Classical Weimar


World Heritage Identification Number: 846

World Heritage since: 1998

Category: Cultural Heritage

Transboundary Heritage: No

Endangered Heritage: No

Country: 🇩🇪 Germany

Continent: Europe

UNESCO World Region: Europe and North America

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Classical Weimar: A Cultural Hub of the Enlightenment Era

Classical Weimar, inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1998, is a testament to the profound cultural bloom that took place in the small Thuringian town of Weimar, Germany, during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. This designation recognizes the significant impact of Weimar as a center of the Enlightenment, a period marked by reason, science, and skepticism, which contrasted with the religious and political upheavals of the time.

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UNESCO Description of the World Heritage Site

In the late 18th and early 19th centuries the small Thuringian town of Weimar witnessed a remarkable cultural flowering, attracting many writers and scholars, notably Goethe and Schiller. This development is reflected in the high quality of many of the buildings and of the parks in the surrounding area.

UNESCO Justification of the World Heritage Site

Criterion (iii): The high artistic quality of the public and private buildings and parks in and around the town testify to the remarkable cultural flowering of the Weimar Classical Period.

Criterion (vi): Enlightened ducal patronage attracted many of the leading writers and thinkers in Germany, such as Goethe, Schiller, and Herder to Weimar in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, making it the cultural centre of the Europe of the day.

Encyclopedia Record: Classical Weimar (World Heritage Site)

Classical Weimar is a UNESCO World Heritage Site consisting of 11 sites located in and around the city of Weimar, Germany. The site was inscribed on 2 December 1998. The properties all bear testimony to the influence of Weimar as a cultural centre of the Enlightenment during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. A number of notable writers and philosophers lived in Weimar between 1772 and 1805, including Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Johann Gottfried Herder, Friedrich Schiller, and Christoph Martin Wieland. These figures ushered in and participated in the Weimar Classicism movement, and the architecture of the sites across the city reflects the rapid cultural development of the Classical Weimar era.

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Additional Site Details

Area: Not available

UNESCO Criteria: (iii) — Unique or exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition
(vi) — Directly associated with events or living traditions

Coordinates: 50.9775 , 11.32861

Image

Image of Classical Weimar

© Dundak, CC BY-SA 2.5 Resized from original. (This derivative is under the same CC BY-SA license.)

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Nearby World Heritage Sites

Bauhaus and its Sites in Weimar, Dessau and Bernau
0 km — Germany
Jewish-Medieval Heritage of Erfurt
21 km — Germany
Naumburg Cathedral
39 km — Germany
Wartburg Castle
72 km — Germany
Collegiate Church, Castle and Old Town of Quedlinburg
90 km — Germany

Country Information: Germany

Flag of Germany

Official Name: Federal Republic of Germany

Capital: Berlin

Continent: Europe

Population (2024): 83,510,950

Population (2023): 83,901,923

Population (2022): 83,797,985

Land Area: 349,390 sq km

Currency: Euro (EUR)

Country Data Sources

Last updated: January 18, 2026

Portions of the page Classical Weimar are based on data from UNESCO — World Heritage List Dataset and on text from the Wikipedia article Classical Weimar (World Heritage Site), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes made. Additional original content by World Heritage Explorer (WHE), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. WHE is not affiliated with UNESCO or the World Heritage Committee. Legal Notice. Privacy Policy.

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