German Cities Educational Geography Posters
for social studies classrooms and homeschoolers.

Berlin is the capital, and largest city Germany, is located in eastern part of the country.

The earliest evidence of settlements in the area of Berlin date from the late 1100s, the first mentions of Berlin are in 1237 and 1244.

Berlin, a world city of culture, politics, media, and science, is home to renowned universities, research institutes, sporting events, orchestras, museums and personalities.

• Historic Headlines Poster - Berlin Wall Tumbles, Saturday, Nov. 11, 1989 ‘Beginning of the End' for Communism, Germany Re-unified, Breaching the Wall‘

Bonn, located south of Cologne on the Rhine River, served as the capitial of post war Germany between 1949-1999.

Bonn was the site of a Roman fort, and the Sterntor (star gate) in the town center is a reconstruction using the last remnants of the medieval city wall which was constructed from the stone fort of the Romans.

Famous people associated with Bonn include Ludwig van Beethoven, August Macke, Robert Schumann, and E.F. Schumacher.

Bremen is an industrial and commerical river port in northwestern Germany, an area that has had human habitation since 12000 BC. The first stone city walls were built in 1032. Bremenhaven is the North Sea port of Bremen.

Famous people associated with Bremen include Roland who became emblematic of city liberties in Europe, Adolf Bastian, Heinrich Focke, Martin Heidegger, and the Brothers Grimm - Wilhelm & Jacob (the fairy tale The Town Musicians of Bremen).

Cologne, Germany's fourth-largest city (after Berlin, Hamburg and Munich), is located on the Rhine River.

Cologne was founded by the Romans in 50 AD and due to its location became a major trading center and political center - so important that a bridge was built over the Rhine by Constantine in 310.

Cologne was heavily bombed by Allies during WWII, reducing the city population by 95% (evacuation and death) and destroying much of the old city center. Cologne was called the “world's greatest heap of rubble” in 1945 by an architect/city planner.

Notable people associated with Cologne include Joost van den Vondel, Albertus Magnus, Johann Adam Schall von Bell.

Dresden, situated in a valley on the River Elbe, in the Germany state of Saxony, was the capital and royal residence for the Electors and Kings of Saxony.

Known as the “Jewel Box” for its Baroque and Rococo archictecture, Dresden was bombed by the Allies near the end of WWII, destroying the historic city center and not the military installations surrounding the city. The author Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was witness to the raid as a POW and the novel Slaughterhouse-Five is based on the experience.

Notable people associated with Dresden include Edith Hamilton.

Dusseldorf, the capital of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, is centrally located in the lower Rhine River basin on the Dussel River delta confluence with the Rhine. Its location in the middle of the industrial Rhine-Ruhr region makes it an important international business and financial center known for its fashion and trade fairs.

Dusseldorf also has the largest Rhenish fair in Germany.

Notable people associated with Dusseldorf include Jurgen Habermas, Heinrich Heine, Luise Rainer, Clara Schumann, Robert Schumann, Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.

Essen, in the central part of the Ruhr area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, historically was a coal and steel center associated with the Krupp family iron works.

Frankfurt am Main (Frankfort on the Main), is located on a ford on the river Main, the German word for which is “Furt”.

One of the mainstays of Frankfurt's economy are trade fairs, and book trade fairs have been held in Frankfurt since 1478.

The city's medieval center was bombed and destroyed in WWII.

Famous people associated with Frankfurt: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Countess Maria d`Agoult, Anne Frank, Otto Hahn, Anna Maria Sibylla Merian, Matthias Jakob Schleiden, Arthur Schopenhauer, Clara Schumann, Bettina von Arnim, Heinrich Hoffmann.

Freiburg, located in extreme southwest Germany, lies at the foot of the Schlossberg (large hill) and straddling the Dreisam river.

Freiburg was founded in 1120 as a free market town (frei=free+burg=town), at a junction of trade routes connecting the Mediterranean and North Sea regions and the Rhine and Danube Rivers.

