Switzerland Guide
Luzern
The Kapellbrücke
Any tour of Luzern must begin with the fourteenth-century covered Kapellbrücke (Chapel Bridge), the oldest road bridge in Europe, angled around the octagonal mid-river Wasserturm. In deference to the fact that the city's development arose largely from defence of this bridge, its distinctive Wasserturm (formerly a lighthouse, a prison, a treasury and today serving as a meeting house) has come to stand as the symbol of Luzern. Disaster struck in the early hours of August 18, 1993, when a small boat moored alongside the bridge caught fire and the flames rapidly spread to engulf the whole structure. By dawn, virtually the entire bridge had been destroyed, with only the bridgeheads on both banks surviving. The authorities set about reconstruction, and an identical replacement was completed nine months later; today, it's easy to see where the old wood meets the new.
Before the fire, the principal historical interest of the bridge lay in its collection of double-sided triangular roof panels, painted in the seventeenth century with scenes from the city's past and present. Of the 111 panels, 65 were entirely ruined and had to be replaced with facsimiles, 30 were restored, and the remainder are still charred and impossible to make out. Each is numbered, and captioned with rhyming couplets, the idiosyncratic local dialect written out in obscure medieval gothic script. The most distinctive image is panel no. 31, which shows William Tell shooting the apple from his son's head, but it's fun to work your way slowly along. Panel no. 1 shows a giant, the first Luzerner; no. 3 Luzern in the earliest times, with the Hofkirche separated from the town by a bridged inlet; no. 4 the foundation of Luzern's monastery; no. 6 the town around 1600; no. 15 St Beatus; no. 16 Einsiedeln; no. 17 Luzern's Franciscan church; no. 26 local hero Winkelried slaying a dragon; no. 32 the Rütli oath; no. 38 the great fire of Luzern in 1340; and no. 58 the 1476 Battle of Grandson.
Opening time: Daily
Price: Free