The Day-trip Diaries - Part 2: Nürnberg Continued

Don't forget to check out Part 1 if you haven't yet...

It was already late afternoon as I woke up from my nap on the tram from the Dokumentations-Zentrum. I found myself at the main train station again and I walked back into the old town.


I visited Nürnberg's main church, the Lorenzkirche...

Nürnberg is sometimes known as the "unofficial capital" of the Holy Roman Empire, mainly because in the Middle Ages the Reichstag (kind of like Parliament) and courts often met at Nürnberg castle. Newly elected kings of Germany also had to hold their first Reichtstag in Nürnberg. Every king had to march up the grand avenue to the great doors of the St. Lorenz Church.

Inside the church...

This is extremely detailed woodwork from the late Middle-Ages. It serves as the storage place for the sacrament wafers during services...

The woodcarver even carved himself into the base...

Outside...

Next I went to the Germanisches-Nationalmuseum, one of the best museums of German History and art in the country.

As you walk inside you see a wall full of old street signs from East Berlin...

I headed first for the really old stuff. Here are Stone-Age engravings of horses from 13,000-10,000 BC. Cavemen stuff...

These axe heads are from 3,500-2,800 BC, but what I found most interesting was that these artifacts were found in Mecklenburg and Brandenburg, the regions where my German ancestors came from. Could it be that my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandparents were the makers and users of these tools?

No these are not the remains of an ancient matress, it's jewelry from the Bronze Age...

And for the guys: Bronze Age weapons...

Here's a pretty cool golden hat from some Germanic tribe in the 9-11th century BC. Not many of these puppies left in the world...

Closeup....

One of the oldest bronze helmets found North of the Alps, 12th century BC...

Some Celtic jewelry from the 1st century BC. The piece on the top left belonged to Larry Bird...

The only complete Roman helmet of its kind, 1st century AD...

These are roof tiles from a Roman grave; I like it because there are dog prints in the tiles. I'm sure the Romans were upset about that dog...

Here's a pretty cool Byzantine Ostrogothic Jewel Eagle from the 5th century AD, and you thought they were the Dark Ages....

Weapons and helmets from the Franks (think Charlemagne)....

Here's a pretty nifty wood sculpture of Christ on the Donkey, 13th century....

Wood carvings of the Three Kings grooving to the beat, 1440...

And then there was a set of random Samurai armor from 18th century Japan...

This was an early keyboard known as a 'virginal' (1605). I think we should paint country scenes on our pianos again...

This was called the "mother and child" virginal. Cute huh?

There were a lot of old musical instruments...

I like these old ceramic ovens. They were used (and still are used... one of my mission apartments had one) to keep rooms warm in the Winter. This oven (17th cent.) even has a "hot seat" if you come in from the cold and need a little warming up...

In those days it was custom for the tiles of these ovens to depict fables. Here's the Fox and the Rooster...

Hooray! A reindeer sleigh from the 1700's...

They had several display rooms to show what a normal middle-class living room was like in the 1700's. I think people in those days didn't believe in comfy chairs...

"Germania" -Philip Veit, 1848...

I came to the paintings and found a couple of well-known portraits. Here is perhaps the most famous painting of Charlemagne (though it was painted in the early 1500's, 700 years after he died)....

Check it out, it's even the main portrait used in Wikipedia entry on the Frankish king.


And here is King Sigismund who was born in Nürnberg and became Holy Roman Emperor and also King of Hungary, Bohemia, and Croatia... all at the same time in the early 1400's. He ruled over one of the largest areas of any European monarch ever...

Both of these portraits were painted by Nürnberg's most famous son, the Renaissance painter Albrecht Dürer.

Dürer was born in Nürnberg in 1471 to Hungarian parents, He studied with Renaissance masters throughout Europe, but most especially in Italy. He was an exceptional painter and print maker, now regarded as one of the greatest artists of the Northern Renaissance.

Most of his works are in big fancy museums like the Louvre, but a few are here in Nürnberg. Here's the "Nürnberger Madonna"...

A portrait of Dürer's mother...

The Lamentation of Christ, 1499...

I explored the gallery a bit more...

Here's a globe of the earth from the year 1492. Notice that it's round (most people knew that at the time), but also notice there's nothing but ocean between Europe and Asia. America hadn't been invented yet...

Here's a projection of what they thought the world looked like in 1500 (before news of Columbus reached Germany, I guess)...

Closeup of Europe...

Famous portrait of Martin Luther by Cranach the Elder (1533)...

I got a kick out of this painting, "The Unlikely Couple" by Lucas Cranach the Elder (1530)...

They also had a few Rembrandts. Here's an early self-portrait of the Flemish master...

"The Apostle Paul in Contemplation" by Rembrandt (1629)...

There was a small collection of Dutch landscape paintings from the 1600's. These are some of my favorites...

After a good time in the museum I went back into the city. I passed the Fountain of the Seven Virtues (rated PG-13)....

Late afternoon brought some great lighting on the Pegnitz river. Here's one of Nürnberg's old hospitals...

I came back to the main market square watched over by the Frauenkirche...

Inside the Frauenkirche. Late afternoon is the best time to visit cathedrals, the lighting is like a fireworks show shining through stained glass onto ancient works of art...

The cross-beamed houses just scream Germany. I get a kick out of them, especially when they're a bit crooked...

Here was Albrecht Dürer's house...

I went back up to the castle grounds to explore the gardens a bit...

Things don't get any more German than this...

I was getting hungry and my legs were getting tired. I was still dreaming of those amazing Nürnberger sausages I had that morning. It was time for an encore. I walked down the main street from the castle...

Cool lighting on the old city hall...

I went to the Bratwursthäusl and found a little table on the terrace...

I ordered a plate of sausages and sauerkraut...

The food came out and it was heavenly! I ate, relaxed, and enjoyed my 360 degree view of medieval Nürnberg...

As evening approached I wanted to back up to the castle for some final photos. Here are the old servants' quarters of the castle, they are now a youth hostel...

Nürnberg skyline!

Colorful houses...

It was time to back and catch my train to Munich. I walked back through the market square and snapped a couple of photos of the Schönen Brunnen (Beautiful Fountain). For some reason it reminded me of the Neighborhood of Makebelieve....

Not so sure about the pigeon...

I got back to the train station hot, sweaty, tired, and thirsty, and so I bought a fruit smoothie and then boarded my train back to Munich.

It was a fun and fascinating day in Nürnberg!

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