Middle Low German is a developmental stage of Low German . It developed from the Old Saxon language in the Middle Ages and has been documented in writing since about 1225/34 ( Sachsenspiegel ). During the Hanseatic period (from about 1300 to about 1600), Middle Low German was the leading written language in the north of Central Europe and served as a lingua franca in the northern half of Europe. It was used parallel to medieval Latin also for purposes of diplomacy and for deeds .
117-798: The Steelyard , from the Middle Low German Stâlhof (sample yard), was the kontor (foreign trading post) of the Hanseatic League in London , and their main trading base in England, between the 13th and 16th centuries. The main goods that the League exported from London were wool and from the 14th century woollen cloths. An important import good was beeswax . The kontor tended to be dominated by Rhenish and Westphalian traders, especially from Cologne . The Steelyard
234-543: A sovereign state with the official title of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg . Hamburg was briefly annexed by Napoleon I to the First French Empire (1804–1814/1815). Russian forces under General Bennigsen finally freed the city in 1814. Hamburg re-assumed its pre-1811 status as a city-state in 1814. The Vienna Congress of 1815 confirmed Hamburg's independence and it became one of 39 sovereign states of
351-639: A district in Hamburg called the Portugiesenviertel [ de ] (Portuguese quarter) where many Portuguese people settled and which has a variety of Portuguese restaurants, cafes and shops that attract many tourists. There are several statues, squares and streets in Hamburg that are named after Portuguese historical figures. These include the Vasco da Gama statue on the Kornhaus bridge, which
468-563: A figure of about 143,200 Muslim migrants in Hamburg, making up 8.4% percent of the population. As of 2021 , there were more than 50 mosques in the city, including the Ahmadiyya run Fazle Omar Mosque , which is the oldest in the city, and which hosts the Islamic Centre Hamburg . A Jewish community also exists. As of 2022, around 2,500 Jews live in Hamburg. The city of Hamburg is one of 16 German states , therefore
585-497: A lengthening e or i , by doubling the following consonants (after short vowels) or by adding h after the following consonants. Lasch distinguished the following large dialect groups, emphasising that she based it strictly on the orthography, which may often omit strongly dialectal phenomena in favour of more prestigious/"standard" forms. Nevertheless, the dialect groups broadly correspond with modern ones. Westphalian ( HG : Westfälisch , Dutch : Westfaals ): Broadly speaking,
702-788: A long stretch of coastal regions from the Zuiderzee in the West to East Prussia in the East. Its orthographic habits come closest to what was traditionally perceived as a MLG standard (the Lübeck standard , nowadays disputed). Some features: Short /e/ and /i/ in open syllables are stretched into a [ɛː] -like vowel. The personal suffixes -er and -ald appear as -ar and -old . The pronouns mî (1.sg.), dî (2.sg.) and jû (2.pl.) are used for both dative and accusative. Three subgroups can be distinguished: (1) East Frisian and Oldenburgish , i.e.
819-635: A marsh between the River Alster and the River Elbe as a defence against Slavic incursion, and acquired the name Hammaburg , burg meaning castle or fort. The origin of the Hamma term remains uncertain, but its location is estimated to be at the site of today's Domplatz . In 834 CE, Hamburg was designated as the seat of a bishopric . The first bishop, Ansgar , became known as the Apostle of
936-412: A merchant corporation ( universitas mercatorum ) in a foreign trading city to facilitate Hanseatic trade. It had its own treasury, seal, code of rules, legal power to enforce rules on residents and administration. Security was the primary reason for establishing kontors, but they were also important for inspecting the quality of trade goods and diplomacy with local and regional authorities. The Steelyard
1053-685: A natural border. Main cities: Hanover , Hildesheim , Brunswick , Goslar , Göttingen , Magdeburg , Halle (early times). The area within the Elbe's drainage was established by colonisation and is in many ways special. The southern part of this Elbe Eastphalian ( HG : Elbostfälisch ) area switched to High German already in Late Medieval times. Some features : Umlaut is more productive, occurring before -ich and -isch (e.g. sessisch 'Saxon, Low German') and shifting also e to i (e.g. stidde for stêde 'place'). Diphthongised short /o/
1170-536: A new influx from the migrant crisis. There is an area in Hamburg behind the central station where many Afghan restaurants and shops are located. Many carpet businesses in Speicherstadt are operated by Afghan traders, with Hamburg still a global leader in the trade of oriental rugs. Hamburg residents with a foreign citizenship as of 31 December 2016 is as follows: As elsewhere in Germany, Standard German
1287-609: A second layer to the fortifications to protect against the Thirty Years' War in the seventeenth century, he extended Hamburg and created a "New Town" ( Neustadt ) whose street names still date from the grid system of roads he introduced. From the autumn of 1696 to the spring of 1697 the Company of Scotland trading to Africa and the Indies was active in Hamburg. While it was unsuccessful in raising capital locally, it commissioned
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#17327657898951404-630: A semidemocratic constitution that provided for the election of the Senate, the governing body of the city-state, by adult taxpaying males. Other innovations included the separation of powers, the separation of Church and State, freedom of the press, of assembly and association. Hamburg became a member of the North German Confederation (1866–1871) and of the German Empire (1871–1918), and maintained its self-ruling status during
1521-445: A sign of length, like oi = /oː/ ). The "breaking" of old short vowels in open syllables and before /r/ was often marked in writing (e.g. karn instead of korn ). Old geminated /jj/ and sometimes /ww/ was hardened into [ɡ] ; /ft/ frequently shifted to /xt/ (sometimes reversed in writing); /s/ instead of /ʃ/ ( sal vs schal ). The native present plural verbs was -et but the written norm often impressed -en . Similarly,
1638-425: A similar way the oblique form mik ('me') with "standard" mî . Unusually, there is also a dative pronoun (1.sg. mê ). Lexically, close connections with Nordalbingian. Unusual plural menne ('men'). (South) Brandenburgish ( HG : (Süd-)Brandenburgisch ) and East Anhaltish ( HG : Ostanhaltisch ): Roughly between the middle Elbe and the middle Oder, and along the middle Havel, bordering old Sorbian territory to
