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SEBES |
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The town of SEBES grew up on the proceeds of the leather-working
industry, trading mainly with Wallachia; as Mühlbach it was the capital
of the Unterwald , the westernmost zone of Saxon settlement. In 1438 a
Turkish army arrived, demanding that the town be surrendered. A number
of inhabitants refused, barricading themselves in one of the towers of
the citadel , which the Turks stormed and burned. The only survivor, a
student aged 16, was then sold as a slave at Adrianople (now Edirne),
but escaped twenty years later to write Of the Religion, Manners and
Infamies of the Turks - a bestselling exposé of the bogeymen of
fifteenth-century Europe - signing himself the "Nameless One of Sebes";
he was in fact a Dominican monk and died in Rome in 1502. The Student's
Tower (also known as the Tailors' Tower), at Str. Traian 6, is thus one
of the main sights of Sebes, together with a large Evangelical Church ,
perhaps the finest Gothic church in Transylvania. The original
Romanesque basilica was built between 1240 and 1270, with a
disproportionately large and grand choir added by 1382, followed by the
upper part of the tower in 1664. The choir boasts the best Parleresque
statues in Transylvania, as well as a large polychrome altar, dating
from 1518. Just to the north stands the cemetery chapel, built in 1400
and now used by the Uniates. A museum (Tues-Fri 8am-4pm, Sat 9am-1pm) is
housed on the north side of the square in the late fifteenth-century
House of the Voivodes , where János Zápolyai died in 1540. The museum
has material on the local guilds, paintings by the locally born Sava
Hentia (1848-1904), and the usual ethnographic display.
The train station (Sebes Alba) and bus station are to the east, in the
new town. There is little incentive to linger, but should you need to
stay overnight, the Motel Dacia (tel & fax 058/732 743; under $6) is
just east on the DN1, and offers a good view of the famous Red Cliffs (
Râpa Rosie ) to the north of town. There's also a rather grotty campsite
at Baile Miercurea, 16km east. Continuing west by road towards Arad and
the border, you'll find several new motels , the pick of which is the
Lutsch 2000 (tel & fax 058/743 851; $6-10), just west of the rail
junction of Vintu de Jos. Note that if you're travelling the few
kilometres north to Alba Iulia, you're best off catching one of the nine
daily buses, saving the lengthy wait for a train connection at Vintu de
Jos.
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