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Jena
Jena (German pronunciation: [ˈjeːna]) is a university city in central Germany on the river Saale. It has a population of approx. 103,000 and is the second largest city in the federal state of Thuringia, after Erfurt.
History
Jena was first mentioned in an 1182 document. In the 11th century it was a possession of the lords of Lobdeburg but, in the following century, it developed into an independent market town with laws and magistrates of its own. The local economy was based mainly on wine production. In 1286, the Dominicans were established in the city, followed by the Cistercians in 1301.
The margraves of Meißen imposed their authority over Jena in 1331. From 1423, it belonged to Electoral Saxony of the House of Wettin, which had inherited Meißen and remained under them after the division of Wettin lands in 1485.
The Protestant Reformation was brought to the city in 1523. In the following years, the Dominican and the Carmelite convents were attacked by the townsmen. In 1558, the university (now called the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena) was founded by elector John Frederick the Magnanimous.
For a short period (1672–1690), Jena was the capital of an independent dukedom (Saxe-Jena). In 1692, it was annexed to Saxe-Eisenach and, in 1741, to the Duchy (later Grand Duchy) of Saxe-Weimar, to which it belonged until 1918.
At the end of the 18th century, the university became the largest and most famous one among the German states and made Jena the centre of idealistic philosophy (with professors like Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Schiller and Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling) and of the early romanticism (with poets like Novalis, the brothers Schlegel and Ludwig Tieck). In 1794, the poets Goethe and Schiller met at the university and established a long lasting friendship.
On 14 October 1806, Napoleon fought and defeated the Prussian army here in the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt. Resistance against the French occupation was strong, especially among the town students, many of whom fought in the Lützow Free Corps in 1813. Two years later, the Urburschenschaft fraternity was founded in the city.
At the end of the 19th century, with the building of the Saal Railway (Saalbahn) along the river Saale from Halle/Leipzig to Nuremberg, Jena became a centre for precision machinery, optics and glass making, with the formation of the world famous companies Carl Zeiss Jena and Schott Jenaer Glaswerk, by Carl Zeiss, Ernst Abbe and Otto Schott.
In 1945, towards the end of World War II, Jena was heavily bombed by the American and British Allies. 153 people were killed and most of the medieval town centre was destroyed (though restored after the end of the war).
Part of the State of Thuringia from its foundation in 1920 on, it was incorporated into the German Democratic Republic in 1949 and its district of Gera in 1952. Since 1990, the city of Jena has been a part of the Free State of Thuringia in the united Federal Republic of Germany.
Economy
Today, Jena is a manufacturing city, specializing in precision machinery, pharmaceuticals, optics and photographic equipment and is home to the famous Zeiss optics plant. In 1926, the world's first modern planetarium was built by the Zeiss company in the Damenviertel district of the town.
Today, the city's economy diversifies into bioinformatics, biotechnology, software and photonics. The metropolitan area of Jena is among Germany's 50 fastest growing regions, with many internationally renowned research institutes and companies, a comparatively low unemployment and a very young population structure. Jena was awarded the title "Stadt der Wissenschaft" (city of science) by the Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft, a German science association, in 2008.
The Jen-Tower.
View over the city center of Jena
View from the Jen-Tower at night: the domed building was part of the former Carl-Zeiss works, now used by the University of Jena
Johannisstraße, looking towards Eichplatz. Jena
Christmas Market in Jena
Main sights
The 13th century Town Hall ("Rathaus"). It has an astronomical clock featuring the "Snatching Hans" ("Schnapphans").
The Gothic St. Michael's Church ("Michaelskirche", 1506). It has a bronze slab of Martin Luther's tomb
Monument to John Frederick the Magnanimous (1905–08), in the Market Square
Numerous towers from the medieval fortifications, including the Powder Tower (13th-14th centuries)
House of Friedrich Schiller and his Wedding Church.
The Botanischer Garten Jena, founded in 1580, the second oldest botanical garden in Germany
Jen-Tower, a research edifice built in GDR times. There is a restaurant and viewing platform at the 27th floor.
In the neighbourhood are the Dornburg Castles and the Kapellendorf Moated Castle.
Public transport
The city is served by the Jena tramway network, and by an extensive network of buses, both run by the "Jenah" organization (a pun on Jena and Nahverkehr, German for public transport).
