Zitadelle
The Zitadelle rises on Jakobsberg at the edge of Mainz’s Old Town, forming a quadrangular fortress. Its walls once filled a strategic gap beyond the city’s defensive fortifications.
The hill held a Benedictine abbey from 1050, before Schweickhardtsburg occupied the site between 1620 and 1629. Around 1655, Johann Philipp von Schönborn transformed that stronghold into the citadel visible today. The grounds preserve the Drususstein, a Roman cenotaph, and remains of St. Jacob’s Abbey. The abbey suffered extensive destruction during the siege of Mainz in 1793, while later military use included Prussian and Austrian troops. French forces occupied the fortress after the Second World War until 1955, and municipal offices and the Mainz Historical Museum now use the site.
A trench forms part of Mainz’s natural heritage, adding a distinct landscape feature to the stone defences. Since 1975, the grounds have hosted the Open-Ohr youth festival during Pentecost weekend.
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Spots like this one are the stops myTuur strings into tours through Mainz. In the app, each story begins where you stand: walk up to a spot and it starts, read it on screen or listen as you go, then follow the route to the next one.
What is myTuur?
myTuur is a free city-guide app. Its tours are built from spots, and each spot carries a story that starts when you get there, to read or to listen to as you like.