Perlachturm


The 70-metre-tall Perlachturm is a tower in the central district of Augsburg, Germany. Originally built as a watchtower in the 10th century, it is nowadays part of an ensemble with the City Hall of Augsburg, a landmark of the Reichsstadt.

Name

The exact origin of the name "Perlachturm" is unknown, with several different theories attempting to explain it. Of the three constituent parts of the name, "Per," "lach" and "turm," only the latter presents no controversy and means "Tower." The conventional wisdom holds that the first two parts originated from the medieval fairs involving bears on the central square. In Old High German, Per means bear and lach describes a show, or fair. An information plaque on the tower itself says that it came from the Latin "perlego". There are 258 steps to the observation deck.