Bielefeld

Bielefeld is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located at 52° N, 8.5 E on both the western and eastern slopes of the Teutoburg Forest. Population: 329,000. The current mayor is Eberhard David.

Trivia

• The original name of the Teutoburg Forest was Osning. During the rise of German nationalism around 1848/1849, people became aware of the reference in Tacitus's Annals I 60, which refers to a defeat of the Roman army at saltus Teutoburgiensis. The similarity resulted in the renaming for "patriotic" reasons, while the actual place was about 40 km (25 miles) north, near Osnabrück. The details of what is known as the Varus Battle are currently subject to archaeological debates.
• The altarpiece of the Bielefeld church Neustädter Marienkirche from around 1400 is among the most prominent masterpieces of artwork of the German Middle Ages. Two of the altarpieces, The Flagellation and The Crucifixion are now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
• Being a strategically highly important point of the traffic connection between Ruhrgebiet and Berlin, the ten tonne Grand Slam bomb, the largest conventional bomb of World War II, was dropped by the No. 617 Squadron of the British Royal Air Force on the railroad viaduct of Bielefeld shortly before Germany surrendered. The viaduct has been rebuilt with a different design.
• Among German netizens, especially on the Usenet, a running gag is the claim that Bielefeld does not exist. This is known as the "Bielefeld-Verschwörung".