Capital of the Land of Thuringia
Erfurt, formerly a powerful trading and university town with a history going back 1,200 years, lies in a wide stretch of the Gera valley, in the south of the fertile Thuringian Basin. It belonged to the Electorate of Mainz until 1802, when it passed to Prussia. Erfurt
was the meeting-place of church Synods and Imperial Diets and the scene of the Congress of Erfurt (Napoleon's meeting with the Czar of Russia and the German princes) in 1808. The first German Garden Show was held here in 1838.
Churches
Erfurt once had some 36 parish churches and chapels and 15 religious houses, earning it the style of the "many-towered city".