volleys of attackers. They are very typical of the Norman style, that Romanesque style exported to Britain.

Church examples of Norman architecture in England include Norwich cathedral with its rounded Romanesque arches (the spire is obviously newer):

http://www.mma-online.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/dsc_3273-edit1.jpg

So who were these Normans? Their name is a version of Northmen, or Norsemen. They were Vikings, probably from Norway, meaning the north way, who had been allowed in 911 by the French Carolingian ruler Charles the Simple to settle in Normandy along the coast of France under their leader Rollo.

In exchange for the land, the Norsemen under Rollo were expected to provide protection along the coast against further Viking invaders. They eventually intermarried with the local population and used the territory granted them as a base to extend the frontiers of their duchy westward.

The Encyclopedia Britannica colorfully writes of them: Despite their eventual conversion to Christianity, their adoption of the French language, and their abandonment of sea roving for Frankish cavalry warfare in the decades following their settlement in Normandy, the Normans retained many of the traits of their piratical Viking ancestors. They displayed an extreme restlessness and recklessness, a love of fighting accompanied by almost foolhardy courage, and a craftiness and cunning that went hand in hand with outrageous treachery. In their expansion into other parts of Europe, the Normans compiled a record of astonishingly daring exploits in which often a mere handful of men would vanquish an enemy many times as numerous. An unequaled capacity for rapid movement across land and sea, the use of brutal violence, a precocious sense of the use and value of money—these are among the traits traditionally assigned to the Normans.

They captured southern Italy, Sicily, and Malta, and made conquests around Byzantium (present-day Istanbul) leaving their architecture in a number of places around the Mediterranean as well. Their best-known conquest, however, concerns England. Let’s let Wikipedia continue the story:

In 1002 King Æthelred II of England married Emma, the sister of Richard II, Duke of Normandy. Their son Edward the Confessor, who spent many years in exile in Normandy, succeeded to the English throne in 1042. This led to the establishment of a powerful Norman interest in English politics, as Edward drew heavily on his former hosts for support, bringing in Norman courtiers, soldiers, and clerics and appointing them to positions of power, particularly in the Church.

Childless and embroiled in conflict with the formidable Godwin, Earl of Wessex, and his sons, Edward may also have encouraged Duke William of Normandy’s ambitions for the English throne.

When King Edward died at the beginning of 1066, the lack of a clear heir led to a disputed succession in which several contenders laid claim to the throne of England. Edward’s immediate successor was Harold Godwinson, the Earl of Wessex (West Saxony), the richest and most powerful of the English aristocrats. Harold was elected king by the Witenagemot (the assembly of the Anglo-Saxon national council) of England and crowned by the Archbishop of York, Ealdred, although Norman propaganda claimed the ceremony was performed by Stigand, the uncanonically elected Archbishop of Canterbury.

Harold was immediately challenged by two powerful neighboring rulers. Duke William of Normandy, illegitimate son of Robert I, Duke of Normandy, by Robert’s mistress Herleva, and thus also known as William the Bastard, claimed that he had been promised the throne by King Edward and that Harold had sworn agreement to this.

Another king with a similar name, King Harald III of Norway, commonly known as Harald Hardrada (“Harald the Hard Ruler”), also contested Harold’s succession. His claim to the throne was based on an agreement between his predecessor Magnus I of Norway and the earlier English king, Harthacnut, whereby if either died without heir, the other would inherit both England and Norway.

William of Normandy and Harald of Norway at once set about assembling troops and ships to invade England. King Harold of England, meanwhile, spent the summer on the south coast with a large army and fleet waiting for William to invade, but the bulk of his forces were militia who needed to get home to harvest their crops, so on the 8th of September Harold dismissed them.

Harald of Norway was initially successful. He captured York before proceeding on September 24, 1066 to the tiny village of Stamford Bridge. King Harold of England probably learned of the Norwegian invasion in mid-September and rushed north, gathering forces as he went.

At dawn on the 25th of September Harold’s forces reached York, where he learned the location of the Norwegians. The English then marched on the invaders and took them by surprise, defeating them in the Battle of Stamford Bridge. Harald of Norway was killed, and the Norwegians suffered such horrific losses that only 24 of their original 300 ships were required to carry away the survivors. The English victory was costly, however, as Harold’s army was left in a battered and weakened state.

The Normans crossed to England a few days after Harold’s victory over the Norwegians at Stamford Bridge. They landed at Pevensey in Sussex (South Saxony) on the 28th of  September and erected a wooden castle at a place called Hastings, from which they raided the surrounding area. The raids ensured supplies for the army, and as Harold and his family held many of the lands in the area, they weakened William’s opponent and made him more likely to attack to put an end to the raiding.

Harold traveled south, gathering forces as he went. On the morning of October 14, the famous Battle of Hastings ensued. At first the English lines held, though they had few archers and few cavalry. But the Normans made repeated feigned withdrawals, tempting the English into pursuit, breaking their own lines and allowing the Norman cavalry to attack them on their flanks.

It has been said that Harold died from an arrow which penetrated the eye-hole in his helmet and pierced his head. Others say he was merely wounded by the arrow and then dispatched with the sword. Either way, by afternoon, Harold was dead and the battle was over.

