Lincke’sches Bad

Lincke’sches Bad stood at the mouth of the Prießnitz behind Dresden’s old Black Gate. Built in the 18th century, it began as a small pleasure house and grew into one of Germany’s first open-air baths. A mineral bath with twenty-eight tubs opened in 1763, and a garden restaurant followed the next year. By 1776 a summer theatre welcomed travelling companies, and a concert hall rose in the 1850s. The site lay between the Elbe and the Neustadt, reached by an avenue now called Schillerstraße. The place drew Europe’s leading artists and writers. Carl Maria von Weber and E.T.A. Hoffmann conducted there, while Franz Grillparzer left a vivid 1826 sketch of the concerts. Joseph Seconda’s troupe performed regularly from 1790 to 1816, and the Royal Court Theatre leased the theatre for summer seasons between 1816 and 1858. Postcards and engravings by Ludwig Richter spread its fame across Germany. Today the grounds hold a sports field and running track, with a changing house and car park. In the northwest corner, salvaged sandstone ashlars form pergolas and raised beds from the 1950s. The old beer house, the Drachenschänke, still stands as flats, the last survivor of a once vast pleasure garden that once seated fifteen thousand guests.