1755-742: A very high quality of living, being ranked 19th in the 2019 Mercer Quality of Living Survey. Hamburg hosts specialists in world economics and international law, including consular and diplomatic missions such as the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea , the EU-LAC Foundation , and the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning , multipartite international political conferences and summits such as Europe and China and
1872-686: Is Low German but whose inhabitants already spoke mostly/exclusively High German when the Reformation set in). Sub-periods of Middle Low German are: Middle Low German was the lingua franca of the Hanseatic League , spoken all around the North Sea and the Baltic Sea . It used to be thought that the language of Lübeck was dominant enough to become a normative standard (the so-called Lübecker Norm ) for an emergent spoken and written standard, but more recent work has established that there
1989-520: Is a modern term used with varying degrees of inclusivity. It is distinguished from Middle High German , spoken to the south, which was later replaced by Early New High German . Though Middle Dutch is today usually excluded from MLG (although very closely related), it is sometimes, especially in older literature, included in MLG, which then encompasses the dialect continuum of all high-medieval Continental Germanic dialects outside MHG , from Flanders in
2106-485: Is a variant of Low Saxon . The official name reflects Hamburg's history as a member of the medieval Hanseatic League and a free imperial city of the Holy Roman Empire . Before the 1871 unification of Germany , it was a fully sovereign city state , and before 1919 formed a civic republic headed constitutionally by a class of hereditary Grand Burghers or Hanseaten . Beset by disasters such as
2223-610: Is at a sheltered natural harbour on the southern fanning-out of the Jutland Peninsula , between Continental Europe to the south and Scandinavia to the north, with the North Sea to the west and the Baltic Sea to the northeast. It is on the River Elbe at its confluence with the Alster and Bille . The city centre is around the Binnenalster ("Inner Alster") and Außenalster ("Outer Alster"), both formed by damming
2340-701: Is in the greater Ohlsdorf Cemetery in the north of Hamburg. At least 42,900 people are thought to have perished in the Neuengamme concentration camp (about 25 km (16 mi) outside the city in the marshlands), mostly from epidemics and in the destruction of Kriegsmarine vessels housing evacuees at the end of the war. Systematic deportations of Jewish Germans and Gentile Germans of Jewish descent started on 18 October 1941. These were all directed to ghettos in Nazi-occupied Europe or to concentration camps . Most deported persons perished in
2457-661: Is no evidence for this and that Middle Low German was non-standardised. Middle Low German provided a large number of loanwords to languages spoken around the Baltic Sea as a result of the activities of Hanseatic traders. Its traces can be seen in the Scandinavian , Finnic , and Baltic languages , as well as Standard High German and English . It is considered the largest single source of loanwords in Danish , Estonian , Latvian , Norwegian and Swedish . Beginning in
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#17327657898952574-465: Is rarely marked as such, contrary to other dialects. Before /r/ , e and a are frequently interchanged for each other. Unstressed o (as in the suffix -schop ) frequently changes into u ( -schup ). The modal verb for 'shall/should' features /ʃ/ , not /s/ (i.e. schal ). The past participle's prefix was commonly spoken e- but mostly written ge- under prescriptive influence. The local form ek ('I' (pron. 1.sg.)) competed with "standard" ik ; in
2691-474: Is spoken in Hamburg, but as typical for northern Germany, the original language of Hamburg is Low German , usually referred to as Hamborger Platt (German Hamburger Platt ) or Hamborgsch . Since large-scale standardisation of the German language beginning in earnest in the 18th century, various Low German-coloured dialects have developed (contact-varieties of German on Low Saxon substrates). Originally, there
2808-703: Is the older usage, appearing as early as 1320. Kingsford traces the first reference to it as the Steelyard to 1382. In 1394 an English merchant writing from Danzig has: In civitate Londonia[...]in Curia Calibis : "In the city of London[...]at the court of steel" ( chalybs ). Kingsford concludes that Steelyard is a mistaken translation of Stâlhof . The kontor was also called the Esterlinghall ("Easterling hall") in Middle English, in 1340 for
2925-790: The Wends along the lower Elbe until about 1700 or the Kashubians of Eastern Pomerania up to modern times. In the North, the Frisian -speaking areas along the North Sea diminished in favour of Saxon, esp. in East Frisia which largely switched to MLG since the mid-14th century. North of the Elbe , MLG advanced slowly into Sleswick , against Danish and North Frisian , although the whole region
3042-598: The Baltic Sea (the 'East Sea'), their territory being called Ôsterlant ('East-land'), their inhabitants Ôsterlinge ('Eastlings'). This appellation was later expanded to other German Hanseatic cities and it was a general name for Hanseatic merchants in the Netherlands, e.g. in Bruges where they had their komptôr (office; see Kontor ). In the 16th century, the term nedderlendisch (lit. 'Lowland-ish, Netherlandish ') gained ground, contrasting Saxon with
3159-789: The Confederation of the Rhine . His son James Colquhoun was his successor as Consul of the Hanseatic cities in London. Lübeck, Bremen and Hamburg only sold their common property, the London Steelyard, to the South Eastern Railway in 1852. The buildings were demolished in 1863. Cannon Street station was built on the site and opened in 1866. The Steelyard was, like the other kontors, a legal person established as
3276-530: The Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg , is the second-largest city in Germany after Berlin and 6th-largest in the European Union with a population of over 1.9 million. The Hamburg Metropolitan Region has a population of over 5.1 million and is the eighth-largest metropolitan region by GDP in the European Union. At the southern tip of the Jutland Peninsula , Hamburg stands on
3393-513: The G20 . Former German chancellors Helmut Schmidt and Angela Merkel were both born in Hamburg. The former Mayor of Hamburg , Olaf Scholz , has been the current German chancellor since December 2021. Hamburg is a major international and domestic tourist destination . The Speicherstadt and Kontorhausviertel were declared World Heritage Sites by UNESCO in 2015. Hamburg's rivers and canals are crossed by around 2,500 bridges, making it
