Saxony

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Leipzig, Saxony, Germany (1890s)

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Leipzig, Saxony, Germany (1890s)

The Leipzig region was the arena of the 1813 Battle of Leipzig between Napoleonic France and an allied coalition of Prussia, Russia, Austria and Sweden. It was the largest battle in Europe before the First World War and the coalition victory ended Napoleon’s presence in Germany and would ultimately lead to his first exile on Elba. The Monument to the…
Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Halle and Madgeburg, Saxony (1890s)

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Halle and Madgeburg, Saxony (1890s)

Halle’s early history is connected with the harvesting of salt. The name of the river Saale contains the Germanic root for salt, and salt-harvesting has taken place in Halle since at least the Bronze Age (2300–600 BC). Magdeburg was annexed to the French-controlled Kingdom of Westphalia in the 1807 Treaty of Tilsit. King Jérôme appointed Count Heinrich von Blumenthal as…
Vintage: Altstadt, Dresden, Saxony, Germany in the late 19th Century

Vintage: Altstadt, Dresden, Saxony, Germany in the late 19th Century

The city of Dresden had a distinctive silhouette, captured in famous paintings by Bernardo Bellotto and by Norwegian painter Johan Christian Dahl. Between 1806 and 1918 the city was the capital of the Kingdom of Saxony (which was a part of the German Empire from 1871). During the Napoleonic Wars the French emperor made it a base of operations, winning…