A Guide to Eastern Germany"For nearly half a century most of eastern Germany was a closed region to travellers from the west, blocked off by the Iron Curtain. Today, after German reunification, its superb cities and towns, its exquisite countryside dotted with lakes and charming villages, are once more open to the rest of the world. In James Bentley's A Guide to Eastern Germany no part of this delightful land is left unexplored." "His authoritative guide comprehensively describes the great and celebrated cities of the region, such as Berlin, Dresden and Leipzig, as well as many other equally entrancing ones, such as Schwerin and Wittenberg, Erfurt and Weimar, Frederick the Great's Potsdam and the porcelain town of Meissen. His tours blend history and anecdote. He evokes the ghosts of the past: among the writers, Goethe, Schiller, Martin Luther and Heinrich Heine; among the artists, Lucas Cranach, Albrecht Durer, Caspar David Friedrich and Otto Dix; among the rulers, the Great Elector and Augustus the Strong of Saxony, who turned Catholic in order to become King of Poland." "James Bentley takes the reader through the forests of the Harz mountains, beside the lakes of Mecklenburg, among the rock climbs of Saxony Switzerland and, a reminder of Germany's grimmer past, into the Nazi concentration camps. His pages include seaside resorts, nature reserves and bustling German taverns. Travellers can here savour in advance the varied food and drink of eastern Germany, a region of both beer and wine as well as extremely hearty food." "Among out-of-the-way and unexpected delight A Guide to Eastern Germany explores such tiny villages as Bad Doberan, with its astonishing monastic church, the country of the Sorabes, where some hundred thousand people speak their own Slavic language as well as German, and the secluded islands of the Baltic coast. If you relish unspoilt villages with half-timbered houses and hotels, if you wish to be punted in a leisurely fashion along the streams of the Spreewald, if you would like to eat in a floating hotel on the River Elbe, if you appreciate soaring Gothic cathedrals and churches as well as medieval fortresses and baroque palaces, this guidebook is an essential aid."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved |
Contents
Introduction I | 1 |
The sea and its hinterland | 14 |
Dresden and the treasures of Saxony | 52 |
Copyright | |
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Common terms and phrases
architect Augustus baroque baroque Schloss basilica Bauhaus Berlin boasts Brandenburg Brandenburg Gate brick building built carved cathedral centre chapel choir church of St classical dates depicting designed Dresden Duke east East Berlin eastern Germany eighteenth-century Elbe Erfurt façade fifteenth century flamboyant Gothic font former fortress fountain fourteenth century frescos Friedrich gabled gallery garden Gate German Goethe Gothic church half-timbered half-timbered houses hall church Heinrich high altar Inside Jesus Johann Karl Karl Friedrich Schinkel lake late-Gothic Leipzig Lübeck Lucas Cranach Luther Magdeburg Marienkirche Markt Marktplatz medieval Meissen monastery nave Nikolaikirche paintings palace parish church park Platz porcelain Potsdam Prussian pulpit Rathaus reach rebuilt Renaissance reredos restaurant restored rises River rococo Romanesque Rostock Saxony Schinkel Schwerin sculpted Second World Second World War sixteenth splendid stands statue STRASSE style superb thirteenth century three-aisled Thuringian tomb tower town hall vaulting Virgin Mary wall Weimar Wilhelm Wismar Wörlitz