William of Normandy still had to defeat one Edgar the Ætheling (a word meaning nobleman), who had quickly been made king by some of his supporters, but by the time William circled his forces around and reached London from the north, Edgar’s supporters had given up and melted away. William was crowned King of England on Christmas Day, 1066. (Charlemagne had been crowned Holy Roman Emperor on Christmas Day, 800, so it appears this had become an auspicious tradition by 1066.)

The Bayeux Tapestry, woven in honor of William’s victory, probably commissioned by his half-brother, Bishop Odo, shows that a bright comet gave the Norman warriors hope that god was on their side:

http://40.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ljgike8fZq1qfg4oyo1_1280.jpg

Here’s another snippet from this 230-foot long embroidery (20 inches tall) now displayed in its own museum in Bayeux, Normandy:

http://mirax.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/bayeux-tapestry-harold-1.jpg

Here Harold is killed. He is obviously the one right below his name, Harold Rex, Harold the King, and is that an arrow in his eye? There’s some evidence that it was added to the tapestry later.

The Norman invasion leads to very interesting further developments in our English language, explaining why we use French words for cooked food, but Anglo-Saxon words for the animals themselves, for example. The upper-class Normans spoke Latin-based French which became the language of cuisine, but the lower-class Saxons tended the animals in the fields and were the butchers. That’s why when we refer to the cooked meat we say pork, for example, or beef, or mutton, all French words, when the Germanic words are swineflesh, cowflesh, or sheepflesh (German: Schweinefleisch, Kuhfleisch, Schaffleisch). Likewise, calf flesh (German: Kalbfleisch) becomes veal.

Shakespeare and other English poets clearly owe their remarkable power in part to the rich vocabulary of English which consists of all the Germanic roots from Saxon and Danish plus French, and through French Latin, and through Latin to a certain extent Greek. It has been claimed that English has a vocabulary boasting over 200,000 common usage words while modern French has a mere 100,000 (though it is very hard to compare vocabularies exactly). Suffice it to say, English has a rich, diverse, heritage, due in no small part to these Normans, erstwhile Norwegian Vikings turned French dukes turned English kings.

Now that we’ve gotten a taste of some history, perhaps our next module ought to spend a bit of time sketching in some major historical events in Western Europe from the Migration of Peoples and the fall of the Roman Empire (where we more or less left off), down to the present day. We’ve mentioned Charlemagne a number of times now, for example, and it’s probably time to explore who he was and where he came from.

RhinejourneymoduleD

Module D. (With Apologies in Advance): A Brief Historical Sketch of Western Europe, or:
Writing Good, Brief History is Like Asking For a Pocket-Sized Bible With Big Print!

Writing about history has proved to be a problem for me in these brief modules, because there’s just so much of it. Europe has been so important for so long, and it’s a very big place. (But I would like very much to whet your appetite for history, not destroy it by heaping more on your plate than you can digest in such a short time!)

Speaking of gigantic feasts: my old beloved one-volume history of Europe by the amazing Welsh scholar Norman Davies is huge: 1,365 very large pages long, and with very small print. It weighs about 10 pounds. It has taken me years to plow through (as well written and enjoyable as it is!)  So, as much as I love it, I felt I must stay as far away as possible from such microscopic views of history. (And I’m no Norman Davies, either: I’m just a humble Professor Emeritus of German Studies who could some day be charged with practicing historiography without a license...)

In module C we did manage to touch on the Norman Invasion of England, at least... And in modules A and B I feel comfortable about having more or less adequately introduced matters up to about the Fall of the Roman Empire and the Migration of Barbarians into Roman lands.

And we randomly jumped about in history a bit during our discussion of cathedral architecture, without overwhelming anyone, I hope.

I still felt a need, however, to offer some kind of over-all sketch of Western European history, picking up about where we left off at the fall of the Roman Empire and proceeding to 2015.

I began several versions of this module, but after each attempt I saw that I was including so much detail that it was going to run into hundred of pages. I eventually decided that it is impossible to include as much detail as I was trying to and yet boil that much history down to a manageable size.

So I finally decided to use the shorthand format of a simple timetable. Such a timetable is admittedly very sketchy but may at least provide a skeleton for us to flesh out during later modules and during our anticipated discussions on board.

I picked up the story again with the Franks, that Germanic tribe which became so important for Western European history after the Migration of Barbarians.

I focused first and foremost on Germany, but I have also provided even briefer timetables for France, Switzerland, and the Netherlands for comparison and context. I apologize if it’s too sketchy, but hope you will find it both manageable and somewhat useful. (The important thing is that after such a meager meal, I hope you will feel free to order second helpings and even some dessert!):

481/482 Clovis I (Chlodovech = Ludwig = Louis) of the Merovingian dynasty, succeeds his father, Childeric, as the ruler of the Salian Franks from the east side of the Rhine. He converts to Catholic Christianity, as do the other Franks.

494 Clovis takes advantage of the disintegration of the Roman Empire, unites all the Franks – Salian, Ripuarian, and Chatti groups –  (their common Christianity helps in this regard), and leads them in a series of campaigns, bringing all of northern Gaul under his rule.

507 Clovis drives southward, subduing the Visigoths who had established themselves in southern Gaul. A unified Frankish kingdom in northern Gaul was thus established and secured.

