Nuremberg City Hall

It was not until the Lorenzer and Sebalder halves of the city were united to form the universitas civium and connected by a common wall that the council acquired an estate from the Heilsbronn Monastery in 1322 and later expanded the area to the north by purchasing additional houses and converting it for administrative purposes.

The so-called Ratsstube building with the late Gothic curtain wall facade was built by Hans Beheim the Elder in 1514–1515 in the north.

Although the horizontal, hitherto unknown in Nuremberg history, plays a dominant role in the elongated monumental building, the roof region returns to the native vertical with the Dwarf Houses, completely unthinkable in Italy.

The uniform window front contrasts with the three Baroque portals, whose sculptures, including figures from the Bible book of Daniel, were commissioned by the city council in 1617 and designed by the sculptor Leonhard Kern.

Above the central portal, the main entrance, is emblazoned the coat of arms of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation with the imperial eagle.

In the northeast corner of the large courtyard of the town hall and on the south side of Theresienstrasse, new buildings in the neo-Gothic style were constructed in 1885–1889 according to plans by August Essenwein.

In 1944–45, after bomb hits during the air raids on Nuremberg, the entire city hall complex burned down to the surrounding walls.

After a long controversial and bitter discussion, Prechtl withdrew his design in 1988, the walls remained white, and local politics decided on a "pause for reflection."

After a video installation in the summer of the Dürer anniversary year 2012, in which both an animation based on the recovered photo documentation from 1944 and the projection of Prechtl's design on the still white wall were shown, a renewed discussion arose about the restoration of the painting.

Among the sculptures enthroned on the three Baroque portals, created in 1617 by the sculptor Leonhard Kern, are figures depicting the prophecies in the 7th chapter of the Book of Daniel.