The towers
27 large ones remain.
Bene Riobó — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Bene Riobó — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Bene Riobó — CC BY-SA 4.0 · ArildV — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Bene Riobó — CC BY-SA 4.0
Visby City Wall is a medieval defensive wall around the town of Visby on the Swedish island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea. It is the strongest, most extensive and best preserved medieval town wall in Scandinavia and a key part of the Visby UNESCO World Heritage Site. It was built in two stages in the 13th and 14th centuries, and about 3.44 km of its original 3.6 km still stands. It once had 29 large and 22 small towers, of which 27 large and 9 small remain. Its oldest part is the Gunpowder Tower at the harbour entrance, built in the 12th century and the oldest surviving non-religious building in the Nordic countries. The grey stone wall and its tall square towers ring the old town, some topped with steep red-tiled roofs. Green meadows and trees lie outside, with house roofs and church towers rising behind and the blue sea along the west side. You can walk the outside of the wall in about an hour and enter the old town through its gates. In winter snow covers the meadows and transforms the scene.
27 large ones remain.
12th century.
Around the wall.
Visby, Gotland, Sweden
About an hour.
By ferry or plane from mainland Sweden.