Bad Kreuznach, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany

🇩🇪 Bad Kreuznach is a town in the Bad Kreuznach district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is a spa town, most well known for its medieval bridge dating from around 1300, the Alte Nahebrücke, which is one of the few remaining bridges in the world with buildings on it.

The town is located in the Nahe River wine region, renowned both nationally and internationally for its wines, especially from the Riesling, Silvaner and Müller-Thurgau grape varieties.

Bad Kreuznach does not lie within any Verbandsgemeinde, even though it is the seat of the Bad Kreuznach (Verbandsgemeinde). The town is the seat of several courts, as well as federal and state authorities. Bad Kreuznach is also officially a große kreisangehörige Stadt ("large town belonging to a district"), meaning that it does not have the district-level powers that kreisfreie Städte ("district-free towns/cities") enjoy. It is, nonetheless, the district seat, and also the seat of the state chamber of commerce for Rhineland-Palatinate. It is classed as a middle centre with some functions of an upper centre, making it the administrative, cultural and economic hub of the region.

Geography: Location Bad Kreuznach lies between the Hunsrück, Rhenish Hesse and the North Palatine Uplands, some 14 km (8.7 mi) as the crow flies south-southwest of Bingen am Rhein. It lies at the mouth of the Ellerbach, where it empties into the lower Nahe.

Neighbouring municipalities Clockwise from the north, Bad Kreuznach's neighbours are the municipalities of Bretzenheim, Langenlonsheim, Gensingen, Welgesheim, Zotzenheim, Sprendlingen, Badenheim (these last five lying in the neighbouring Mainz-Bingen district), Biebelsheim, Pfaffen-Schwabenheim, Volxheim, Hackenheim, Frei-Laubersheim, Altenbamberg, Traisen, Hüffelsheim, Rüdesheim an der Nahe, Roxheim, Hargesheim and Guldental.

Constituent communities Bad Kreuznach's outlying Ortsbezirke or Stadtteile are Bosenheim, Ippesheim, Planig, Winzenheim and Bad Münster am Stein-Ebernburg.

History As early as the 5th century BC, there is conclusive evidence that there was a Celtic settlement within what are now Bad Kreuznach's town limits. About 58 BC, the area became part of the Roman Empire and a Roman vicus came into being here, named, according to legend, after a Celt called Cruciniac, who transferred a part of his land to the Romans for them to build a supply station between Mainz (Mogontiacum) and Trier (Augusta Treverorum). Kreuznach lay on the Roman road that led from Metz (Divodurum), by way of the Saar crossing near Dillingen-Pachten (Contiomagus) and the Vicus Wareswald, near Tholey to Bingen am Rhein (Bingium). About AD 250, an enormous (measuring 81 × 71 m), luxurious palace, unique to the lands north of the Alps, was built, in the style of a peristyle villa. It contained 50 rooms on the ground floor alone. Spolia found near the Heidenmauer ("Heathen Wall") have led to the conclusion that there were a temple to either Mercury or both Mercury and Maia and a Gallo-Roman provincial theatre. According to an inscription and tile plates that were found in Bad Kreuznach, a vexillatio of the Legio XXII Primigenia was stationed there. In the course of measures to shore up the Imperial border against the Germanic Alemannic tribes who kept making incursions across the limes into the Empire, an auxiliary castrum was built in 370 under Emperor Valentinian I.

History: Middle Ages After Rome's downfall, Kreuznach became in the year 500 a royal estate and an imperial village in the newly growing Frankish Empire. Then, the town's first church was built within the old castrum's walls, which was at first consecrated to Saint Martin, but later to Saint Kilian, and in 1590, it was torn down. According to an 822 document from Louis the Pious, who was invoking an earlier document from Charlemagne, about 741, Saint Martin's Church in Kreuznach was supposedly donated to the Bishopric of Würzburg by his forebear Carloman. According to this indirect note, Kreuznach once again had a documentary mention in the Annales regni Francorum as Royal Pfalz (an imperial palace), where Louis the Pious stayed in 819 and 839. Kreuznach was mentioned in documents by Louis the Pious (in 823 as villa Cruciniacus and in 825 and 839, as Cruciniacum castrum or Cruciniacum palatium regium), Louis the German (in 845 as villa Cruzinacha and in 868 as villa Cruciniacum), Charles III, "the Fat" (in 882 as Crucinachum, Crutcinacha, Crucenachum), Arnulf of Carinthia (in 889), Henry the Fowler (in 923), Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor (in 962 as Cruciniacus) and Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor (in 1179 as Cruczennach). On the other hand, the Crucinaha in Emperor Otto III's documents from 1000 (which granted the rights to hold a yearly market and to strike coins) is today thought to refer to Christnach, an outlying centre of Waldbillig, a town nowadays in Luxembourg. In mediaeval and early modern Latin sources, Kreuznach is named not only as Crucenacum, Crucinacum (adjective Crucenacensis, Crucinacensis) and the like, but also as Stauronesus, Stauronesum (adjective Staurone[n]sus; from σταυρός "cross" and νῆσος "island") or Naviculacrucis (from navicula, a kind of small boat used on inland waterways, called a Nachen in German, and crux "cross"). Sometimes also encountered is the abbreviation Xnach (often with a Fraktur X, with a cross-stroke. About 1017, Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor enfeoffed his wife Cunigunde's grandnephew, Count Eberhard V of Nellenburg, with the noble estate of Kreuznach and the Villa Schwabenheim belonging thereto. After his death, King Henry IV supposedly donated the settlement of Kreuznach to the High Foundation of Speyer in 1065, who then transferred it shortly after 1105 – presumably as a fief – to the Counts of Sponheim. On Epiphany 1147, it is said that Bernard of Clairvaux performed a miraculous healing at Saint Kilian's Church. In 1183, half of the old Frankish village of Kreuznach at the former Roman castrum – the Osterburg – burnt down. Afterwards, of the 21 families there, 11 moved to what is now the Old Town (Altstadt). In the years 1206 to 1230, Counts Gottfried III of Sponheim (d. 1218) and Johann I of Sponheim (d. 1266) had the castle Kauzenburg built, even though King Philip of Swabia had forbidden them to do so. Along with the building of this castle came the rise of the New Town (Neustadt) on the Nahe's north bank. In the years 1235 and 1270, Kreuznach was granted town rights, market rights, taxation rights and tolling rights under the rule of the comital House of Sponheim, which were acknowledged once again in 1290 by King Rudolf I of Habsburg. In 1279, in the Battle of Sprendlingen, the legend of Michel Mort arose. He is a local legendary hero, a butcher from Kreuznach who fought on the Sponheim side in the battle against the troops of the Archbishop of Mainz. When Count Johann I of Sponheim found himself in difficulties, Michel Mort drew the enemy's lances upon himself, sparing the Count by bringing about his own death. Early knowledge of the town of Kreuznach is documented in one line of a song by the minstrel Tannhäuser from the 13th century, which is preserved in handwriting by Hans Sachs: "vur creűczenach rint aűch die na". In Modern German, this would be "Vor Kreuznach rinnt auch die Nahe" ("Before Kreuznach, the Nahe also runs"). Records witness Jewish settlement in Kreuznach beginning in the late 13th century, while for a short time in the early 14th century, North Italian traders ("Lombards") lived in town. In the 13th century, Kreuznach was a fortified town and in 1320, it withstood a siege by Archbishop-Elector Baldwin of Trier (about 1270–1336). In 1361, Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor granted Count Walram I of Sponheim (about 1305–1380) a yearly market privilege for Kreuznach. In 1375, the townsfolk rose up against the town council. Count Walram's response was to have four of the uprising's leaders beheaded at the marketplace. Through its long time as Kreuznach's lordly family, the House of Sponheim had seven heads: • Simon I (1223–1264) • John I (1265–1290) • John II (1290–1340) and Simon II (1290–1336) • Walram (1336–1380) • Simon III (1380–1414) • Elisabeth (1414–1417).

