Reichenau Island
The number of Wikipedia languages with an article is our measure of how widely known a site is. Counts of visitors and wishes will appear once enough people use the app.
How it came to be
Reichenau, an island in Lake Constance, was uninhabited until 724. In that year the monk Pirmin, with the support of the Frankish ruler Charles Martel, founded a monastery there. Pirmin fell out with the local Alemannian duke Hnabi and left the island in 727.
Under Carolingian and Ottonian patronage the abbey flourished, and the cruciform basilica at Mittelzell was consecrated in 816. It produced the poet and abbot Walafrid Strabo and the scholar Hermann of Reichenau, and in the late 10th and early 11th centuries its workshop was among the leading centres in Europe for lavishly illuminated manuscripts. The church of St George at Oberzell holds the only complete and largely preserved set of narrative wall paintings from before 1000 north of the Alps.
In 1540 the Bishop of Constance became lord of Reichenau, and the abbey's importance faded. Its lands were secularised in 1757 and finally in 1803, and part of its famous library went to the state library in Karlsruhe. A causeway to the mainland was completed in 1838, and the island was inscribed as a World Heritage site in 2000. Today it is also known for its vegetable farms.
Data: Wikidata (CC0). Photos: Wikimedia Commons, under each photo’s license. Prototype; may contain errors. We measure usage anonymously to improve the app (PostHog, EU).