3510-554: The German dialects in the uplands to the south. It became dominant in the High German dialects (as ENHG niderländisch , which could also refer to the modern Netherlands ), while sassisch remained the most widespread term within MLG. The equivalent of 'Low German' ( NHG niederdeutsch ) seems to have been introduced later on by High German speakers and at first applied especially to Netherlanders. Middle Low German
3627-522: The German Confederation (1815–1866). In 1842, about a quarter of the inner city was destroyed in the " Great Fire ". The fire started on the night of 4 May and was not extinguished until 8 May. It destroyed three churches, the town hall, and many other buildings, killing 51 people and leaving an estimated 20,000 homeless. Reconstruction took more than 40 years. After periodic political unrest, particularly in 1848 , Hamburg adopted in 1860
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3744-482: The Great Fire of Hamburg , North Sea flood of 1962 and military conflicts including World War II bombing raids , the city has managed to recover and emerge wealthier after each catastrophe. Major regional broadcaster NDR , the printing and publishing firm Gruner + Jahr and the newspapers Der Spiegel and Die Zeit are based in the city. Hamburg is the seat of Germany's oldest stock exchange and
3861-543: The Hasselbrack at 116.2 metres (381 ft) AMSL . Hamburg borders the states of Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony . Hamburg has an oceanic climate ( Köppen : Cfb ; Trewartha : Dobk ), influenced by its proximity to the coast and maritime influences that originate over the Atlantic Ocean. The location in the north of Germany provides extremes greater than typical marine climates, but definitely in
3978-595: The Kontor of Bruges , but the London thirds had much less independence. The Hansards lived in the Steelyard at a relatively closed off area, more so than at Bryggen , and they certainly were not as integrated into the host city as at the kontor of Bruges . They had however many ties with Londoners, for example Englishmen acted as executors for Hansards, and merchants rented rooms from the English, so they were not nearly as segregated as at Novgorod 's Peterhof . The kontor
4095-515: The Lower Rhine , MLG bordered on closely related Low Franconian dialects whose written language was mainly Middle Dutch . In earlier times, these were sometimes included in the modern definition of MLG (cf. Terminology ). In the South, MLG bordered on High German dialects roughly along the northern borders of Hesse and Thuringia . The language border then ran eastwards across the plain of
4212-515: The Mayor of Hamburg 's office corresponds more to the role of a minister-president than to that of a city mayor. As a German state government , it is responsible for public education, correctional institutions and public safety; as a municipality, it is additionally responsible for libraries, recreational facilities, sanitation, water supply and welfare services. Since 1897, the seat of the government has been Hamburg City Hall (Hamburg Rathaus), with
4329-468: The RAF , killed at least 42,600 civilians; the precise number is not known. About one million civilians were evacuated in the aftermath of the raids. While some of the boroughs destroyed were rebuilt as residential districts after the war, others such as Hammerbrook were entirely developed into office, retail and limited residential or industrial districts. The Hamburg Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery
4446-597: The Weimar Republic (1919–1933). Hamburg acceded to the German Customs Union or Zollverein in 1888, the last (along with Bremen) of the German states to join. The city experienced its fastest growth during the second half of the 19th century when its population more than quadrupled to 800,000 as the growth of the city's Atlantic trade helped make it Europe's second-largest port. The Hamburg-America Line , with Albert Ballin as its director, became
4563-553: The sea shanty Hamborger Veermaster , written in the 19th century when Low German was used more frequently. Many toponyms and street names reflect Low Saxon vocabulary, partially even in Low Saxon spelling, which is not standardised, and to some part in forms adapted to Standard German. 65.2% of the population is not religious or adherent other religions than the Evangelical Church or Catholicism. In 2018, 24.9% of
4680-563: The world's oldest merchant bank , Berenberg Bank . Media, commercial, logistical, and industrial firms with significant locations in the city include multinationals Airbus , Blohm + Voss , Aurubis , Beiersdorf , Lufthansa and Unilever . Hamburg is also a major European science, research, and education hub , with several universities and institutions, including the Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron Laboratory DESY . The city enjoys
4797-567: The 15th century, Middle Low German fell out of favour compared to Early Modern High German, which was first used by elites as a written and, later, a spoken language. Reasons for this loss of prestige include the decline of the Hanseatic League, followed by political heteronomy of Northern Germany and the cultural predominance of Central and Southern Germany during the Protestant Reformation and Luther's translation of
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4914-488: The Bible . The description is based on Lasch (1914) which continues to be the authoritative comprehensive grammar of the language but is not necessarily up-to-date in every detail. It is not rare to find the same word in MLG affected by one of the following phonological processes in one text and unaffected by it in another text because the lack of a written standard, the dialectal variation and ongoing linguistic change during
5031-443: The English king than a free decision. The settlement was only later made official as the Steelyard and confirmed in tax and customs concessions granted by Edward I , in a Carta Mercatoria ("merchant charter") of 1303. This led to constant friction over the legal position of English merchants in the Hanseatic towns and Hanseatic privileges in England, which repeatedly ended in acts of violence. Not only English wool but finished cloth
5148-410: The English merchants. When negotiations failed, the grandmaster banned English imports and exports of forests to England in 1386. The compromise at the treaty of Marienburg of August 1388 restored trade ties but failed to address the underlying problems. But when a new grand master cancelled the treaty of Marienburg in 1398 after Prussian towns complained, Henry IV did not retaliate and instead reconfirmed
5265-552: The Flemings later in the century and even began to get involved in the export of English wool to Flanders. The first mention of a Hansa Almaniae (a "German Hansa") in English records is in 1282, concerning merely the community of the London trading post. This was a union of town merchant guilds ( hanses ) from Cologne, or the Rhineland, and Lübeck and Hamburg . It was maybe more the result of government pressure from London and