In 1417, however, the "Further" line of the House of Sponheim died out when Countess Elisabeth of Sponheim-Kreuznach (1365–1417) died. In her will, she divided the county between Electoral Palatinate and the County of Sponheim-Starkenburg, bequeathing to them one fifth and four-fifths respectively. In 1418, King Sigismund of Luxembourg enfeoffed Count Johann V of Sponheim-Starkenburg (about 1359–1437) with the yearly market, the mint, the Jews at Kreuznach and the right of escort, as far as Gensingen on the Trier-Mainz highway. In 1437, the lordship over Kreuznach was divided up between the Counts of Veldenz, the Margraves of Baden and Palatinate-Simmern. In 1457, at a time when a children's crusade movement was on the rise, 120 children left Kreuznach on their way to Mont-Saint-Michel by way of Wissembourg. In 1475, Electoral Palatinate issued a comprehensive police act for the Amt of Kreuznach, in which at this time, no Badish Amtmann resided. Elector Palatine Philip the Upright and John I, Count Palatine of Simmern granted the town leave to hold a second yearly market in 1490. In that same year, Elector Palatine Philip bestowed ownership of the saltz- und badbronnen ("salty and bathing springs") upon his cooks Conrad Brunn and Matthes von Nevendorf. The briny springs were likely discovered in 1478; nevertheless, a Sulzer Hof in what is today called the Salinental ("Saltworks Dale") had already been mentioned in the 13th or 14th century. On 24 August 1495, there was another uprising of the townsfolk, but this one was directed at Kreuznach's Palatine Amtmann, Albrecht V Göler von Ravensburg, who had refused to release a prisoner against the posting of a bond. Nobody was beheaded this time, but Elector Palatine Philip did have a few of the leaders maimed, and then put into force a new town order.

Town fortifications The town wall, first mentioned in 1247, had a footprint that formed roughly a square in the Old Town, and was set back a few metres from what are today the streets Wilhelmstraße, Salinenstraße and Schloßstraße, with the fourth side skirting the millpond. Serving as town gates were, in the north, the Kilianstor or the Mühlentor ("Saint Kilian's Gate" or "Mill Gate"; torn down in 1877), in the south-east the Hackenheimer Tor (later the Mannheimer Tor; torn down in 1860) and in the south the St.-Peter-Pförtchen, which lay at the end of Rossstraße, and which for security was often walled up. In the New Town, the town wall ran from the Butterfass ("Butterchurn"; later serving as the prison tower) on the Nahe riverbank up to the intersection of Wilhelmstraße and Brückes on Bundesstraße 48, where to the north-west the Löhrpforte (also called the Lehrtor or the Binger Tor; torn down about 1837) was found. It then ran in a bow between Hofgartenstraße and Hochstraße to the Rüdesheimer Tor in the south-west at the beginning of Gerbergasse, whose course it then followed down to the Ellerbach and along the Nahe as a riverbank wall. Along this section, the town wall contained the Fischerpforte or Ellerpforte as a watergate and in the south, the Große Pforte ("Great Gate") at the bridge across the Nahe. Belonging to the fortified complex of the Kauzenburg, across the Ellerbach from the New Town, were the Klappertor and a narrow, defensive ward (zwinger), from which the street known as "Zwingel" gets its name. On the bridge over to the ait (or the Wörth as it is called locally; the river island between the two parts of town) stood the Brückentor ("Bridge Gate"). To defend the town there was, besides the castle's Burgmannen, also a kind of townsmen's defence force or shooting guild (somewhat like a town militia). Preserved as an incunable print from 1487, printed in Mainz by Peter Schöffer (about 1425–1503), is an invitation from the mayor and town council to any and all who considered themselves good marksmen with the crossbow to come to a shooting contest on 23 September.

Jewish population On 31 March 1283 (2 Nisan 5043) in Kreuznach (קרויצנאך), Rabbi Ephraim bar Elieser ha-Levi – apparently as a result of a judicial sentence – was broken on the wheel. The execution was likely linked to the Mainz blood libel accusations, which in March and April 1283 also led to pogroms in Mellrichstadt, Mainz, Bacharach and Rockenhausen.

