Heilbronn


Heilbronn is a city in northern Baden-Württemberg, Germany, surrounded by the Heilbronn District.
From the late Middle Ages on, it developed into an important trading centre. At the beginning of the 19th century, Heilbronn became one of the centres of early industrialisation in Württemberg. Heilbronn's old town was completely destroyed during the air raid of 4 December 1944 and rebuilt in the 1950s. Today Heilbronn is the economic centre of the Heilbronn-Franken region.
Heilbronn is known for its wine industry and is nicknamed Käthchenstadt, after Heinrich von Kleist's Das Käthchen von Heilbronn.
In October 2025, Heilbronn was named the European Green Capital for 2027.

Geography

Heilbronn is located in the northern corner of the Neckar basin at the bottom of the Wartberg. It occupies both banks of the Neckar, and the highest spot inside city limits is the Schweinsberg with a height of 372 meters. Heilbronn is adjacent to the Swabian-Franconian Forest Nature Park and is surrounded by vineyards.
Heilbronn and its surroundings are located in the northern part of the larger Stuttgart metropolitan area. The city is the economic center of the Heilbronn-Franken region and is one of fourteen such cities in the Baden-Württemberg master plan of 2002. It also serves Abstatt, Bad Rappenau, Bad Wimpfen, Beilstein, Brackenheim, Cleebronn, Eberstatt, Ellhofen, Eppingen, Flein, Gemmingen, Güglingen, Ilsfeld, Ittlingen, Kirchardt, Lauffen am Neckar, Lehrensteinsfeld, Leingarten, Löwenstein, Massenbachhausen, Neckarwestheim, Nordheim, Obersulm, Pfaffenhofen, Schwaigern, Siegelsbach, Talheim, Untergruppenbach, Weinsberg, Wüstenrot, and Zaberfeld as a regional economic centre.

Neighboring communities

Heilbronn shares a border with the following cities and towns, all part of Heilbronn County and listed here clockwise from the North: Bad Wimpfen, Neckarsulm, Erlenbach, Weinsberg, Lehrensteinsfeld, Untergruppenbach, Flein, Talheim, Lauffen am Neckar, Nordheim, Leingarten, Schwaigern, Massenbachhausen and Bad Rappenau.

Boroughs

The city is divided into nine boroughs:
  • 001: Heilbronn itself
  • 002: Böckingen
  • 003: Neckargartach
  • 004: Sontheim
  • 005: Klingenberg
  • 006: Frankenbach
  • 007: Kirchhausen
  • 008: Biberach
  • 009: Horkheim

    Climate

History

Up to AD 1200

The oldest traces of humans in and around Heilbronn date back to the Old Stone Age. The fertile Neckar floodplains in the Heilbronn basin aided early settlement by farmers and ranchers. The city limits of present-day Heilbronn contain many sites of Bronze Age finds. Later on, but still before AD, the Celts already mined here for salt from brine.
Under Roman Emperor Domitian the Romans pushed east away from the Rhine and the outer boundary of the Roman Empire was set at the Neckar-Odenwald Limes. A castle in today's borough of Böckingen was part of that limes, and nearby numerous Roman villas and plantations were built. Around AD 150, the Neckar-Odenwald Limes became obsolete when the boundary of the Roman Empire was moved approximately to the east, where it was subsequently fortified with the construction of the Upper Germanic Limes complete with parapet and trenches.
Around 260, the Romans surrendered the limes, and the Alamanni became rulers of the Neckar basin. Between the 4th and 7th centuries, the area became part of the Frankish Empire, and the first settlement was built in the general vicinity of the present center of town.
In 741, Heilbronn is first mentioned in an official document of the Diocese of Würzburg as villa Helibrunna, and in 841, King Louis the German set up court here for a period of time. The name Heilbrunna hints to a well that is located not far from the basilica. In 1050, a significant settlement of Jews is noted in official documents, and the Codex of the monastery in Hirsau documented Heilbronn's right to hold market days and mint coins, mentioning its harbor and vineyards as well. The name of the city became a widespread Jewish surname in many varieties, see Heilprin, Halpern, and Halperin.

1200–1500

In 1225, Heilbronn was incorporated into the Hohenstaufen Empire as oppidum Heilecbrunnen. Oppidum signified a city fortified by parapet and trenches. Later during the 13th century, the Teutonic Knights obtained ownership of a large area south of Heilbronn which would remain owned by that order until German Mediatisation in 1805. Starting in 1268, the order built the Deutschhof there as one of its residences. The church building of the order that was located on the premises was modified and expanded several times: First in 1350 it was expanded, then it was remodeled in 1719, and in 1977, it was consecrated as a cathedral.
After the demise of the Staufen dynasty, King Rudolf I returned city status to Heilbronn in 1281 and installed a regal advocate to rule the city. In addition to the advocate he put a council in place that was headed up by a mayor. Around 1300, the first city hall was erected in the market place and the Kilianskirche was expanded. The Neckar privilege gave the city the right to modify the flow of the river in 1333, which meant it now had the right to construct dams, harbors and mills. Because of the infrastructure thus created, during the 14th century Heilbronn grew attractive to merchants and craftspeople, who now demanded the right to determine their own fate.
In 1371, Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor, issued a new charter to the city. Now Heilbronn needed to answer only to the Emperor and as such was an Imperial Free City. Craftspeople and merchants were now represented in its council and the villages of Böckingen, Flein, Frankenbach and Neckargartach became part of Heilbronn's territory.
As an Imperial Free City Heilbronn was threatened by the ambitious House of Württemberg. A relationship with the Holy Roman Emperor and a treaty with the Electorate of the Palatinate in effect from 1417 to 1622 strengthened Heilbronn's position and kept the House of Württemberg at bay. The political stability enjoyed by the city during the 15th century enabled it to expand, and many of its historic structures, such as the Kilianskirche, trace their origins to that era.

