Free Walking Tour Leipzig: Bach, Faust and 1989

Your Leipzig Walking Tour, Stop by Stop: From Bach to the Monday Demonstrations

1. 1

   Old Town Hall (Altes Rathaus)

   

   You start on the Markt, where the Old Town Hall fills the entire east side of the square. It counts among the most important secular Renaissance buildings in Germany, and its beauty comes from length and proportion rather than height: two storeys stretched over more than 300 feet, lifted by a steep roof with a row of wall dormers, six on the market side and seven facing the Naschmarkt behind.

   Notice how few colours there are: just two, the warm reddish tone of Rochlitz porphyry and a matching ochre plaster. The long line is broken by the octagonal tower next to the main portal. The portal itself rests on two Ionic columns and is flanked by so-called gaff heads, carved faces said to represent the master builders. The stone arcade along the market is younger than it looks; it was added between 1906 and 1909. For all its symmetry, the building has a few surprises, so keep an eye out for details that do not mirror each other.

   Walk round to the south side to find the oldest piece: a stone mullion dated to 1230, saved from an earlier building, probably a tower house, and so more than three centuries older than the hall around it. Look out too for the box oriels on the gable ends, the decorated keystones and the many commemorative plaques. The mayor and city administration moved out in 1905, to the New Town Hall you will reach later.

   Inside, the permanent exhibition is free, while guided tours cost extra; give it half an hour if you like city history. A passage through the building leads to the Naschmarkt, but save that square for the finish. Instead walk 110 m, about a minute, past the Forum of Contemporary History to the Mädlerpassage.

   Hours

   Tue–Sun and holidays 10:00–18:00, Mon closed; 24.12 and 31.12 closed

   Price

   Free (permanent exhibition); guided tours chargeable

   Website

   stadtgeschichtliches-museum-leipzig.de ↗

   Location

   Old Town Hall (Altes Rathaus) on Google Maps ↗

2. 2

   Mädlerpassage

   

   Step in from Grimmaische Strasse and you are in the last completely preserved historic shopping arcade in central Leipzig with a glass roof running its full length. Its model was the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II in Milan, and the family likeness shows: street facades drawn inside, a passage 6 or 7 m wide, and a glass roof on steel ribs about 13 m above your head, with two more floors rising above it.

   The first arm runs about 75 m to an octagonal rotunda some 12 m across, where the three arms meet in a T. That shape grew in stages. The long arm came first, then the stretch from the rotunda to Neumarkt turned the plan into an L. The third arm to Petersstrasse was only added in the 1960s, when the trade fair built its Messehaus am Markt. You can tell it apart easily: it is just one storey high and artificially lit. Long before any of this, between 1530 and 1911, the Auerbachs Hof complex stood on the site.

   In the first section is the way down to Auerbachs Keller, the historic wine cellar that Goethe wrote into Faust. Beside it stand two bronze groups by Mathieu Molitor: Faust and Mephistopheles on one side, the bewitched students on the other, a quotation in bronze from the cellar scene. Stand between them and you are in the middle of the play.

   Entry is free. More than 20 small shops and restaurants line the arcade, and the upper floors hold offices, the Sanftwut cabaret and an art room of 250 m². From here it is 260 m, three minutes, to St. Thomas Church.

   Hours

   Mon–Fri: 10:00–19:00 | Sat: 10:00–18:00 | Sun: Closed (Auerbachs Keller restaurant open daily)

   Price

   Free

   Website

   maedlerpassage.de ↗

   Location

   Mädlerpassage on Google Maps ↗

3. 3

   St. Thomas Church (Thomaskirche)

   

   This is Bach's church. Johann Sebastian Bach became Thomaskantor, the music director, in 1723 and held the post until his death in 1750, and he is buried here. Even if you only have a few minutes, go inside for his grave.

   From outside you see a late-Gothic hall church, paid for by the silver found in the Ore Mountains, which brought money into Leipzig. The Romanesque nave was torn down and the present hall raised in its place, consecrated by Thilo of Trotha, Bishop of Merseburg, on 10 April 1496. The tower was first built in 1537 and rebuilt in 1702. Allied incendiary bombs hit the church in 1943, yet it has kept its late-Gothic character.

