Colmar

Colmar, the chief town of the German province of Upper Alsace, on the Lauch. A canal connects it with the Rhine, and it is on the railway to Strasburg, from which city it is distant 40 miles. The cathedral is a historical monument of fourteenth-century architecture, and the tower commands a fine view of the Vosges. The thirteenth-century convent of St. Benedict Unter Linden has a perfect specimen of cloisters. The town possesses a good museum of paintings and works of art, and a library. There are manufactures of cotton, paper, leather wadding, and animal black, as well as breweries, distilleries, foundries, and tanneries. The Romans had a fortress here, called Columbaria. In 1697 Colmar became French under the Treaty of Ryswick, and in 1871 it again became German.