1500–1700

spent three years in "knightly custody" in Heilbronn starting in 1519 and even spent a night in the tower of the bastion. That same year people first took note of the pub owner Jäcklein Rohrbach who with accomplices would later kill the executor of Böckingen. After he had spent some time in the Hohenlohe Plains and collected similarly minded characters around him, he returned to Heilbronn in April 1525 just as the German Peasants' War was getting into full swing. On April 16 the peasants killed many of the nobles in Weinsberg and on April 18 the Heilbronn monastery of the Order of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel was attacked and ransacked. The city opened its gates in response to demands of the peasants and consequently more churches and municipal institutions were robbed the next day. For about a month Heilbronn remained under the control of rebellious peasants. And even though Johann Lachmann, later a church reformer, had attempted to mediate, the peasants did not leave the city until one of their armies was defeated on May 12, 1525, in Böblingen. Their leader Rohrbach was executed on May 21, 1525, in Neckargartach and his home town of Böckingen was partially burnt to the ground in punishment.
In 1528, the replacement of the mayor by Hans Riesser, a Protestant, brought on the previously delayed Reformation and through the efforts of Reformer Lachmann schools and healthcare were also reorganized. In 1529 the Kilianskirche was completed. It was the first important religious building of the Renaissance in Germany. The year 1530 brought about the acceptance of the Augsburg Confession by city council and residents and the Heilbronn Catechism of 1536 is the second oldest catechism in the Protestant Church. In 1538 Heilbronn joined the Schmalkaldic League but by 1546 squabbles between troops of the Schmalkaldic League and those of the Emperor Charles V escalated into battles that were won by the Emperor. As a result, Charles V spent Christmas 1546 in Heilbronn to attend the ensuing criminal proceedings. It is also Charles V who in 1522 changed the charter of the city and this charter survived almost unscathed until 1803.
During the Thirty Years' War the city and surrounding villages suffered badly. After the battle of Wimpfen in 1622, Neckargartach was burnt to the ground. In 1631 Heilbronn was occupied by imperial troops but the same year the Swedes succeeded in conquering the city. From 1644 through 1647, Heilbronn was again part of the Holy Roman Empire, but then French troops moved in and later those of the Electorate of the Palatinate. The city was not free of occupying forces until four years after the Peace of Westphalia of 1648. But already in the 1670s the city again became the stage for armed manoeuvres, until it was occupied by French troops in 1688. But while that occupation of the city only lasted several months, the French were only persuaded to leave the surrounding areas in 1693, after a large defensive army had been put into the field and fortifications had been erected.

1700–1900

During the 18th century, archives suggest all members of the city council enjoyed some sort of formal education; Schiller and Goethe came to visit; and elaborate buildings were being constructed in the Rococo style.
On September 9, 1802, Heilbronn lost its status as an Imperial Free City when the troops of Duke Friedrich I of Württemberg arrived. The duke had conceded the left bank of the Rhine to France during the French Revolutionary Wars but had been compensated with areas on the right bank. This is how Heilbronn and other former Imperial Free Cities became part of Württemberg in 1803. Heilbronn became the seat of an Oberamt, and the four Imperial Free villages became separate communities within the district. In 1806 the Duchy of Württemberg became the Kingdom of Württemberg.
In 1815, Heilbronn again became a staging area for major armies ahead of the campaign against Napoleon, and 10,000 troops paraded in front of Emperor Franz of Austria and more than one hundred German princes and generals in the Theresienwiese. Tsar Alexander I of Russia met in Heilbronn with the Baltic Baroness Juliane von Krüdener, who talked him into founding the "Holy Alliance".
Industrialization arrived in 1820. When the first train lines were placed in service in Württemberg, Heilbronn was at the end of the line of the northern branch that connected Heilbronn with Stuttgart and further fueled industrialization.
For a while Heilbronn suffered from the upheavals of the Baden Revolution that its civil guard participated in. During that time the 8th infantry regiment switched sides and joined the revolutionaries until it was subsequently disarmed and force-transferred out of the area.
In 1849, the Hoerner Bank, one of the oldest still functioning banks in Germany, was founded in Heilbronn.
Heilbronn became part of the German Empire in 1871 during the unification of Germany.
In the 1860s the city's train tracks were extended to Heidelberg via Bad Wimpfen, to Würzburg via Osterburken, and to Crailsheim via Schwäbisch Hall. In 1880, the Kraichgau line was completed and created an important connection towards Karlsruhe, and by the end of the 19th century, Heilbronn had become an important hub, second in Wuerttemburg to Stuttgart in industrial output.
The year 1892 brought a connection to the power plant in Lauffen; thus Heilbronn became the first city in the world to enjoy long-distance electric power.