5382-579: The Guildhall existed alongside individual cities' privileges. Low German traders from the area around the Baltic Sea appeared in England too around this time, but they directed their trade more at English towns up north. The merchant communities from Westphalia and the Rhineland and from the Baltic formed a joint venture by the mid 13th century. They took over the hegemony in the trade with England from
5499-413: The Hamburg region ( Hamburg Metropolitan Region ) is home to 5,107,429 living on 196/km (510/sq mi). There were 915,319 women and 945,440 men in Hamburg. For every 1,000 females, there were 1,033 males. In 2015, there were 19,768 births in Hamburg (of which 38.3% were to unmarried women); 6422 marriages and 3190 divorces, and 17,565 deaths. In the city, the population was spread out, with 16.1% under
5616-467: The Hanseatic cities of Hamburg in 1804 and by Bremen and Lübeck shortly after as the successor of Henry Heymann, who was also Stahlhofmeister , "master of the Steelyard". Colquhoun was valuable to those cities through their occupation by the French since he provided indirect communication between Northern Germany and Whitehall , especially in 1808, when the three cities considered their membership in
5733-471: The Hanseatic privileges. A second treaty of Marienburg and a treaty between England and the wider Hanseatic League with promises about compensation and protection against pirates were agreed in 1405, followed by treaties in 1408 and 1409. However the underlying problems of tonnage and poundage and the lack of reciprocal rights for English merchants remained. By 1420 the Hanseatic League's trade in England had decreased in importance. Cologne remained dominant in
5850-583: The Hanseatic trade on England in the 15th century, and Danzig had a dominant role too. The English Parliament in 1431 increased poundage by half for foreign merchants. In 1434 the Tagfahrt ( de ) (the Hanse representative body) finally began negotiations and started a blockade at the same time. The conflict was resolved in 1437 with the Second Treaty of London, when Hanseatic privileges were renewed and
5967-502: The Holocaust . By the end of 1942, the Jüdischer Religionsverband in Hamburg was dissolved as an independent legal entity and its remaining assets and staff were assumed by the Reich Association of Jews in Germany (District Northwest). On 10 June 1943, the Reich Security Main Office dissolved the association by a decree. The few remaining employees not somewhat protected by a mixed marriage were deported from Hamburg on 23 June to Theresienstadt , where most of them perished. The city
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#17327657898956084-478: The League and its privileges in April 1471. Edward IV was helped by Hanseatic ships in his landing in May to retake power, but he reaffirmed Cologne's exclusive privileges in July. A war of piracy called the Anglo-Hanseatic War began against England, the main effort came from ships from Danzig, and much of the rest from Lübeck. One of their captains was the famous Paul Beneke , who commanded the formidable Peter von Danzig . Negotiations began in 1473 and Edward IV
6201-402: The Merchant Adventurers after the loss of the Dutch market in the Dutch Revolt . Hanseatic trade with England was centred in Hamburg in those days. Other Hanse towns resented the success of the Merchant Adventurers and wanted to secure the old favorable trade privileges that England suspended years ago. A Tagfahrt pressured Hamburg to close the Merchant Adventurers' trading post after the end of
6318-432: The Middle Low German (MLG) era. General notes Specific notes on nasals (Indented notes refer to orthography.) Specific notes on stops and fricatives Specific notes on approximants Modern renderings of MLG (like this article) often use circumflex or macron to mark vowel length (e.g. â or ā ) to help the modern reader, but original MLG texts marked vowel length not by accents but by doubling vowels, by adding
6435-460: The North. Two years later, Hamburg was united with Bremen as the Bishopric of Hamburg-Bremen . Hamburg was destroyed and occupied several times. In 845, 600 Viking ships sailed up the River Elbe and destroyed Hamburg, at that time a town of around 500 inhabitants. In 1030, King Mieszko II Lambert of Poland burned down the city. Valdemar II of Denmark raided and occupied Hamburg in 1201 and in 1214. The Black Death killed at least 60% of
6552-446: The River Alster to create lakes. The islands of Neuwerk , Scharhörn , and Nigehörn , 100 kilometres (60 mi) away in the Hamburg Wadden Sea National Park , are also part of the city of Hamburg. The neighbourhoods of Neuenfelde , Cranz , Francop and Finkenwerder are part of the Altes Land (old land) region, the largest contiguous fruit-producing region in Central Europe. Neugraben-Fischbek has Hamburg's highest elevation,
6669-426: The Southeast. Main cities: Berlin , Frankfurt/Oder , Zerbst . A colonial dialect strongly influenced by settlers speaking Low Franconian. Also strongly influenced by High German early on. Some features : Old long ê and ô were diphthongised into [iə] and [uə] , written i and u . Old Germanic coda /n/ is restored, contrary to Ingvaeonic sound changes , e.g. gans 'goose'. Present plural of verbs features
6786-416: The Steelyard were portrayed by Cornelis Ketel . There is a fine description of the Steelyard by John Stow . The Steelyard's privileges were suspended in 1552. One group that shipped trade goods for the merchant of Hamburg when they moved out of English active trade, was the Company of Merchant Adventurers of London . They got a residence for 10 years in Hamburg in 1567. Hamburg became a crucial market for
6903-441: The Steelyard, normally stationed in London for only a few years, sat for a famous series of portraits by Hans Holbein the Younger in the 1530s, portraits which were so successful that the Steelyard merchants commissioned from Holbein the allegorical paintings The Triumph of Riches and The Triumph of Poverty for their Hall. Both were destroyed by a fire, but there are copies in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford . Later merchants of
7020-555: The West to the eastern Baltic. Middle Low German covered a wider area than the Old Saxon language of the preceding period, due to expansion to the East and, to a lesser degree, to the North. In the East, the MLG-speaking area expanded greatly as part of the Ostsiedlung (settlement of the East) in the 12th to 14th century and came to include Mecklenburg , Brandenburg , Pomerania and (Old) Prussia , which were hitherto dominated by Slavic and Baltic tribes. Some pockets of these native peoples persisted for quite some time, e.g.
