Colmar

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This article is about the city in Alsace. There is also a Colmar, Pennsylvania in the United States.

Template:French commune Template:FRdot Image:Colmarcoat.gif Colmar is a town and commune in the Haut-Rhin département of Alsace, France. Colmar was also known as Kolmar during the times when Alsace was part of Germany.

In 1999 the town of Colmar had a population of 65,136 people. Colmar is also the chief town of the arrondissement of Colmar, with 86,832 inhabitants.

1 History
2 Geography
3 Culture
4 Miscellaneous
- 4.1 Twin towns
5 See also
6 External links

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History

The town of Colmar was founded in the 9th century. This was the place where Charles the Fat held a diet in 884. Colmar was granted the status of a free imperial city of the Holy Roman Empire in 1226. In the Thirty Years' War, the city was taken by the armies of Sweden in 1632, who held it for two years. The city was united with France in 1697.

With the rest of Alsace, Colmar was ceded to Germany in 1871 as a result of the Franco-Prussian War. It was only reunited with France after World War I.

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Geography

The city of Colmar is 40 miles (64 kilometers) south-southwest of Strasbourg, at 48.08°N, 7.36°E, on the Lauch River. It is connected to the Rhine River by a canal.

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Culture

The well-preserved old city center houses several, sometimes large-scale buildings in German gothic and early Renaissance style, as well as a number of old churches, among which the collégiale Saint-Martin (13th-16th century) is the largest and most noteworthy. Local 15th century artist Martin Schöngauer painted what is considered his masterpiece, The Madonna of the Roses, in Colmar's Eglise des Dominicains. Matthias Grünewald's famous Isenheim Altarpiece is the most noteworthy of the treaures housed in the city's Unterlinden Museum.

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Miscellaneous

Colmar was also the home town of sculptor Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi (best known for the Statue of Liberty), and contains a museum dedicated to a number of his works.

Colmar has a sunny microclimate; it is the driest city in France, with an annual precipitation of just 550 mm, making it ideal for Alsace wine.

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