Wrapping up summer

Neuf-Brisach Day-Trip

We are now going to deep-dive in to all things Alsace, starting with the vine.

The last few bits of summer featured getting through most of the moving boxes, procurement of school supplies, and local explorations before the start of school. It was during one of these outings that we stumbled innocently upon a guy named Vauban.

Sebastien Le Prestre de Vauban (1633-1707) was a French military engineer who worked most famously for Louis the 14th. The pre-eminent military engineer of his day, he built forts, cities, ports and gardens. The guy was a 17th century Elon Musk. His concepts were still in use 100 years after his death, and those outputs are still scattered across Europe. 

He created over 300 fortifications and supervised around 40 individual sieges over his career. Thought to be the greatest engineer of his time, he is also one of the key ones in the annals of Western military history.

Vauban: More Productive Than You. 

Image Source.

The neighborhood down the hill from us is called Vauban, connected to the fact that his designs were used to build the fort-like defences of Freiburg in the 1700's. 

This is going somewhere, be patient.

So two weeks ago we decided to rent a car and go to France because it is possible to just go do such things. But where to go?

I pulled up an online map and zoomed in to get some ideas and immediately noticed a bizarre 8-pointed star shape just on the French side of the Rhine River. Zooming in I realized it was actually a city, and the star shape came from a nearly perfectly-preserved system of moats, ditches and ramparts around its border.

I'd happened upon Neuf-Brisach, Vauban's final city-fort, a UNESCO world heritage spot, and one of the most famous architectural city-sites in Western Europe. This shows the joy of moving to new places: you realize how clueless you are about so many things. It is barely 20 miles from our house, close enough for a quick outing.

We drove over the Rhine and parked just inside the battlements. After picking up some wine and bread at the weekend market in Neuf-Brisach's central plaza, we proceeded to the ramparts to walk on a path around the star-shaped perimeter.

Rampart hike view.

"Casemate Embrasures" which means this is where they kept the cannons.

Exploring around the ramparts you can't get a sense of the crazy symmetry of Neuf Brisach, this could only come from the bird's eye view, so we did the next best thing and booked a tour on a silly off-road caravan train that drives you down into the fortifications and around the various moats of the city.

Local and regional artists put in various outdoor installations around the outer walls.

Neuf-Brisach (which means "New" Brisach) was built from scratch after the French lost the town of Breisach on the East side of the Rhine in a treaty in 1697 to Austria. This Alsace borderland between the French and the Holy Roman Empire, and later the German states, has seen constantly-redrawn frontiers as the big powers strove to secure the area. So in 1697 Breisach went to Austria and Vauban decided to built New-Brisach from nothing instead of fortifying the next biggest town nearby of Colmar. Since it was the hotly-contested border area you needed the fortress towns exactly there.

Why is it still intact is the next question. The town was besieged by the Prussians in 1870 and suffered lots of damage in the war that the French went on to lose. But luckily it was rebuilt to the original specifications afterwards. During WWII it also suffered some damage as the Nazis used it as a garrison, but this too was later repaired. Highways have been routed around it and it is now a listed location.

Cass at the cafe. With her new dress!

So when you come visit us, and if you evidence any interest in historical French military engineering projects, we will whisk you off to Neuf-Brisach and then sit you down in a cafe (probably this one) later to enjoy an ice cream.