Naumburg (German: [ˈnaʊmbʊɐ̯k] ⓘ) is a town in (and the administrative capital of) the district Burgenlandkreis, in the state of Saxony-Anhalt, Central Germany.

This UNESCO designation recognizes the processes that shaped the European continent during the High Middle Ages between 1000 and 1300: Christianization, the so-called "Landesausbau" and the dynamics of cultural exchange and transfer characteristic for this very period.

The successful foundation not long beforehand of a Propstei Church on the site of the later Naumburg Cathedral was mentioned in the Merseburg Bishops' Chronicles in 1021.

The emergence of Leipzig as a trade-fair centre from 1500 and the Thirty Years' War adversely affected the Naumburg economy.

[4] The ecclesiastical domain was secularised in middle of the 16th century and transferred to the Dukes of Saxony, who administered the district through a government endowment (Stiftsregierung) and later provided administrators.

Under the German Democratic Republic Naumburg was a centre of mechanical engineering, pharmaceuticals, metal-working and footwear manufacture.

The cathedral is composed of a Romanesque core structure flanked by two Gothic choirs in the east and in the west.

The plant décor of the west choir, due to its exceptional accuracy and the great variety of shapes to be seen on the capitals, friezes and corbels (corydalis, mugwort, hazel and vine), softens the sharpness and blocky features of the partition architecture and emphasises the organic character of the architecture.

[12] The relief frieze is one of the most sophisticated and formally most perfected arrangement of the Passion of Christ among the preserved sculptural ensembles from the 13th century throughout Europe.

It shows the last supper, the payment of the pieces of silver, the capture, Peter's denial, two guards, the reading of Christ's sentence, the flagellation and the carrying of the cross.

The Jews, for example, wear the typical hats, while Pilatus appears in a splendorous courtly garment, washing his hands off responsibility.

The monumental multi-coloured crucifixion group in the central portal of the choir screen shows in an impressive manner the immeasurable suffering of Christ and the deep and obvious grief of Mary and John.

The twelve statues of the founders of Naumburg Cathedral rank among the most outstanding creations of European medieval sculpting.

[16] The nearly portrait-like representation of aristocratic men and women of the Thuringian-Saxon nobility is an unparalleled appreciation of the first founders of the church.

Even though the people honoured with the sculptures had already been dead for 150 to 200 years at the time of creation, they are shown wearing contemporary courtly garments from the middle of the 13th century.

Only the sculpture of Uta has experienced an unparalleled cult, fostered considerably by the photographs of Walter Hege in the early 20th century.

Encouraged by a privilege granted by Emperor Conrad II in 1033 the merchants of Kleinjena also moved to Naumburg, being guaranteed free trade and the heritable, interest-free ownership of their enclosed domicile.

The relevant areas, subject to special rights held by the bishop and his cathedral chapter, included castles, towns, church institutions, villages, forums, but also fields, meadows and forests, and were enclosed by trenches, ramparts, walls, or fences.

[27] The oldest residential tower of Naumburg was built probably in the mid-12th century at the cathedral precincts, at the curia episcopalis, Domplatz 1.

The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche spent his childhood and his later years in Naumburg in the home of his mother's family.

A teacher is said to have led his pupils outside the gates of the beleaguered city to beg the Hussite commander Andreas Prokop for mercy.

After the fusion of both and the migration from the school site Seminarstraße in the year 2007, the Domgymnasium is now housed in the buildings of the former Lepsiusgymnasium.

Here pupils, who were refused the Abitur at public schools during the SED regime, were able to attain an ecclesiastical qualification.