Pictures of Cologne Cologne yesterday & today

A Roman garrison in the first century B.C., Cologne was made a Roman colony in A.D. 50 by Emperor Claudius, who named it Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensis for his wife, Agrippina. The city passed under Frankish control in the 5th century.

Cologne was self-governing after 1288, became a free imperial city in 1475, and, as a member of the Hanseatic League, flourished as a commercial center until the 16th cent. Its decline was hastened by the expulsion of the Jews (15th century) and the restrictions imposed on Protestants (16th century). Cologne was seized by the French in 1794, and the archbishopric was officially secularized in 1801. The city passed to Prussia in 1815, and in 1821 the archdiocese was reorganized.

In the 19th century, Cologne prospered again as an industrial center and as the main transit port and depot of NW Germany. Old Cologne, with its numerous historic buildings, was severely damaged by aerial bombardment in World War II.

The famous Gothic cathedral, the largest in northern Europe, was closed from the end of the war until 1956.

Cologne cathedral, lit up at night, and the Hohenzollern rail and pedestrian bridge

over the Rhine River, Cologne, Germany.

It contains the relics of the Wise Men of the East and the paintings of Stephen Lochner. The cathedral was begun in 1248 on the site of an older church, but the nave and the two spires (each spire 515 ft/157 m high) were built according to the original plans between 1842 and 1880.

As the center of German Catholicism, Cologne has long been famous for its impressive religious processions and for its exuberant Mardi Gras celebrations. The city figures prominently in German romantic literature. Cologne is the seat of a university (founded 1388; discontinued 1798; reestablished 1919) and numerous museums, including those of painting, ethnology, and municipal history.

Pictures of Cologne Cologne yesterday & today

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