In 1311, Aaron Judeus de Crucenaco (the last three words mean "the Jew from Kreuznach") was mentioned, as was a Jewish toll gatherer from Bingen am Rhein named Abraham von Kreuznach in 1328, 1342 and 1343. In 1336, Emperor Louis the Bavarian allowed Count Johann II of Sponheim-Kreuznach to permanently keep 60 house-owning freed Jews at Kreuznach or elsewhere on his lands ("… daß er zu Creützenach oder anderstwoh in seinen landen 60 haußgesäsß gefreyter juden ewiglich halten möge …"). After further persecution in the time of the Plague in 1348/1349, there is no further evidence of Jews in Kreuznach until 1375. By 1382 at the latest, the Jew Gottschalk (who died sometime between 1409 and 1421) from Katzenelnbogen was living in Kreuznach and owned the house at the corner of Lämmergasse and Mannheimerstraße 12 (later: Löwensteiner Hof) near the Eiermarkt ("Egg Market"). On a false charge of usury, Count Simon III of Sponheim (after 1330–1414) had him thrown in prison and only released him after payment of a hefty ransom. He was afterwards taken into protection by Ruprecht III of the Palatinate against a yearly payment of 10 Rhenish guilders. At Gottschalk's suggestion, Archbishop Johann of Nassau-Wiesbaden-Idstein lifted the "dice toll" for Jews crossing the border into the Archbishopric of Mainz. The special taxes for Jews ordered in 1418 and 1434 by King Sigismund of Luxembourg were also imposed in Kreuznach.

In the Middle Ages, the eastern part of today's Poststraße in the New Town was the Judengasse ("Jews' Lane"). The Kleine Judengasse ran from the Judengasse to what is today called Magister-Faust-Gasse. In 1482, a "Jewish school" was mentioned, which might already have stood at Fährgasse 2 (lane formerly known as Kleine Eselsgass – "Little Ass's Lane"), where the Old Synagogue of Bad Kreuznach later stood (first mentioned here in 1715; new Baroque building in 1737; renovated in 1844; destroyed in 1938; torn down in 1953/1954; last wall remnant removed in 1975). In 1525, Louis V, Elector Palatine allowed Meïr Levi to settle for, at first, twelve years in Kreuznach, to organise the money market there, to receive visits, to lay out his own burial plot and to deal in medicines. In the earlier half of the 16th century, his son, the physician Isaak Levi, whose collection of medical works became well known as Des Juden buch von kreuczenach ("The Jew's Book of/from Kreuznach"), lived in Kreuznach. The work is preserved in a manuscript transcribed personally by Louis V, Elector Palatine. The oldest Jewish graveyard in Kreuznach lay in the area of today's Rittergut Bangert (knightly estate), having been mentioned in 1525 and 1636. The Jewish graveyard on Stromberger Straße was bought in 1661 (one preserved gravestone, however, dates from 1630) and expanded in 1919. It is said to be one of the best preserved in Rhineland-Palatinate. The Jewish family Creizenach, originally from Kreuznach, is known from records to have been in Mainz and Frankfurt am Main from 1733, and to have produced a number of important academics (Michael Creizenach, Theodor Creizenach, and Wilhelm Creizenach). In 1828, 425 of the 7,896 inhabitants of the Bürgermeisterei ("Mayoralty") of Kreuznach (5.4%) adhered to the Jewish faith, as did 611 of the town's 18,143 inhabitants (3.4%) in 1890.

Monasteries Before the Thirty Years' War, Kreuznach had some 8,000 inhabitants and seven monasteries. In the Middle Ages and early modern times, the following monasteries were mentioned: • Saint Mary's Monastery (St. Marien-Kloster; monastery's nature legendary) or Saint Mary's Church (St. Marien-Kirche) on the ait, supposedly endowed by King Dagobert I (d. 639) on the site where Paul's Evangelical Church (Pauluskirche) now stands. • Saint Kilian's Monastery (Kloster St. Kilian; old parish church; monastery's nature unclear), in the Osterburg (old Roman castrum, Charlemagne's palace) on the Heidenmauer ("Heathen Wall") built on the site of the Constantinian Saint Martin's Church (St. Martins-Kirche), first mentioned about 741 and destroyed by the Normans about 891, tied with a hospital in 1310; in the 14th century there was a Beguine cell with prayer house; the monastery was torn down about 1590. The patrocinia of Saint Martin and Saint Kilian were then added to Saint Mary's Church on the ait. • Augustinian convent of Saint Peter, endowed by Rhinegrave Wolfram I (III) of Stein (d. about 1179) about 1140, incorporated into the Schwabenheim Augustinian monastery in 1437, moved to the so-called Bubenkapelle ("Lads' Chapel") in 1491, reoccupied in 1495, dissolved in 1566/1568; the 15 nuns who were driven out went to Eibingen Abbey. In 1624, an attempt to reoccupy the complex by Augustinian monks failed; Jesuits settled there in 1636 and in 1648 they were granted it by agreement, today Oranienhof. The Pietà from Saint Peter, for whose reverence a forty-day indulgence was secured from Pope Alexander VI in 1502, was kept until its destruction in 1942 at St. Quintin's Church, Mainz. • Carmelite Monastery to Saint Nicholas, so-called Schwarz-Kloster ("Black Monastery"), endowed in 1281 by the comital House of Sponheim, confirmed in 1290 by Archbishop Gerhard II of Eppstein of Mainz (about 1230–1305), dissolved in 1802. • Saint Anthony's and Saint Catherine's Chapel (St. Antonius-und-St.-Katharinen-Kapelle; also called the Bubenkapelle) on the way into Mühlengasse ("Mill Lane"), which belonged to the Schwabenheim Augustinian monastery; it was here, right inside the town, that Count Walram of Sponheim (about 1305–1380) moved the Beguine cell from Saint Kilian's, given up in 1437; reoccupied by Augustinian nuns from 1491 to 1495, then moved to Saint Peter's. • Saint Wolfgang's Franciscan Monastery (Franziskanerkloster St. Wolfgang), endowed in 1472 by Frederick I, Elector Palatine and Count Palatine Frederick I of Simmern, confirmed by Pope Sixtus IV, dissolved in 1802, now the Gymnasium an der Stadtmauer ("Gymnasium on the Town Wall"). • Saint Vincent's Monastery, location unclear, existed in the Thirty Years' War and later. • Jesuit occupation about 1623, 1625 to 1632 and 1636 to 1652 in the quire of the Ait Church (Wörthkirche), later called the Bridge Church (Brückenkirche) and now Paul's Church (Pauluskirche), received in 1631 from Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor Saint Peter's and took ownership in 1636. In Kreuznach, the study prefect Johann Engelbert Oliverius worked and died.

