Haller Bastion

The Haller Bastion stands at the south-eastern end of Sibiu's old fortifications, where Bulevardul Spitalelor meets Strada Pompeiu Onofreiu, near the Thick Tower (Turnul Gros). It belongs to the city's late fortifications, together with the Soldisch Bastion, fragments of a rondel and stretches of curtain wall, listed as historic monuments under code SB-II-m-A-12010.05. In the mid sixteenth century, as the Ottoman threat grew, Sibiu's defences were reinforced with rondels and bastions. After imperial troops under General Giovanni Battista Castaldo entered Transylvania in 1551 and placed a garrison in the city, the Italian architect Alessandro Clippa designed five large bastions for the corners of the walls. The bastion was built under Mayor Peter Haller, with the work overseen by the master builders Peter Nürnberger and Georg Waahl. The bastion dates from the mid-sixteenth century. The Haller and Soldisch bastions in Sibiu and the bastioned fortress of Oradea are considered the only surviving examples of the sixteenth-century Italian fortification system on the territory of present-day Romania. The bastion is built of brick and filled with earth to withstand artillery fire. Its walls have a total length of 223 metres and a maximum height of 9 metres, and its casemates have gun openings facing the Thick Tower and Strada Manejului. Near the top, the walls have stone spacers that prevented siege ladders from being set against them. In 1771 a riding school (manège) was built on the bastion, and in the first decade of the twentieth century the present Neurology Hospital building, itself a historic monument (code SB-II-m-A-12173). In 2006 the walls were cleaned and restored through sponsorship by the German companies Kärcher and AeDis, in partnership with Sibiu City Hall. The walls can be seen from the street.