Vienna Reflection Paper

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Christopher Hannum Jr HUM 212 Vienna Reflection Paper Our educational field trip this semester was to Vienna, Austria. Vienna is located in north east Austria on the banks on the Danube river. It is Austria’s capital city and has a population of 1.8 million. In 500 BC it was believed to be a Celtic settlement until the Romans came in and established a fort called Vindobona about 15 BC. The first time the city was referred to as “Wien” was in the Salzburg Annals in 881 CE. It is still unsure if the city was named after the river Wien which branches off of the Danube, or if the river was named after the town. During our first night in town we toured the Nationalbibliothek and the Hofburg Palace. The Nationalbibliothek is housed in what used …show more content…

The monastery was founded in the 12th century by rulers from the House of Babenberg who were feuding with the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, Henry IV. The monastery was built and handed over to the Augustinian Monks in the early 12th century before it was consecrated in 1136. It was originally built in the Romanesque style, but throughout the years that church has been built over with a Baroque and Neoclassical architecture. The damage to the Monastery was most extensive during the Ottoman sieges in the 16th century. The church rebuilt but to this day there still is a fountain at the base of the monastery celebrating the victory against the ottomans. The monastery also studied humanistic themes such as geography and astronomy. Something interesting about the church is the presence of a star of David in the design of one of the rooms. The star being present in the monastery is rather symbolic of how secular some of the monks were at the time. Today the monastery is still in service, but they also produce wine and protect some of the Austrian nations most valuable artifacts. They house the Verdun Altar, the crown of St. Leopold, and a series of important religious artifacts from previous archbishops. Some of the most extensive damage done to the Monastery was during the Ottoman sieges in the 16th

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