Visit to the Hansemarkt in Goslar

On Saturday, 28th of March, we visited the small town of Goslar, located at the outskirts of the Harz mountains. After an hour of train journey, we had a short walk to the town centre and had our first group picture taken with the famous sculptures "Mann mit Stock" and "Frau mit Schirm" of the Columbian artist Fernando Botero. The weather was absolutely great, lots of sunshine and blue sky for most of the time, even although the weather forecast promised us some rain.

We started our town tour at the market place with the former guildhall of the cloth merchants, which is now a hotel called Kaiserworth. One particular detail of the decoration shows the "ducat mannekin" and his special way to generate money, a symbol for the enormous wealth of the cloth merchants. Most houses adjoining the market place feature colorful fronts with richly carved decorations, showing off the wealth of their owners. Another prominent feature is slate used as siding on walls and for roofs.

From the marketplace we went to the eastern part of the town, mostly along the "Abzucht", a small branch of the local stream Gose, featuring lots of bridges and beautiful timber-framed houses from the 15th and 16th century. In front of the town museum, a bronze sculpture of the town center allows to discover Goslar from a different perspective: We discover the Goslar "church cross", as the bird's eye view reveals that the large city churches form a cross shape within the town center.

We returned to the marketplace to hear the carillon bells and see the figures on the front of the "Kämmereigebäude", showing scenes from the history of the Rammelsberg ore mine. According to legend, the mountain was named after a knight called "Ramm", who was a henchman of Emperor Otto the Great. In 968, whilst out hunting, the knight tied his horse to a tree, in order to pursue some deer through almost impassable terrain. His charger impatiently pawed the ground with its hooves whilst waiting for his master to return and so exposed a vein of silver ore! The mine was closed down in 1988 and the figures accompanying the carillon were given to Goslar by the mining company Preussag AG in 1968 for the 1000 years anniversary.

After a short break and a drink, we headed to the western part of the town, towards the Imperial Palace of Goslar. The central part of it, the "Kaiserhaus", is the greatest, oldest and best-preserved secular building of the 11th century in Germany. It was a favourite imperial residence, especially for the Salian emperors. Since 1992, the palace site, together with the Goslar's Old Town and the Rammelsberg, has been a UNESCO world heritage site.

We moved on to the quarters of the mine workers. While still beautiful, the houses in this part of the town were of a quite different style, small and simply decorated. In contrast, the ancestral house of the Siemens family tells of the family's wealth by way of sheer size and abundantly used glass windows.

Last but not least, we spent some time strolling around the medieval market at the St. James Church. While the Hansemarket was smaller than expected, we enjoyed ourselves with rustic food, hot mead and live music.

At the end of the day, we still haven't seen half of what there is to discover about Goslar - so we will definitely return! You are welcome to join us next time!