   The story starts much earlier. A church has stood on this spot at least since the 12th century, and Romanesque foundations still lie under the choir. In the early 13th century it became the church of a new college of Augustinian canons founded by Margrave Dietrich of Meissen, a college that later formed the core of the University of Leipzig, founded in 1409. In 1217 the minnesinger Heinrich von Morungen gave the church a relic of St Thomas when he joined the canons, after a journey to India that is probably legend. During the Reformation the church became Lutheran, and Martin Luther himself preached here on Pentecost Sunday 1539.

   The church is also home to the Thomanerchor, an internationally known boys' choir that was probably founded in 1212. Entry is free and guided church tours cost a little extra. Check the hours before you come, as the church closes earlier on some days. The Bach Museum is just 70 m across the church square, a minute's walk.

   Hours

   Mon–Thu: 10:00–18:00 | Fri: 10:00–16:00 | Sat: 10:00–13:30, 16:30–18:00 | Sun: 11:30–17:30

   Price

   Free; guided church tours 3 EUR

   Website

   thomaskirche.org ↗

   Location

   St. Thomas Church (Thomaskirche) on Google Maps ↗

4. 4

   Bach Museum

   

   Opposite the church stands the Bosehaus, a Baroque house on the Thomaskirchhof, home to the Bach Archive and its museum. The museum tells the life and work of Johann Sebastian Bach, and after standing at his grave it is the natural next step.

   Its beginnings were modest. The Bach Archive used to be at Gohlis Palace, and a first small Bach memorial opened in the entrance hall of the Bosehaus in 1973. After the house was renovated, the museum opened on the composer's 300th birthday, 21 March 1985. A second thorough rebuild ended in 2010 with a new extension holding a special exhibition room and a treasure room, plus a small pleasure garden; the exhibition area grew to 450 m².

   Twelve themed rooms cover Bach's life and work, his family, research into his music and more, designed to be multimedia and interactive. The highlight is the treasure chamber, where original Bach manuscripts are on show. The museum puts real weight on work with children and young people, which makes it a good stop for families.

   The museum charges admission, with reduced tickets available. Allow about an hour and a quarter if Bach means something to you; if not, the church outside may be enough. From here it is 440 m, six minutes, to the New Town Hall.

   Hours

   Mon: Closed | Tue–Sun: 10:00–18:00

   Price

   14 EUR adults, 9 EUR reduced, children under 18 free (free admission first Tuesday of each month)

   Website

   bachmuseumleipzig.de ↗

   Location

   Bach Museum on Google Maps ↗

5. 5

   New Town Hall (Neues Rathaus)

   

   Since 1905 the Leipzig city administration has worked from here, and the building does not do things by halves. Its main tower rises 114.8 m, the tallest town hall tower in Germany, beating Hamburg's previous record by eight feet. With 1,708 rooms it is also the largest town hall in the world by number of rooms.

   By the end of the 19th century the Old Town Hall was far too small for the booming city. In 1895 the Kingdom of Saxony granted Leipzig the site of the Pleissenburg, and the design competition came with a condition: the castle's Rapunzel tower silhouette had to survive. Hugo Licht, the city's building director, won in 1897 with the motto 'Arx nova surgit', a new castle emerges. The foundation stone was laid on 19 October 1899, and the tower you see stands on the base of the old Pleissenburg tower.

   The complex forms an irregular pentagon covering more than 10,000 m², built in light-grey shelly limestone from Main-Franconia in the style of historicism; the sculptor Georg Wrba shaped its decoration. On the southwest facade look for five statues: Crafts, Justice, Book Art, Science and Music. The clock carries the Latin MORS CERTA, HORA INCERTA, death is certain, its hour uncertain, which locals turned into 'the clock is sure to be wrong'. The female figure in the gable above it stands for Truth, and at night the clock glows blue. The building also holds a dark chapter: in the final days of the Third Reich it was the scene of numerous mass suicides.

   You can walk in for free on weekdays. Now comes the long leg: 4,260 m, 61 minutes, out to the Monument to the Battle of the Nations, passing the Bayerischer Bahnhof on the way.

