subject: Bamberg History Germany [print this page] Like Rome, Bamberg is built on seven hills, and the only practical way to explore it is on foot. Almost every hill is crowned by a church, of which the Dom (cathedral), commissioned by Heinrich II in 1004 and completed in its present form in 1237, ranks as one of the finest and most harmonious examples of Late Romanesque and Early Gothic architecture in Europe. With its four massive spires, it towers above the city and is visible from miles away. (As the crow flies, it is no more than 500 yards southeast of the Altes Rathaus, but because the way up follows steep, winding streets, figure on a ISminute climb.)
On your way to the Dom, consider checking in at the BarockHotel am Dam, Vorderer Bach 4, a small (19 rooms), charming, moderately priced hotel tucked into an 18thcentury town house. Breakfast is served in its. crossvaulted cellar. Although the Dom's exterior is surprisingly austere (the main embellishment being a few gargoyles and a vividly sculpted scene of the Lastjudgment in the tympanum of the Prince's Porta!), the cathedral is crammed with art treasures. The most famous is the Bamberger Reiter (Bamberg Rider), which was sculpted in 1235. The identity of the rider is as anonymous as that of the artist. A number of other statutes in the cathedral, as well as the Tomb of Clement II, the only pope buried north of the Alps, are believed to be works by the same unknown master.
There is no mystery, on the other hand, about the sarcophagus of Heinrich II and Kunigunde (his Wife), which was sculpted out of Italian marble by the Wiirzburg master Tilman Riemenschneider in 1513, or the Nativity Altar, carved from linden wood in 1523 by Veit Stoss. The tomb of Heinrich and Kunigunde depicts many of the legends surrounding their lives, including the one in which she walked barefoot, without suffering so much as a blister, over redhot plowshares in order to prove she had remained faithful to her husband during one of his sojourns through the empire. Both were canonized for their piety and good works.
North of and adjacent to the Dom is the soaring Renaissance fa