Plague and leprosy The Plague threatened Kreuznach several times throughout its history. Great epidemics are recorded as having broken out in 1348/1349 (Johannes Trithemius spoke of 1,600 victims), 1364, 1501/1502, 1608, 1635 (beginning in September) and 1666 (reportedly 1,300 victims). During the 1501 epidemic, the humanist and Palatine prince-raiser Adam Werner von Themar, one of Abbot Trithemius's friends, wrote a poem in Kreuznach about the plague saint, Sebastian. Outside the town, a sickhouse for lepers, the so-called Gutleuthof, was founded on the Gräfenbach down from the village of Hargesheim and had its first documentary mention in 1487.

Modern times In the War of the Succession of Landshut against Elector Palatine Philip of the Rhine, both the town and the castle were unsuccessfully besieged for six days by Alexander, Count Palatine of Zweibrücken and William I, Landgrave of Lower Hesse, who then laid the surrounding countryside waste. The Sponheim abbot Johannes Trithemius had brought the monasterial belongings, the library and the archive to safety in Kreuznach. The besieged town was relieved by Electoral Palatinate Captain Hans III, Landschad of Steinach. In 1507, Master Faust assumed the rector's post at the Kreuznach Latin school, which had been secured for him by Franz von Sickingen. On the grounds of allegations of fornication, he fled the town only a short time afterwards, as witnessed by a letter from Johannes Trithemius to Johannes Virdung, in which Virdung was warned about Faust. Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, who spent Whitsun 1508 in Boppard, stayed in Kreuznach in June 1508 and wrote from there to his daughter Duchess Margaret of Savoy. In 1557, the Reformation was introduced into Kreuznach. According to the 1601 Verzeichnis aller Herrlich- und Gerechtigkeiten der Stätt und Dörffer der vorderen Grafschaft Sponheim im Ampt Creutznach ("Directory of All Lordships and Justices of the Towns and Villages of the Further County of Sponheim in the Amt of Kreuznach"), compiled by Electoral Palatinate Oberamtmann Johann von Eltz-Blieskastel-Wecklingen, the town had 807 estates and was the seat of a Hofgericht (lordly court) to which the "free villages" of Waldböckelheim, Wöllstein, Volxheim, Braunweiler, Mandel and Roxheim, which were thus freed from the toll at Kreuznach, had to send Schöffen (roughly "lay jurists").

Thirty Years' War During the Thirty Years' War, Kreuznach was overrun and captured many times by various factions fighting in that war: • 9 September 1620 [O.S. 31 August 1620] - In the Siege of Bad Kreuznach the town was taken by the Imperial-Spanish troops of General Marquis Ambrogio Spinola under Wilhelm Ferdinand von Effern. In 1621 Countess Catharina Belgica of Nassau travelled to Kreuznach to see Spinola to ask him to the spare the County of Hanau-Münzenberg. The Governors General of the Lower Palatinate, based in Kreuznach, were Don Guillermo de Verdugo di Fauleria, Baron von Böhmisch-Mascha und Tuppau, Don Felipe de Sylva (d. 1644) and Louis de la Tour. • 1 March 1632 [O.S. 20 February 1632] - Kreuznach was taken by Swedish, Saxe-Weimar and English troops under King Gustav II Adolf; the castle capitulated on 4 March 1632 [O.S. 23 February 1632]). William Craven and Sir Francis Fane of Fulbeck (about 1611–1681?) were both seriously wounded at the conquest of the castle. Serving as commanders were the Scots Colonel Alexander Ramsay (d. 1634) and Lieutenant Colonel (later General and Field Marshal) Robert Douglas. Julius Wilhelm Zincgref was installed in 1632 as the Kreuznach state scrivener by the allied Ludwig Philipp of Palatinate-Simmern. • 14 July 1635 - Imperial troops briefly thrust their way into Kreuznach, but were repulsed by the occupation at the castle. • 6 August 1635 [O.S. 27 July 1635] - Saxe-Weimar and French troops under Duke Bernard of Saxe-Weimar and Louis de Nogaret Cardinal de La Valette, together with the Swedes passed through Kreuznach, later passing through once again on 19 September 1635 [O.S. 9 September 1635] as they retreated. Kreuznach's last "Swedish" commander was Colonel Johann Georg Stauff from Dirmstein. • 20 December 1635 - Kreuznach was taken by Imperial-Spanish and Imperial-Croatian troops under General Matthias Gallas. The castle was still held by the Swedes until May 1636 under an armistice upon which both Colonel Stauff and Badish Lieutenant Colonel Bernhard Studnitzky von Beneschau (Studnický z Benešova) agreed on 9 January 1636 [O.S. 30 December 1635]. Stationed in the town were regiments headed by William, Margrave of Baden-Baden. As neutral ground, Kreuznach was placed under joint Badish and Palatinate-Simmern rule. • 21 November 1639 [O.S. 11 November 1639] - Kreuznach was taken by French and Saxe-Weimar troops under Duke Henri II d’Orléans, Duke of Longueville, after town commander Braun von Schmidtburg zu Schweich had gone over to them. • 27 May 1641 [O.S. 17 May 1641] - Bad Kreuznach was captured by Imperial-Bavarian and Imperial-Spanish troops under the Schillerhaas, Generalfeldwachtmeister Gilles de Haes began. An earlier attack in March 1641 had been defeated. The town capitulated on 6 June 1641 [O.S. 27 May 1641], while the fortress held out until 12 June 1641 [O.S. 2 June 1641]. • 4 November 1644 [O.S. 25 October 1644] - Kreuznach was taken by French troops under Marshal of France Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne (the castle was held by the Bavarians until 26 December 1644 [O.S. 16 December 1644]) and transferred by Maréchal de camp Guy de Bar to Palatinate-Simmern.

The town was thus heavily drawn into hardship and woe, and the population dwindled from some 8,000 at the war's outbreak to roughly 3,500. The expression "Er ist zu Kreuznach geboren" ("He was born at Kreuznach") became a byword in German for somebody who had to struggle with a great deal of hardship. On 19 August 1663, the town was stricken by an extraordinarily high flood on the river Nahe.

Nine Years' War In the Nine Years' War (known in Germany as the Pfälzischer Erbfolgekrieg, or War of the Palatine Succession), the Kauzenburg (castle) was conquered on 5 October 1688 by Marshal Louis François, duc de Boufflers. The town fortifications and the castle were torn down and the town of Kreuznach largely destroyed in May 1689 by French troops under Brigadier Ezéchiel du Mas, Comte de Mélac (about 1630–1704) or Lieutenant General Marquis Nicolas du Blé d’Uxelles. On 18 October 1689, Kreuznach's churches were burnt down.

