Zabergäu-Gymnasium Brackenheim

The Zabergäu-Gymnasium Brackenheim is a general-education grammar school in Brackenheim, Germany. It is attended by about 1000 students from all over Zabergäu and its tradition goes back to the 15th century.HistoryThe first reference of a school for town chroniclers in Brackenheim is dated to 1460. In 1503 the Town Clerk’s office was separated from the grammar school and a certain Wendel Bender was named as the first schoolmaster in Brackenheim. Besides Latin classes with particular clerical commitments there were German classes, too. In these classes students were only taught in German. Since the Church Order by duke Christopher of Württemberg in the year 1559 the territorial lord (Landesherr) supervised the school, but the town held the authorisation to name the schoolmaster. This person had to be countersigned by the territorial lord. After 1560 an assistant teacher was mentioned beside the schoolmaster for the first time. About 1600 the construction of a new school building was started, which had been finished nine years later after a delay of building because of pest.Under Magister (Latin: teacher) Johann Jakob Rappolt, who administered this office from 1747 to 1791, the Latin school was separated from the German classes prospectively called elementary school. Later these classes obtained their own rooms. In 1793 the great school reform changed the orientation of the grammar school from interpretation of texts to “Realien” (arithmetic, geography, regional and cultural studies of fatherland). In 1834 another type of secondary school was established. But in 1851 it was closed again in default of students. In the first few years of its short existence the school was so popular that the number of Latin students temporarily sank to under ten (1842: only three students).