Freiburg is noted for its university, as a wine center, and tourist haven for visitors to the Black Forest.

Famous people associated with Freiburg: Hannah Arendt, Desiderius Erasmus, Martin Heidegger, Edmund Husserl, Walter Kaufmann, Berthold Schwarz, Hermann Staudinger, Edith Stein (Saint Teresia Benedicta of the Cross), Max Weber.

Hamburg, officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg was a member of the medieval Hanseatic League and a free imperial city of the Holy Roman Empire.

Located at the crossroads between Scandanavia and Europe in northern Germany, Hanover is is a major transportation, media, cultural and tourist center.

Famous people associated with Hanover: Heinrich Barth, Johannes Brahms, Ernst Cassirer, Heinrich Hertz, Karen Horney, Fanny Cäcilie Mendelssohn, Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.

Located on the river Leine Hanover was a small medieval village that grew into a large town due to its location at convergence of natural crossroads.

At one time it was the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, also known as the Elector of Hanover.

Famous people associated with Hanover: Hannah Arendt, William and Caroline Herschel, Otto Meyerhof, Mary Wigman.

Heidelberg, well known as a university town and for its picturesque cityscape which includes Heidelberg Castle and the baroque style Old Town popular tourist destination.

The jaw bone of Homo heidelbergensis, an extinct species of the genus Homo was found nearby and given the name Heidelberg Man.

Leipzig, first mentioned in 1015, has been an important commerce city for centuries, located at the intersection of the Holy Roman Empire's the Via Regia and Via Imperil and the confluence of the Weisse Elster, Pleisse and Parthe rivers. It has been the home of the Leipzig Trade Fair since the Middle Ages as well as a major center of learning and music.

Notable people associated with Leipzig include Johann Sebastian Bach, Max Beckman, Tycho Brahe, Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Edith Hamilton, Werner Heisenberg, Edmund Husserl, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Bronislaw Malinowski, Felix Mendelssohn, August Ferdinand Möbius, Friedrich Nietzsche, Novalis, Edward Teller, Richard Wagner.

Lubeck is one of the major German ports, located on the Trave River and the Baltic Sea.

There is archeological evidence of human settlement in the area since the Neolitic period. Today, Lubeck is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site for its Brick Gothic architectural heritage.

Notable people associated with Lubeck are Thomas Baltzar, Willy Brandt, Thomas Mann, Günter Grass.

Magdeburg, located on the Elbe River, was founded by Charlemagne in 805 as Magadoburg (Old High German magado for big, mighty and burga for fortress).

Magdeburg was one of the most important medievl cities of Europe. The Magdeburg rights, its version of German town law, granted them autonomy from local secular or religious rulers. Privileges granted included self-governance, economic autonomy, criminal courts, and militia.

Mainz, on the west bank of the Rhine River across from the confluence of the Main River in western Germany, began as a Roman fort Mogontiacum in the late 1st century BC. It is across the Rhine from the famous spa town of Wiesbaden.

In the 1450 Johannes Gutenberg invented his moveable type printing press in Mainz.

Mannheim is located at the confluence of the River Rhine and the River Neckar. A distinct feature of Mannheim is its grid layout as different from most German cities.

Notable people associated with Mannheim include Constanze Mozart, Steffi Graf, and Karl Benz who built his first motor car there in 1885.

Munich, the third largest city in Germany (after Berlin and Hamburg), is located on the River Isar north of the Bavarian Alps.

The city's name means “by the monks' place” derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city.

Notable people associated with Munich include: Orlando di Lasso, W.A. Mozart, Carl Maria von Weber, Richard Wagner, Gustav Mahler, Richard Strauss, Carl Orff, Franz Marc, Thomas Mann, Adolph Hitler, Ludwig Hohlwein, Wassily Kandinsky, Lola Montez, William of Ockham, Georg Ohm, Wilhelm Röntgen, Lucia Popp, Albert Einstein, Max Planck, Vladimir Lenin, Feodor Lynen, Oswald Spengler.