7137-420: The age of 18, and 18.3% were 65 years of age or older. 356 people in Hamburg were over the age of 100. According to the Statistical Office for Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein , the number of people with a migrant background is at 34% (631,246). Immigrants come from 200 countries. 5,891 people have acquired German cititzenship in 2016. In 2016, there were 1,021,666 households, of which 17.8% had children under
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#17327657898957254-403: The age of 18; 54.4% of all households were made up of singles. 25.6% of all households were single parent households. The average household size was 1.8. Hamburg has the largest Portuguese community in Germany with about 30,000 people with Portuguese heritage . Many Portuguese sailors and merchants came to Hamburg beginning in the 15th century due to its port . Since the 1970s, there has been
7371-482: The agreement and Hamburg obeyed. England responded with countermeasures. Queen Elizabeth suppressed the Steelyard and rescinded its privileges in 1598. James I reopened the Steelyard, but it never again carried the weight it formerly had in London. Most of the buildings were destroyed during the Great Fire of London in 1666. The land and buildings remained the property of the Hanseatic League, and were subsequently let as warehouses to merchants. The Hanseatic League
7488-423: The area between the middle Weser and lower Rhine . Main cities: Münster , Paderborn , Dortmund , Bielefeld , Osnabrück . Some Saxon dialects in the modern Netherlands (esp. modern Gelderland and Overijssel ) belonged to this group. Dutch influence on them strongly increased since the 15th century. Some features : In the West, strong influence from Low Franconian orthographic patterns (e.g. e or i as
7605-481: The areas further east, like Mecklenburg , Pomerania , northern Brandenburg (Prignitz, Uckermark, Altmark), Old Prussia , Livonia . Very close to Nordalbingian . While the Eastern dialects are today clearly distinguished from the West by their uniform present plural verb ending in -en (against Western uniform -(e)t ), in MLG times, both endings competed against each other in West and East. Main towns: Lübeck, Wismar , Rostock , Stralsund . High German influence
7722-472: The areas west of the lower Weser , in the North including dialects on Frisian substrate. As can be expected, there is much Westphalian, Dutch and Frisian influence ( hem next to em 'him'; plurals in -s ; vrent next to vrünt 'friend'). (2) Nordalbingian , between the lower Weser and the lower Elbe , and also Holstein on the right bank of the lower Elbe . main towns: Hamburg , Bremen , Lunenburg , Kiel . (3) East Elbian , including Lübeck and
7839-528: The boroughs and quarters have been rearranged several times. Each borough is governed by a Borough Council (German: Bezirksversammlung ) and administered by a Municipal Administrator (German: Bezirksamtsleiter ). The boroughs are not independent municipalities: their power is limited and subordinate to the Senate of Hamburg . The borough administrator is elected by the Borough Council and thereafter requires confirmation and appointment by Hamburg's Senate. The quarters have no governing bodies of their own. Since
7956-430: The branching River Elbe at the head of a 110 km (68 mi) estuary to the North Sea , on the mouth of the Alster and Bille . Hamburg is one of Germany's three city-states alongside Berlin and Bremen , and is surrounded by Schleswig-Holstein to the north and Lower Saxony to the south. The Port of Hamburg is Germany's largest and Europe's third-largest , after Rotterdam and Antwerp . The local dialect
8073-711: The category due to the prevailing westerlies. Nearby wetlands enjoy a maritime temperate climate. The amount of snowfall has varied greatly in recent decades. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, heavy snowfall sometimes occurred, the winters of recent years have been less cold, with snowfall just a few days per year. The warmest months are June, July, and August, with high temperatures of 20.1 to 22.5 °C (68.2 to 72.5 °F). The coldest are December, January, and February, with low temperatures of −0.3 to 1.0 °C (31.5 to 33.8 °F). The annual extreme temperatures range from −29.1 °C (−20.4 °F) on 13 February 1940, to 40.1 °C (104.2 °F) on 20 July 2022 , and
8190-439: The city and the harbour. On 23 July 1943, the Royal Air Force and United States Army Air Force firebombing created a firestorm which spread from the Hauptbahnhof (main railway station) and quickly moved south-east, completely destroying entire boroughs such as Hammerbrook , Billbrook and Hamm South . Thousands of people perished in these densely populated working class boroughs. The raids, codenamed Operation Gomorrah by
8307-403: The city from most of its hinterland and reduced Hamburg's global trade. Since German reunification in 1990, and the accession of several Central European and Baltic countries into the European Union in 2004, the Port of Hamburg has restarted ambitions for regaining its position as the region's largest deep-sea port for container shipping and its major commercial and trading centre. Hamburg
8424-571: The city with the highest number of bridges in Europe, and with 5 of the world's 29 tallest churches standing in Hamburg , it is also the city with the highest number of churches surpassing 100 metres (330 ft) worldwide. Aside from its rich architectural heritage, the city is also home to notable cultural venues such as the Elbphilharmonie and Laeiszhalle concert halls. It gave birth to movements like Hamburger Schule and paved
8541-608: The coalition broke apart on 28 November 2010. On 7 March 2011 Olaf Scholz ( SPD ) became mayor. After the 2015 election the SPD and the Alliance 90/The Greens formed a coalition. Hamburg is made up of seven boroughs (German: Bezirke ) and subdivided into 104 quarters (German: Stadtteile ). There are 181 localities (German: Ortsteile ). The urban organisation is regulated by the Constitution of Hamburg and several laws. Most of
8658-644: The construction of four vessels in the port. The Caledonia , a ship of 600 tons with 56 guns, and the Instuaration (later renamed the St. Andrew ), a vessel of 350 tons, were launched in March 1697. Upon the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, the Free Imperial City of Hamburg was not incorporated into a larger administrative area while retaining special privileges ( mediatised ), but became
