Today it is one of only four towns in Germany that still have completely intact city walls, the other three being Nördlingen, Dinkelsbühl and Berching, all in Bavaria.

In 1070, the counts of Comburg-Rothenburg, who also owned the village of Gebsattel, built Rothenburg castle on the mountain top high above the River Tauber.

Rabbi Meir Ben Baruch of Rothenburg (died 1293, buried 1307 in Worms) had a great reputation as a jurist in Europe.

In October 1631, during the Thirty Years' War, the Catholic Johann Tserclaes, Count of Tilly, wanted to quarter his 40,000 troops in Protestant Lutheran Rothenburg.

The famous German landscape painter Eugen Bracht visited Rothenburg in 1877; although he stayed only two days, he was clearly impressed.

Because incendiary bombs were used most outer walls still stood after the attack and were used to rebuild the newer eastern part of the old town.

Battalion commander Frank Burke, a future Medal of Honor recipient, ordered six soldiers of the 12th Infantry Regiment (United States), 4th Division to march into Rothenburg on a three-hour mission and negotiate the surrender of the town.

American troops of the 12th Infantry Regiment, 4th Division occupied the town on April 17, 1945, and in November 1948, McCloy was named an honorary citizen (German: Ehrenbürger) of Rothenburg.

Around 32% of Rothenburg ob der Tauber, mainly in the eastern half of the town, had to be repaired or rebuilt after being bombed in World War II (with most outer walls still standing and used for the rebuild houses).

Donations for the rebuilding works in Rothenburg were received from all over the world, and rebuilt parts of the walls feature commemorative bricks with donor names.

In most cases, only the wooden upper portions or roofs of the eastern towers and walls needed to be rebuilt, and most of their stone structure had been preserved.

At the top of the tower, an admission fee of 2 euros is charged to enter the room with a scenic view of almost the entire town.

The room also contains manuscripts providing the visitor with historical information about the construction and relevant history of the city wall.

Many stores and hotels catering to tourists are clustered around the Town Hall Square and along several major streets (such as Herrngasse, Schmiedgasse).

A staple pastry of Rothenburg ob der Tauber is the Schneeball, deep-fried dough shaped like a snowball and covered in either confectioner's sugar or chocolate.

Rothenburg is the primary location for Elizabeth Peters's mystery novel, Borrower of the Night (1973) about the search for a missing Tilman Riemenschneider sculpture.

The town featured as the location in the Belgian comic book, The Adventures of Yoko Tsuno in the episode of La Frontière de la vie (On the Edge of Life, 1977) and it inspired the look of the town in the Japanese manga and anime series A Little Snow Fairy Sugar (2001).

[11] Illustrator and concept artist Gustaf Tenggren based the village in Disney's Pinocchio on photographs and images of the town.

[13] The video game Team Fortress 2 features a map titled "Rottenburg", a play on the original's namesake along with visually similar architecture.

The southern part of the marketplace is prominently featured in the video game Gabriel Knight 2 depicting the fictional town of Rittersberg.

The WWII-era first-person shooter Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, from the Medal of Honor video game series, features a level in which the player must fight their way through a snowy town near the Siegfried Line in Germany that is strikingly similar to Rothenburg, buildings with similar architecture can be seen throughout the town, as well as similar-looking streets, as the player makes their way through.