Mainz as the capital of Rhineland-Palatinate is with about 200,000 inhabitants its biggest city and looks back on a history of 2,000 years. With its cathedral it is a diocesan town as well as location for several media companies and a center of Rhenish carnival. The university town offers a lot of different cultural facilities: state theatre, small stages, other cultural centers and several museums. Some pretty designed parks, as there are the Volkspark, Rosengarten, or Stadtpark, invite to extensive walks. Longer hiking tours are enjoyable in the woods, meadows, and vineyards around Mainz. Excursions to the nearby abbeys and the castles at the bank of the river Rhine are worthwile.
The University of Mainz was founded in 1477, but in the progress of the French Revolution the teaching program had to be in abeyance. It was reopened after the Second World War with scarcely 2.000 students. The University was named after one of the most famous inhabitants of the town: Johannes Gutenberg, the inventor of book printing with movable letters. Today, the University of Mainz with its more than 32,000 students from more than 130 nations is one of the largest and most dynamical universities in Germany. It is the scientific center of Rhineland-Palatinate: 2,200 scientists teach and do research in 150 institutes and clinics.
For detailed information about Mainz and the University, see Stadt Mainz or Universität.