8775-518: The crown council. The Hanseatic cities were open to negotiation but rejected any common Hanseatic liability and called for an embargo against England. The merchants of Cologne were exempted from the ruling and could trade unhindered, which served to foment dissension among Hansards. Meanwhile Henry VI was put back on the throne in 1470 as part of the Wars of the Roses . Cologne was temporarily excluded from
8892-540: The first constitution of Hamburg . In 1356, the Matthiae-Mahl feast dinner for Hanseatic League cities was celebrated for the first time on 25 February, the first day of spring in medieval times. It continues today as the world's oldest ceremonial meal. In 1529, the city embraced Lutheranism , and it received Reformed refugees from the Netherlands and France. When Jan van Valckenborgh introduced
9009-726: The first time. The Steelyard was located on the north bank of the Thames by the outflow of the Walbrook , in the Dowgate ward of the City of London . The site is bounded by Cousin Lane on the west, Upper Thames Street on the north, and Allhallows Lane on the east, an area of 5,250 m or 1.3 acres. It is now covered by Cannon Street station and commemorated in the names of Steelyard Passage and Hanseatic Walk. The Steelyard, like other Hansa stations,
9126-535: The largest medieval trading complex in Britain, were uncovered by archaeologists during maintenance work on Cannon Street Station . Merchants from Cologne bought a building at the corner of Thames Street and Cousin Lane in the 1170s, though they seem to have used it as early as 1157, and it became known as the "Germans' Guildhall" ( Gildahalda teutonicorum ). Henry II of England granted very extensive privileges to traders from Cologne in 1175/76 in an attempt to limit
9243-583: The latest territorial reform of March 2008, the boroughs are Hamburg-Mitte , Altona , Eimsbüttel , Hamburg-Nord , Wandsbek , Bergedorf , and Harburg . Hamburg-Mitte ("Hamburg Centre") covers mostly the urban centre of the city and consists of the quarters Billbrook , Billstedt , Borgfelde , Finkenwerder , HafenCity , Hamm , Hammerbrook , Horn , Kleiner Grasbrook , Neuwerk , Rothenburgsort , St. Georg , St. Pauli , Steinwerder , Veddel , Waltershof , and Wilhelmsburg . The quarters Hamburg-Altstadt ("old town") and Neustadt ("new town") are
9360-453: The latter was measured at Hamburg-Neuwiedenthal Meteorological Station, on the same day, a high temperature record of 39.1 °C (102.4 °F) was recorded at Hamburg Airport . View climate chart 1986–2016 or 1960–1990 On 31 December 2016, there were 1,860,759 people registered as living in Hamburg in an area of 755.3 km (291.6 sq mi). The population density was 2,464/km (6,380/sq mi). The metropolitan area of
9477-467: The main trade routes of the North Sea and Baltic Sea , quickly made it a major port in Northern Europe. Its trade alliance with Lübeck in 1241 marks the origin and core of the powerful Hanseatic League of trading cities. On 8 November 1266, a contract between Henry III and Hamburg's traders allowed them to establish a hanse in London. This was the first time in history that the word hanse
9594-479: The merchants' native cities. The Steelyard had its own statutes, like any kontor, written in Middle Low German , the main language of the Hanseatic merchants. It applied to all traders of the Hanse who resided in London. In the 14th and early 15th century, most rules were introduced by the kontor's merchants, but after 1474 legislation was decided by the Hanseatic hometowns. The main export from England
9711-506: The middle Elbe until it met the (then more extensive) Sorb -speaking area along the upper Spree that separated it from High German. The border was never a sharp one, rather a continuum . The modern convention is to use the pronunciation of northern maken vs. southern machen ('to make') for determining an exact border. Along the middle Elbe and lower Saale rivers, Low German began to retreat in favour of High German dialects already during Late Medieval times (cf. Wittenberg whose name
9828-510: The most important of the imports goods, but the Hansards also imported salted herring, stockfish and beer to London. The Steelyard possibly gave its name to the steelyard balance , a type of portable balance , consisting of a suspended horizontal beam. An object to be weighed would be hung on the shorter end of the beam, while weights would be slid along the longer end, till the beam balanced. The weight could then be calculated by multiplying
9945-486: The new duties were removed. The Teutonic grandmaster did not ratify the treaty, pressed by Danzig , but England still enforced it despite unfulfilled demands for equal privileges for English traders in 1442 and 1446. Another English attack on Hanseatic ships, this time a Wendish and Prussian salt fleet, in May 1449 led to another crisis. Lübeck instructed German traders to leave England in 1450 and blocked English trade through
10062-513: The office of the mayor, the meeting room for the Senate and the floor for the Hamburg Parliament . From 2001 until 2010, the mayor of Hamburg was Ole von Beust , who governed in Germany's first statewide "black-green" coalition, consisting of the conservative CDU Hamburg and the alternative GAL, which are Hamburg's regional wing of the Alliance 90/The Greens party. Von Beust was briefly succeeded by Christoph Ahlhaus in 2010, but
10179-585: The originally seven gates of the city, from where the roads led to their interests in Boston and Lynn . Danzig and Cologne were still the dominant players in the Hansa's trade on England in the 16th century, but Hamburg achieved an important role by shipping German fabrics and Icelandic cod to England and English ink to the Netherlands. Hamburg's merchants became over time less involved in active trade with England, and let other parties carry goods instead. Members of
10296-497: The participle prefix ge- was usually written, though probably only spoken in the Southwest. Lexically, strong connections with adjacent dialects further north (East Frisian and Oldenburgish), e.g. godensdach ('Wednesday') instead of middeweke . Westphalian was and is often thought to be altogether the most conservative dialect group. North Low Saxon ( HG : Nordniedersächsisch , Dutch : Noord-Nedersaksisch ): Spoken in
