STRAS'BOURG (Ger. Strassburg), a fortified t., formerly the capital of the French department of the Bits Rhin, but, since 1871, capital of the new German province of Alsace-Lorraine, stands at the confluence of the Ill and the Brnsche, and not fu• from the left bank of the Rhine. 89 tn. n. of Basel, and 312 m. e. of Paris by rail. The citadel, originally built by Vauban. 1684, was demolished by the Germans during the bombardment of 1870, but in 1873 they began to rebuild it. and this in conjunction with a system of 12 detached forts, being erected at several miles' distance front the walls, will make the position one of great strength. The most celebrated building is the min ster, or cathedral, founded in 1015, which is one of the most sublime specimens of Gothic architecture. Of the two western towers, one, that at the s. corner, has not been completed. The other, finished in 1:399, rises, according to Baedeker, to a height of 495 ft. above the pavement-14 ft. higher than the original top of the pyramid of Cheops, while the towers of Cologne cathedral are to be 514 ft. high. The minster has a remark able astronomical clock representing the planetary system. Other notable structures are the Protestant church of St. Thomas, with the tomb of marshal Saxe, and various monu ments to distinguished Strasbourg scholars; the temple Neuf, or new temple, the syna gogue of the Jews, the town-house, the palace of justice, the arsenal, the episcopal palace, and the theater. The university of Strasbourg was the only complete university in France—i.e., the only cue which has the full complement of faculties—besides that of Paris. It was founded in 1621, became specially famous in the branches of medicine and philology, went to the ground during the great revolution, and had its place sup plied by an ecole centrale. In 1303 a Protestant academy was established with 10 chairs, for teaching theology, philology, philosophy, and history. Five years later, Napoleon founded an imperial academy, with faculties of law, medicine, physical science, and philosophy; and in 1819 a partial fusion of these academies took place. greatly to the
benefit of both. The university was reopened after the Franco-Prussian war, in May. 1872. In 1878 it had 624 students. The famous library of Strasbourg. consisting of nearly 200,000 volumes, and rich in incunabula (q.v.), was entirely destroyed by tire during the bombardment in 1870, but has been to some extent replaced by a library of about 120,000 volumes contributed by the Germans. The trade of Strasbourg. especially its transit-trade, is very extensive, and it has a great variety of manufactures—beer, ham, sausages, fat-liver pies, watches and clocks, leather, cottons, woolens, silks, cutlery, musical and mathematical instruments, jewelry, brandy, potash, tobacco, etc. The Basel and Baden railways, the railway to Paris, and the communication with Rotterdam and London by means of the Rhine steamers, as well as with the Danube and all the great rivers of France by means of canals, have greatly added to its facilities for con ducting commerce. The country round about Strasbourg is fertile and carefully culti vated, with beautiful gardens, mansions, and villages. Pop. ('71), 85,529; ('75), 02,370,. of whom about one-half are Catholics.
Strasbourg, the Argentoratum of the Romans, was extant before the time of Caesar, but is first mentioned by Ptolemy. The Romans had a manufactory of arms here. In the 5th c. it appears to have received the name of or per haps from the invading Franks, whence the modern German Strassburg and the French Strasbourg. It became a free town of the German empire, and in 1681 passed with the rest of Alsace into the hands of the French, under whom its population and prosperity greatly increased. On Sept. 28, 1870, after a bombardment of seven weeks, Strasbourg surrendered to the Germans, and in 1871 was annexed to Germany.