The town is equipped with a nearly complete city wall and Germany's biggest and most complete early modern fortress, Rosenberg Fortress.[3] The headquarters of German television and AV equipment manufacturer Loewe are located there.[4]
Rosenberg Fortress, which dominates the townThe greater coat of arms of Kronach, commemorating the flayed men
The area of Kronach has been occupied for millennia, and in the late Bronze Age, the Heunischenburg, the oldest known stone fortification north of the Alps, was built nearby.[5][6]
Kronach was first mentioned in a chronicle of Thietmar of Merseburg in 1003 as urbs crana.[7] In 1122, Holy Roman Emperor Henry V gifted Kronach and its surroundings (the praedium crana) to the Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg. Kronach remained part of the Prince-Bishopric until its secularization in 1803. The town's massive fortress originates from 1130, when Otto of Bamberg had a "stone house and tower" erected in Kronach.[8] When Kronach gained town rights is unclear, but as its inhabitants were termed as "citizens" (cives) in a 1260 treaty, it can be assumed that it had attained rights before that date.[9]
Kronach was put under siege by the Hussites in 1430. Although the defense was successful and the fortress remained unconquered, its inhabitants burned part of the town to block the invaders. This destruction caused discord among the town's Burghers, which was only resolved through the intervention of the Prince-Bishop in 1439 through the conference of privileges to the Upper Town of Kronach.[8]
With the Reformation in 1517, Kronach became an important border bulwark of the Catholic Prince-Bishopric against the newly Protestant Electorate of Saxony, this function continued until peace was made in 1648. This border function made thorough fortification necessary, and it was during this period that Rosenberg Fortress was expanded the most. However, many of the inhabitants of the town and its surroundings converted to Protestantism early on. Protestants were eventually expelled from the town by the early 17th century, following the maxim of Cuius regio, eius religio, and were only allowed back after the secularization in 1803.[8]
During the German Peasant's War, in 1525, the town and fortress surrendered to the peasant host, under the condition that the fortress would not be plundered. Following the intervention of the Swabian League, the peasants were forced out on 25 July, 1525.[8][10]
During the Bamberg witch trials, Kronach found itself at the center of witch hysteria, with several of its inhabitants being executed for alleged witchcraft. The trials were only ended by the Swedish invasion of Bamberg.[11]
During the Thirty Years' War, the town experienced one of its most dramatic episodes. It was put under siege for two years, from 1632 to 1634, by a Swedish Army and its German allies, numbering between 3,000 and 5,000. Despite improbable odds, the town and fortress remained unconquered. Famously, after a Swedish sap tore a hole in the town wall in 1634, the Swedish soldiers were repulsed by the town's women, who rained down boiling substances on them and forced them to retreat.[12][9] The unlikely victory is, to this day, commemorated by a "Swede's Procession" on the Sunday after Corpus Christi, where the citizens and clergy, led by women, march from the fortress to the town square.[13] The siege also gave rise to a popular legend: allegedly, the siege finally ended after the citizens of Kronach let the last living animal in the town, a female rabbit (the Kroniche Housnküh) run free on the walls. This convinced the Swedes that the siege was hopeless, since Kronach had enough provisions to set a rabbit loose. The Kroniche Housnküh remains a mascot of the city.[14] The siege is also commemorated, in a macabre manner, on the town's greater coat of arms. The supporters of the shield are two flayed men: according to legend, saboteurs who were executed by the Swedes and their corpses sent back to the town gates. During the war, Kronach was struck twice by plague, in 1629 and 1634, killing circa 300 and circa 400 people respectively.[15]
Kronach was once again put under siege by the Prussian Army during the Seven Years' War. Situated on the Kreuzberg, a hill overlooking the fortress, the Prussians attempted to use field artillery to destroy the fortress. However, their efforts proved insufficient, and the Prussians decided to bypass Kronach and march south.[9]
In 1803, as a result of the Reichsdeputationshauptschluss, the Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg was secularized, and Kronach was made part of the Electorate, later Kingdom of Bavaria. Kronach lost some of its privileges, and its town walls and fortress were no longer seen as modern or necessary, with parts of the former being reused or demolished.[8]
In 1853, Kronach got its first rail line, and in 1866, its first train station. Today, it is a stop on the Franconian Forest Railway. In 1897, it was connected to the Bavarian telephone network.[16]
During the First World War, the Fortress was the site of an officers' prisoner of war camp, in which, among others, a young Charles de Gaulle was interned from July 20 to November 21, 1917. Following two attempted escapes from the fortress, he was transferred to Ingolstadt Fortress.[17] Kronach also hosted a hospital for wounded soldiers.