History: 18th century As of 1708, Kreuznach wholly belonged to Electoral Palatinate. Under Elector Palatine Karl III Philipp, the Karlshalle Saltworks were built in 1729. Built in 1743 by Prince-Elector, Count Palatine and Duke Karl Theodor were the Theodorshalle Saltworks. On 13 May 1725, after a cloudburst and hailstorm, Kreuznach was stricken by an extreme flood in which 31 people lost their lives, some 300 or 400 head of cattle drowned, two houses were utterly destroyed and many damaged and remaining parts of the town wall fell in. Taking part at the founding of the Masonic Lodge Zum wiedererbauten Tempel der Bruderliebe ("To the Rebuilt Temple of Brotherly Love") in Worms in 1781 were also Freemasons from Kreuznach. As early as 1775, the Grand Lodge of the Rhenish Masonic Lodges (8th Provincial Grand Lodge) of Strict Observance had already been given the name "Kreuznach". In the extreme winter of 1783/1784, the town was heavily damaged on 27–28 February 1784 by an icerun and flooding. A pharmacist named Daniel Riem was killed in his house "Zum weißen Schwan" ("At the White Swan") when it collapsed into the floodwaters.

French Revolutionary and Napoleonic times In the course of the Napoleonic Wars (1792–1814), French emigrants came to Kreuznach, among them Prince Louis Joseph of Condé. In October 1792, French Revolutionary troops under General Adam Philippe, Comte de Custine occupied the land around Kreuznach, remaining there until 28 March 1793. The town itself was briefly occupied by French troops under General François Séverin Marceau-Desgraviers on 4 January and then again on 16 October 1794. From 30 October until 1 December 1795, the town was held by Imperial troops under Rhinegrave Karl August von Salm-Grumbach, but they were at first driven out in bloody battles by Marshals Jean-Baptiste Jourdan and Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte. In this time, the town suffered greatly under sackings and involuntary contributions. After the French withdrew on 12 December, it was occupied by an Austrian battalion under Captain Alois Graf Gavasini, which withdrew again on 30 May 1796. On 9 June 1796, Kreuznach was once again occupied by the French. In 1797, Kreuznach, along with all lands on the Rhine's left bank, was annexed by the French First Republic, a deed confirmed under international law by the 1801 Treaty of Lunéville. The parts of town that lay north of the Nahe were assigned to the Arrondissement of Simmern in the Department of Rhin-et-Moselle, whereas those that lay to the south were assigned to the Department of Mont-Tonnerre (or Donnersberg in German). The subprefect in Simmern in 1800 was Andreas van Recum and in 1806 it was Ludwig von Closen. The maire of Kreuznach as of 1800 was Franz Joseph Potthoff (b. 1756; d. after 1806) and beginning in 1806 it was Karl Joseph Burret. On 20 September and 5 October 1804, the French Emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte visited Kreuznach. On the occasion of Napoleon's victory in the Battle of Austerlitz a celebratory Te Deum was held at the Catholic churches in January 1806 on Bishop of Aachen Marc-Antoine Berdolet's orders (Kreuznach was part of his diocese from 1801 to 1821). In 1808, Napoleon made a gift of Kreuznach's two saltworks to his favourite sister, Pauline. In 1809, the Kreuznach Masonic Lodge "Les amis réunis de la Nahe et du Rhin" was founded by van Reccum, which at first lasted only until 1814. It was, however, refounded in 1858. In Napoleon's honour, the timing of the Kreuznach yearly market was set by Mayor Burret on the Sunday after his birthday (15 August). Men from Kreuznach also took part in Napoleon's 1812 Russian Campaign on the French side, to whom a monument established at the Mannheimer Straße graveyard in 1842 still stands. The subsequent German campaign (called the Befreiungskriege, or Wars of Liberation, in Germany) put an end to French rule.

Congress of Vienna to First World War Until a permanent new order could be imposed under the terms of the Congress of Vienna, the region lay under joint Bavarian-Austrian administration, whose seat was in Kreuznach. When these terms eventually came about, Kreuznach passed to the Kingdom of Prussia in 1815 and from 1816 it belonged to the Regierungsbezirk of Koblenz in the province of the Grand Duchy of the Lower Rhine (as of 1822 the Rhine Province) and was a border town with two neighbouring states, the Grand Duchy of Hesse to the east and the Bavarian exclave of the Palatinate to the south. The two saltworks, which had now apparently been taken away from Napoleon's sister, were from 1816 to 1897 Grand-Ducal-Hessian state property on Prussian territory. In 1817, Johann Erhard Prieger opened the first bathing parlour with briny water and thereby laid the groundwork for the fast-growing spa business. In 1843, Karl Marx married Jenny von Westphalen in Kreuznach, presumably at the Wilhelmskirche (William's Church), which had been built between 1698 and 1700 and was later, in 1968, all but torn down, leaving only the churchtower. In Kreuznach, Marx set down considerable portions of his manuscript Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right (Zur Kritik der Hegelschen Rechtsphilosophie) in 1843. Clara Schumann, who was attending the spa in Kreuznach, and her half-sister Marie Wieck gave a concert at the spa house in 1860. With the building of the Nahe Valley Railway from Bingerbrück to Saarbrücken in 1858/1860, the groundwork was laid for the town's industrialisation. This, along with the ever-growing income from the spa, led after years of stagnation to an economic boost for the town's development. Nevertheless, the railway was not built for industry and spa-goers alone, but also as a logistical supply line for a war that was expected to break out with France. Before this, though, right at Kreuznach's town limits, Prussia and Bavaria once again stood at odds with each other in 1866. Thinking that was not influenced by this led to another railway line being built even before the First World War, the "strategic railway" from Bad Münster by way of Staudernheim, Meisenheim, Lauterecken and Kusel towards the west, making Kreuznach into an important contributor to transport towards the west. Only about 1950 were parts of this line torn up and abandoned. Today, between Staudernheim and Kusel, it serves as a tourist attraction for those who wish to ride draisines.

