Sister cities of Mühlhausen

Mühlhausen (official German long version Mühlhausen/Thüringen) is a city in Thuringia, Germany. It is the capital of the Unstrut-Hainich district in the north-west of Thuringia, situated only 5 km (3 miles) north of Germany's accurate geographical centre (in the neighbouring municipality of Niederdorla) as well as 50 km (31 miles) NW of Erfurt, 65 km (40 miles) E of Kassel and 50 km (31 miles) SE of Göttingen.

Mühlhausen was first mentioned in 967 and became one of the most important cities in central Germany during the later Middle Ages. In the early 13th century, it became a free imperial city, so that is was an independent and republican self-ruled member of the Holy Roman Empire, controlling an area of approx. 220 square kilometres (85 sq mi) and 19 regional villages. Due to its long-distance trade, Mühlhausen was prosperous and influential with a population of 10,000 around 1500, that was the second-largest in Thuringia after Erfurt, today's capital. Because it was spared from later destruction, Mühlhausen hosts a great variety of historical buildings today with one of the biggest remaining medieval city centres in Germany, covering a surface of more than 50 hectares within the inner city wall and approx. 200 hectares within the non-remained outer city wall. There are 11 Gothic churches, several patrician's houses and a nearly complete preserved fortification (walls, towers etc.) as main sights.

Famous people from and in Mühlhausen were Johann Sebastian Bach, who worked as the city's organist from 1707 until 1708, the theologian Thomas Müntzer, a leading person in the German Peasants' War, John A. Roebling, the Mühlhausen-born constructor of the Brooklyn Bridge and Friedrich August Stüler, an influential architect in mid-19th century Prussia, who was also born in Mühlhausen.

Mühlhausen is located within the Thuringian Basin, a flat and fertile area, at Unstrut river on the eastern edge of the Hainich mountains and has a population of 33,000.