MAIN ATTRACTIONS:
The Council Place
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The Council Place, „the kilometer 0” of the town, is the area with the biggest density of cultural objectives, hosting most of the various events unfolded in Brasov. If during its first centuries of existence, the centre of „Brasov's Stronghold” used to have a different configuration, in 1420 the perimeter of the town’s main market used to have the same dimensions as the actual one, with the constructions of the Council House located in its centre. The rivulet flowing from „Schei” neighbourhood, on the Horses Fair Street (today George Baritiu Street), used to split in the market on Saint Peter Street (Muresenilor) and the Gate's Street (Republicii), at the level of The Pillory, where used to be the Lies' Bridge, mentioned for the first time in 1523.The market sides used to have names connected to the commerce practiced across the time: The Flax Course (on north), The Tubbers’ Course (on west), The Flowers Course and the Fruits' Fair (on south), the Wheat’s Course (on east).
The buildings which border the market's perimeter have a late aspect, due to the renewals undertaken after the big fire occurred in 1689. However, there are still conserved medieval remnants of the inhabited buildings (George Baritiu Street no. 2, Council Place no. 20 and 25), buildings dating back to the Renaissance, such as the Merchants' House (no. 14) or the houses of the urban patriciate (no. 15-16), highlighted through the restoration works undertaken during the last years. From the XVIIIth century dates back the Seuler House (no. 27), with its facade remodelled in Baroque style, from the XIXth century – The Safrano House (no. 23) and from the beginning of the XXth century, The Czell Palace (no. 26, today a bank seat) and the parochial house of the orthodox church The Assumption, erected in neo-byzantine style, on the eastern side of the assembly.
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The Council House
On December 23rd 1420, it has been issued the act that mentioned for the first time the chamber destined to „justice rendering” and the sittings of the town’s Magistrate, located above the vault of the furriers' guild on the main market place of “Brașov's Stronghold”. The following documents record the works that took place at the above mentioned building of 1503 under the name of Praetorium. In 1521 are mentioned the guardian’s chamber and the prison located in the Council’s House, while the older tower, became part of the assembly, suffered an increase in height during the years 1515 and 1528; it was endowed with a pyramidal roof surrounded by the four little towers, symbolizing in the Middle Ages the supreme town’s jurisdiction – jus gladii.
Destroyed by the devastating fire of 1689, which affected the most part of the representative buildings of the „Brașov's Stronghold”, the Council’s House is rebuilt in baroque style, between 1774 and 1778, with the loggia decorated with the town's blazonry and the tower’s „domed roof”, conserved in this form until 1910. At the end of the XVIIIth century, the clock of the „Trumpeters’ Tower”, with their quadrants painted by Joseph Moor in 1775, used to represent one of the town’s attractions.
Until 1923, the Council’s House used to conserve the towns' archive, and since 1950, the building received the function of museum, with historical and archaeological collections.
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The Museum of the Urban Civilisation (Council’s Place 15), is a pilot-project unique in Romania, through its thematic nature, which recreates the way of life of the inhabitants of an urban space and the commercial relationships of Brasov with the Orient and the Occident, across the XVIIIth and the XIXth centuries.
The museum is set up inside the Closius House, erected during the XVIth-XIXth centuries, along with the residencies of the families Hiemesch and Giesel in the southern side of the Council Place, and reflects the houses’ typology of the urban patriciate during the Renaissance in Transylvania, conserving elements characteristic to the period, such as the representation halls with semi-cylindrical vaults and plastering mouldings, the interiors decorated with vegetal-floral and figurative mural paintings, elements of decorative stone works.
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The Memorial Museum „Casa Mureșenilor” (The Council Place 25), is hosted by the building dating back to the XVth-XIXth centuries, became residence of Muresenilor family since 1840. Here used to be the editorial office’s seat of the „Transylvania’s Gazette”, the first political paper of the Romanians of Ardeal, established in 1838 and the printing house „A. Mureşianu”.
The Mureseni Family is known through its scholars and patriots, militants for the civic and political rights of the Romanians in Transylvania, in the XIXth century. Andrei Mureşianu (1816-1863), the poet of the Revolution of 1848, composed in Brasov the lyrics of the song „Deşteaptă-te române” „Wake up, Romanian”, became in 1989 the National Anthem of Romania.
The museum established in 1968, thanks to the donation made by the descendants of Muresianu family, exhibits a valuable collection of objects of the family, among which pieces of furniture, paintings, sculptures and an archive of great cultural value, containing more than 25.000 documents. Besides the permanent and temporary exhibitions, the museum has a rich cultural activity, consisting in recitals and classic music concerts.
"Georghe Dima” Hall, located at the museum's ground floor, is dedicated to the memory of one of the most important animator of the national cultural life of the decades around 1900. Gheorghe Dima (1847-1925), left the Romanian music an original and homogenous creation, comprising more than 225 titles, being at the same time an interpreter and conductor on countless concert and representations' scenes of Romanian and abroad, with a remarkable educational activity