Due to its proximity to the early NSDAP stronghold of Coburg, Kronach fell under the influence of the Nazi Party early on. The first Nazi State Diet Fraction in Germany was founded at a hotel in Kronach, in the presence of Adolf Hitler, Julius Streicher, Hermann Esser, and other Nazis on July 28, 1925. The local SS division, founded later the same year, was one of the first in Germany. After years of steady Nazi growth, the town was fully put under the party's control in March 1933.[18]
The Jewish community of Kronach, which had existed since at least the 14th century and numbered 35 individuals in 1933, was destroyed by Nazi persecution. Synagogue services were ended in 1936, with the building being sold to the town, and the remaining Jewish families were deported starting in 1938. Those who did not emigrate were mostly murdered in concentration camps in 1941 and 1942.[8][19]
The Subcamp Gundelsdorf, a subcamp of Flossenburg Concentration Camp, was situated in Gundelsdorf, today a town quarter of Kronach. Around 100 Polish Jews were imprisoned there and used as forced labor for the Luftwaffe.[20] From 1942 to 1944, the Fortress was also used as a forced labor camp, originally producing industrial porcelain for Rosenthal and, by war's end, producing the Messerschmidt Me 163 Komet in a specialized facility built into one of the Fortress' bastions.[8]
Kronach was not subjected to mass air raids, and most of the town survived unharmed, although air raids targeting the town's train station started in March 1945. Kronach refused to surrender to the advancing US Army, and was attacked by the 11th Armored Division of the Third Army under George Patton on the morning of April 12, 1945. After heavy fighting that resulted in the destruction of 15 buildings, the Americans marched into the town square in the evening of the same day.[21]
After the end of the war, Kronach received thousands of East German emigrants, it also hosted deported Sudeten Germans from the former Landkreis of Podersam.[22] The town hosted the Bavarian Regional Garden Show in 2002, and celebrated its millennial anniversary in 2003.[23]
Lucas Cranach the Elder (ca.1472–1553), a German Renaissance painter and printmaker in woodcut and engraving.[24]
Burchard Kranich (ca.1515 – 1578), (also known as Doctor Burcot) a mining engineer and physician who was involved in mining ventures in Derbyshire and Cornwall
Maximilian von Welsch (1671–1745), a German architect, construction director and fortress master builder.
Johann Kaspar Zeuss (1806–1856), a German historian and founder of Celtic philology.
Josef Stangl (1907–1979), a Roman Catholic bishop of Würzburg, Germany; he consecrated Father Joseph Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI, as a bishop in 1977.
Heinrich Setz (1915–1943), Luftwaffe military aviator during WWII, and a fighter ace
Gloria Friedmann (born 1950), a German-French sculptor and installation artist
Sebastian Borger (born 1964), a German journalist and author based in London.
Bamberg is a town in Upper Franconia district in Bavaria, Germany, on the river Regnitz close to its confluence with the river Main. Bamberg had 79,000 inhabitants in 2022. The town dates back to the 9th century, when its name was derived from the nearby Babenberch castle. Cited as one of Germany's most beautiful towns, with medieval streets and buildings, the old town of Bamberg with around 2,400 timber houses has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1993.
Franconia is a region of Germany, characterised by its culture and East Franconian dialect . Franconia is made up of the three Regierungsbezirke of Lower, Middle and Upper Franconia in Bavaria, the adjacent, Franconian-speaking, South Thuringia, south of the Thuringian Forest—which constitutes the language boundary between Franconian and Thuringian—and the eastern parts of Heilbronn-Franconia in Baden-Württemberg.
Upper Franconia is a Regierungsbezirk of the state of Bavaria, southern Germany. It forms part of the historically significant region of Franconia, the others being Middle Franconia and Lower Franconia, which are all now part of the German Federal State of Bayern (Bavaria).
Kronach is a Landkreis (district) in Bavaria, Germany. It is bounded by the districts of Hof, Kulmbach, Lichtenfels and Coburg, and the state of Thuringia.