A map showing the growth of Frankish territory:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/16/Frankish_Empire_481_to_814-en.svg/1000px-Frankish_Empire_481_to_814-en.svg.png

Note that the area held in about 481 is called Austrasia (not to be confused with Australia, Australasia, or Austria, though it shares with the word Austria the idea that it was an eastern realm = cf. German Österreich – Eastern realm – for Austria). Neustria, meaning “new western land” is the territory in northern Gaul conquered by Clovis in the wake of the Battle of Soissons of 486.

622 Mohammed and his followers in Mecca migrate to Medina. This event, the Hijra, marks the beginning of  Islam.

622-750 Islam spreads west as far as Spain:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/72/Map_of_expansion_of_Caliphate.svg/900px-Map_of_expansion_of_Caliphate.svg.png

687 During a period of particularly weak Merovingian kings, a Mayor of the Palace (a kind of glorified butler) to the kings, a certain Pippin or Pepin, takes upon himself the title Duke and Prince of the Franks.

715 Pepin is succeeded by his illegitimate son, Charles − Carolus –  Martel, who went on to found a new line of the family named (after his first name, Carolus) the Carolingian dynasty. Martel began a series of military campaigns that re-established the Franks as the undisputed masters of all Gaul, subjugating Bavaria, Alemannia, and Frisia, defeating the Saxons, and halting the further Islamic advance into Western Europe at the Battle of Tours, deep inside present-day France, in 732. (Charles was appropriately nicknamed The Hammer) He did not call himself king, however, reserving that honor for his son Pepin the Short or Pepin the Younger, father of Charlemagne.

768 Martel’s illustrious grandson Charlemagne becomes king of the Franks.

774 Charlemagne also becomes king of Italy.

782 Charlemagne attacks the Saxons, forcing them at the point of the sword to convert to Christianity. He is responsible for a massacre of 4,500 pagan Saxons at Verden, a town in Lower Saxony on the Aller, a terrible blot on Charlemagne’s otherwise heroic record.

800 Charlemagne, crowned Roman Emperor by the pope on Christmas Day, became a powerful protector of the papacy, removing the anti-papal Lombards from power in northern Italy, and leading an incursion into Muslim Spain. He invited important scholars such as Alcuin of York to help him found an important school, and initiated what has been called the Carolingian Renaissance. (Scholars at Charlemagne’s school made beautiful manuscripts using clearly formed, easily legible lower-case letters called Carolingian Minuscules. The letters you are reading in this module evolved directly from them.):

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/ea/78/53/ea7853a5e61797cba2247e92b290cab6.jpg

 Portions of Charlemagne’s very impressive palace and Byzantine-style chapel still stand in Aachen, Germany, near the Dutch border:

http://faculty.cua.edu/pennington/mbs201crusades/LectureTwo/CharlemagnePalace.jpg

http://jfbradu.free.fr/mosaiques/germigny/palais-aix2.jpg

http://www.olympicwanderings.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/aachen-arches.jpg

(Charlemagne himself was very impressive):

http://www.route-charlemagne.eu/images/content/Karl/karl_ideal_header.jpg

814 Charlemagne dies. After his death and that of his son Louis the Pious, three of his grandsons fight over territory and his vast empire begins to break up. The eastern part becomes Germany under Louis the German, the western part France under Charles the Bald, the middle part Lothringen (Lothar’s realm = French: Lorraine), under Lothar, as on this map:

http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~mapplace/EU/EU20_France/Maps/EU20_98PostCharlemagne.jpg

842 The Strasbourg Oaths were read by Louis and Charles to their troops as they conducted their wars while attempting to steal Lothar’s realm. Part of it is in Old French and is the oath cited by Charlemagne’s grandson Louis or Ludwig the German to the French-speaking troops of his brother Charles the Bald. It’s the oldest written document in any Romance language. Conversely, Charles the Bald read the Old High German version of the oaths to his brother’s German-speaking soldiers, (though this does not happen to be the oldest document in Old High German as it is for Old French.) This marks the distinction between the use of German mostly east of the Rhine and French mostly west of the river. Henceforth east of the Rhine is to become Germany, west is to become France and Belgium. Here’s a page with Old High German on the left and Latin on the right, with the same text highlighted in clearer print on both:

http://idata.over-blog.com/3/22/65/27/Oath-of-Strasbourg.jpg

843 The Treaty of Verdun settles the fratricidal wars and gives Lothar his inheritance, though the old desire of his two brothers to carve up his realm has lingered, almost as a kind of curse over the land, down to the present. The borders of Lothar’s realm have become a sort of permanent political, cultural fault line dividing western Europe right down the middle between France and Germany.

911 One of Louis the German’s descendants, Louis the Child, died at age 12 without a male heir. The eastern Franks joined with their former enemies, the now Christian Saxons, to elect Conrad, the duke of Franconia, as the German king. Though not of the Carolingian line, Conrad was nevertheless still a Frank.

919 At Conrad’s death, however, Franks and Saxons join forces again, this time to elect a Saxon king, Henry I, the founder of the Saxon (soon to be called the Ottonian) dynasty.

936 Henry was succeeded by his son Otto I (the Great), after whom the Ottonian dynasty was then named. The rule of Otto the Great resulted in a revival and expansion of the eastern half of Charlemagne’s great empire.