In 1891, three members of the Franciscan Brothers of the Holy Cross came to live in Kreuznach. In 1893, they took over the hospital Kiskys-Wörth, which as of 1905 bore the name St. Marienwörth. Since 1948, they have run it together with the Sisters of the Congregation of Papal Law of the Maids of Mary of the Immaculate Conception, and today run it as a hospital bearing the classification II. Regelversorgung under Germany's Versorgungsstufe hospital planning system. In 1901, the Second Rhenish Diakonissen-Mutterhaus ("Deaconess's Mother-House"), founded in 1889 in Sobernheim, moved under its abbot, the Reverend Hugo Reich, to Kreuznach. It is now a foundation known as the kreuznacher diakonie (always written with lowercase initials). In 1904, the pharmacist Karl Aschoff discovered the Kreuznach brine's radon content, and thereafter introduced "radon balneology", a therapy that had already been practised in the Austro-Hungarian town of Sankt Joachimsthal in the Bohemian Ore Mountains (now Jáchymov in the Czech Republic). Even though the Bad Kreuznach's radon content was much slighter than that found in the waters from Brambach or Bad Gastein, the town was quickly billed as a "radium healing spa" – the technical error in that billing notwithstanding. In 1912, a radon inhalatorium was brought into service, into which was piped the air from an old mining gallery at the Kauzenberg, which had a higher radon content than the springwater. The inhalatorium was destroyed in 1945. In 1974, however, the old mining gallery itself was converted into a therapy room. To this day, radon inhalation serves as a natural pain reliever for those suffering from rheumatism. In the First World War, both the Kreuznach spa house and other hotels and villas became as of 2 January 1917 the seat of the Great Headquarters of Kaiser Wilhelm II. The Kaiser actually lived in the spa house. Used as the General staff building was the Oranienhof. At the spa house on 19 December 1917, General Mustafa Kemal Pasha – better known as Atatürk ("Father of the Turks") and later president of a strictly secular Turkey – the Kaiser, Paul von Hindenburg and Erich Ludendorff all met for talks. Only an extreme wintertime flood on the Nahe in January 1918 led to the Oberste Heeresleitung being moved to Spa in Belgium.

Weimar Republic and Third Reich After the First World War, French troops occupied the Rhineland and along with it, Kreuznach, whose great hotels were thereafter mostly abandoned. In 1924, Kreuznach was granted the designation Bad, literally "Bath", which is conferred on places that can be regarded as health resorts. Since this time, the town has been known as Bad Kreuznach. After Adolf Hitler and the Nazis seized power in 1933, some, among them the trade unionist Hugo Salzmann, organised resistance to National Socialism. Despite imprisonment, Salzmann survived the Third Reich, and after 1945 sat on town council for the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). The Jews who were still left in the district after the Second World War broke out were on the district leadership's orders taken in 1942 to the former Kolpinghaus, whence, on 27 July, they were deported to Theresienstadt. Bad Kreuznach, whose spa facilities and remaining hotels once again, from 1939 to 1940, became the seat of the Army High Command, was time and again targeted by Allied air raids because of the Wehrmacht barracks on Bosenheimer Straße, Alzeyer Straße and Franziska-Puricelli-Straße as well as the strategically important Berlin-Paris railway line, which then led through the town. The last Stadtkommandant (town commander), Lieutenant Colonel Johann Kaup (d. 1945), kept Bad Kreuznach from even greater destruction when he offered advancing American troops no resistance, and yielded the town to them on 16 March 1945 with barely any fighting. Shortly before this, German troops had blown up yet another part of the old bridge across the Nahe, thus also destroying residential buildings near the bridge ends.

After 1945 Bad Kreuznach was occupied by US troops in March 1945 and thus stood under American military authority. This even extended to one of the Rheinwiesenlager for disarmed German forces, which lay near Bad Kreuznach on the road to Bretzenheim, and whose former location is now marked by a memorial. It was commonly known as the "Field of Misery". Found in the Lohrer Wald (forest) is a graveyard of honour for wartime and camp victims. Under the Potsdam Protocols on the fixing of occupation zone boundaries, Bad Kreuznach found itself for a while in French zone of occupation, but in an exchange in the early 1950s, United States Armed Forces came back into the districts of Kreuznach, Birkenfeld and Kusel. Until the middle of 2001, the Americans maintained four barracks, a Redstone missile unit, a firing range, a small airfield and a drill ground in Bad Kreuznach. The last US forces in Bad Kreuznach were parts of the 1st Armored Division ("Old Ironsides"). In 1958, President of France Charles de Gaulle and Federal Chancellor Konrad Adenauer agreed in Bad Kreuznach to an institutionalisation of the special relations between the two countries, which in 1963 resulted in the Élysée Treaty. A monumental stone before the old spa house recalls this historic event. On 1 April 1960, the town of Bad Kreuznach was declared, after application to the state government, a große kreisangehörige Stadt ("large town belonging to a district"). In 2010 Bad Kreuznach launched a competition to replace the 1950s addition to the Alte Nahebrücke ("Old Nahe Bridge"). The bridge, designed by competition winner Dissing+Weitling architecture of Copenhagen, is scheduled for completion by 2012.

Amalgamations In the course of administrative restructuring in Rhineland-Palatinate, the hitherto self-administering municipalities of Bosenheim, Planig, Ippesheim (all three of which had belonged until then to the Bingen district) and Winzenheim were amalgamated on 7 June 1969 with Bad Kreuznach. Furthermore, Rüdesheim an der Nahe was also amalgamated, but fought the amalgamation in court, winning, and thereby regaining its autonomy a few months later. As part of the 2009 German federal election, a plebiscite was included on the ballot on the question of whether the towns of Bad Kreuznach and Bad Münster am Stein-Ebernburg should be merged, and 68.3% of the Bad Kreuznach voters favoured negotiations between the two towns. On 25 May 2009, the town received another special designation, this time from the Cabinet: Ort der Vielfalt – "Place of Diversity".

