The year 1158 is the earliest date the city is mentioned in a document signed in Augsburg. By that time Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, had built a bridge over the river Isar next to a settlement of Benedictine monks. Almost two decades later in 1175 Munich was officially granted city status and received fortification. In 1180, with the trial of Henry the Lion, Otto I Wittelsbach became Duke of Bavaria and Munich was handed over to the Bishop of Freising. The Wittelsbach dynasty would rule Bavaria until 1918. In 1255, when the Duchy of Bavaria was split in two, Munich became the ducal residence of Upper Bavaria. In the late 15th century Munich underwent a revival of gothic arts: the Old Town Hall was enlarged, and Munich's largest gothic church, the Frauenkirche cathedral, was constructed in only twenty years, starting in 1468.
When Bavaria was reunited in 1506, Munich became its capital. The arts and politics became increasingly influenced by the court and Munich was a center of the German counter reformation as well as of renaissance arts. The Catholic League was founded in Munich in 1609. During the Thirty Years' War Munich became electoral residence, but in 1632 the city was occupied by King Gustav II Adolph of Sweden. When the bubonic plague broke out in 1634 and 1635 about one third of the population died.
Under the regency of the Bavarian electors Munich was an important center of baroque life. In 1806, the city became the capital of the newly established Kingdom of Bavaria, with the state's parliament and the new archdiocese of Munich and Freising being located in the city. Twenty years later Landshut University was moved to Munich. Many of the city's finest buildings belong to this period and were built under the first three Bavarian kings. These years were marked by tremendous artistic and cultural activity in Munich. The most famous of the Bavarian kings was Ludwig II who is often referred to as the Fairy Tales King and sometimes as Mad King Ludwig. He commissioned the construction of two extravagant palaces and a castle, the most famous being Neuschwanstein, and was a generous patron of opera composer Richard Wagner. Ludwig was deposed on grounds of mental incapacity without any medical examination and died shortly thereafter under mysterious circumstances in Lake Starnberg.
After World War I, the city was at the center of much political unrest. In November 1918 on the eve of revolution, the royal family fled the city. After the murder of the first republican premier of Bavaria in February 1919, the Bavarian Soviet Republic was proclaimed, but it was put down on 3 May 1919 by conservative troops. While the republican government had been restored, Munich subsequently became a hotbed of extremist politics, from among which Adolf Hitler and the National Socialists rose to prominence. On 8 Nov 1923 Hitler and his supporters, who were then concentrated in Munich, launched the so called "Beer Hall Putsch" from the Bürgerbräukeller, in an attempt to overthrow the Weimar Republic and seize power. The revolt failed, resulting in Hitler's arrest and the temporary crippling of the Nazi Party, which at that time was virtually unknown.
The city once again became a Nazi stronghold when the National Socialists took power in Germany in 1933. The National Socialist German Workers Party (NSDAP) created the first concentration camp at Dachau, 16 km (10 mi) north-west of the city. Because of its importance to the rise of National Socialism, Munich was referred to as the "Capital of the Movement" (Hauptstadt der Bewegung). Munich was also the base of the White Rose, a student resistance movement from June 1942 to February 1943. However, the core members including Hans and Sophie Scholl were arrested and executed following a distribution of leaflets at the University of Munich. The city was heavily damaged by allied bombing during World War II.
After US occupation in 1945, Munich was completely rebuilt following a meticulous plan which preserved its pre-war street grid. In 1957 Munich's population passed the 1 million mark. Munich was the site of the 1972 Summer Olympics, during which Israeli athletes were assassinated by Palestinian terrorists during the so called Munich massacre. The final game of the 1974 FIFA Worldcup took place in Munich and so did the opening game of the 2006 FIFA WorldCup. Today, Munich is Germany's third largest city. Together with Frankfurt it is the most important business city in Germany and it remains one of Europe's most important centers of arts, science, learning and sports.
