Flensburg
From Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Flensburg (Danish: Flensborg, Low Saxon: Flensborg, North Frisian: Flansborj) is a city in Germany, next to the border to Denmark. There are about 87,000 people living in Flensburg. The city has an university and a small marine harbour. It lives on tourism, students and the German marine forces.
[edit] History
There was a first settlement about 1200 A.D., which became a city in 1284. In the following century, Flensburg became economic centre of the Duchy of Schleswig. In 1409 there were battles between people of the Duchy of Holstein and the Danish crown about the control of Schleswig. In 1412 and 1500 there were bad plagues in Flensburg. In 1485, there was a big fire in the city.
Between 1460 and 1864 was Flensburg the second important harbour to Denmark after Copenhagen. Since the 16th century Flensburg was an important place for trade. Flensburg became a part of Prussia in 1864, after the Danish-Pussian War.
In 1920, there was an election in Schleswig. The vote was to decide if the people wanted to belong to Denmark or Germany. South of Flensburg and Flensburg wanted to stay in Germany, north of Flensburg the people decides to became Dans.
In 1945, many German were driven out their homes in the eastern German provinces. These people went to Flensburg. The city had more than 100,000 inhabitants for a couple of years. Nowadays Flensburg has about 87,000 inhabitants.
