1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Niederwald

NIEDERWALD, a broad hill in Germany, in the Prussian province of Hesse-Nassau, on the right bank of the Rhine, between that river and the Wisper, opposite Bingen, forming the south-western apex of the Taunus range. Its summit is clothed with dense forests of oak and beech, while its southern and western sides, which descend sharply to Rüdesheim and Assmannshausen on the Rhine, are covered with vineyards, and produce some of the finest wines of the district. At the edge of the forest, on the crest of the hill above Rüdesheim, stands the gigantic “Germania” statue, the national monument of the war of 1870–71, which was unveiled on the 28th of September 1883 by the emperor William I., in the presence of all the rulers in Germany or their representatives. It was designed by Johannes Schilling, and the bronze figure of Germania is 33 ft. high; the pedestal is adorned with allegorical figures and portraits of German princes and generals. Cogtooth mountain railways run up the hill from Rüdesheim and Assmannshausen.

See Spielmann, Niederwald und Nationaldenkmal (Wiesbaden, 1898).