Reimlinger Tor
You begin at the Reimlinger Tor, the earliest of Nördlingen's five town gates and a protected monument. Look first at the square base of the main tower: it went up before 1376 and was altered around 1480. The top storey and the stepped pyramid roof are younger, renewed in 1603, and the forward gate was laid out in the early sixteenth century and raised in 1597. So what you see is not one building but three centuries of fortification stacked on top of each other.
The gate exists because of an order from 1327. Ludwig the Bavarian told the town to enclose its suburbs with ditch, walls and defences, since they lay outside the old Staufer-era wall. This southeastern gate guarded the long-distance road that ran via Harburg and Donauwörth to the Danube, on to Augsburg and over the Alpine passes to Italy. Whatever came north from Italy came through here.
Now look at the materials. The tower walls are plastered brick, but the corner stones, door frames and cornices are cut from suevite, the local stone. Keep that word in mind; it comes back at almost every stop and its origin is explained in the RiesKraterMuseum. In 1825 the barbican with its two round towers was pulled down, yet the bridge on the field side and the enclosing walls still give the gate much of its original character. A thorough renovation in 2015 and 2016 left it in the condition you see today.
The passage is free and open at all times. From here it is 500 m, about 6 minutes, to the wall itself.
