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Published: November 25th 2006
Porta Nigra (Black Gate)
Trier's most famous landmark. The gate was built in the last third of the 2nd century and was the northern gate of the city walls, which originally were 6.4 km (approx. 4 miles) long.
According to medieval legend, ‘Before Rome, Trier stood one thousand and three hundred years’. However, according to recorded history, Trier’s history begins around the middle of the first century B.C., when a guy by the name of Julius Caesar conquered Gaul (France, Belgium, Luxemburg and some portions of the Netherlands and Germany) in 51 B.C. and integrated the Moselle Region into the Roman Empire. Not only is Trier Germany’s oldest city, but also it was the “Rome of the North” and, in its heyday in the 4th century A.D., as important and splendid as Rome itself. Trier is still a great city to visit today.
In his De Situ Orbis, a description of the then known world, the 1st- century Roman geographer Pomponius Mela called it "urbs opulentissima"--the most opulent city--of the empire. It was from Trier that six Caesars, including Constantine the Great, governed their far-flung Western European realm and ruled over Britain, Gaul, and Spain.
Constantine the Great's Imperial Baths, the Kaiserthermen, with their network of hot and cold water basins, drying rooms, dining halls and forum, cover an area of more than 400,000 square feet-- large enough to accommodate four football fields. The Amphitheater, built Hauptmarkt (Main Market)
The Hauptmarkt square forms the center of Trier's Old Town. It is the venue for what's happening in Trier. The tall tower just beyond the square is St. Gangolf's church founded in the 10th century. in A.D. 100, has seating for 25,000. The Romerbrücke, a Roman bridge across the Moselle, was built nearly two millennia ago and its ancient pillars support modern traffic today. The 2nd- century Porta Nigra--Black Gate-- some 100 feet high and 120 feet wide, is the largest and most architecturally stunning city gate ever built in Europe and an impressive symbol of Roman might and power. Two hundred forty feet long, 94 feet wide, and 108 feet from floor to wood ceiling, the Aula Palatina, the palace and audience hall of Constantine I, Valentian I and Gratian, is second only to the Pantheon as the largest Roman public building to have survived the centuries. (And the answer is: Prudence, Temperance, Fortitude, and Justice.)
Trier is one of the wellsprings of Christianity (as one can see by the number of churches there) and the site of Rome's acceptance of Christianity as the state religion, due to the conversion of both Constantine the Great and his mother, St. Helena. Not only was St. Ambrose born there in 340, but also it is the repository of a very sacred relic--the Holy Shroud, believed to have been worn by Jesus on his way to
Entrance to St Gangolf's
This entrance leads to a very nice courtyard and then the church. the Cross. It was brought to Trier by Helena from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and is enshrined in the Petersdom, St. Peter's Cathedral. It is shown only every 30 years or so, the last time in 1996.
For those to whom history, architecture, art and ogling monuments are only half the pleasure of traveling, eating and drinking delights being the other, Trier also has plenty to offer. Situated in the heart of the Moselle-Saar-Ruwer wine district, it is virtually synonymous with the light dry whites of that region. They ripen in the vineyards on the surrounding hills, making the city a kind of mecca for serious imbibers, and also gourmets. We found the food to be great here and the portions much more than adequate. We also enjoyed a two-hour river cruise which we found to really appreciate the beauty of the area. All in all, Trier is a great place to visit and a place we would like to come to in the future.
Until our next voyage....
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