Hirtenturm

Hirtenturm stands in Würzburg beside the Main, where a surviving tower marks the city’s medieval southern fortifications. Its present square form dates from 1642 and served as the wall’s southwestern corner. Large sections of the old wall once ran through the Sand suburb and around Josef-Stangl-Platz.

The earlier round tower, called Roren, was destroyed during the Peasants’ War in 1525. From 1527, Würzburg rebuilt this corner as a lower square structure with gun slits, known as Neue Letz. In 1641, the city reinforced the southwest corner before expanding the tower into its current shape. Balthasar Neumann later incorporated it into the old infantry barracks, where it became a prison for soldiers. The cleared site exposed the tower, and restoration returned it to its original form after the barracks suffered bombing damage in 1945.

Shepherds once rented rooms inside and watched cattle grazing beside the Main from above. A small gate beneath the tower led directly towards the riverbank. Today, the 1. Kage Elferrat Würzburg 1935 e.V. uses it as a clubhouse, while the protected monument remains one of three large towers surviving from Würzburg’s expanded southern fortifications.