The portraits of many famous professors since the earliest days hang in the university aula, one of the most memorable places, as Niebuhr called it, in the history of science.
The aula (restored in 1879) was originally the chapter-house of the cathedral.
The most conspicuous building is the old ducal castle of Hohentubingen, built in1507-1535on a hill overlooking the town, and now containing the university library of 460,000 volumes, the observatory, the chemical laboratory, &c. Among the other chief buildings are the quaint old Stiftskirche (1469-1483), a Gothic building containing the tombs of the rulers of Wurttemberg, the new aula and numerous institutes of the university, all of which are modern, and the town-hall dating from 1435 and restored in 1872.