The wooded foothills of the Alps surround the attractive little town of Oberammergau with its many painted houses. This art came to Germany with the Baroque style from Italy and began to be widely followed in about 1660. The first houses were painted in this town one century later. Oberammergau has became world famous because of the Passion Plays performed here. After a terrible plague epidemic in 1633, which miraculously stopped just short of Oberammergau, the people of the village vowed to give a presentation of the Passion of ... (more)