Strasbourg: the European city - Europe in Strasbourg and Alsace

The European Landmarks

The Lieu d’Europe is a place of education for European citizenship and is open to all. Its task is to inform citizens about Europe from an educational, historical and cultural perspective. It highlights Europe’s distinctive features from the Strasbourg viewpoint and emphasises its core values of democracy and human rights. With a permanent exhibition, a resource centre run by the Centre for Information on European Institutions and a room for meetings and discussions, it is open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 6pm.

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The building that houses the Lieu d’Europe is one of a number of country houses (known as güeter) much sought-after by the Strasbourg nobility and well-to-do bourgeoisie in the 18th century.

Le Parcours d’Europe

The Parcours d’Europe signposted walk invites you to experience Europe on a human scale. The Europe of rights and freedoms, of European institutions and of the life that millions of Europeans live every day. Do you want to reorganise the world sitting on a bench, contemplate time passing, test your balance or look to the skies? Just follow the studs on the ground, take a walk through Strasbourg and experience Europe on an entertaining walk in the heart of the European quarter (2.5 km - about 1 hour 30 minutes).

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The Parcours d'Europe comprises 9 stages, from rue Boecklin to Place Kléber.

Strasbourg Cathedral

Described by Victor Hugo as a "gigantic and delicate marvel", the splendour of Our Lady of Strasbourg cathedral is visible from a long way away in the Alsatian plain. It is situated in the heart of the old centre of Strasbourg in a part of the city surrounded by the river Ill. With over four million visitors a year, it is the second most visitied cathedral in France after Notre-Dame in Paris. It can easily be recognised by its inique clock tower surmounted by a spire.

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Twice a year, at the equinox in March and September, the Cathedral is home to a mysterious event: a green ray of light passing through a stained-glass window and illuminating the sculpted figure of Christ inside.

Impact of shells on 12-13 Cathedral Square

If you take a good look at the facade of the Hôtel de la Cathédrale, you will see embedded in it a Prussian shell that has remained there since the shelling of the city in 1870, when the Prussians invaded France and spread terror in Strasbourg by firing at it. France lost the war and under the Treaty of Frankfurt Alsace became German until the end of the First World War.

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During the Franco-Prussian war the city of Strasbourg was under siege. More than 193 700 shells fell on the town centre.

The pilier de la minceur/Buchmesser

Located at 10 Cathedral Square, this is a column that supports the corner of what was once the oldest pharmacy in France (1268) and has now become the Culture Shop. The name is taken from an old tradition: if a person could not squeeze between the column and the wall, it meant they should go on a diet. This indicates the importance attached by sixteenth-century burghers to their physical appearance.

The Kammerzell House

. Built in 1427 and situated on the corner of the Cathedral Square, the Kammerzell House is one of the most original buildings produced by the Renaissance in Alsace. Every piece of carving on the beams depicts representations of ancient religious and secular scenes. The other main feature is the windows, the panes of which are made from bottle bottoms.

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On the front, several key historical characters appear, including Caesar and Charlemagne.

Strasbourg hospices’ historic cellar

Perpetuating six centuries of tradition, new Alsatian winemakers have restored the storage facilities of the Historic Cellar Strasbourg Hospice's, which was created in 1395 to produce a selection of Alsatian wines in the magnificent
1200 m2 vaulted cellar. Three historical barrels dating from 1472, 1519 and 1525 are still to be found there, and one of them still contains 300 litres of a legendary vintage wine dating from 1472, the world's oldest wine in a barrel.

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General Leclerc, who liberated the city in 1944, tasted this wine, the oldest in the world. Analyses carried out in 1994 determined that the wine was in a perfect state of preservation and still good!

Petite France

This charming district takes its name from a terrible disease, syphilis. In the sixteenth century, the soldiers of Francis I afflicted with the "French disease", as the Germans called it, were treated in a hospital located nearby. It is now one of the places most visited by tourists in the city. Its is famous for its half-timbered houses with large sloping roofs that were occupied in the Middle Ages by tanners, millers and fishermen, as evidenced by the names of the streets, such as rue des Moulins (Mills Street) or Fossé des Tanneurs (Tanners' Ditch).

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The Ponts couverts (“covered bridges”) are dominated by four 14th-century towers that once guarded the independence of the city-state of Strasbourg.

ENA

The Ecole nationale de l’administration is a major French educational institution created in October 1945 by General de Gaulle. His aim was to make access to the top levels of the state civil service more democratic. Today it is responsible for the selection and initial training of high-grade civil servants. It also educates them in European issues and in bilateral and multilateral European and international relations in the field of public service and administration.

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Built initially as an army command post, the Commanderie St-Jean, in the 14th century, the ENA building later became a prison. Between 1740 and 1989 it housed both male and female convicts sentenced to severe punishment.

The "Pont du Corbeau"

Situated between rue de la Douane and quai Saint-Nicolas, the Pont du Corbeau (Ravens Bridge) was a place of public execution in the Middle Ages, earning it the title “bridge of torture”. Those condemned to death were shut in a cage and exposed to the gazes of passers-by for some days before being thrown into the water.

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The “Raven’s Bridge”, dating from the 13th century, was the main way into Strasbourg from the south, leading to the customs-house, the merchant quarters, and the cathedral.

The Vauban weir, square Hans-Jean-Arp

After the incorporation of Strasbourg into France in 1681, Louis XIV asked the military engineer Vauban to construct a weir so that the sluice gates could be closed in the event of an attack and the land to the south could be flooded to make it impassable by the enemy. In order to give the building added protection, the roof was resurfaced with a covering of earth to deaden the impact of shells.

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The roof terrace offers a panoramic view over the Ponts couverts and the Cathedral.

National UniversityLibrary

Second in France only to the National Library in Paris, and first as far as higher education institutions are concerned, the holdings of Strasbourg’s “BNU” number over 3½ million documents. The ultra-modern interior architecture, renovated in 2014, forms a sharp contrast with its exterior which, together with the other buildings in the Place de la République, is typical of the Neustadt, or “German district”.

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The former holdings of the Council of Europe library are now housed at the BNU (National University Library), which is an important documentary source in European matters.

Museums in Strasbourg

• Palais Rohan (archaeological museum, museum of art, museum of decorative arts)
• Musée de l'Oeuvre Notre-Dame (museum for Upper Rhenish fine and decorative arts)
• Musée Alsacien (Alsatian Museum)
• Musée d'Art Moderne et Contemporain (Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art)
• Musée Historique (Historical Museum)
• Musée Zoologique (Zoological Museum)
• Musée Tomi Ungerer/Centre International de l'Illustration (Tomi Ungerer Museum/International Centre for Illustration
• The Aubette
• Cabinet des Estampes (Print Room)

Tourism Office of Strasbourg

Follow the guide... The Tourism Office of Strasbourg answers all your questions.
Place de la Cathédrale office: Open every day from 9am to 7pm
TGV train station office : Open Monday through Saturday from 9am to 7pm

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Visit more, spend less with the Strasbourg Pass proposed by the Tourism Office.