Skip to main content

Begging Your Indulgence. . .

The yearly Christmas Market in Luebeck, Germany, adjacent to the Marienkirche and the old Rathaus.  While I've never been to the city in December, I've spent lots of time goofing off in this very square during visits in 1986, 1990, and 2009.

Today is the first of December and time again for various and sundry seasonal images that catch my eye.  While I promise there will be more photos of my own soldiers-in-progress and tabletop battles in the coming days and weeks as the academic calendar for the year mercifully winds down, I nevertheless wanted to kick off the Advent and Christmas season with a few photographs of the annual Luebecker Weinachtsmarkt . . .  The Christmas Market as it exists in Luebeck, Germany.  I've never been fortunate enough to spend Christmas in this delightfully sleepy old capital of the Hanseatic League, but I hope to one day.  Keep your fingers crossed.  In the meantime. . .


Another part of the Christmas market in the old part of the city center, this time along An der Obertrave.  The Grand Duchess and I purchased some delicious marzipan in one of the shops here during our June 2009 visit to Luebeck.


Another Christmas market in another part of the old town, this time in front of the old Hospital of the Holy Ghost along Der Grosse Burgstrasse.


Here's a shot of the main Christmas Market near the Marienkirche.  Doesn't it look pretty?  The German word gemuetlichkeit comes readily to mind when I look at scenes like this. 


  Here's a dark, snowy street scene during one recent December in Luebeck.  It looked just like this the first time I visited in Febrary 1986.  Snow and coalsmoke everywhere.  I even saw a tall blond guy with a mustache dressed in old-fashioned black chimney sweep clothes, complete with tophat and large wire brush attached to a long, coiled cable over his shoulder.


And finally, an advertisement for one recent Christmas Market in the city.  Why is it that we always want to be somewhere else where we are not?

Comments

Rob Young said…
Like Christmas markets. Went to Lille yesterday - small but quite nice. Lincoln next weekend - well worth the visit to anyone in the UK. Birmingham is pretty good as well, but I wasn't impressed by the London ones last year - expensive. Wife and son have been to Cologne, which actually has several markets dotted about, and liked that, I've never been there though.
11:47 AM
Der Alte Fritz said…
Less Holiday stuff, more toy soldiers or Hives stories please.
1:03 PM
Old School ACW said…
Wouldn't it be great to be about 6 and at the Christmas Market?
1:07 PM
Anonymous said…
They have started to have Christmas market where I live in Cirencester. No snow though. : ( The dark winter street scene reminded me of my last visit to Prague back in February 2007. It snowed the second day and the view from the castle across the city was timeless. Red tiled roofs covered in snow and smoke rising from the chimneys.
11:29 PM
Unknown said…
Well, you do know that there is a German Christmas Market in Chicago at Daley Plaza each year. I may walk over there tomorrow and have a knockwurst for lunch.
11:51 PM
CelticCurmudgeon said…
My Dear Heinz-Ulrich,

These wonderful pictures remind me so sentimentally of the Christmas markets of my youth. May you and the royal family have the most wonderful of holiday seasons.

Gerardus Magnus
Archbishop Emeritus
10:34 AM
warpaintjj said…
Seasons greeting old chap.
I rather agree with Der Alte Fritz but wouldn't dream of saying so! Have a splendid Christmas.
Jeremu

PS the market in nearby Georgian Bath was so commercialized it actually hurts.
5:42 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Presenting the Anspach-Bayreuth Kuirassiere!!!

Here they are, with the rearmost nine figures still drying, three squadrons of the Anspach-Bayreuth Kuirassiere, now in the service of the Grand Duchy of Stollen. And now, it's onto that artillery!
14 comments
Read more

And It's the End of September!!!

  Saxony's Ploetz Cuirassiers, an illustration lifted from the Kronoskaf website, which has thus far guided my spectacularly glacial painting of 30 28mm Eureka Saxon cuirassiers purchased all the way back in October 2016. A gray, cool Saturday here in Mid-Michigan with rain in the forecast. The Grand Duchess is away at a conference, so it's just "The Boys" here at home. The Young Master (almost 15) has retreated to his room for something or other following breakfast while I have stolen back down here to Zum Stollenkeller (masquerading as my office) with a second mug of coffee and both cats comfortably ensconced nearby. Enjoying the late morning and still in my pajamas! Not much planned for today beyond designing a couple of promotional flyers for workshops my department is presenting (small parties we will throw?) in October and November.  With maybe a bit of on the next podcast script. More important,  I am toying with the idea of returning for an hour or...
4 comments
Read more

Happy September 2nd!!!

    T his weekend, the question of what, precisely, constitutes an "imagination" came up in an online forum of which I am a part.  To be fair, the issue originates from further afield in a Facebook group that I am not a member of, but I weighed in with my own view.  The following was in response to the question posed yesterday (Sunday) morning by an exasperated member of my own rather more gentlemanly town square, who had been met with a strident response to information he shared about his (admirable) hobby activities on said FB group.  Here is, more or less, what I wrote: To my mind, the concept of imagi-nation(s) is a broad one.  It can range from historical refights or what-if scenarios/battles/campaigns between armies of a particular era, to completely made up combatants operating in a quasi-historical setting, to the rather generic red and blue forces of the Prussian Kriegspiel that examine a particular tactical problem, task, or exercise.   ...
6 comments
Read more