Donaueschingen is a
GermanGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
town in the
Black ForestThe Black Forest is a wooded mountain range in Baden-Württemberg, southwestern Germany. It is bordered by the Rhine valley to the west and south. The highest peak is the Feldberg with an elevation of 1,493 metres ....
in the southwest of the
federal stateGermany is made up of sixteen which are partly sovereign constituent states of the Federal Republic of Germany. Land literally translates as "country", and constitutionally speaking, they are constituent countries...
of
Baden-WürttembergBaden-Württemberg is one of the 16 states of Germany. Baden-Württemberg is in the southwestern part of the country to the east of the Upper Rhine, and is the third largest in both area and population of Germany's sixteen states, with an area of and 10.7 million inhabitants...
in the Schwarzwald-Baar
KreisThe districts of Germany are known as , except in the states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein where they are known simply as ....
. It stands near the confluence of the two sources of the river
DanubeThe Danube is a river in the Central Europe and the Europe's second longest river after the Volga. It is classified as an international waterway....
(in ; the town's name is an
eponymAn eponym is the name of a person or thing, whether real or fictitious, after which a particular place, tribe, era, discovery, or other item is named or thought to be named...
).
Donaueschingen stands in a
basinA drainage basin is an extent or an area of land where surface water from rain and melting snow or ice converges to a single point, usually the exit of the basin, where the waters join another waterbody, such as a river, lake, reservoir, estuary, wetland, sea, or ocean...
within low mountainous terrain. It is located about 13 km (8.1 mi) south of
Villingen-SchwenningenVillingen-Schwenningen is a city in the Schwarzwald-Baar district in southern Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It has 80,941 inhabitants .-History:...
, 24 km (14.9 mi) west of
TuttlingenTuttlingen is a town in Baden-Württemberg, capital of the district Tuttlingen. Nendingen, Möhringen and Eßlingen are three former municipalities that belong to Tuttlingen...
, and about 30 km (18.6 mi) north of the Swiss town of
SchaffhausenSchaffhausen is a city in northern Switzerland and the capital of the canton of the same name; it has an estimated population of 34,587 ....
. In 2003, the population was 21,300 making it the second largest town in the
district (Kreis)The districts of Germany are known as , except in the states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein where they are known simply as ....
of Schwarzwald-Baar. The location of the town is favourable for its role as a regional rail hub.
Geography
Donaueschingen lies in the
Baar basinThe Baar is a plateau that lies 600 to 900 metres above sea level in southwest Germany. It is bordered by the southeastern edge of the Black Forest to the west, the southwestern part of the Swabian Alb known as the Heuberg to the east, and the Randen mountain to the south.The Baar contains the...
in the southern
Black ForestThe Black Forest is a wooded mountain range in Baden-Württemberg, southwestern Germany. It is bordered by the Rhine valley to the west and south. The highest peak is the Feldberg with an elevation of 1,493 metres ....
at the confluence of the
BrigachThe Brigach is the shorter of two streams that jointly form the river Danube in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The Brigach has its source at 925 metres above sea level within St. Georgen in the Black Forest. The Brigach crosses the city Villingen-Schwenningen. After 43 km from the source, Brigach...
and Breg rivers— the two source tributaries of the
DanubeThe Danube is a river in the Central Europe and the Europe's second longest river after the Volga. It is classified as an international waterway....
— from which the town gets its name.
The town is close to Lake
TitiseeTitisee is a lake in the southern Black Forest in Baden-Württemberg. It is said it got its name from Roman Emperor Titus. It covers an area of 1.3 km² and has an average depth of 20 m. It owes its creation to the Feldberg glacier, the moraine ploughed up by which in the Pleistocene epoch...
and less than an hour's drive from
SwitzerlandSwitzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
and
FranceThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
.
