Cologne - Kölner Dom

Cologne is the fourth-largest city in Germany - and one of the oldest. A Germanic tribe, the Ubii, had a settlement here, this was named by the Romans "Oppidum Ubiorum". In 50 AD, the Romans founded "Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium", the city then became the provincial capital of "Germania Inferior".

The "Kölner Dom" (Cologne Cathedral) seen from the Rheinauhafen.

The cathedral was planned as a grand structure to house the reliquary of the Magi. The relics of the "Three Holy Kings" had been stolen from Milano by Archbishop Rainald von Dassel when his friend and confidante of Emperor Frederick Barbarossa looted and destroyed Milano in 1164.

The construction of the cathedral began in 1248 but was halted in the years around 1560 unfinished. Work did not restart until the 1840s, and the cathedral was completed to its original medieval plan in 1880.

After the original plans for the façade had been found in Darmstadt and Paris 1814/1816 it was decided to complete the cathedral. Two-thirds of the costs were raised by civic efforts, while the remaining costs were covered by the Prussian state. The state saw this as a way to improve its relations with the large number of Catholic subjects it had gained in 1815 when the Catholic Rhineland was added to the Protestant Prussian Kingdom.

In 1842 Frederick William IV of Prussia and Johannes von Geissel, later archbishop of Cologne laid the foundation stone for the completion. In 1880, 632 years after construction had begun, the Cologne Cathedral was completed. The celebration was attended by Emperor Wilhelm I. It was regarded as a project to symbolize German nationhood.

With a height of about 157 m., the cathedral was the highest building on the planet for a short while. The Washington Monument, completed in 1884, took over that position with 169m.