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Altstadt (the German for "old town") in the Swiss city of Zurich encompasses the area of the entire historical city before 1893, before the incorporation of what are now districts 2 to 12 into the municipality, over the period 1893 to 1934. Altstadt approximately corresponds to the area enclosed by the former city ramparts, and is today within the administrative area of the city called Kreis 1 (District 1). With a population of just below 5,600 (as of 2005), it houses about 1.5% of the city's total population.
Administratively, District 1 is divided into four parts or quarters by the Zurich statistical office, Rathaus, Hochschulen, Lindenhof and City. Lindenhof and Rathaus correspond to the parts of the medieval city left (west) and right (east) of the Limmat, respectively, while City and Hochschulen include the area of the Early Modern city west and east of the medieval walls, respectively.
Zürich on the 1881 Siegfriedkarte (Altstadt highlighted), after the construction of the Limmatquai and the train station, but before the construction of Uraniastrasse, and of the lakeside quais with Quaibrücke (hover mouse over map for labels).
LINDENHOLF
Altstadt: St. Peter church
The Lindenhof quarter corresponds to the mindere Stadt, the smaller but more prestigious half of the medieval town left of the river. This is the oldest core of the city, with settlement traces dating to pre-Roman (La Tène) times, and fortified as a Roman oppidum with a surrounding vicus in the final decades of the 1st century BC. The Lindenhof hill itself is the site of the Roman castle, rebuilt in Carolingian times but derelict by the 13th century, when it was used as a quarry for the first stone houses of rich burghers of the recently reichsfrei city. The Schipfe quarter at the Limmat river below the Lindenhof is the site of the Roman vicus, with traces of a hypocaustum excavated. St. Peter church was the parish church of the medieval city, built on the site of an earlier temple to Jupiter. The Rennweg street below the Lindenhof hill was the main street of the medieval city, entering by the Rennweg gate through the western city wall (now marked by the course of the Bahnhofstrasse. Augustinergasse is a small street leading from St. Peterhofstatt situated at the St. Peter church, passing the former Augustinians monastery below the Lindenhof hill, towards the Kecinstürlin gate at the southern Fröschengraben moat, Bahnhofstrasse as of today. The quarter contains the Fraumünster, the abbey which ruled the town until the 1336 "guild revolution" of Rudolf Brun and which remained highly influential until Zwingli's Reformation. Zunfthaus zur Meisen at Münsterhof plaza near Fraumünster church houses the porcelain and faience collection of the Swiss National Museum. Lindenhof also contains the former Augustinian abbey, and formerly the Oetenbach abbey north of the Lindenhof hill, demolished in 1903 to make way for the Uraniastrasse as part the partially built «Urania-axis» Sihlporte–Uraniastrasse–Zähringerplatz by Gustav Gull, and the Urania Sternwarte.
The Limmatquai was built along the right side of the Limmat, running from Central to Bellevue. It was built in the 19th century, connecting various earlier quais built into the Limmat. The current right bank is some 28 m west of the medieval river's. The quai was constructed from 1823-1859 from Bellevue to the Rathaus, in 1835-1836 from the Rathaus to the Wasserkirche and 1835-1839 the portion from the Wasserkirche to Bellevue, formerly called Sonnenquai. At the Limmatquai are located some guild houses, as Zunfthaus zur Zimmerleuten, Zunfthaus zur Haue, Zunfthaus zum Rüden and Zunfthaus zur Saffran. Trams 4 and 15 run along the Limmatquai, serving the stops Helmhaus, Rathaus and Rudolf-Brun-Brücke. The quai was one of the main routes through the old town before it was freed from traffic in 2004. The bridges passed by the Limmatquai, south to north, are: - Quaibrücke, connecting Bellevue and Bürkliplatz,
- Münsterbrücke between Grossmünster and Fraumünster,
- Rathausbrücke just north of the town hall,
- Rudolf-Brun-Brücke, between Mühlegasse and Uraniastrasse,
- the Mühlesteg footbridge
- Bahnhofbrücke, between Central and Zürich Hauptbahnhof.
north of Limmatquai:
- Walche-Brücke
- the Drahtschmidlisteg footbridge to Platzspitz
City is the area west of the Bahnhofstrasse, delimited by the Sihl and the Schanzengraben, i.e. the moat of the 17th century ramparts. It includes the Paradeplatz, Zürich Hauptbahnhof, the Swiss National Museum and the Platzspitz park (formerly Limmatspitz). It comprises the tram stops Bürkliplatz, Paradeplatz, Rennweg, Bahnhofstrasse / Bahnhofplatz / Bahnhofquai, Löwenplatz, Sihlstrasse and Bahnhof Selnau. City borders on District 2 (Enge) to the southwest, and on Districts 4 and 5 (Aussersihl) to the northwest. 1724 view of the northern end of town, with the Platzspitz in the foreground, at the time a shooting-range.
Platzspitz (formerly Platzpromenade, Limmatspitz) is a park at the confluence of the two rivers of Zurich; the Limmat and the Sihl.
In medieval times, the area situated north of the city was used as pasture. In the early 15th century it was made into a shooting-range, and in the 16th to 17th centuries, Schützenfeste were held there. A remnant of these can be found in the contemporary Knabenschiessen shooting contest. During the 1990s, the long-practised official tolerance of drug users there from throughout Central Europe has been the subject of much worldwide media interest.
