Ravensburg is a town of 50,000 souls in Upper Swabia, Württemberg, Germany. It is located about 20 km north-east of Friedrichshafen¹, 60km to the south of Ulm (or a two-hour drive from Munich to the south-west)². The town lies beautifully on a mountainside, the surrounding region is ideal for hiking. Ravensburg is dubbed 'The City of Towers and Gates' since many of the 14th and 15th Century storage towers and city-wall gates survive to this day. Ravensburg is not only a picturesque destination for tourism, but is also the main town in this region with solid industry and commerce.

History

The castle of Ravensburg and the small village were first mentioned as 'Rauenspurc' in a document from 1088 AD; the settlement in that area is therefore considered to be a lot older. The name 'Rauenspurc' comes from an archaic German word 'Rauen' or 'Raven' which is a designation for a place of execution or a court place; in a more abstract sense it also means 'an eerie place'. The castle, which today is called Veitsburg (after a nearby chapel)³, originally belonged to the family of the Welfen, who were the Dukes of Bavaria⁴. In 1191 Ravensburg went⁵ to the Staufer Family, who were the Emperors of the German Empire at that time⁶. In that process the city became an imperial city (Reichstadt), which meant it was under direct control of the empire and not affected by the tribal factionalism common in the lower aristocracy in Germany. Ravensburg flourished.

Around 1200 the town was given the 'market privilege'. In the 14th and 15th Centuries it became one of the most important commercial turning points in central Europe. This is also the time when most of the famous towers, more precisely storage towers, were erected. The most important goods traded in Ravensburg were parchment, leather and paper⁷. Ravensburg's wealth and the fact that it was an imperial city granted the city some relative independence from the rest of the German Empire. The town had certain degrees of freedom and privileges other cities did not have. In the years of the Reformation (around 1520), for example, the city administration granted Catholics and Protestants equal rights (only four towns in Germany did so). A good move, because instead of religious trouble, the city could go on with its daily business and gain more wealth. A century later, however, during the Thirty Years War (1618 - 1648), the mixed society of Ravensburg virtually self-destructed. Ravensburg never recovered from that episode. In 1802 the town was reintegrated into the Kingdom of Bavaria. From 1810 it became part of Württemberg. Today Ravensburg is a relatively quiet town.

Assorted Details

The city of Ravensburg is unusually well-known to Germans, that is, in contrast to the innumerable other German towns of the same size, because one of the biggest board-game and children's books publishing companies of Germany is based there and releases its products under the brand name 'Ravensburger' ⁸, meaning 'from Ravensburg'. Many Germans grew up with toys, games and books from this company.⁹. The company built a theme park a few kilometres off Ravensburg; more information can be found here: Spieleland.

Ravensburg (www.ravensburg.de) is at the time of writing an extremely tourist-friendly town. The tourist information office¹⁰ is at Kirchstrasse 16, just a 5 minute walk from the train-station. The visitable¹¹ towers of the town are Mehlsack (built in 1350, on a hilltop overlooking the city) and Blaseturm (16th Century, directly in the city centre). Vliesburg, a very beautiful castle on a hilltop, also serves as a youth-hostel. The 14th Century city-walls (which, unfortunately, are not intact) surround the historic city centre. The city centre is nicely disorganised in small alleys around the old marketplace, Marienplatz. Most buildings date from around 1800. Older buildings include the leather guild's house (Lederinnung), the old hospital (Seelenhaus) and the old hospital's chapel (Spitalkapelle) from around 1450.