With an area of 3.7 km2 (1.4 sq mi) (370 ha or 910 acres), the Englischer Garten is one of the world's largest urban public parks.

The new ruler preferred his existing home in Mannheim on the Rhine to living in Bavaria and tried unsuccessfully to trade his unloved inheritance for the Austrian Netherlands.

Born in Massachusetts, Thompson had served on the Loyalist side in the American Revolutionary War, and after the British defeat had returned to England before moving to continental Europe and entering Charles Theodore's service in 1784.

[3] In 1788 Thompson proposed that in peacetime the majority of the soldiers of the Elector's army should be given leave to do civilian work, such as farming and gardening.

[4] In February 1789, Charles Theodore decreed that military gardens should be laid out in each garrison city, to provide soldiers with good agricultural knowledge and also to serve as recreation areas, accessible also to the public.

[5] The planned location of the Munich gardens was the area north of the Schwabinger city gate, a hunting ground of the Wittelsbach rulers since the Middle Ages.

[12] By May, 1790 sufficient progress had been made to allow Charles Theodore to make an inspection tour; but it was first in the spring of 1792 that the park was officially opened to the approximately 40,000 citizens of Munich.

Werneck's improvements had been costly, and in 1804 he was replaced by Sckell, who was given the post of Bayerischer Hofgärtenintendant ("Bavarian Court Garden Supervisor").

The only significant addition since his time is the creation of the hill for the Monopteros by his nephew Carl August Sckell, who succeeded him as director of the park.

In the Second World War, Allied bombing damaged the Monopteros and destroyed the Chinese Tower, and 93,000 cubic metres of rubble were dumped in the Hirschanger.

)[20] Transport too has harmed the character of the garden, most notably with the construction in 1963 of the Isarring, part of Munich's central ring road, which divides the park just north of the Kleinhesseloher See.

[21] Towards the end of the 20th century the city of Munich wished to construct a tram route through the garden north of the Chinese Tower, currently a road used only by buses;[22] but it was opposed by the Bavarian government, which owns the land, and the Bayerische Verwaltungsgerichtshof rejected the plan.

[citation needed] It caused quite a sensation at the time and also made the English Gardens well-known, even outside Munich.

[citation needed] The Schönfeldwiese proper lies to the south of the Schwabingerbach, which crosses the English Garden at this point before flowing northwards along its west side; but the name is sometimes used of the whole larger open space.

It was built on a 15 m high foundation, around which a small hill was created in 1832, using leftover building material from recent work on the Munich Residenz (Royal Residence).

A particular feature of the Monopteros is the use of polychrome stone painting, an interest of Klenze at the time, who intended the building to serve as a model for its use.

In 1838, Leo von Klenze built an exedra or stone bench (Steinerne Bank) in place of the temple, with the inscription "Hier wo Ihr wallet, da war sonst Wald nur und Sumpf" ("Here where you meander was once only wood and marsh").

[29] The Chinesischer Turm ("Chinese Tower") is a 25-metre-high wooden structure, first constructed in 1789 to 1790, from a design by the Mannheimer military architect Joseph Frey (1758–1819).

In the late 19th century up to 5000 servants, manual workers, soldiers, and students would come to the tower early on a Sunday morning to dance to the music of a brass band.

The dance began around five in the morning and ended around eight o'clock, so that servants could return to serve their employers' breakfast or go to church.

This soon expanded to offer milk and cold meals and came to be a favoured stop for walkers in the park, especially after a wooden dance place had been added.

For fifteen years service was from temporary buildings, until in 1985 the current Seehaus was built to a design by Ernst Hürlimann and Ludwig Wiedemann.

In contrast to the southern part, which on sunny days contains as many people as one would find in a medium-sized town, the Hirschau has a peaceful character.

In the southern part the grass in the open expanses (heavily used for sport and sunbathing) must be kept short; but in the Hirschau some meadows are allowed to grow and are mown for hay in June and August, while others are used as pasture for sheep.

(An amphitheatre built in 1793 to a similar plan, but in a different position, a little north of the Rumford-Saal, has not survived; this had been used primarily for fireworks exhibitions).