10413-459: The people"; 'popular, vernacular') which could also be used for Low German if the context was clear. Compare also the modern colloquial term Platt(dütsch) (from platt 'plain, simple') denoting Low (or West Central ) German dialects in contrast to the written standard . Another medieval term is ôstersch (lit. 'East-ish') which was at first applied to the Hanseatic cities of
10530-1068: The population belonged to the North Elbian Evangelical Lutheran Church , the largest religious body, and 9.9% to the Roman Catholic Church . Hamburg is seat of one of the three bishops of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Northern Germany and seat of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Hamburg . According to the publication Muslimisches Leben in Deutschland (" Muslim life in Germany "), an estimated 141,900 Muslim migrants (from nearly 50 countries of origin) lived in Hamburg in 2008. About three years later (May 2011) calculations based on census data for 21 countries of origin resulted in
10647-521: The population in 1350. Hamburg experienced several great fires in the medieval period. In 1189, by imperial charter, Frederick I "Barbarossa" granted Hamburg the status of a Free Imperial City and tax-free access (or free-trade zone ) up the Lower Elbe into the North Sea. In 1265, an allegedly forged letter was presented to or by the Rath of Hamburg. This charter, along with Hamburg's proximity to
10764-446: The power of Flemish merchants who then controlled the English wool trade. This group from Cologne effectively controlled the trade of Rhine wine and acquired a building called the gildhalla from then on too. They are alluded to in the De itinere navali , an account of crusaders from Lübeck for whom the kontor arranged the purchase of a replacement cog in the summer of 1189. The privileges of
10881-503: The primary written language, speakers also referred to discourse in Saxon as speaking/writing to dǖde , i.e. 'clearly, intelligibly'. This contains the same root as dǖdisch 'German' (cf. High German : deutsch , Dutch duits ( archaically N(i)ederduytsche to mean the contemporary version of the Dutch language ) both from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz lit. "of
10998-469: The quarters were former independent cities, towns or villages annexed into Hamburg proper. The last large annexation was done through the Greater Hamburg Act of 1937, when the cities Altona , Harburg , and Wandsbek were merged into the state of Hamburg. The Act of the Constitution and Administration of Hanseatic city of Hamburg established Hamburg as a state and a municipality. Some of
11115-535: The same time English traders entered the Baltic and especially Prussian trade, demanding equal reciprocal trading rights. A trade conflict began in 1385 when an English privateer fleet seized a number of Hanseatic ships near Bruges in the Zwin . Some ship were Prussian and the grandmaster of the Teutonic Order confiscated English goods. Richard II retaliated and confiscated Prussian goods in England to compensate
11232-604: The suffix -en . Lack of negative determiner nên ('no' (attr.)), instead: keyn , similar to High German. The past participle retains the prefix ge- . Lack of gaderen ('to gather') and tőgen ('to show'); instead of them, forms close to High German, i.e. samenen and teigen . In East Anhaltish, distinction of dative and accusative pronouns (e.g. mi vs mik , cf. HG mir and mich ). Hamburg Hamburg ( German: [ˈhambʊʁk] , locally also [ˈhambʊɪ̯ç] ; Low Saxon : Hamborg [ˈhambɔːç] ), officially
11349-456: The sum of the known weights by the ratio of the distances from the beam's fulcrum . 51°30′41″N 0°05′26″W / 51.51139°N 0.09056°W / 51.51139; -0.09056 Middle Low German While Middle Low German (MLG) is a scholarly term developed in hindsight, speakers in their time referred to the language mainly as sassisch (Saxon) or de sassische sprâke (the Saxon language). In contrast to Latin as
11466-641: The way for bands including the Beatles . Hamburg is also known for several theatres and a variety of musical shows. St. Pauli 's Reeperbahn is among the best-known European red light districts. Claudius Ptolemy (2nd century AD) reported the first name for the vicinity as Treva . The name Hamburg comes from the first permanent building on the site, a castle which the Emperor Charlemagne ordered constructed in AD 808. It rose on rocky terrain in
11583-509: The world's largest transatlantic shipping company around the start of the 20th century. Shipping companies sailing to South America, Africa, India and East Asia were based in the city. Hamburg was the departure port for many Germans and Eastern Europeans to emigrate to the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Trading communities from all over the world established themselves there. A major outbreak of cholera in 1892
11700-503: The Øresund in 1452 by an agreement with Christian I of Denmark. England was weakened after the Hundred Years' War and briefly restored the Hanseatic privileges, though another salt fleet from Lübeck was taken in 1458. Incidents like that kept tensions high. Edward IV held the Hanseatic League responsible, when English ships were attacked in the Øresund by Danes in 1468, and German merchants in London were arrested and convicted by
11817-408: Was a range of such Missingsch varieties, the best-known being the low-prestige ones of the working classes and the somewhat more bourgeois Hanseatendeutsch (Hanseatic German), although the term is used in appreciation. All of these are now moribund due to the influences of Standard German used by education and media. However, the former importance of Low German is indicated by several songs, such as
11934-478: Was a separate walled community with its own warehouses on the river, its own weigh house , chapel, counting houses , a guildhall , cloth halls, wine cellars, kitchens, and residential quarters. The kontor could be accessed by sea-going ships. As a church the Germans used former All-Hallows-the-Great , since there was only a small chapel on their own premises. In 1988 remains of the former Hanseatic kontor, once