955 Otto protected the eastern border of what now became known as the German Reich (empire) by a decisive victory against the Magyars of Hungary on a plain near the river Lech, south of Augsburg, north of Munich.

962 Otto is crowned king of the Lombards and Roman Emperor by the pope, the beginning of an unbroken line of Roman Emperors of the German Nation lasting for more than eight centuries.

1024 The male line of descent from Otto the Great died out. The princes elected Conrad, the duke of Franconia, descended from Otto in the female line, as the German king Conrad II. His dynasty was known either as Franconian (named after Franconia, the province of the Franks) or Salian (from the Salii, one of the main tribal groups of the Franks).

1046 Conrad II’s son, Henry III, was crowned Roman Emperor in Rome. When he insisted on installing his own man as pope, he launched two centuries of bitter conflict between German emperors and the papacy.

1095-1291 Crusaders, often from Germany, begin to attempt to free the holy sites in Palestine from Arab/Muslim control. Muslims and Jews in Spain are also targeted.

1096 Crusaders of the First, or German Crusade move north up the Rhine, systematically murdering an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 Jews, fully a third of all the Jews living in Northern Europe. Jews in Speyer, Trier, Metz, Regensburg, Cologne, Worms, Mainz and seven other locations were particularly targeted during this co-called Rhineland Massacre, a horrible harbinger of the Holocaust.

1125 Henry IV’s son, Henry V, dies without an heir.

1157 The Germanic Empire is called the Holy Roman Empire for the first time.

1190 German Emperor Frederick I dies while on a crusade.

1220 Frederick II becomes emperor. He was known as stupor mundi (wonder of the world) because of his brilliant mind. Speaking six languages (Latin, Sicilian, German, French, Greek and Arabic), for much of his reign Frederick II succeeded in controlling Germany, Italy and his favorite domain of Sicily, as well as going on a crusade, where he had himself crowned king of Jerusalem. Here’s his likeness:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/db/Frederick_II_and_eagle.jpg

1254-1273 The Great Interregnum (a period without an emperor)

1273 Rudolf of Habsburg finally becomes emperor, ending the interregnum. Much later, in 1438, the house of Hapsburg becomes the longest-lasting imperial dynasty by far – 480 years – ending only in 1918.

1349 The Black Death strikes Germany and kills about a third of the population.

1355 Charles (Karl) IV is crowned emperor in Rome.

1356 Charles issues the Golden Bull, a decree which excludes the pope from any further influence in the choice of emperors. He makes his capital in Prague, having inherited Bohemia as well as Luxembourg, bringing that city its first period of glory. The imperial designation remains in Charles’s family until 1438, when it is finally transferred to the Habsburgs. (It was called the Golden Bull because of the golden seal affixed to it):

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/91/Goldene-bulle_1c-480x475.jpg

1386 Heidelberg University is founded.

1409 Leipzig University is founded.

1414 Sigismund, Charles’s son, is instrumental in bringing together the Council of Constance which finally ends the Great Schism (three competing popes at the same time) and restores a single pope to Rome.

1502 Wittenberg University is founded.

1517 Martin Luther begins the Reformation.

1522 The Diet of Worms (a meeting of the German states with the Emperor Charles V in charge), tries Luther for heresy. Martin Luther translates the New Testament into German while imprisoned by his friends for his own protection in the secluded Wartburg castle in Thuringia:

http://www.thueringen.de/imperia/md/images/freshup/english/history/wartburg_eisenach_570px.jpg

1525 The Peasants War (a peasants uprising) takes place in Germany. Luther calls for the peasants to be shot down like dogs.

1531 German Protestant princes form an alliance.

1555 The Diet of Augsburg decrees that each prince can decide which religion his people will follow.

1618 The Thirty Years War begins when Catholic emissaries are thrown out a window in the palace at Prague, landing in a manure pile. It is virtually a world war, with all major European powers weighing in, but mostly fought on German soil.

http://homepage.smc.edu/buckley_alan/ps7/30_years_war2.jpg

1648 The Peace of Westphalia. The Thirty Years War ends but Germany is left enormously devastated, with much of her population dead. Estimates range from 25% to 40%. Some regions were affected much more than others. For example, the state of Württemberg lost three-quarters of its population during the war. In the territory of Brandenburg, the losses amounted to half, while in some areas an estimated two-thirds of the population died. Overall, the male population of the German states was reduced by almost half:

http://www.clashofempires.ca/Blog/Tilly%20dying.jpg

1709-1710  The "Poor Palatines" were some 13,000 Germans who came to England between May and November 1709 and many moved on to the US the next year, as refugees from places like Heidelberg, which had been decimated by invasions of the French. In the US they became known as Pennsylvania Dutch (Deutsch or Deitsch):

http://pabook.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/PADutch1934Picnic.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0f/Lancaster_County_Amish_03.jpg

1740 Frederick the Great becomes king of Prussia and invades Silesia. An enlightened despot and a good musician, he invites the Bachs, Jr. and Sr. as well as Voltaire to his court.

