Regensburg, Germany

Friday, June 23, 2023- Regensburg, Germany

         We were up by 6 A.M. It was cloudy out, with a light mist of rain. Breakfast found us joining Madeline and Clayton. Exchanging stories, lifestyles and previous adventures is one of the great pleasures of being on a cruise or tour. Our schedule was free until this afternoon, so we dawdled over breakfast, chatting with our new found friends. Then, we read for a time in the lounge. The ship was motoring down the Danube and approaching Regensberg. I had never before heard the name of this town,  but others had. It was the home of Joseph Ratzinger, later in life to become Pope Benedict XVI. Johannes Kepler, the astronomer, had also called the area home.

       The Tir docked at Regensburg in the late morning. There were already six other cruise ships tied up along the pier, with a light rain. We met our guide “Susan” on the pier at 2 P.M. She is an elementary teacher here and had already worked a full day when she met up with us. She would prove to be a wonderful and energetic story teller, and much enhanced our experience of the town.

        The City wall and tower, along the pier,  had been erected in 900. Various uses had claimed the tower in the years after, including the storage of gun powder and a repository for corpses. There is a University here, so there are lots of pubs and cafes to loiter in. The area had been spared total destruction in WW II because there wasn’t any industry of note present. A Messerschmitt air craft plant, in the far suburbs, had absorbed much of the devastation delivered by allied bombers. We walked along the pier. A grand stone bridge, built in 1138, crosses the Danube here. It had also been a way station for the collection of taxes, especially on salt, considered to be the white gold of its time. One of the last great Crusades of the middle ages had been launched from this bridge. A huge warehouse, to hold the salt, still exists and is now used as a library and a museum.

       A curious statue sits on the banks of the river. It is that of a Golden Walla. Once a year this odd shaped fish rises up from the bottom of the Danube, to feast on the annoying plethora of bugs that carpet the river in August. A wooden canal boat had been restored and anchored here. In centuries past, it had been used for hauling cargo. Horses had dragged the ship along the river, using ropes deployed from her bow, walking along the banks of the river.

       Like most towns, along this area of the Danube, Regenberg had been a Roman fortification two thousand years ago. Remnants of the original Roman walls turn up every time new construction begins. The fierce Germanic tribes held sway across the river. The Romans had lost three entire legions, fighting the Barbarians in the early years. They had good reason to try and keep the fierce tribes at bay.

      A humorous aside occurred as we walked. One of the guest remarked upon the historic appearance of the cobble stoned streets. Susan remarked, somewhat candidly, that “yes, they were indeed historic, having been installed in the mid 1970’s as a tourist attraction by town fathers." It was all part of the tourist-oriented  “medieval Disneyland” concept that we were to find everywhere. High above us, on a promontory, sat the old Bishop’s Hof and tower. The Prince Bishop governing concept had held sway all throughout the area. In the city’s mains square, on the walls of the  Rathaus (city Hall) are several iron bars prominently displayed. Susan explained that during the middle ages, virtually every town had their own system of measurements. The bars were posted to demonstrate what size each measurement depicted. It enhanced fairness in trade and prevented some nasty misunderstandings, between merchants, about how much was actually how much in the transactions.

     The tour had been billed as a "walking tour of Jewish History." There was much to say and not much of it good. Serious persecution of the Jewish population here had begun in the 1,400’s and continued on with varying degrees of ferocity until it penultimate horror show in the 1940’s. In 1,518, the Jews had been completely expelled from Regensburg. Their homes and property were confiscated. Conditions didn’t improve until King Frederick Barbarossa declared the area a free city, in the 1600’s. Napoleon and his armies had ravaged the area in 1805. And then, the Nazis came during the 1930’s. All of the local Jewish population was sent off to the extermination camps.

       One bright note on the tour, was a stop at the “Oskar Schindler” Haus. After WWII, Schindler, who had saved so many Jews, retired here. He was impoverished, but kept alive by donations from relatives of the many people he had saved during the Nazi era. He later moved to Argentina and died there in relative poverty. His wife had returned to Regensburg. Their Haus had been made into a shrine of sorts. Our last stop on the tour was a controversial one. On the walls of a Catholic Church stands a raised etching of a pig, beneath it suckled three people in garb associated with the Jews. At the time, it was considered a penultimate sneering derision of Jews. In later decades, town fathers had debated having the shameful image removed. The argument that prevailed was to leave the stain in place, as a lesson of what hatred and bigoty could spawn. A monument to the suffering of the Jews, a new temple,  had been erected in the area in 2018. Susan left us here. We thanked her for her lively narration. We had much to think about that afternoon.

       Reboarding the Tir, we cleaned up for dinner. The Tir slipped her lines by 6:30 P.M. and motored down the Danube towards Passau, Germany, on the border with Austria. We  joined the Broyles and the Pinazza’s for the 7:00 P.M dinner seating. Cream of asparagus soup, sea bass, and an apple crumb desert, accompanied by the now favored German cabernet, made for a delightful repast. The conversation was lively, as we all traded stories of what we had seen and done that day. 

      After dinner, we read for a time and then were gratefully welcomed into the arms of Morpheus.

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                                   (1,083 words)

                             Joseph Xavier Martin