Romans and emperors

The Romans built towns on the Rhine and the Moselle. The emperors later built huge cathedrals at Speyer, Mainz and Worms.

The Porta Nigra in Trier, a town gate from the late 2nd century, became a church in the Middle Ages and was saved for that reason. Charlemagne’s palace chapel in Aachen, consecrated around 805, is one of the first large stone buildings north of the Alps after the Romans.

Speyer Cathedral, begun around 1030, was one of the largest churches of its time and the burial church of the Salian emperors.

• Porta Nigra
• Speyer Cathedral