1741 The Prussians defeat the Austrians at Mollwitz.

1745 The war ends but Prussia is left with more territory.

1756 Prussia goes to war against a coalition of enemies.

1772 Prussia takes part of Poland.

1792 Prussia goes to war with France.

1793 Prussia takes more of Poland.

1795 Prussia makes peace with France.

1806 Napoleon temporarily ends the Holy Roman Empire. The French crush the Prussians at Jena.

1812 Napoleon defeated before Moscow. Of the 680,000 men in his Grande Armee, Napoleon lost 380,000 dead, 200,000 captured. Only 27,000 fit soldiers survived. The Russians lost 400,000 men. Of the Battle of Borodino just before Moscow, it has been said by historian Gwynn Dyer that the casualties there were the “equivalent of one fully loaded Jumbo Jet crashing onto the battlefield every three minutes from breakfast to sundown.”

1813 Prussia joins Russia against the remaining army of the retreating Napoleon at the Battle of Leipzig or Battle of Nations, the largest battle in European history before the First World War:

http://greatestbattles.iblogger.org/GB/Leipzig/p78.jpg

1815 A German Confederation is formed, a step toward unification.

1819 Count Metternich, main Habsburg hatchet man, introduces strict censorship with the Karlsbad decrees, rolls back all Napoleonic reforms and other Republican innovations.

1834 Prussia and other states form a customs union called the Zollverein, another step toward unification.

1835 The first steam railway in Germany is built, from Nürnberg to Fürth, six kilometers (3.6 miles):

http://kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/beckum/FurthEisenbahn1835.jpg

1848 Revolution sweeps Germany. An elected assembly representing all Germany, called the Frankfurt Parliament, meets.

1849 The rebellions are put down and the old order returns. Many disillusioned Germans emigrate to the US, such as the revolutionary Carl Schurz, who became Abraham Lincoln’s Secretary of the Interior, a Union Army General in the Civil War, and a senator from Missouri:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/Carl-Schurz.jpg

1864 Prussia and Austria fight Denmark. Germany gains control over Schleswig-Holstein:

http://www.worldology.com/Europe/images/pre_war_german.jpg

1866 War between Prussia and Austria. Afterwards a North German Confederation is formed, dominated by Prussia.

1870 Prussia crushes France in the Franco-Prussian war.

1871 Prussia makes peace with France. The southern German states unite with the north.

1883 Arch-Conservative Prussian Chancellor Otto von Bismarck introduces universal health insurance in an attempt to blunt the demands of Socialists. (The term Bismarkcare does not catch on.)

1889 Bismarck introduces old age pensions for the same reason.

1890 Bismarck resigns:

https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcR3Hk8HXR_l_YgJ7dlPXvlif74K_YMPLwMY-US4T3TAsAKkoh8k1Q


1898 Germany begins to expand its navy. Nineteen battleships, 8 armored cruisers, 12 large and 30 light cruisers to be completed by 1904.

1900 Size of German fleet to be doubled to 38 battleships, 20 armored cruisers and 38 light cruisers.

1914 Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria is assassinated by a Serb, though in Bosnia, not in Serbia. Logically (!?) Austria declares war on Serbia. Russia backs Serbia and declares war on Austria. Germany hands Austria a “blank check” by declaring war on Russia, which is allied to Britain and to France, who then enter the war. The German army overruns Belgium on its way into France. The first mechanized war is a catastrophe of killing. Poison gas is used for the first time. A photo of Franz Ferdinand in his car just before the assassination of him and his wife, Sophie:

http://i.ytimg.com/vi/pBBOPsOhRaA/hqdefault.jpg

The car, with bullet holes and blood (not visible in this photo) in the war museum in Vienna:

http://blogs.forteana.org/system/files/482895.jpg

1917 Russia, having experienced the Bolshevik revolution, withdraws from the conflict. America enters the war on the western front:

http://img.docstoccdn.com/thumb/orig/71076518.png

1918 The Germans launch a final series of assaults in the trenches of France but fail to break through. From August on the Germans are pushed back. On November 11 at 11 am they sign a cease-fire, which becomes Armistice Day. Over ten million die in battle. Spread by the movement of troops, in a short time the “Spanish flu” [H1N1] kills as many as 100 million more world-wide. Trench warfare:

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/eb/ed/7a/ebed7acb5f9d229bb257c9de375db8bb.jpg

1919 Germany is forced to sign the Treaty of Versailles. Germany has to pay enormous reparation costs. It loses control of the left bank of the Rhine and some of the right bank in the Rhineland. Germany is forbidden to have certain industrial capacity and any armaments, including airplanes. Communists try to seize power in Berlin but are defeated.

1920 Right wing extremist Dr. Wolfgang Kapp attempts a coup in Berlin but is defeated. The German Workers Party changes its name to the National Socialist German Workers Party.

1921 Hitler becomes head of the National Socialists.

1923 Hitler leads a coup attempt in Munich but is arrested and sentenced to prison. He uses the time to write his book, Mein Kampf (My Struggle):

http://www.diplomat.am/all-21/book_mein_kampf_verlag.jpg

1923 French and Belgian troops occupy the Ruhr. Hyper-inflation and hyper-unemployment ensue. Here’s a 200 billion-mark note:

http://www.oldenburg-dobbenviertel.com/PV/Inflationsgeld/200Milliarden-150dpi.jpg

Bundles of smaller denominations became children’s building blocks:

http://www.planet-wissen.de/bilder/mediendb/planetwissen/bilder/politik_geschichte/deutsche_geschichte/weimarer_republik/weimar_kindergeld_akg.jpg

1925 French and Belgian troops end their occupation of the Ruhr and eventually also of the Rhineland.

1929 Wall Street Crash in the USA leads to further unemployment and other turmoil in Germany.

1932 Unemployment in Germany reaches 6 million. The National Socialists become the largest party.

1933 Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany. Later, after an arsonist sets the building on fire, the Nazis blamed it on the Communists and the Reichstag passes the enabling law, which gives Hitler absolute dictatorial powers.