Lichtenfels is a Landkreis (district) in Bavaria, Germany. It is bounded by the districts of Coburg, Kronach, Kulmbach, Bayreuth and Bamberg.
Fürth is a city in northern Bavaria, Germany, in the administrative division (Regierungsbezirk) of Middle Franconia.
Steinwiesen is a market town and municipality located in the Upper Franconian district of Kronach, in Bavaria, Germany. The town is situated about 100 km slightly east of due north of Nuremberg, and approximately 10 km northeast of Kronach. The main town is located in a valley, within the Franconian Forest Nature Park, and is known for its particularly scenic surroundings.
Lichtenfels is a town in the Upper Franconian region of Bavaria, Germany, the administrative seat of Lichtenfels district. It is chiefly known as the German "Basket City".
Burgkunstadt is a town in the district of Lichtenfels, in northern Bavaria, Germany. It is situated on the right bank of the Main, 15 km west of Kulmbach, and 24 km southeast of Coburg.
Wallenfels is a town in the district of Kronach, in Bavaria, Germany. It is situated in the Franconian Forest, 11 km east of Kronach, and 32 km west of Hof.
Johann Maximilian von Welsch was a German architect, construction director and fortress master builder.
The Second Margrave War was a conflict in the Holy Roman Empire between 1552 and 1555. Instigated by Albert Alcibiades, Margrave of Brandenburg-Kulmbach and Brandenburg-Bayreuth, who was attempting to form a Duchy of Franconia under his rule, the war resulted in widespread devastation in Franconia, while also affecting the Rhineland and Lower Saxony.
The Castle Road is a theme route in southern Germany and a small portion in the Czech Republic, between Mannheim and Prague.
The Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg was an ecclesiastical State of the Holy Roman Empire. It goes back to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bamberg established at the 1007 synod in Frankfurt, at the behest of King Henry II to further expand the spread of Christianity in the Franconian lands. The bishops obtained the status of Imperial immediacy about 1245 and ruled their estates as Prince-bishops until they were subsumed to the Electorate of Bavaria in the course of the German Mediatisation in 1802.
Weigand of Redwitz was Prince-Bishop of Bamberg from 1522 until his death.
Franconia is a region that is not precisely defined, but which lies in the north of the Free State of Bavaria, parts of Baden-Württemberg and South Thuringia and Hesse in Germany. It is characterised by its own cultural and linguistic heritage. Its history began with the first recorded human settlement about 600,000 years ago. Thuringii, Alemanni and Franks, who gave the region its name, settled the area in the Early Middle Ages. From the mid-9th century, the Stem Duchy of Franconia emerged as one of the five stem duchies of the Empire of East Francia. On 2 July 1500, during the reign of Emperor Maximilian I, as part of the Imperial Reform, the empire was divided into Imperial Circles. The Franconian Circle, which was formed as a result of this restructuring, became decisive in the creation of a Franconian national identity. A feature of Franconia in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period was its Kleinstaaterei, an extreme fragmentation into little states and territories. In the 19th century under Napoleon, large parts of Franconia were incorporated into the newly created Kingdom of Bavaria.
The Heunischenburg is a stone fortification of the late Urnfield period near the Upper Franconian town of Kronach in Germany. Its heyday was in the 9th century BC, making it the oldest stone fortification north of the Alps that is known and archaeologically investigated.
Egloffstein Castle is a former high mediaeval, aristocratic castle, that stands immediately west of the eponymous village of Egloffstein in the Upper Franconian county of Forchheim in the German state of Bavaria.
Forchheim Fortress was laid out after the occupation of the town of Forchheim during the Second Margrave War (1552) by the Bishopric of Bamberg. Today about one third of the fortification works have survived and have been incorporated into the municipal parks.
Rosenberg Fortress is a fortress situated on a hill overlooking Kronach, a town in the Upper Franconia region of Bavaria, Germany. It is one of the largest, best-preserved, and most complete fortresses in Bavaria. Tracing its origins back to the 13th century, the fortress was never captured by violent means. Originating as a medieval hill castle, it was transformed into a massive baroque fortress complex during the early modern period, being one of the two fortresses of the Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg. With countless construction stages representing centuries of architectural development visible, Rosenberg Fortress serves as an outstanding example of the evolution of defensive architecture in Germany. Including its moats and ravelins, the fortress covers an area of circa 8.5 hectares.
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