Stadtbefestigung Boppard

The medieval town wall of Boppard stands on the left bank of the Rhine in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis. It began as a Roman fort in the 4th century and grew into a double ring of defences in the 12th and 13th centuries. The older Roman masonry was kept where it suited the new layout, so the wall today shows both ages in one structure.

The wall’s second great enlargement came in the 14th century under Archbishop Balduin of Trier. He added thick curtain walls, new gates and towers, and linked the Roman corner towers to the expanded defences. A surviving inscription from the 12th century records the duties of nearby towns to maintain their stretch of wall.

Visitors walk along stretches of the 1.8 to 2-metre-thick curtain wall that still stand beside the river. The Sandtor, once a four-storey gate with a pointed arch, survives as a lower archway framed by two grave slabs from St Severus church. A neogothic viewing balcony now clings to its outer face, and the remains of the Lilientor and Kronentor mark other entry points into the old town.