1934 President Hindenburg dies. Hitler also takes over the President’s powers.

1935 Hitler announces that Germany has an air force. He also introduces conscription. Hitler institutes the Nuremberg Laws oppressing Jews in Germany.

1936 German troops enter the demilitarized zone in the Ruhr and across the Rhine. France, England, and the US do nothing to stop them.

1938 Anschluss (Annexation) of Austria by Nazi Germany, March 12.

1938 Germans attack Jews and Jewish property on Reichskristallnacht (“crystal night”), the night of broken glass, 9-10 November. Nearly all synagogues like this one in Baden-Baden are torched:

http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/kristallnacht/images/baden/photo03.jpg

1939 Germany invades Czechoslovakia, March 15.

1939 The Pact of Friendship and Alliance between Germany and Italy, informally called the “Pact of Steel” is signed by Hitler and Mussolini, May 22.

1939 Germany invades Poland, September 1.

1940 Germany invades Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium, and France. Troops are sent as well to aid the Italians in North Africa.

1941 Germany invades Yugoslavia, Greece, and then, fatefully, Russia.

1942 The Germans are defeated at El Alamein in Egypt.

1943 The Germans are resoundingly defeated at Stalingrad.

1944 Allied forces land at Normandy.

1945 Russia invades Germany from the east. Britain and the USA invade from the west and from the Mediterranean through Italy.  Hitler commits suicide (April 30) and Germany surrenders (the capitulation agreement was signed May 7th and went into force on May 8th at 11:01 pm).

1945 Germany is divided by the French, British, Americans, and Russians into four zones.
The capital, Berlin, located in the Soviet zone, is also divided into four zones.

1948 USA sends Marshall Plan Aid to help rebuild the German economy.

1948 The USSR blockades surface routes to Berlin. The Berlin airlift takes place (Provo Mormon Gail Halvorsen becomes a hero dropping candy to German children):

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51KkjOEHhnL._SX258_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg

http://www.stripes.com/polopoly_fs/1.161707.1322258355!/image/982873814.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_804/982873814.jpg

1949 A new state, West Germany, is created with its provisional capital in Bonn, birthplace of Beethoven.

1951 The European Coal and Steel Community is formed, a free-trade agreement which marks the beginning of the evolution of the European Union.

1953 Strikes take place in Communist East Germany. The Russians send in tanks and violently put down the uprising.

1955 West Germany joins NATO.

1958 The European Economic Community is formed, another step on the way to the EU.

1961 East German Communists build the Berlin Wall to slow the flow of persons escaping their repressive regime:

http://adst.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/building-of-wall-1.jpg

1989 The Berlin Wall falls:

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/11/10/article-1226507-0021569C00000258-24_634x417.jpg

1990 Germany is reunited.

1993 The Maastricht Treaty established the European Union under its current name.

2002 Germany begins to use the Euro instead of the Deutschmark (DM) on January 1.

2005 East-German Physicist Angela Merkel [pronounced Mare- kul not Mur- kul] becomes the first woman chancellor:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2d/Angela_Merkel_Juli_2010_-_3zu4.jpg

2007 The world-wide economic shock from the American housing bubble causes Germany under Merkel to adopt a policy of strict austerity. Fearing a repeat of the hyper-inflation which led Germans to vote for Hitler in 1933, Germany cut public spending and generally engaged in “belt-tightening” across the board. The result appears to have been a chronic stagnation of the economy – with certainly almost no inflation at all – which has begun to lead to a re-thinking of such austerity policies in Germany and in Europe generally (including England).

2014 Russia invades Ukraine, annexes the Crimea, and moves to conquer other places in Russian-speaking Eastern Ukraine, (though Vladimir Putin claims Russia is merely “supporting glorious Ukrainian patriots in their noble struggle for freedom,” etc.) Angela Merkel and Germany play a leading role in attempting to pressure President Putin to cease such aggressions. Alliances with Russian businesses and reliance on Russian natural gas, however, complicate the matter considerably.

2014 Anti-emigrant emotions flare up in Germany as in other European countries. Organizations such as PEGIDA are formed (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamification of the West) which stage large demonstrations against Muslims. The history of anti-Semitism in Germany makes these demonstrations doubly painful. Counter demonstrations are often larger than the anti-emigrant demonstrations.

2015 Grievous financial problems in Greece and elsewhere in Europe threaten the stability of the Euro. Germany has become the particular target of Greek anger, not only because Angela Merkel is such a strong force in the European Central Bank – she does not want to be seen by voters as using German tax money to bail out Greek debts –  but also because Greeks suddenly recalled being invaded by Germany and are now demanding additional reparations. Anti-German sentiment in Greece has risen markedly recently. Grexit, the exit of Greece from the Euro, seems a very troubling possibility. The Euro loses a considerable amount of its value (which is actually good for German exporters, bad for American exporters, but good for tourists).



