Fuggerei

Description:

• During the 15th and 16th centuries, Augsburg became one of Europe's wealthiest communities, mainly because of its textile industry and the political and financial clout of its two banking families, the Welsers and the Fuggers. The Welsers have long since faded away. But the founders of the powerful Fugger family have established themselves permanently by an unusual legacy, the Fuggerei, set up in 1519, by Jakob Fugger the Rich, to house poorer Augsburgers. It's Europe's oldest welfare housing.

  The basic features, laid down in 1521, are still in force today. The nominal rent of 1€ ($1.60) per annum (formerly one Rhenish guilder) has not changed in more than 450 years (the city council determines who gets the break -- it's based on need). The only obligation is that tenants pray daily for the souls of their founders. The Fuggerei is a miniature, self-contained town with its own gates, which are shut from 10pm to 5am and guarded by a night watchman. Franz Mozart, a master Mason fallen on hard times -- and great-grandfather of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart -- once lived at Mittlere Gasse 14.

  The Fugger Foundation owns the Fuggerei. A house at Mittlere Gasse 13, next to the one once occupied by Mozart's ancestor, is now the Fuggerei's museum. The rough 16th- and 17th-century furniture, wood-paneled ceilings and walls, and cast-iron stove, as well as other objects of everyday life, show what it was like to live here in earlier times.

• © Frommer's 2012

Awards:

Frommer's

•  Recommended 2010