History
Donaueschingen is first recorded as
Esginga in 889; the modern form of the name is first attested in 1292. In 1283,
Rudolph von HabsburgRudolph I was King of the Romans from 1273 until his death. He played a vital role in raising the Habsburg dynasty to a leading position among the Imperial feudal dynasties...
granted the principality of Baar and Donaueschingen to Heinrich von
FürstenbergFürstenberg was a county of the Holy Roman Empire in Swabia, present-day southern Baden-Württemberg, Germany.-History:...
. The right to brew beer was also connected with this grant. This is the source of the Royal Fürstenberg Brewery. In 1488, possession was passed to the Count of
Fürstenberg-BaarFürstenberg-Baar was a County of medieval Germany, located in southern Baden-Württemberg in the historical territory of Baar. It was created as a partition of Fürstenberg-Fürstenberg in 1441. It inherited the County of Fürstenberg-Geisingen in 1483, and Fürstenberg-Wolfach in 1490...
. From the 18th Century it was the residence of the
Princes of FürstenbergFürstenberg-Fürstenberg was the name applied to two historical states in southern Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Both Counties were named after the state of Fürstenberg and the castle of the same name. The first County was created as a partition of the County of Fürstenberg in 1408...
. In 1806, Donaueschingen came under the rule of the
Grand Duchy of BadenThe Grand Duchy of Baden was a historical state in the southwest of Germany, on the east bank of the Rhine. It existed between 1806 and 1918.-History:...
and was granted township in 1810. A large part of the town was destroyed by fire in 1908. Donaueschingen has a tradition as a military garrison; since
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
the
FrenchThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
military has maintained barracks in the town, and, until the early 1990s, the U.S. Air Force operated a contingency hospital there. Fortunately the hospital never received casualties on a large scale from military operations; it saw the most activity in 1989, when the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
offered the facility as temporary housing for refugees leaving from East Germany to the West.
Though the Princes of Fürstenberg were nominally
mediatisedThe German Mediatisation was the series of mediatisations and secularisations that occurred in Germany between 1795 and 1814, during the latter part of the era of the French Revolution and then the Napoleonic Era....
and deposed as absolute ruler of the principality, they still own huge property in their former lands, including their palace with the surrounding parks and gardens. The Schlosspark (palace gardens) which used to be public and the only park accessible to the citizens of the town since 1806 recently became off-limits again. The Princes of Fürstenberg were also the owners of an important manuscript of the
NibelungenliedThe Nibelungenlied, translated as The Song of the Nibelungs, is an epic poem in Middle High German. The story tells of dragon-slayer Siegfried at the court of the Burgundians, how he was murdered, and of his wife Kriemhild's revenge....
(Manuscript C) until they sold it in 2001. The ancestral brewery has also been sold.
Government
The results of the 2004 local elections are as follows:
| CDU The Christian Democratic Union of Germany is a Christian democratic and conservative political party in Germany. It is regarded as on the centre-right of the German political spectrum...
|
: 16 Seats |
| FDP/FW |
: 7 Seats |
| SPD |
: 7 Seats |
| Independents |
: 5 Seats |
| Bündnis 90/Die Grünen |
: 4 Seats |
Economy
The town's economy consists of nearly 1,000 various enterprises, of which 24 are medium-sized employing 2,200 people. The most important industries are machine assembly, semiconductors,
injection mouldingInjection molding is a manufacturing process for producing parts from both thermoplastic and thermosetting plastic materials. Material is fed into a heated barrel, mixed, and forced into a mold cavity where it cools and hardens to the configuration of the cavity...
, magnetics, dyes, and shoe manufacturing.