Here’s an (even briefer) timeline for France:

6,000 BC Farming begins in France

c. 4,500 BC Menhirs (standing stones) are erected in France

2,000 BC Bronze is used in France

900 BC Celtic people migrate to France

600 BC The Greeks (who knew!) found Marseilles

121 BC The Romans conquer Provence

58 BC Julius Caesar begins to conquer the rest of France (Gaul)

52 BC Celtic leader Vercingetorix leads a rebellion against the Romans but is defeated

48 AD Gauls are allowed to become Roman senators

250 AD St Denis is beheaded

406 Germanic tribes invade France

481-511 Clovis rules the Franks

507 Clovis makes Paris his capital

732 Charles Martel wins the battle of Tours against the Arabs

751 Pepin the Short becomes king

800 Charlemagne is crowned emperor

838-877 Carolingian empire divided. Charles the Bald is king of France

911 Charles the Simple grants Normandy to the Viking chief, Rollo

987 Hugh Capet becomes king of France

1150 Paris University is founded

1204 The French king takes Normandy from the English

1225-1270 Louis IX rules France

1337 The Hundred Years War begins between England and France

1340 The English win the battle of Sluys

1346 The English win the battle of Crecy

1348 The Black Death reaches France

1356 The English win the battle of Poitiers

1358 French peasants rebel but are defeated

1396 Charles VI becomes insane

1415 The English win the battle of Agincourt

1429 Joan of Arc inspires the French who win the battle of Orleans

1453 The English are driven out of France apart from Calais

1482 Provence is absorbed into France

1523 Jean Valliere becomes the first Protestant martyr in France

1539 French is made the language of official documents instead of Latin

1562-1598 France is torn by a series of religious wars

1572 Thousands of French Protestants are murdered by Catholics in the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre. Protestant Huguenots begin to emigrate, many invited to settle in Protestant northern Germany (including Friedrichsdorf, future site of the LDS Frankfurt temple where the residents, originally opposed, when reminded they were mostly descendants of Hugeunot refugees, changed their minds and voted to allow the building of the temple.)

1610 King Henry IV is assassinated by a fanatical Catholic

1624 Cardinal Richlieu becomes principal minister of France

1627 La Rochelle rebels

1628 La Rochelle surrenders

1642 Cardinal Richlieu dies

1635 France enters the Thirty Years’ War

1643 Louis XIV becomes king of France

1648-1652 A series of uprisings called the Fronde take place in France

1661 An academy of dance is founded

1666 An academy of sciences is founded

1682 Louis XIV moves to a new palace at Versailles

1685 Louis XIV revokes the Edict of Nantes, which gave Protestants toleration

1693-94 France suffers famine

1707-1710 Famine strikes again

1715 Louis XIV dies

1720-onward Trade in France grows rapidly. The middle class increase in numbers and wealth.

1763 After the Seven Years War France loses Canada and India

1778 France goes to war with Britain to support the American colonies who are rebelling

1788 The king calls the Estates-General

5 May 1789 The Estates-General meet

20 May 1789 Members take the tennis court oath

14 July 1789 The Bastille falls

4 August 1789 The feudal privileges of the nobility are abolished

26 August 1789 The declaration of the rights of man

6 October 1789 The king moves from Versailles to Paris

June 1791 The king attempts to flee from France

September 1791 A new constitution is introduced in France

April 1792 France goes to war with Austria

May 1792 France goes to war with Prussia

September 1792 A new government, the National Convention, meets

January 1793 The king is beheaded

February 1793 Conscription is introduced in France

March 1793 The Vendee rises in revolt

April 1793 The Committee for Public Safety is formed

September 1793 The Great Terror begins. Thousands are executed over the next 9 months.

October 1793 Queen Marie Antoinette is beheaded

December 1793 Captain Napoleon Bonaparte recaptures Toulon from the British

June 1794 The French defeat the Austrians at Fleurus

28 July 1794 Robespierre is executed

August 1794 A new constitution is drawn up

1795 Napoleon gives the Paris mob a “whiff of grapeshot”

1799 Napoleon becomes First Consul of France

1804 Napoleon becomes Emperor of France

1807 Napoleon is at his peak

1812 Napoleon is defeated before Moscow

1813 Napoleon is defeated at the battle of Leipzig

1815 Napoleon returns from exile for 100 days but is defeated at Waterloo

1820 The Duc de Berry is assassinated

1824 Charles X becomes king

1830 A revolution takes place. Louis Philippe becomes king of France.

1848 Another revolution takes place and Louis Philippe abdicates. France becomes a republic. In December Louis Napoleon is elected president.

1851 Louis Napoleon stages a coup. He becomes Napoleon III.

1854-56 France fights Russia

1859 France fights Austria

1867 Napoleon III makes his regime more liberal

1870 France is defeated by Prussia and Napoleon is forced to abdicate

1871 Paris rebels but the army crushes the revolt

1875 The Third Republic is created

1894 Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a Jew, is convicted of treason. Anti-Semitism runs high.

