Monheim | |
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 The southern gate of Monheim | |
COA.svg) Coat of arms | |
Location of Monheim within Donau-Ries district  | |
 Location of Monheim | |
  Monheim  Monheim | |
| Coordinates:48°50′N10°50′E / 48.833°N 10.833°E /48.833; 10.833 | |
| Country | Germany |
| State | Bavaria |
| Admin. region | Schwaben |
| District | Donau-Ries |
| Government | |
| • Mayor(2020–26) | Günther Pfefferer[1] (CSU) |
| Area | |
• Total | 69.33 km2 (26.77 sq mi) |
| Elevation | 495 m (1,624 ft) |
| Population (2023-12-31)[2] | |
• Total | 5,544 |
| • Density | 79.97/km2 (207.1/sq mi) |
| Time zone | UTC+01:00 (CET) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC+02:00 (CEST) |
| Postal codes | 86653 |
| Dialling codes | 09091 |
| Vehicle registration | DON |
| Website | www.monheim-bayern.de |
Monheim (German pronunciation:[ˈmoːnˌhaɪm]ⓘ) is atown in theDonau-Ries district, inBavaria, Germany. It is situated 15 km northeast ofDonauwörth, and 27 km east ofNördlingen. It lies in theRegierungsbezirkSchwaben.
The origins of Monheim date back into the 7th century, when a village was formed at the crossing of the Gailach, a small river running into theAltmühl. From 870, aBenedictianconvent existed within the small town. In 893, theabbess of the convent, Mother Liubila, transferred it to theBishop of Eichstätt, Erchanbald, and it was then that Monheim was first mentioned in an official document. It became an important place ofpilgrimage due to therelics ofSaint Walpurga, a former abbess of the convent inEichstätt. Unlike virtually all of Schwaben, which belongs to theDiocese of Augsburg, Monheim is still part of theDiocese of Eichstätt today.
The village of Monheim came into possession of theGraf vonOettingen, now theHouse of Oettingen-Wallerstein, around the year 1325. Monheim was awarded itstown rights shortly after and the oldestseal of the town dates from 1340. The seal from 1340 already shows themoon, which is still part of the towns crest today. The nameMonheim however does not derive frommoon. Until 1821, the crest's colors were red and silver, the colors of the House of Oettingen. Only after 1821 were the current blue and gold adopted.
The town was fortified, lying at the intersection of the important trade route fromAugsburg toNürnberg, which is nowadays theBundesstraße 2, and the road fromNördlingen toNeuburg an der Donau. Some of this wall still remains today, including both gates.
The town remained a possession of Oettingen until the end of theLandshut war of succession in 1505. Monheim was then handed to the duchyPalatinate-Neuburg (German:Pfalz-Neuburg), whom it remained with until 1808. The duke Heinrich introduced theReformation to his lands and Monheim in 1530 and the convent in town was dissolved. Monheim lost its relics and with it much of its religious importance for the region. The convent building was taken down in 1574 but the large Saint Walpurga church, the current building dating from 1509, and some of the conventsRomanesque courtyard, dating from the 12th century, remained. The courtyard was fully restored in 1977.
Martin Luther spent a night in Monheim, traveling back from an interrogation in 1518. A large plaque of this notable event remains at the location he stayed.
In 1614, theElector Wilhelm reintroducedCatholicism in Palatinate-Neuburg, including Monheim, but the convent was not restored. The Swedish army under the King of Sweden,Gustav Adolf, ransacked Monheim in 1632 during theThirty Years' War, an event the town took long to recover from.
From 1523 onwards, Monheim also became the seat of thecounty court (German:Landgerichtssitz) for the surrounding region and in 1650 a small palace (German:Schloß) was built for the duke's administrator.
The year 1697 saw the first arrival ofJews in Monheim. In 1741, they had to leave the town again, under pressure from the authorities. Thecurrent town hall was built by a rich Jewish merchant, theCourt Jew Abraham Elias Model, between 1714 and 1720. Model was the chief creditor for theGraf von Wallerstein at that time.[3] The upper floor of his house originally was thought to have served as thesynagogue for the small Jewish community, a fact since disproved, and in 1978 and 1994 the originalceilings, displaying motives from theOld Testament, orTanakh, were fully restored. The fact that they were covered by a layer of gypsum, which had to be removed, saved them from almost certain destruction by the Nazis. The rooms now serve as the meeting hall for the town council.
The end of theWar of Bavarian Succession in 1779 saw the reunification of Bavaria with Palatinate-Neuburg and Neuburg lost its status as a capital. Monheim was now Bavarian again.