Transport
Donaueschingen is a regional rail hub; four rail lines join in the town. It sits on the Schwarzwaldbahn line from
OffenburgOffenburg is a city located in the state of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. With about 60,000 inhabitants, it is the largest city and the capital of the Ortenaukreis.Offenburg also houses University of Applied Sciences Offenburg...
to
KonstanzKonstanz is a university city with approximately 80,000 inhabitants located at the western end of Lake Constance in the south-west corner of Germany, bordering Switzerland. The city houses the University of Konstanz.-Location:...
and it is the start of the Höllentalbahn (Schwarzwald) from Donaueschingen to Freiburg im Breisgau. Both of these lines are uniquely constructed because of the rough Black Forest terrain they cover. Donaueschingen is also the starting point for the
DonautalbahnThe Danube Valley Railway in Baden-Württemberg in south-western Germany is a 164-kilometer-long railway running from the city of Ulm to Donaueschingen, which is largely single-tracked and for the most part not electrified...
and the Bregtalbahn which run to Ulm and Bräunlingen respectively. The town is part of the Schwarzwald-Baar public transport system.
The town is on the A 864, a spur of the A 81 to
StuttgartStuttgart is the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. The sixth-largest city in Germany, Stuttgart has a population of 600,038 while the metropolitan area has a population of 5.3 million ....
. Three Federal Highways cross each other near Donaueschingen: the B 27 from Stuttgart to Schaffhausen; the B 31 from Freiburg im Breisgau to Lindau and the B 33 from Offenburg to Konstanz.
The long-distance Danube Cycle Trail begins in Donaueschingen and follows the course of the Danube. It is one of the most well-known and longest bicycle trails in Europe.
Education
The town has four secondary schools: the Fürstenberg-Gymnasium and the Wirtschaftsgymnasium, one Realschule, and one Hauptschule. There are four elementary schools associated with these schools: Eichendorffschule, Erich-Kästner-Schule, Grundschule Pfohren, and the Grundschule Wolterdingen. There are two special-needs schools: the Heinrich-Feuerstein-Schule and the Karl-Wacker-Schule.
There are two professional training schools: the Donaueschingen Commercial School and the Business and Home Economics Schools. There is also the Nursing College and the College for Agriculture. The Academy for Continuing Education and Personal Development is located in the former district hospital.
Cultural Events
The
Donaueschingen FestivalThe Donaueschingen Festival is a festival for new music that takes place every October in the small town of Donaueschingen...
for contemporary music ("Donaueschinger Musiktage). Founded in 1921, the world's oldest festival for
New musicContemporary classical music can be understood as belonging to the period that started in the mid-1970s with the retreat of modernism. However, the term may also be employed in a broader sense to refer to all post-1945 modern musical forms.-Categorization:...
takes place every year in October. Guest composers have included
Paul HindemithPaul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
,
Arnold SchoenbergArnold Schoenberg was an Austrian composer, associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School...
,
Pierre BoulezPierre Boulez is a French composer of contemporary classical music, a pianist, and a conductor.-Early years:Boulez was born in Montbrison, Loire, France. As a child he began piano lessons and demonstrated aptitude in both music and mathematics...
,
Elliott CarterElliott Cook Carter, Jr. is a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer born and living in New York City. He studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris in the 1930s, and then returned to the United States. After a neoclassical phase, he went on to write atonal, rhythmically complex music...
,
John CageJohn Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, music theorist, writer, philosopher and artist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde...
, and
György LigetiGyörgy Sándor Ligeti was a composer of contemporary classical music. Born in a Hungarian Jewish family in Transylvania, Romania, he briefly lived in Hungary before becoming an Austrian citizen.-Early life:...
.
Partner Cities
Donaueschingen has partnerships with the following cities:
- Kaminoyama, Japan (since 1995)
- Saverne
Saverne is a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Alsace in north-eastern France. It is situated on the Rhine-Marne canal at the foot of a pass over the Vosges Mountains, and 45 km N.W...
, France (since 1964)
- Vác
Vác is a town in Pest county in Hungary with approximately 35,000 inhabitants. The archaic spellings of the name are Vacz and Vacs.-Location:...
, Hungary (since 1993)
Sons and daughters of Donaueschingen
- Anselm Kiefer
Anselm Kiefer is a German painter and sculptor. He studied with Joseph Beuys and Peter Dreher during the 1970s. His works incorporate materials such as straw, ash, clay, lead, and shellac...
(* 1945) – German painter and sculptor
External links