1906 Dreyfus is exonerated

1918 The First World War leaves France exhausted

1932 The Depression begins to affect France

1936 The left-wing Popular Front government is formed

1940 France surrenders to Germany

1944 France is liberated

1947 A new constitution is drawn up

1957 France helps Germany found the EU

1958 De Gaulle takes power in France. He draws up a new constitution.

1968 Rioting across France

1969 De Gaulle resigns

1981 Francois Mitterand becomes president of France

1995 Jacques Chirac becomes president

1999 France joins the Euro

2005 Riots take place in France

2014 Anti-emigrant sentiment clashes with Muslim extremism.


An even briefer timeline of Switzerland:

c 500 BC A Celtic people called the Helveti enter Switzerland

58 BC The Romans are in control of Switzerland

260 A tribe called the Alemanii raid Switzerland

c 400 The Roman army withdraws from Switzerland

5th Century: Peoples called the Alemans, Burgundians and Lombards settle in Switzerland

c 600 The Franks conquer Switzerland

9th Century The Franks rule most of Europe but their empire breaks up

13th Century The Habsburg family from Austria rule most of Switzerland. Meanwhile trade and commerce in Switzerland are booming and new towns are founded.

1291 The Swiss want their independence. Delegates from the cantons of Schwyz, Uri, and Unterwalden meet at Rütli Meadow and form an alliance. They create the nucleus of modern Switzerland.

1315 The Swiss defeat the army of Prince Leopold of Habsburg

1388 The Swiss defeat the Habsburgs again

1506 Pope Julius II forms the Swiss guard to be his bodyguard at the Vatican. They still function today with their uniforms from 1506:

http://extraordinaryintelligence.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/swiss-guard.jpg

1513 Switzerland now consists of 13 cantons

1515 The Swiss are defeated by the French and Venetians. Afterwards the Swiss adopt a policy of neutrality.

16th Century: Switzerland is rocked by the Reformation

1648 The Austrians formally recognize Swiss independence

1760 Clock and watch making flourish in Switzerland

1798 Napoleon invades Switzerland

1847 The Swiss fight a civil war

1890 Industry in Switzerland is growing rapidly

1918 A general strike takes place in Switzerland

1920 Switzerland joins the League of Nations

1971 Swiss women are allowed to vote (Finally! Good grief!)

2002 Switzerland joins the UN


Finally, a short timeline for the Netherlands:

1st century BC: Numerous tribes (mostly Frisians and Batavians) become the area’s first inhabitants.

4th century: Barbarians invade the area.

1275 Amsterdam is founded.

1421 Storm causes a flood that drowns approximately 10,000 inhabitants.

1516, Habsburg king of Spain Charles V inherits the Netherlands.

1521 Wooden buildings in Amsterdam are banned.

1578 Amsterdam abandons the Spanish and Catholic cause.

1579 The Union of Utrecht unites the northern Low Countries.

1581 The United Provinces declare their independence from Spain.

1602 The United East India Company is founded.

1609 The Dutch discover Manhattan Island.

1626 Peter Minuit (Director-General of the Dutch colony of New Netherlands) purchases Manhattan Island for the equivalent of 24 dollars.

1630 - 1654 The Dutch conquer Brazil.

1642 Rembrandt paints The Night Watch.

1642 - 1643 Abel Tasman reaches Tasmania and New Zealand.

1648 End of war with Spain; Dutch independence recognized.

1652 Jan van Riebeek reaches Cape Town; first Anglo-Dutch war.

1661 Brazil is sold to Portugal.

1665 - 1667 Second Anglo-Dutch war.

1672 - 1674 Third Anglo-Dutch war.

1795 Velvet Revolution; French occupy the Netherlands.

1806 - 1810 Louis Bonaparte (Napoléon’s brother) becomes king of the Netherlands.

1813 The Netherlands regains independence.

1814 The country becomes the Kingdom of the Netherlands headed by Willem I of the House of Oranje-Nassau.

1830 Belgium rebels against the Netherlands and breaks free.

1853 Vincent van Gogh is born.

1890 Vincent van Gogh commits suicide (maybe...)

1920 KLM launches the world’s first scheduled air service.

1922 Dutch women get the vote.

1928 Olympic Games are held in Amsterdam.

1940 Germany invades and conquers the Netherlands four days after the aerial bombardment of Rotterdam.

1941 February strike against deportation of the Jewish community.

1942 - 1945 Anne Frank and her family hide in Amsterdam. The refuge is betrayed and Anne dies at Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. She was 15.

1944 - 1945 Thousands die during the Hunger Winter.

1947 The Diary of Anne Frank is published.

1948 Benelux (Belgium Netherlands, Luxemburg) customs union takes effect.

1949 The Dutch East Indies receives its independence as Indonesia; the Netherlands joins NATO.

1952 The Netherlands are a founding member of European Coal and Steel Community.

1958 The Netherlands joins the European Economic Community.

1975 Amsterdam’s 700th anniversary; the Netherlands grants independence to Surinam; use of cannabis is decriminalized.

1980 Queen Juliana retired and was succeeded by her daughter Beatrix.

2001 The world’s first same-sex marriage takes place in Amsterdam.

2002 Euro replaces the Dutch guilder; regulated euthanasia is legalized.

2005 Dutch voters reject EU constitution.

2010 The Netherlands withdraws its soldiers from Afghanistan.