   Hours

   Mon–Thu: 07:00–18:00 | Fri: 07:00–16:00 | Sat–Sun: Closed

   Price

   Free to enter; tower tours 5 EUR

   Website

   leipzig.de ↗

   Location

   New Town Hall (Neues Rathaus) on Google Maps ↗

6. 6

   Monument to the Battle of the Nations (Völkerschlachtdenkmal)

   

   After an hour on foot, the monument fills your view: 91 m of concrete faced with granite, completed in 1913 for the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Leipzig. It cost six million gold marks, paid mostly by donations and the city, and is widely regarded as one of the best examples of Wilhelmine architecture.

   The Battle of the Nations of 1813 ended in the defeat of Napoleon's French army, a crucial step towards the end of the War of the Sixth Coalition. The armies of Russia, Prussia, Austria and Sweden were led by Tsar Alexander I and Karl Philipp, Prince of Schwarzenberg. Germans fought on both sides: Napoleon's troops included conscripts from the left bank of the Rhine, which France had annexed, as well as soldiers from his German allies in the Confederation of the Rhine.

   The monument is said to stand where some of the bloodiest fighting took place, the spot from which Napoleon ordered his army to retreat. More than a century later it saw fighting again, when Nazi forces in Leipzig made their last stand here against US troops in the Second World War.

   The ticket includes the FORUM 1813 museum. At the top, a viewing platform looks out across the city and its surroundings. If the battle and its age interest you, the long walk is worth it; if your day is about Bach and 1989, skip it with one of the shorter versions. From here it is 3,410 m, 46 minutes, back towards the centre to the Grassi Museum.

   Hours

   Apr–Oct: Daily 10:00–18:00 | Nov–Mar: Daily 10:00–16:00

   Price

   12 EUR adults, 10 EUR reduced (includes FORUM 1813 museum)

   Website

   stiftung-voelkerschlachtdenkmal-leipzig.de ↗

   Location

   Monument to the Battle of the Nations (Völkerschlachtdenkmal) on Google Maps ↗

7. 7

   Grassi Museum

   

   Three museums share this building: the Ethnography Museum, the Musical Instruments Museum and the Applied Arts Museum. It carries the name of Franz Dominic Grassi, a Leipzig businessman of Italian descent who left more than two million marks to the city when he died in 1880. His money also helped pay for the Mende Fountain, which you will meet shortly on Augustusplatz, and for an older Grassi Museum that now houses the municipal library.

   When that first building grew too small, a competition produced the one you see: New Objectivity and Art Deco, arranged around several courtyards, built in the late 1920s and finished in 1929, one of the few new museums of the Weimar years. It rose on the site of the old Johannis Hospital, and the urban planner Hubert Ritter meant it to be the starting point of an eastward expansion of the city. St John's Church also stood here until it was demolished in 1963.

   Bombs hit the museum hard in 1943, and tens of thousands of objects were lost. Rebuilding began in 1947 and the first exhibitions followed in 1954. After a full renovation it partly reopened in 2005, with the Applied Arts Museum following in 2007. Today it is one of around 20 'Cultural Lighthouses' of the former East Germany listed in the federal government's Blue Book.

   Special exhibitions charge admission, with reduced tickets available. Pick one collection rather than all three; after the Bach stops, the Musical Instruments Museum is the obvious choice. Augustusplatz is 610 m away, nine minutes on foot.

   Hours

   Mon: Closed | Tue: 10:00–18:00 | Wed: 10:00–20:00 | Thu–Sun: 10:00–18:00

   Price

   Special exhibition 10.00 EUR adults, 7.00 EUR reduced, under 18 free; first Wednesday of the month 3 EUR for the whole house

   Website

   grassimak.de ↗

   Location

   Grassi Museum on Google Maps ↗

8. 8

   Augustusplatz

   

   Augustusplatz is the city's largest square and one of the largest in Europe, part of the inner ring road and a central hub for the trams. Look around: the opera house on the northern edge, the Neues Gewandhaus with the Mende Fountain on the south side, and on the western side, towards the old centre, the main buildings of the University of Leipzig with the City-Hochhaus.

