Ingolstatt

Title

Ingolstatt

Description

Map shows the city of Ingolstadt

ca. 1670

Artist

Merian (1593-1650)

Matthäus Merian (1593 – 1650) , born in Basel, learned the art of copperplate engraving in Zurich and subsequently worked and studied in Strasbourg, Nancy, and Paris, before returning to Basel in 1615. The following year he moved to Frankfurt, Germany where he worked for the publisher Johann Theodor de Bry. He married his daughter, Maria Magdalena 1617. In 1620 they moved back to Basel, only to return three years later to Frankfurt, where Merian took over the publishing house of his father-in-law after de Bry's death in 1623. In 1626 he became a citizen of Frankfurt and could henceforth work as an independent publisher. He is the father of Maria Sibylla Merian, who later published her the famous and wellknown studies of flowers, insects and butterflies.

Historical Description

Ingolstadt is an independent city on the Danube in Upper Bavaria. The first written mention of Ingolstadt is found in Charlemagne's imperial partition document, the Divisio Regnorum of 806, as villa Ingoldesstat, the site of Ingold, cf. Ingold, which developed in or before the time of the Agilolfings. Ingolstadt cannot have been without importance after the lords of Bogen took over the bailiwick over Niederaltaich. After the extinction of the Counts of Bogen in 1242, the Wittelsbach Dukes inherited the property, therefore a city foundation by the Wittelsbachers before 1242 cannot be considered. With the Wittelsbachers, a renewed rise of the town seems possible, since there was an important ducal customs post with a bridge that guarded the road to Nuremberg. In 1392, while Ingolstadt was still being developed, Bavaria was divided into the duchies of Bavaria-Munich (under John II), Bavaria-Landshut (under Frederick the Wise) and Bavaria-Ingolstadt. Ingolstadt thus became the capital and residence of a sovereign duchy under Stephen III. From the 14th to the 18th century, Ingolstadt's medieval city defenses were a massive structure of moat, rampart and towers. In the 15th century, the city expansion was completed with 87 towers; this earned the city the nickname "The Hundred-Towered City" (lat. ad centum turres). The end of the sovereign duchy meant no significance for Ingolstadt.