Rotenburg an der Fulda

the town in Hesse

Rotenburg an der Fulda (officially Rotenburg a. d. Fulda) is a town in Hersfeld Rotenburg district in northeastern Hesse, in central Germany, situated, as the name says, on the river Fulda.

The town lies south of the Stölzinger Gebirge (range) in the narrowest part of the Fulda valley. The town's lowest point lies at 180 m above sea level in the area near the two bridges across the Fulda linking Rotenburg's Old Town and New Town; these are the Alte Fuldabrücke (“Old Fulda Bridge”) and the Brücke der Städtepartnerschaften (“Bridge of Town Partnerships”). The town's highest point is the 548.7 m high Alheimer, lying on the town limit between Rotenburg and the neighbouring community of Alheim. The nearest major towns are Bebra (some 6 km to the southeast) and Bad Hersfeld (some 16 km to the south), The nearest cities are Kassel (some 50 km to the north) and Fulda (some 70 km to the south).

Clockwise from the north, these are Alheim, Spangenberg, Cornberg, Bebra and Ludwigsau. On the so called Stölzinger Höhe (heights) in the northeast, above the outlying centre of Dankerode, Rotenburg has a boundary with the town of Waldkappel.

Besides the main town, Rotenburg a. d. Fulda is made up of the outlying Stadtteile of Lispenhausen, Braach, Schwarzenhasel, Erkshausen, Seifertshausen, Dankerode, Atzelrode (with Alte Teich Estate and Wüstefeld) and Mündershausen.

In 769, the outlying centres of Braach and Lispenhausen, along with the now vanished village of Breitingen (which lay somewhere near the Hochmahle) had their first documentary mentions in the Hersfeld Abbey’s directory of holdings. These consisted of six estates and 90 Morgen of land. The Gisonen were the Abbey’s Vögte (singular: Vogt). They built the first security castle in the Fulda valley once they had come to hold the Vogtei (the right to be Vogt). Around this castle arose a settlement. The Landgraves of Thuringia, who inherited the Vogtei from the Gisonen, built on the Alter Turm (mountain) Rodenberg Castle, which today lies in ruins, but is believed to be the town’s namesake. The settlement on the Fulda’s left bank, today’s Altstadt (“Old Town”), had its first documentary mention as a town in 1248, and after the Thuringian Hessian War of Succession in 1264 the town belonged to the Landgraviate of Hesse. The old castle in the valley had supposedly been removed sometime after 1423. In 1470 arose the first Schloss Rotenburg. A great town fire destroyed the Old Town in 1478 along with the newly built Schloss. Between 1627 and 1834, Rotenburg was a residence town of the landgrave family of Hesse Rotenburg, the so called Rotenburger Quart. In 1615, 57 houses burnt down in Braach, and in the Thirty Years' War, in 1637, the town and the town hall burnt. The fire was set by soldiers from the Isolani Regiment. In March 1882, the volunteer fire brigade was started as a club. In 1900 it acquired an equipment shed with a drying tower near the Fulda. Following the joint German Soviet invasion of Poland, which started World War II in 1939, it was the location of the Oflag IX C prisoner of war camp for Polish officers and orderlies, which in June 1940 was converted into a subcamp of the Oflag IX A camp in Spangenberg, and then held Belgian officers. Rotenburg has belonged since 1972 to Hersfeld Rotenburg district, before which it was the old Rotenburg district's seat. In 2003, the town earned unwanted fame through Armin Meiwes. In 2004, the town earned a silver medal in the national contest Unsere Stadt blüht auf (“Our Town is Blossoming”), and in 2005 it earned a gold medal with a special prize for the landscaping design of the Fulda floodplain. In August 2007, the volunteer fire brigade staged the 20th Hessian Fire Brigade Day with an extensive programme of events on the occasion of its 125 anniversary of founding.

There are ten Evangelical churches in town, two Catholic churches and one New Apostolic.

Through municipal reform in 1972, the above named formerly self administering communities were integrated into the town of Rotenburg an der Fulda.

The mayor is Christian Grunwald, elected in 2011 and re elected in 2017.

The town's arms might be described thus: Argent at the nombril point a mount of three gules surmounted by a bough vert in fess arising from the bottom of which and growing in pale a sprig of three linden leaves vert. The German blazon describes the “mount” as a Dreiberg, even though in the artistic rendering seen here, it does not have the same shape that this charge usually has in German civic coats of arms. See, for instance, Nentershausen's, Neuenstein's or Philippsthal's coat of arms. The arms come from the early 17th century. The mound stands for the Rotenberg, a mountain on which once stood a castle. From these, the town got its name. The linden sprig comes from old guild seals, which bore a cloverleaf and a star. From this arose the linden sprig, which was adopted as a charge in the town's arms, putting the coat of arms in the “North Hesse Cloverleaf Arms Family” along with Kassel and Felsberg. The first example of the arms now valid in the town was in the Knights’ Hall (Rittersaal), which was torn down in the late 18th century. The first examples on mediaeval town seals show a saint bearing a palm frond before a town gate. It most likely was meant to be the town's patron saint, James the Elder.

Especially important to the town and the whole area is the Herz Kreislauf Zentrum (HKZ – Cardiovascular Centre) on the south slope above the town. As at January 2006, 4,188 workers are employed in town, of which 989 jobs are offered by producing businesses, 2,143 by service providers, 367 by trade, 80 by forestry and agriculture and 609 by other fields of endeavour. There are 1,325 beds dedicated to tourism.

Rotenburg lies on Bundesstraße 83 and on the so called Friedrich Wilhelms Nordbahn (railway), which is nowadays part of the Mitte Deutschland Verbindung (“Middle Germany Connection”).

Hessische/Niedersächsische Allgemeine (daily newspaper) with its Lokalteil Rotenburg Bebra (local section) and the Kreisanzeiger published district wide.

There are ten schools in town, among them the Jakob Grimm Schule, which acts as an ancillary comprehensive school with a Gymnasium upper level. There is also the BKK Akademie, where there is training in social insurance law and related themes for those employed in the field.