Explorer Wurtzbourg

The Marienkapelle is a late-Gothic hall church built between 1377 and about 1480 on Würzburg's Marktplatz, on the site of a Jewish cemetery destroyed in 1349. Its 70-metre tower has carried a gilded, rotating Madonna since 1713. The south portal shows copies of Tilman Riemenschneider's Adam and Eve sculptures, and the architect Balthasar Neumann is buried inside.

Neumünster was founded around 1057 on the traditional martyrdom site of the Frankish missionary bishops Kilian, Kolonat and Totnan, whose relics rest in its western crypt. Architect Joseph Greissing gave the church its Baroque dome and red sandstone west facade in 1711-1716. The adjoining Lusamgärtchen garden holds a memorial stone for poet Walther von der Vogelweide.

Würzburg Cathedral was begun in 1040 under Bishop Bruno and completed by 1075, making it the fourth-largest Romanesque church in Germany at 105 metres long. Severely damaged by bombing in 1945, it was rebuilt by 1967, combining Romanesque masonry with modern additions such as a bronze portal by Fritz Koenig. The interior holds bishops' tombs carved by Tilman Riemenschneider.

The Alte Mainbrücke is Würzburg's oldest bridge over the Main, begun in 1476 with its stone piers finished by 1488; the arches were vaulted in stone between 1512 and 1703. Twelve Baroque statues of saints were added from 1728, including work by the Becker brothers. Rebuilt after wartime damage by 1950, it has carried only pedestrians and cyclists since 1990.

The Juliusspital was founded in 1576 by Prince-Bishop Julius Echter von Mespelbrunn as a hospital and almshouse, admitting its first patients in 1580. Its Baroque Fürstenbau, rebuilt from 1700 by architects Antonio Petrini and Joseph Greissing after a fire, now adjoins the Juliusspital winery, Germany's second-largest, whose cellar and Vinothek shop are open to visitors.