Tourist attractions The town of Bad Kreuznach is home to the following tourist attractions: • The Alte Nahebrücke, a bridge that crosses the River Nahe in central Bad Kreuznach along the Walkplatz, dates from around 1300. It supports houses built from 1582 to 1612, and it is one of the few remaining bridges with buildings on it. • The Pauluskirche (St. Paul's Church), where Karl Marx was married to Jenny von Westphalen on 19 June 1843. • The Kurhaus (built in 1913) is a hotel and bath house. The baths which give the town its special designation contain the noble gas radon, with supposedly curative properties. • The Dr-Faust-Haus (built in 1507) was the home of Johann Georg Faust, the alchemist on whom the Faust tale is said to be based. • Two mosaics from a Roman villa (about AD 250) are displayed in an on-site museum, the Römerhalle. The tombstone of Tiberius Julius Abdes Pantera is also on view here. • Bad Kreuznach's wine is well known. • For 50 years Kreuznach was home to a United States Army base, Rose Barracks, including headquarters of the U.S. 8th Infantry Division, including the 8th Signal Battalion, and the 8th Intelligence Co., and later the U.S. 1st Armored Division, which closed down in May 2001

Music clubs and choirs • Capella Nicolai • Chor Cantamus • Chor Mosaik • Chor Reinhard – newly founded men's Christian choir • Gospelchor Grenzenlos – "Borderless" Gospel choir • Kantorei der Pauluskirche – Paul's Evangelical Church choir • Konzertgesellschaft Bad Kreuznach – concert company • Kreuznacher-Diakonie-Kantorei – diaconal choir • MC Harmonie 1845 Planig e.V. • Musikverein "Musikfreunde Winzenheim" e. V. – "Winzenheim Friends of Music" • Pop- und Gospelchor ReJOYSing, Planig

Regular events • Weekly market (Wochenmarkt) at the Kornmarkt: Tuesday and Friday, 0700 to 1300 • Altweiberfastnacht ("Old Women's Carnival") in the Narrenkäfig ("Fools' Cage") at the Kornmarkt: Thursday before Ash Wednesday • Kreuznacher Narrenfahrt ("Kreuznach Fools' Journey"): Saturday before Ash Wednesday • Nahetal-Turnier, junior football tournament: at Whitsun from Friday to Monday. • Drachenfest auf dem Kuhberg ("Dragon Festival on the Kuhberg"): mid to late April • Kreuznacher Hockey Club International Easter Hockey Tournament • Automobilsalon: biggest automobile exhibition in Rhineland-Palatinate, last weekend in April • Eiermarktfest ("Egg Market Festival"): mid July • Kreuznacher Jahrmarkt ("Yearly Market"): (since 1810) third weekend in August (Friday to Tuesday) • Fischerstechen ("Water Jousting"): first weekend in September • RKV (Rowing and Canoeing Club) Herbst-Kanuslalom ("Autumn Canoe Slalom") in the Salinental: last weekend in September • Nikolausmarkt ("Saint Nicholas's Market"): until 2008 always at the Eiermarkt ("Egg Market"), future still unclear • Festival "marionettissimo"/Die Kunst des Spiels am Faden ("The Art of Playing on the Thread") in November at the Museum für PuppentheaterKultur • Französischer Markt ("French Market"): once a year, dealers from the French partner town Bourg-en-Bresse hold a "French market" at the Kornmarkt; last held in 2007.

Town of Bad Kreuznach Cultural Prize The Kulturpreis der Stadt Bad Kreuznach is a promotional prize awarded by the town of Bad Kreuznach each year in the categories of music, visual arts and literature on a rotational basis. A full list of prizewinners since the award's introduction can be seen at the link. In 2013, the prize was not awarded owing to cost-cutting measures.

Sport clubs In Bad Kreuznach there are many clubs that can boast of successes at the national level. In trampolining and whitewater slalom, the town is a national stronghold, while it has also shown strength at the state level in shooting sports and bocce. The biggest club is VfL 1848 Bad Kreuznach, within which the first basketball department in any sport club in Germany was founded in 1935. After the Second World War, too, the club produced many important personalities, among them several players at the national level. Moreover, the club's field hockey department is also of importance, having for a while been represented in the Damen-Bundesliga ("Ladies' National League"). The first field hockey department in a Bad Kreuznach sport club, however, was the Kreuznacher HC, which made it to the semi-finals at the German Championship in 1960, and which to this day stages the Easter Hockey Tournament. In football, the town's most successful club is Eintracht Bad Kreuznach. The team played in, among other leagues, the Oberliga, when that was Germany's highest level in football, as well as, later, the Second Bundesliga. The club that has won the most titles is MTV Bad Kreuznach, which in trampolining is among Germany's most successful clubs. Canoeing, in particular whitewater slalom, is practised by RKV Bad Kreuznach. Creuznacher RV has a long tradition in rowing. Also important are the shooting sport clubs SG Bad Kreuznach 1847 and BSC Bad Kreuznach. In disabled sports, the Sportfreunde Diakonie especially has been successful, particularly in bocce.

Town of Bad Kreuznach Sport Badge The Sportplakette der Stadt Bad Kreuznach is an honour awarded by the town once each year to individual sportsmen or sportswomen, whole teams, worthy promoters of sports and worthy people whose jobs are linked to sports. With this award, the town also hopes to underscore its image as a sporting town in Rhineland-Palatinate. The Sport Badge is conferred upon sportsmen or sportswomen at three levels: • Gold ◦ Participation in a world championship or the Olympic Games ◦ World Cup ranking 1st to 3rd place ◦ 1st to 3rd place at European championships • Silver ◦ World Cup ranking 4th or 5th place ◦ European championships 4th or 5th place ◦ 1st place at German championships • Bronze ◦ World Cup ranking 6th or 7th place ◦ Participation in a European championship ◦ 2nd or 3rd place at a German championship

A promoter or person working in a sport-related field must be active in an unpaid capacity for at least 25 years to receive this award.

Winegrowing Bad Kreuznach is characterised to a considerable extent by winegrowing, and with 777 ha of vineyard planted – 77% white wine varieties and 23% red – it is the biggest winegrowing centre in the Nahe wine region and the seventh biggest in Rhineland-Palatinate.

Industry and trade Bad Kreuznach has roughly 1,600 businesses with at least one employee, thereby offering 28,000 jobs, of which half are filled by commuters who come into town from surrounding areas. The economic structure is thus characterised mainly by small and medium enterprises, but also some big businesses like the tire manufacturer Michelin, the machine builder KHS, the Meffert Farbwerke (dyes, lacquers, plasters, protective coatings) and the Jos. Schneider Optische Werke GmbH may be mentioned. In 2002, the tradition-rich Seitz-Filter-Werke was taken over by the US-based Pall Corporation. Thus producing businesses are of great importance, and are especially well represented by the chemical industry (tires, lacquers, dyes) and the optical industry as well as machine builders and automotive suppliers. Retail and wholesale dealers, as well as restaurants hold particular weight in the inner town, although in the last few years, the service sector, too, has been gaining in importance. The express road links to the Autobahn bring Bad Kreuznach closer to Frankfurt Airport. The town can also attract new investment with its economic conversion areas.