Nuremberg, in the German state of Bavaria, was probably founded the turn of the 11th century. Because of its location it became an important trading city and was an ‘unofficial capital’ of the Holy Roman Empire (Diets of Nuremberg).

Prior to World War II the Nazis also held huge propaganda rallies in Nuremberg which lead to the international tribunal of the German officials involved in the Holocaust and war crimes to be held in the same city.

Famous people associated with Nuremberg: Albrecht Durer, Ludwig Feuerbach, Kaspar Hauser, Johann Pachelbel, Johann Christoph Volkamer.

Potsdam is located southwest of Berlin in a area with large moraines left after the last ice age that have formed a series of interconnected lakes.

The area shows Bronze Age habitation, was mentioned in a Holy Roman Empire document in 993, lost nearly half its population in the Thirty Years War (1618-1648), and with the Edict of Potsdam in 1685, a safe haven for oppressed Huguenots from France, Russia, the Netherlands and Bohemia.

Until 1918 Potsdam was the residence of the Prussian kings and German Kaisers where Frederick William I had set up a hunting residence in 1660. Frederick the Great built homes such as Sanssouci (French: "without cares") as his summer place.

During WWII Potsdam (which held comparable national status as Windsor in England) was severely damaged. At the end of the war the Allied leaders met a Potsdam to decide the fate of Germany.

Today Potsdam is the the largest World Heritage Site in Germany.

Famous people associated with Potsdam: Ernst Haeckel, Hermann von Helmholtz, Moritiz von Jacobi, Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi.

Schwerin

Famous people associated with Schwerin:

Stuttgart, in southern Germany, is associated with automobile manufacturing, such as Benz, Daimier and Ferdinand Porsches prototype of the VW Beetle. Stuttgart also a high density of scientific, academic and research organizations.

Weissenhof Estate is a housing development built for exhibition in Stuttgart in 1927. It was an international showcase of what became known as the International style of modern architecture.

Famous people associated with Stuttgart: Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Johannes Itten, Walter Gropius, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Friedrich Schiller.

Tubingen, in southern Germany, is renown as a university town.

Famous people associated with Tubingen: Alois Alzheimer, Johann Gottlieb von Fichte, Leonhart Fuchs, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Hölderlin, Johannes Kepler, Hans Küng, Friedrich Schelling, David Friedrich Strauss.

Weimar, located in central eastern Germany, was a focal point for the German Enlightenment, the Bauhaus movement, and where Germany's first democratic constitution was signed after WWI.

Famous people associated with Weimar: Johann Sebastian Bach, Lucas Cranach the Elder, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Walter Gropius, Johann Gottfried Herder, Johannes Itten, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Friedrich Nietzsche, Oskar Schlemmer, Friedrich Schiller.

Worms, on the Rhine River, is one of the oldest, if not the oldest city, in Germany.

A settlement has existed at the site of Worms since before the Romans built fortifications with a street plan, forum and temples. FYI - the temple to Minerva became the foundation of the cathedral which was destroyed by intense bombing by Allied forces at the end of WWII.

In 1521 a meeting at Worms resulted in the Edict of Worms which condemned the theologian Martin Luther for refusing to recant his religious beliefs.

Notable people associated with Worms include Hanya Holm.

Most Ancient European Towns Network: Argos, Beziers, Cadiz, Colchester, Cork, Evora, Maastricht, Roskilde, Tongeren, Worms.

Würzburg, located on the Main River, was a center of the German Peasants' War (1524-1526) and all of the churches, cathedrals, and other monuments were heavily damaged or destroyed in a bombing firestorm near the end of WWII.

Notable people associated with Würzburg include Waither von der Vogelweide, Albertus Magnus, Mathias Grunewald, Lilli Lehmann, Rilman Riemenschneider, Balthasar Neumann, Wilhelm Röntgen, Werner Heisenberg.