Cologne Cologne Cologne (; , , ) is the largest city of Germany's most populous federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia, and its 1,075,935 (2016) inhabitants make it the fourth most populous city in Germany after Berlin, Hamburg, and Munich. The largest city on the Rhine, it is also the most populous city both of the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Region, which is Germany's largest and one of Europe's major metropolitan areas, and of the Rhineland. Centred on the left bank of the Rhine, Cologne is about southeast of North Rhine-Westphalia's capital of Düsseldorf and northwest of Bonn. It is the largest city in
History of the Jews in Cologne archbishop vacant, but Charles IV was not near enough to take action. On 23–24 August the relative security of Jews in Cologne came to an end. The Jews, who had already faced slaughter in the surrounding territories, were now also killed in Cologne itself. The actual outcome of the pogrom is not well known. In the course of St. Bartholomew's Night in 1349 the Jewish quarter near the town-hall ("Rathaus") was attacked, after which killing, plundering of Jewish properties, and arson followed. Fugitives were pursued and struck down. Though partly contradictory of each other, many sources testify to the calamity.