Like most of Bavaria, the age ofindustrialisation bypassed Monheim and it remained predominantly agricultural. The two world wars saw great personal losses but no real destruction for the town.
During the Nazi era, Monheim saw its mayor, Josef Hofmann, replaced with local party leader Albert Königsdorfer. Some of the members of the local council were temporarily taken in "protective custody". Resistance to the Nazis was passive, at best. When the figurine of Saint Walpurga on the fountain of the market square was replaced by a more war-like motif in October 1937, the Catholic parish priest, Anton Geitner, an anti-Nazi, refused the Nazi salute and found himself heavily criticised.[4]
Liberation came to Monheim on 24 April 1945, with only limited amounts of fighting taking place. A number of houses in town were shelled and the white flag was raised in town by Matthias Schmied, mayor of Monheim from 1945 to 1947, who was quickly followed in his example by other citizens. In appreciation of the fact that the town survived the war with such little damage, the local town council decreed that a church service was to be held annually on the 24 April. Monheim experienced a short occupation of four days before the US soldiers left the town again.[4]
The post-World War II years saw a growth in small industries in town. The county court was relocated from Monheim in 1957. The reorganisation of communities in Bavaria and Germany between 1972 and 1978 meant that Monheim came in charge of the previously independent surrounding villages, enlarging the town in size and population.
The townmayor is Günther Pfefferer, of theCSU, in office since 2012.[1][5]
As of 2025, the town council (German:Stadtrat) consists of 20 elected members (including mayor and vice mayor) from the following parties:[6]
The town largely depends on light industry, with theHama company being one of the main employers, having relocated fromDresden to Monheim after the second world war.
Agriculture is still an important factor with about half of the surrounding land used for it.
Monheim lies on theBundesstrasse 2, theFederal Road No. 2. TheB2 used to go straight through town until a bypass was built in the early 1990s. The road from Neuburg to Nördlingen, which passes through the outskirts of Monheim, is not a Federal road.
The nearest train line is nowadays inFünfstetten, the Augsburg–Nürnberg line. From there, a 5.6 km long[7] side track used to run to Monheim, built in 1905–06, but passenger service was suspended in 1960 and goods services in the 1990s. During the 1980s, a historic train used to operate on the line on selected summer weekends. Footage of this train was used in the 1983 German movieDer Glockenkrieg.[8]
The train line has now been completely removed and only the railway station is still in place, now home to the localpigeon breeders club.
The local sports club,TSV Monheim, has a strong tradition inartistic gymnastics, being one of the centres of the sport in Germany. Its team competes at the highest national level of the sport, often attracting foreign athletes, especially fromBrazil. In April 2008, the town hosted a four-nations under-18's tournament with Germany, France, the UK and Switzerland participating.
Warching, one of the neighboring villages, is home to amotocross track and club, theMV Warching, formed in 1973. The club has a strongsidecarcross tradition, having had many of its members race atworld championship level. Through Hubert Rebele and Alois Wenninger, the club archived four runners-up spots in this competition in the 1980s and 90's. The track was also the venue for the 1985 German sidecarcross Grand Prix, the only time it was held in Warching.[9]
Like many towns in Bavaria which preserved their old town centre, Monheim hosts a historicalTown Festival (German:Historisches Stadtfest). It is staged every second year.
'Hortulus Monheimensis' is aflorilegium of watercolour sketches commissioned in 1615 by Wolfgang Philippus Brandt, the local governor or magistrate. It is a singular record of the Renaissance garden of the Monheim Palace. The work is hosted by theBavarian State Library and may have been inspired by the 'Hortus Eystettensis' of 1613.[10]
Monheim lies at the edge of the region of theSolnhofen limestone in what was once theTethys Ocean. Fossil crocodiles, such asGeosaurus,Cricosaurus,Rhacheosaurus andSteneosaurus are all known from quarries near Monheim, whileArchaeopteryx was found in the region aroundSolnhofen. The Gailach, the little river who runs through Monheim, disappears in the ground to travel underneath the surface shortly after passing Warching and resurfaces in Mühlheim, approximately 4 km further on.[11] The reason for this is thelimestone in the region, which makessinkholes a very common site. A marked trail, theKarstlehrpfad Monheimer Alb with signs in German explaining the origins of the landscape and the geology.
The local dialect of the region isAlemannic German, referred to in German asSchwäbisch, with Monheim being at the most northeastern point of its extension. Traveling north, the villages beyond Monheim speakEast Franconian German dialects while to the east,Bavarian is spoken.
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