12051-609: Was badly handled by the city government, which retained an unusual degree of independence for a German city. About 8,600 died in the largest German epidemic of the late 19th century, and the last major cholera epidemic in a major city of the Western world. Hamburg was a Gau within the administrative division of Nazi Germany from 1934 until 1945. During the Second World War , the Allied bombing of Hamburg devastated much of
12168-463: Was dropped, though this result was against the background of the reduction of the Hanseatic trade's importance over the 15th century. In 1475 the Hanseatic League purchased the London site outright and it became universally known as the Steelyard. The kontor then required that Hansards lived on the Steelyard. In exchange for the privileges the German merchants had to maintain Bishopsgate , one of
12285-405: Was exported through the Hansa, who controlled the trade in English cloth-making centres. After the treaty of Stralsund the Hansards drove out rival merchants from Scania. English traders were arrested and their goods confiscated. The English king imposed new tonnage and poundage in 1371/72, that covered Hanseatic goods too. The Hanseatic towns and traders thought it violated their privileges. At
12402-487: Was formed by the area of Cologne , the left bank of the Rhine and Guelders . A second by the Wendish, Saxon and Westphalian towns and the right bank of the Rhine. The final third was made up of Livonian, Prussian and Gotlandic towns. The German alderman and his deputies were not allowed to come from the same third, so representation of all regional merchant groups' interests was ensured. A similar division of third existed at
12519-486: Was in the middle of the town on the Thames, but this also made it easy to block off. London was a city with a more cosmopolitan, urban flair than the average Hanseatic hometown. Merchants operating out of the Steelyard were granted certain privileges and were exempt from customs duties and some taxes. In effect, the Steelyard was a separate and independent community, governed by the codes of the Hanseatic League, and enforced by
12636-494: Was led by an alderman, who was the chief juridical authority and diplomatic representative. There was also an English alderman from the late 14th century, an arrangement that was unique to London. The aldermen were assisted by achteinen , assistants or deputies. Around the mid 15th century the position of clerk, who was legally trained and performed secretarial duties. The Hanseatic merchants in London were grouped in geographical categories called "thirds" (German: Drittel ). One third
12753-534: Was never officially dissolved but is considered to have disintegrated in 1669. Lübeck , Hamburg and Bremen would however continue to be known as the "Hanseatic Cities". Consulates of the Hanseatic cities provided indirect communication between Northern Germany and Whitehall during the European blockade of the Napoleonic wars . Patrick Colquhoun was appointed as Resident Minister and Consul general by
12870-549: Was not the only Hanseatic trading post in England. There were a number of Hanseatic factories on the English east coast, like the remaining Hanseatic warehouse in King's Lynn , Norfolk. The name seems to indicate the practice of tagging samples ( stalen ) of inspected wool with a seal . In Charles Kingsford's commentary on John Stow 's A Survey of London (1598 edition) the Middle Low German name Stâlhof
12987-538: Was open to make large concessions for peace. Hanseatic demands were very excessive and Edward did not transfer the property of the Steelyard and the outposts in Lynn and Boston to the Hanseatic towns, but they achieved a very favourable peace from the English commissioners in Utrecht in 1474 : many regulations from the Second Treaty of London of 1437 were reconfirmed and the demand for reciprocity on behalf of English merchants
13104-455: Was ruled by Denmark . MLG exerted a huge influence upon Scandinavia (cf. History ), even if native speakers of Low German were mostly confined to the cities where they formed colonies of merchants and craftsmen. It was an official language of Old Livonia , whose population consisted mostly of Baltic and Finnic tribes. In the West, at the Zuiderzee , the forests of the Veluwe and close to
13221-523: Was strong in the Teutonic Order , due to the diverse regional origins of its chivalric elite, therefore MLG written culture was neglected early on. Eastphalian ( HG : Ostfälisch ): Roughly the area east of the middle Weser , north and partly west of the Harz mountains, reaching the middle Elbe , but leaving out the Altmark region. In the north, the sparsely populated Lunenburg Heath forms something of
13338-590: Was suggested by Portuguese residents to bring visibility to the Portuguese community in Hamburg. Hamburg's Afghan community of about 50,000 people is the largest not only in Germany, but also in Europe. They first came to Hamburg in the 1970s before expanding during the Afghan conflict in the 1980s and 1990s where many Afghan migrants chose to live in Hamburg. After 2015 the Afghan population almost doubled due to
13455-608: Was surrendered to British Forces on 3 May 1945, in the Battle of Hamburg , three days after Adolf Hitler 's death. After the Second World War , Hamburg formed part of the British Zone of Occupation ; it became a state of West Germany in 1949. On 16 February 1962, a North Sea flood caused the Elbe to rise to an all-time high, inundating one-fifth of Hamburg and killing more than 300 people. The inner German border – only 50 kilometres (30 mi) east of Hamburg – separated
13572-468: Was used for the trading guild of the Hanseatic League . In 1270, the solicitor of the senate of Hamburg , Jordan von Boitzenburg , wrote the first description of civil, criminal and procedural law for a city in Germany in the German language, the Ordeelbook ( Ordeel : sentence). On 10 August 1410, civil unrest forced a compromise (German: Rezeß , literally meaning: withdrawal). This is considered
13689-421: Was wool, but from the late 14th century cloth became an important export good. The importance of London as an export harbour grew with this shift. London also supplied luxury goods, like spices and literature. Trade in London was not controlled by the Hansards, and they met traders from various places in Europe, offering the availability of exotic goods but showing also new ideas and customs. Beeswax and fur were
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