Mainz

Title

Mainz

Description

Map of the besieged city of Mainz on the Rhine.

ca. 1650

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

However, the first permanent settlements in the Mainz city area are of Celtic origin. Around 406 Mainz was conquered and plundered by Vandals, Alans and Suebi. After the period of the so-called migration of peoples, during which Western Rome disintegrated, the city gradually began to rise, finally coming under Frankish rule around 480 at the latest. The function as a transhipment point for trade goods of all kinds accelerated the city's development. The High Middle Ages brought special privileges for the citizens for the first time, which were granted to them by Archbishop Adalbert I of Saarbrücken (1110-1137). In the disputes that became increasingly fierce between the Staufers and their opponents in the 1240s, the citizens of Mainz allowed themselves to be wooed by both sides. The consequence of this policy was that the citizens received a comprehensive city privilege from Archbishop Siegfried III of Eppstein in 1244 as the price for their support. The period as a free city (until 1462) is considered the high point of the city's history. From 1328, conflicts with the archbishop began the decline of the free burghers and their privileges. The Reformation, which began in 1517, initially had good prospects in Mainz. The printing press with movable type invented there around 1450 by Johannes Gutenberg enabled the rapid spread of the Reformation writings. The medieval city fortifications had given way to more modern fortifications by the middle of the 16th century, but despite these fortifications, Mainz was taken without a fight by the Swedish army during the Thirty Years' War. After this war, jurisdiction in the Electorate of Mainz was reorganized and compulsory education was introduced in 1682. In the now emerging Baroque era, splendid buildings were erected in the city. The ideas of the Enlightenment finally led to the Revolution in France. In 1790, the so-called Mainz Knot Uprising took place. Due to the loss of its residential function, the city, which had belonged to the Grand Duchy of Hesse since 1816, became very provincialized in the 19th century, as the French occupation of the city caused the nobility to leave Mainz and the city became increasingly bourgeois. Like all areas on the left bank of the Rhine, Mainz was annexed by France and, as Mayence, the capital of the French Département du Mont-Tonnerre, fell under French administration. However, the most significant development of the city occurred with the annexation of the "Gartenfeld" or New Town. This newly built city wall extension triggered a building boom and population growth during the Wilhelminian period, starting in 1872. It was not until shortly before the First World War that the old fortified structures were finally demolished, so that the city could now expand outside the previous walls.