   Its names tell Leipzig's 20th century. The square was laid out from 1785 as the square in front of the Grimma Gate, to designs by city architect Johann Carl Friedrich Dauthe, and named Augustusplatz in 1839 after Frederick Augustus, the first king of Saxony. The social-democratic city government renamed it Karl-Marx-Platz in 1928, a name so unpopular that newspapers and town plans ignored it. The Nazis changed it back in 1933, it became Karl-Marx-Platz again in 1953, and on the day of German reunification in 1990 it returned to Augustusplatz.

   Little of the old look survived. War damage and radical GDR planning left mostly concrete and steel from the 1960s onward. In May 1968 the bomb-damaged Augusteum and the barely damaged university church, the Paulinerkirche, were both blown up. And from 4 September 1989, this square belonged to the Monday demonstrations.

   The square is open at any hour and free. Walk 250 m, four minutes, to the church where those demonstrations began.

   Hours

   Open 24 hours

   Price

   Free

   Website

   leipzig.de ↗

   Location

   Augustusplatz on Google Maps ↗

9. 9

   St. Nicholas Church (Nikolaikirche)

   

   In 1989 this church became the centre of the peaceful revolt against communist rule. People gathered here on Monday evenings, and from those gatherings grew spontaneous peaceful protests that carried on into 1991. The cabaret artist Bernd-Lutz Lange put it this way: 'There was no head of the revolution. The head was the Nikolaikirche and the body the centre of the city.'

   The building is far older than its fame. Construction began around 1165 in Romanesque style, with twin towers, and it was enlarged as a Gothic hall church in the early 16th century. The Baroque main tower followed in 1730, the portal in 1759. Named after Saint Nicholas, patron of travellers and merchants, it is one of the largest churches in Saxony by capacity, Protestant since 1539, and today the Catholic Church may use it too.

   Go inside for the Neoclassical interior, remodelled in the late 18th century by Johann Carl Friedrich Dauthe, the same architect who laid out Augustusplatz. Bach worked here as well: four of the five performances of his St John Passion, including the premiere on Good Friday 1724, took place in this church, along with many of his cantatas and oratorios. And on 3 July 1646 the philosopher and mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was baptised here.

   Entry is free; the audioguide and the tower excursion cost extra. Check the closing time so you do not leave it too late. The Museum of Fine Arts is 560 m away, seven minutes on foot.

   Hours

   Mon–Fri: 11:00–18:00 | Sat: 11:00–16:00 | Sun: 11:30–14:30

   Price

   Free; audioguide 3 EUR, tower excursion 5 EUR

   Website

   nikolaikirche.de ↗

   Location

   St. Nicholas Church (Nikolaikirche) on Google Maps ↗

10. 10

    Museum of Fine Arts (Museum der bildenden Künste)

    

    The Museum of Fine Arts covers art from the late Middle Ages to modernity, and it began with private enthusiasm. Leipzig collectors founded an art association in 1837 with the aim of creating a museum, and on 10 December 1848 they opened a first municipal museum in a school on the Moritzbastei, with around a hundred donated works of what was then contemporary art.

    The collection grew through donors such as Maximilian Speck von Sternburg, Alfred Thieme and Adolf Heinrich Schletter. In 1853 the merchant Adolf Fer gave his collection on one condition: the city had to build a museum within five years. It opened on 18 December 1858, just before the deadline, on Augustusplatz, in Italian Renaissance style by Ludwig Lange, where the Gewandhaus stands today. Hugo Licht, later the architect of the New Town Hall, extended it in the 1880s.

    Then came the losses. In 1937 the Nazis confiscated 394 paintings and prints, mostly Expressionist, in their 'Degenerate art' campaign. On the night of 4 December 1943 a British air raid destroyed the building, though most of the collection had been moved to safety. A 61-year odyssey followed: the former Reichsbank on Petersstrasse in 1948, the former Reichsgericht in 1952, the Handelshof in 1997, always showing only part of the collection, until the city decided in the mid-1990s to give the museum its own building again.

    Special exhibitions charge admission, with reduced tickets available. Give it about an hour. From here it is 320 m, four minutes, to the Naschmarkt, passing the Museum of City History Leipzig.

