Stein am Rhein

The Rathausplatz in Stein am Rhein is often called Switzerland's most beautiful town square, with every building adorned with painted facades. Most of the original frescoes were painted by the German artist Thomas Schmid between 1520 and 1525, making this the world's largest concentration of Renaissance facade frescoes. The paintings depict biblical stories, mythological scenes, everyday life, and moral tales. Owners of frescoed buildings must maintain the paintings at their own expense in the same condition as the originals.

In September 1969, workers laying heating pipes in Stein am Rhein discovered two skeletons and a glass bowl fragment, leading to the excavation of a necropolis of 83 graves. The grave goods include exceptional Roman glassware, notably the Jagdschale (hunting cup), made in the Rhineland between 260 and 290 AD, and a double glass jug from Cologne dating to the early 4th century. The Roman settlement at this Rhine crossing was called Tasgetium, and a Late Roman fortress was built here around 294 AD under Emperors Diocletian and Maximian.

Kloster St. Georgen is one of the best-preserved medieval monastery complexes in Switzerland. The last abbot, David von Winkelsheim (elected 1499, died 1526), commissioned the Festsaal around 1515, a banquet hall decorated with frescoes that count among the earliest Renaissance paintings north of the Alps. The paintings were by Thomas Schmid and Ambrosius Holbein. During the Reformation in 1525, the monastery was secularised and its assets taken over by Zuerich. Winkelsheim was suspected of collusion with the Habsburgs and imprisoned, but escaped to Radolfzell, where he died shortly after in 1526.

Hohenklingen Castle stands at 590 metres above sea level on the wooded ridge above Stein am Rhein. Around 1200, Walter von Klingen erected a residential tower on the site. Walther III von Klingen (c. 1220--1284), a descendant, was a Minnesaenger (lyric poet) whose eight songs are preserved in the famous Codex Manesse manuscript. The miniature in the Codex depicts him as the victor of a joust. The castle was the first toll castle on the Rhine, and has been remarkably spared from war damage throughout its entire history.

The Haus zur Sonne (House of the Sun) is the oldest hotel in Stein am Rhein, built around 1520 under Mayor Johann Jakob Meyer. Its main fresco shows a large laughing sun overlooking a man hiding in a barrel while being interrogated by soldiers. The house is one of many Renaissance-era painted buildings on the Rathausplatz, where Thomas Schmid created the world's largest concentration of facade frescoes between 1520 and 1525.

In 1972, Stein am Rhein became the very first winner of the Wakkerpreis, awarded by the Schweizer Heimatschutz (Swiss Heritage Society). The prize was made possible through a bequest from Geneva businessman Henri-Louis Wakker, who died in 1972. The jury praised Stein am Rhein for caring for an extraordinary and unique townscape in exemplary fashion, noting that nowhere else in Switzerland could one find so many outstanding individual buildings in such a small space. The award was worth CHF 20,000.

Dendrochronological analysis of bridge piles discovered in 1986 dates the first wooden bridge across the Rhine at Stein am Rhein to 81--82 AD. The Roman settlement here was called Tasgetium, a name recorded by the geographer Claudius Ptolemaeus in the 2nd century AD as Taxgaition, deriving from a Celtic personal name, Tasgetius. The civilian settlement lay on the south bank in present-day Eschenz, while the fortress stood on the north bank.

Zum Weissen Adler (White Eagle) is considered the most beautifully decorated building on Stein am Rhein's Rathausplatz, featuring the oldest preserved Renaissance mural in Switzerland from around 1520, with scenes from Boccaccio's Decameron and a depiction of Hercules fighting the Hydra. Zum Rothen Ochsen (Red Ox) is the oldest tavern in town, first documented in 1395, featuring a red ox fresco alongside medieval village scenes. Both are part of the extraordinary ensemble of painted facades that earned the town the first Wakkerpreis in 1972.