HAVE GERMAN WILL TRAVEL Martin Luther Martin Luther (der 10. November 1483-der 2. Februar 1546) Martin Luther came this way. Yet it is Wittenberg, a feisty university in effect, the metaphorical last straw. Wittenberg, Eisleben is now Lutherstadt town since the days of Frederick the The pulpit formerly stood in the Eislebeo and Mansfeld is Mansfeld­ Wise, that has never stopped proudly Parish Church of St. Mary where he was Lutherstadt. All are UNESCO World statinrr its claim as "Cradle of the Refor- married and where the four-paneled Heritage Sites today, and Saxony-Anhalt mation.""' Its name is officially Luther- Reformation altar in the Choir Room is has adopted the subtitle "Luther's Coun­ stadt Wittenberg, and here he received attributed to Lucas Cranach the Elder t1y" for its tourist promotions. his doctor's degree; lived and taught for (1472 to 1553) , onetime mayor of the His commitment meant nearly con­ nearly forty years. Luther's House town. stant traveling throughout central Ger­ (Lutherhaus, Collegianstrasse 54), t~e Under the Communists, noxious fac­ many. It was not an easy life, but he Augustinian Monastery where he resid­ tories lined the Elbe, and Wittenberg never hesitated to go where he was ed with his family after its religious dis­ was called "Chemical-town," but, to no needed or to speak the doctrine to his solution, contains Lutherhalle, the one's surprise, the name never caught people. world's largest museum of Reformation on. Even as the Wall was coming down in In the cold winter of 1546, Luther's history. The Museum was opened in Berlin and officials of the GDR were try­ health was failing when he returned to 1883 and renovated in 2003. Among ing to fade away across the east, Luther­ Eisleben to settle a feud between two other things it contains the pulpit he stadt Wittenberg was back. Protestant Counts of Mansfeld, and he used and an old ironbound box with a On College Street, an oak tree marks contracted pneumonia in a snowstorm slit in the top. Here, a jingle supposedly the spot where Luther burned the papal on the way. Desperately ill, he still recited by a salvation-selling monk from bull that condemned him for the capital preached four sermons in St. Andrew's Rome tells it all: crime of heresy. The distance between Church (Andreaskirche) though too the Palace Church and Luther House is weak to finish the final sermon (based "As soon as the coin in the coffer rings now called the "Cultural Mile." on Matthew 11 :25-30). He returned to The soul from purgatmy springs. " As Wittenberg became Lutherstadt his rooms across the street (Andreaskirchplatz 7) and died the next For Luther, Doctor of Theology and day. Professor at the University of Witten­ The Sterbehaus where he died was berg, this cash register of the Middle For moFe mfforrnanion: restored and opened in 1894 as a memo­ Ages represented all that needed chang­ German National Tourist Office rial. It contains the pall that covered his ing in the Roman Church. To Luther, T'e1ephone: 212-661-7200 coffin and one of the last letters he wrote this money box for the Indulgences was, Website: www.cometogerrnany.com to his wife. His funeral took place in Andreaskirche. His body was returned to Wittenberg where he was buried in the Castle Church, later to be joined by his friend, the Greek scholar and reformer Philipp Melanchthon (1497 to 1560). Statues of the two men stand in front of the High Renaissance Town Hall. Simple bronze plaques mark their graves. In 1933, a "Luther Jahre," was called to celebrate the four hundred fiftieth anniversary of his birth. The Nazis stopped this tribute to the Protestant Reformation, but in Halle, the Universi­ ty, founded in 1694 and united with Wit­ tenberg (1502) in 1817, quietly changed its name to Martin Luther University. Your own "Luther Jahre" will be whenever you come. Wittenberg's Market Sq uare, the historical Town Hall, and the towers of St. Mary's Church . .