    Hours

    Tue, Thu–Sun and holidays 10:00–18:00, Wed 12:00–20:00, Mon closed; 24.12 and 31.12 closed

    Price

    Special exhibition 12 EUR adults, 6 EUR reduced, 9 EUR group per person; evening ticket (1 hr before closing) half price; first Wednesday of the month 3 EUR; under 19 free

    Website

    mdbk.de ↗

    Location

    Museum of Fine Arts (Museum der bildenden Künste) on Google Maps ↗

11. 11

    Naschmarkt

    

    You end right behind the Old Town Hall, on a narrow square 90 m long and about 20 m wide. Its name goes back to the fruit once sold here, which counted as a sweet treat; 'naschen' means to snack on sweets. In the warmer months it becomes an open-air restaurant, and before Christmas it hosts part of the Christmas market.

    At the north end stands the baroque Old Stock Exchange, and in the small green area in front of it a memorial to the young Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the same Goethe whose Faust you met in the Mädlerpassage. At the south end, towards Grimmaische Strasse, is the Lion Fountain. Facing the Old Town Hall on the east side is the Handelshof, today the Steigenberger Grandhotel, with a passage through to Reichsstrasse.

    The square was created in 1556, when old buildings were cleared while the Old Town Hall was going up. Food was traded here, and the Neuberin theatre troupe performed here too. Until 1679 herring stalls sold salted fish, which earned it the nickname herring market. On 20 May 1593, in the Leipzig Calvinist riot, an angry crowd stormed and plundered the house of the Calvinist-minded merchant Adolph Weinhaus on this square.

    Afterwards the Old Stock Exchange rose here, already in use unfinished in 1679 and completed by 1687. A Hercules Fountain followed in 1688; around 1820 it was moved to the southern edge and redesigned with bronze lions after a design by Johann Gottfried Schadow. That is the Lion Fountain you see now, and the end of your walk, a few paces from where it began.

    Hours

    Open 24 hours

    Price

    Free

    Location

    Naschmarkt on Google Maps ↗

Shorter Ways Through Leipzig

Leave out the monument and the route falls into two compact halves, each easy to walk in a morning or an afternoon.

Bach and the Old Town

Stops: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

For anyone with Bach on their list or only half a day to spare. 880 m and 11 minutes of walking from the Old Town Hall to the New Town Hall. Only the Bach Museum charges admission; everything else is free.

Revolution and Art in the East

Stops: 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

For museum lovers and anyone drawn to the story of 1989. 1.74 km and 24 minutes of walking from the Grassi Museum to the Naschmarkt. Augustusplatz, St. Nicholas Church and the Naschmarkt are free; the Grassi Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts charge for their special exhibitions.

How Long Does This Leipzig Tour Take on Foot?

The pure walking time is 2 h 24 min. Most of it, 7.67 km and 1 h 47 min, lies on the detour from the New Town Hall out to the monument and back in to the Grassi Museum; everywhere else the stops sit only minutes apart.

With the interiors that repay the time (the free exhibition in the Old Town Hall, St. Thomas Church, about 75 minutes in the Bach Museum, about 75 minutes at the monument, one collection at the Grassi, St. Nicholas Church and an hour in the Museum of Fine Arts), the full route takes around eight and a half hours. Treat it as a full day.

The Bach and Old Town half takes about three hours including the Bach Museum. The eastern half, with time in both museums, takes a little over two and a half hours.

Before You Set Off in Leipzig

• Start and finish: Start at the Old Town Hall on the Markt for the recommended order, though you can join at any stop. The walk ends at the Naschmarkt, right behind the Old Town Hall, so you finish next to where you began.
• Best day: A weekday in the middle of the week works best, as not every stop is open every day. Check the opening times of the places you care about most before you set off. Leaving the Old Town Hall at 10:00 brings you to St. Nicholas Church shortly after five.
• Tickets: The route itself costs nothing. The Bach Museum, the monument and the special exhibitions at the Grassi Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts charge admission; the churches, squares, the arcade and the Old Town Hall exhibition are free.

Common Questions About Walking Leipzig