Buses of the JES Verkehrsgesellschaft connect Jena with cities and villages in the region.
The high-speed Intercity-Express trains from Berlin to Munich call at the Jena Paradies station, just to the east of the city centre (like all other trains on the north-south Saal Railway); trains from Erfurt and further west arrive at Jena West station, just west of the city centre (like all other trains on the east-west Weimar–Gera line).
The nearest airports to Jena are Leipzig-Altenburg Airport and Erfurt Airport. However, international visitors normally arrive at Frankfurt, Berlin or Munich airports, from all of which there are convenient train connections to Jena.
Colleges, universities and research institutes
The Friedrich Schiller University of Jena was founded in 1558 as the "Collegium Jenense".
The University of Applied Sciences (Fachhochschule Jena) was founded in 1991.
The Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology is an important research center and offers a Ph.D. program.
The Max Planck Institute of Economics
The Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry
The Institute of Photonic Technology
The Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering (IOF)
INNOVENT - one of the biggest private research centers in Germany
The Leibniz Institute for Age Research is an important research center and offers a Ph.D program.
The Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology
Friedrich-Löffler-Institute of Bacterial Infections and Zoonoses
Friedrich-Löffler-Institute of Molecular Pathogenesis
The Jena Center for Bioinformatics
Museums
Optical Museum Jena - history of optical instruments
Schott GlassMuseum - production and usage of glass
The Göhre City Museum - urban history of Jena
Botanical Garden
Phyletic Museum - phylogeny and evolutionary theory
House of Romanticism - literature
Memorial to Goethe - literature
Oriental Coin Cabinet Jena - Oriental history, numismatics (non public, open for scientific research only)
Schott Villa - history of the Jena glassworks and of Otto Schott and his family
Culture
The Botanical Garden of Jena
The Jenaer Philharmonie is the largest independent symphony orchestra in Thuringia.
Kulturarena: annual music festival held in front of the theatre
Famous citizens and alumni of the university
Ernst Abbe, physicist, social reformer, partner of Carl Zeiss and Otto Schott
Anton Wilhelm Amo, African philosopher
Johannes R. Becher, poet and politician
Hans Berger, discoverer of human EEG
Bernhard, Prince of the Netherlands
Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, influential German naturalist, doctor, comparative anatomist and physiologist
Johann Gottfried Eichhorn, orientalist and Protestant theologian of the Enlightenment
Robert Enke, German footballer
Walter Eucken, founder of neoliberal economic theory
Rudolf Eucken, philosopher and the winner of the 1908 Nobel Prize for Literature
Johann Gottlieb Fichte, philosopher and early German nationalist
Gottlob Frege, mathematician, logician, and philosopher
Friedrich Wilhelm August Fröbel, inventor of the kindergarten
Johann Wolfgang Goethe, poet/writer
Ernst Haeckel, German evolutionary biologist/zoologist
G. W. F. Hegel, philosopher
Friedrich Hölderlin, poet
Martin Luther, reformer
Philipp Melanchthon, theologian
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, philosopher
Novalis, poet
Max Reger, composer, pianist, professor and conductor
Friedrich Schelling
Friedrich Schiller, poet/writer
Caroline Böhmer Schlegel Schelling
Wilhelm Schlegel, philosopher
Bernd Schneider, German footballer
Otto Schott, inventor of fireproof glass, founder of the Schott glass works
Reinhard Johannes Sorge, German poet, dramatist, and Roman Catholic convert
Johann Gustav Stickel, orientalist
Kurt Tucholsky, writer
Carl Zeiss, founder of the Zeiss company
Gabor Schablitzki aka Robag Wruhme, Electronic Musician, member of the Wighnomy Brothers
International relations
See also: List of twin towns and sister cities in Germany
Jena is twinned with:
Portugal Porto, Portugal[2]
Romania Lugoj, Romania, since 1983
Germany Erlangen, Germany, since 1987
Nicaragua San Marcos, Nicaragua, since 1996
France Aubervilliers, France, since 1999
United States Berkeley, USA
References
^ "Bevölkerung nach Gemeinden, erfüllenden Gemeinden und Verwaltungsgemeinschaften" (in German). Thüringer Landesamt für Statistik. 27 June 2011.
^ "International Relations of the City of Porto". © 2006-2009 Municipal Directorateofthe PresidencyServices InternationalRelationsOffice. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
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