Der Beginenturm (the Beginen Tower) is a famous and prominent medieval feature of old Hannover. It luckily escaped being destroyed during WW II: at the (new) municipal Rathaus is a 3-D rendering of how the city appeared after the bombing; it shows this structure, dating from the 1300s, still standing strong among the bombed-out ruins of the old city.
This was part of the solid stone wall and fortifications that surrounded medieval Hannover. Many other European cities still have some remains of their medieval city walls, and they serve as a reminder that in this part of the world such fortifications were necessary to defend the population against invading medieval gangs and plunderers.
This particular structure dates to at least the mid-1300s. According to it’s Wikipedia page, it was mentioned in a writing from 1357. The structure is made of limestone and the Wikipedia entry also cites a source that says that the stones were taken from the Romanesque church building that originally made up the Marktkirche. ( https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beginenturm_(Hannover) )
How it appears at night:
For a sense of scale, that's me standing to the left of the window in the next photo:
Der Beginenturm is near the edge of the Leine river, and therefore would have greeted arriving and passing boats. I wonder how many arrows came out of those windows against invading warships.
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