Antique map - Bremen 1917

Pharus-Plan of Bremen (Bremen) in 1917: the Hanseatic city, its free port, the Norddeutscher Lloyd, the Rathaus and the Roland, and the Bürgerpark.

This Pharus-Plan shows Bremen, Bremen in German, in 1917. The city was then the Freie Hansestadt Bremen, a free Hanseatic city that formed a state in its own right within the German Empire: it joined the North German Confederation in 1866 and the Empire in 1871, surrounded by Prussian territory, with its only direct border to the west being the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg. Today, with Bremerhaven, purchased from the Kingdom of Hanover in 1827 to gain access to the sea, it forms Germany's smallest Land, a state composed of two cities (Freie Hansestadt Bremen). Bremen has had more than 100,000 inhabitants since 1875.

Places and districts shown:

• The Rathaus and the Roland - on the Market Square, the Roland, a stone statue from 1404 measuring 10 metres with its pedestal, is the largest free-standing statue from the German Middle Ages; it symbolises the city's liberties. The Gothic Rathaus was built from 1405 to 1410, then received its Weser Renaissance facade at the beginning of the 17th century. An extension by Gabriel von Seidl was completed in 1913, and the whole was designated a historic monument in 1917, the year of the map. Rathaus and Roland have been listed by UNESCO since 2004.
• The free port (Frei-Hafen) - to the west of the map, it was established in 1888, when Bremen joined the German customs union on the condition that its new basins remained outside the customs area. The silting up of the Weser made the city difficult for large ships to access, and a major river improvement project was launched the same year. The map also names the Hohentorshafen and the Holzhafen.
• The Norddeutscher Lloyd - this company, founded in Bremen in 1857 by Hermann Henrich Meier and Eduard Crüsemann, became one of Germany's largest shipping companies; several of its ships won the Blue Riband for the fastest crossing of the Atlantic. The map shows a Norddeutscher Lloyd building near the central station.
• The central station (Central-Bhf) - built from 1885 to 1889 by the architect Hubert Stier in Neo-Renaissance style, it opened on 15 October 1889 and replaced the neighbouring stations of Hanover and Hamburg. The map also names the Neustadt-Bahnhof, the Parkbahnhof, the Rangierbahnhof and the Haupt-Güterbahnhof.
• The Bürgerpark - designed in the 1860s by the landscape architect Wilhelm Benque, whose name appears on the map in that of a neighbouring street, it is Germany's largest urban park funded by private funds. Together with the Stadtwald, it covers 202 hectares; the map shows its lake, the Hollersee, near the Parkbahnhof.
• The trams - the red lines on the map are those of the Strassenbahn. Horse-drawn tram companies competed with each other: the Große Bremer Pferdebahn opened a line in 1879, and the networks reached the free port in 1888 and the Hohentor in 1889. In 1890, a line was electrified as a trial between the Bourse and the Bürgerpark exhibition site.

Cartographic key: this "Pharus-Plan Bremen" belongs to the same series as the 1917 plans of Berlin and Aachen: every monument is drawn in perspective, and the stations are in red. Above and below the map, banners praise the Magdeburgische Zeitung, with its eagle and the date of 1664: it was then the oldest German-language gazette, published thirteen times a week. The legend marks in orange the city's exit routes intended for motor vehicles and cyclists, and a grid of letters and numbers allows you to locate every place. Along the edges, arrows indicate the directions to Hamburg, Oldenburg, Hanover and Osnabrück, Vegesack and Bremerhaven.

In short: for anyone with ties to Bremen or the Weser, who loves Hanseatic cities and port history, this map shows a city-state in the Empire, with its free port and transatlantic company, in the very year its town hall was designated a historic monument.

What area does this map of Bremen cover? It covers Bremen and its surroundings: the old town on the right bank of the Weser, the Neustadt on the left bank, the free port, the central station, the Bürgerpark, and the suburbs up to the northern and eastern limits of the city.

In what year was this map published? This map dates from 1917. It was published by the Pharus-Verlag in Berlin.

Reproduction of the "Pharus-Plan Bremen", published in 1917 by the Pharus-Verlag in Berlin.

Printed on 200 g/m² textured art paper. Landscape orientation, standard 50x70 and 70x100 cm formats: easy to frame.