StaticMapLite
staticMapLite (staticmap.openstreetmap.de) is one of the options for OpenStreetMap static map images (tools which let you compose a URL to fetch a map image centred at specified location, generating such images and hosting the image at the URL).
The live service currently requires referrer headers, but does not support https, which is a largely non-functional combination.
openstreetmap.de hosting
The hosted image urls run at http://staticmap.openstreetmap.de which was recently (Late 2018) taken over and pointed at a new server managed by openstreetmap.de folks. They reluctantly set that up on their own server to keep the same URLs working after the original set-up by (TODO: who? dfacts?) was suddenly shut down.
The referrer header set-up is some "strict usage limits" they introduced. So far nobody has added any information to the website on usage restrictions/limits or what is considered abuse, and the site still invite developer to use "the following simple <img> tag" (may be a bad idea)
For may years previous to this staticmap.openstreetmap.de appeared to be the best (more reliable) of the options, seemingly suitable for for use in a website <img> tag. The hosting had significant longevity compared to other options, although it did have some periods of downtime over the years, during which the folks hosting it were unresponsive .
Example
Example image URL with parameters defining three markers:
It has a separate 'wizzard' tool for composing image URLs: http://staticmap.openstreetmap.de/wizzard/
Running yourself
The software is open source and you can host a staticMapLite server yourself. If you want to permalink to static map images, then self-hosting is very desirable. The knowledge that you could do self-hosting if the hosted version disappeared, is also valuable.
You need apache, php and imagemagic. With that you simply place the files in your www serving directory.
Development
Source code and issue tracker: https://github.com/dfacts/staticmaplite
Unmaintained: Despite having good long term hosting on openstreetmap.de, it seems the maintainers "dfacts" (who also maintain the main deployed instance) are not attending to issue discussions or pull requests