Spa and tourism The spa operations and the wellness tourism also hold a special place for the town as the world's oldest radon-brine spa and the Rhineland-Palatinate centre for rheumatic care. Available in town are 2,498* beds for guests, which out of 449,756* overnight stays have seen 270,306* stays by guests in rehabilitation clinics. All together, the town was visited by 92,700 overnight guests (*as of 31 December 2010). Also available to the spa operations are six spa clinics, spa sanatoria, the thermal brine movement bath "Crucenia Thermen" with a salt grotto, a radon gallery, graduation towers in the Salinental (dale), the brine-fogger in the Kurpark (spa park) set up as open-air inhalatoria and the "Crucenia Gesundheitszentrum" ("Crucenia Health Centre") for ambulatory spa treatment. The indications for these treatments are for rheumatic complaints, changes in joints due to gout, degenerative diseases of the spinal column and joints, women's complaints, illnesses of the respiratory system, paediatric illnesses, vascular illnesses, non-infectious skin diseases, endocrinological dysfunctions, psychosomatic illnesses and eye complaints. After the noticeable decline in the spa business in the mid 1990s, there was a remodelling of the healing spa. At the Saunalandschaft bathhouse rose a "wellness temple" with 12 great saunas on an area of 4 000 m2, which receives roughly 80,000 visitors every year.

Hospitals and specialised clinics In the hospital run by kreuznacher diakonie (397 beds) and the St. Marienwörth hospital (Franciscan brothers), Bad Kreuznach has at its disposal two general hospitals that have available the most modern specialised departments for heart and intestinal disorders, and also strokes. In the spa zone, there is also the "Sana" Rhineland-Palatinate Rheumatic Centre, made up of a rheumatic hospital and a rehabilitation clinic, the Karl-Aschoff-Klinik. Another rehabilitation clinic under private sponsorship is the Klinik Nahetal. Also, there are the psychosomatic specialised clinic St.-Franziska-Stift and the rehabilitation and preventive clinic for children and youth, Viktoriastift.

Transport Given Bad Kreuznach's location in the narrow Nahe valley, all transport corridors run upstream parallel to the river. Moreover, the town is an important crossing point for all modes of transport.

Transport: Rail From 1896 to 1936, there were the Kreuznacher Kleinbahnen ("Kreuznach Narrow-Gauge Railways"), a rural narrow-gauge railway network. An original steam locomotive and its shed, which were moved from Winterburg, can be found today in nearby Bockenau. The Kreuznacher Straßen- und Vorortbahnen ("Kreuznach Tramways and Suburban Railways") ran not only a service within the town but also lines out into the surrounding area, to Bad Münster am Stein, Langenlonsheim and Sankt Johann. In 1953, the whole operation was shut down. Since the introduction of "Rhineland-Palatinate Timetabling" (Rheinland-Pfalz-Takt) in the mid 1990s, the train services other than the ICE/EC/IC services have once again earned some importance. Besides the introduction of hourly timetabling, there has also been a marked expansion into the nighttime hours, with trains leaving for Mainz three hours later each day. Bad Kreuznach station is one of Rhineland-Palatinate's few V-shaped stations (called a Keilbahnhof, or "wedge station", in the German terminology). Branching off the Nahe Valley Railway (Bingen–Saarbrücken) here is the railway line to Gau Algesheim. From Bingen am Rhein, Regionalbahn trains run by way of the Alsenz Valley Railway, which branches off the Nahe Valley Railway in Bad Münster am Stein, to Kaiserslautern, reaching it in roughly 65 minutes. Running on the line to Saarbrücken and by way of Gau Algesheim and the West Rhine Railway to Mainz are Regional-Express and Regionalbahn trains. The travel time to Mainz lies between 25 and 40 minutes, and to Saarbrücken between 1 hour and 40 minutes and 2 hours and 20 minutes.

Transport: Road Bad Kreuznach can be reached by car through the like-named interchange on the Autobahn A 61 as well as on Bundesstraßen 41, 48 and 428. Except for Bundesstraße 48, all these roads skirt the inner town, while the Autobahn is roughly 12 km from the town centre. Local public transport is provided by a town bus network with services running at 15- or 30-minute intervals. There are seven bus routes run by Verkehrsgesellschaft Bad Kreuznach (VGK), which is owned by the company Rhenus Veniro. Furthermore, there is a great number of regional bus routes serving the nearby area, run by VGK and Omnibusverkehr Rhein-Nahe GmbH (ORN). The routes run by the various carriers are all part of the Rhein-Nahe-Nahverkehrsverbund ("Rhine-Nahe Local Transport Association").

Broadcast • Antenne Bad Kreuznach radio station • domradio Studio-Nahe UKW 87,9, clerical radio, domradio Köln repeater, local station on Saturday morning and church service broadcast on Sunday • Bürgerfernsehen Offener Kanal Bad Kreuznach, public access television channel

Media: Print • Allgemeine Zeitung Bad Kreuznach: daily newspaper for Bad Kreuznach and area, owned by Verlagsgruppe Rhein Main. circulation roughly 13,000. • Oeffentlicher Anzeiger: daily newspaper for Bad Kreuznach and area, owned by Rhein-Zeitung (Mittelrhein-Verlag). circulation roughly 22,000. • Concerned with town history: Bad Kreuznacher Heimatblätter, irregularly appearing insert in the Oeffentlichen Anzeiger • VorSicht – Das Rhein-Nahe-Journal. circulation 15,000 • Lifetime: town magazine for Bad Kreuznach • Wochenspiegel Bad Kreuznach: weekly advertising flyer, owned by SW-Verlag. • Kreuznacher Rundschau, until 1 October 2010: Neue Kreuznacher Zeitung: weekly advertising flyer. The first edition appeared in October 2006.

Online • Kreuznach-Blog – current events and information about Bad Kreuznach from the region and the Internet. Since 1 June 2008. • Extrawelle – news for Bad Kreuznach