Krummenau
Encyclopedia
Krummenau is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality
belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde
, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld
district
in Rhineland-Palatinate
, Germany
. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Rhaunen
, whose seat is in the like-named municipality
.
north of the 746 m-high Idarkopf in the Idar Forest
. The municipal area is 61.6% wooded. The Idarbach flows through the village.
and in the west on the municipality of Horbruch
.
Wezilo
. A manuscript from the late 18th century – kept at the archive of the Museum of Wasserburg-Anholt of the Prince of Salm-Salm in Isselburg
-Anholt in Westphalia
– is the only record of this. The original was a donation document whereby Wezilo granted Saint Christopher’s Church at Ravengiersburg
an estate in the village of Lindenschied
and also three mansos in Runa und Crummenauwe in pago Nachgowe (“oxgang
s in Rhaunen
and Krummenau in the County of the Nahegau
”). Such pious gestures to the church were not unusual in mediaeval
Germany, but they did come with conditions. This particular donation, for instance, required the recipient to say a Mass
each Friday for the donor’s salvation
and also to sing a Requiem
for him when he died. There is some question as to whether the manuscript writer, J. G. F. Schott, falsified the document just so that he could earn money by selling it, but whatever happened in the 18th century, it is highly likely that Krummenau is older than 900 years anyway.
could never feel altogether safe in the Hunsrück in what they called Germania Superior
. Beginning in the mid 4th century AD, Germanic peoples
were thronging into the region. Before the Franks
cut a swath of destruction along their path and took the land along the Moselle and on the Hunsrück into their ownership about 475, Roman colonist families left the area and withdrew along with Roman troops. Only the higher areas of the Hunsrück were left more or less untouched. A new settlement process began with farmsteads, clearings, village foundings and the division of the land into Gau
e.
Throughout the Middle Ages
, the old Roman road and a “grey cross” at the crossing of this road with the path from Krummenau to Hirschfeld
formed important reckoning points for the borders of the sovereign area to which Krummenau belonged. “Aus dem kroen Kruytz in die Steynstraß immer dann die Steynstraß hin” reads one of many border descriptions from 1509 (“From the grey cross onto the Stone Road and then always down the Stone Road”). Furthermore, a 1508 Weistum likewise mentions the “grey cross” as part of a border description (a Weistum – cognate
with English
wisdom – was a legal pronouncement issued by men learned in law in the Middle Ages and early modern times). Even as late as 1711, a map marked a cross on the old Roman road at that spot, even though protocols from as early as 1461 had noted that it had long ceased to be there. There was, however, a “grey stone”.
Krummenau belonged to the High Court Region
of Rhaunen, within which the Waldgrave
s of Schmidtburg, later those of Dhaun, sat as the lords of the high court, which as a high court had the power to hand down death sentences
.
On 29 September 1399, Johann and Friedrich, Waldgraves at Dhaun, enfeoffed Count Palatine Ruprecht (who the very next year became Rupert, King of Germany) with the court and people at Krummenau, for which they received a charter of protection for this and other villages. In 1461 and 1469, the Waldgraves of Dhaun and Kyrburg were mentioned as lords of the high court. In 1493, 1508 and 1558 it was the Waldgraves of Dhaun. The court passed in 1633 to the Dhauns, who had now become the Rhinegraves of Dhaun. Beginning in 1789, sovereign rights passed to the Princes of Salm-Salm. In each case, the villagers were under serfdom
.
in the late 18th century was the Hunsrück. Great havoc was wrought as French
, Prussia
n and Austrian troops marched on through, taking their toll by demanding supplies and by encamping.
The winter of 1794-1795 must have been hard for the local people as well as for the French soldiers, many of whom were ill. The French did not stay long in any one place, not even in the winter, preferring to move elsewhere in search of supplies once they had depleted those nearby. The local schoolteacher in Krummenau, Korb, recorded plundering in the village by French soldiers.
The French swept the old feudal
order away and the nobility was stripped of its powers and its holdings. Serfdom was abolished. A new administrative order was set up on the Rhine’s left bank after the French Revolution
ary model. Krummenau now belonged to the Department of Sarre, the arrondissement
of Birkenfeld, the canton
of Rhaunen and the Mairie (“Mayoralty”) of Rhaunen. As of 1801, with the Treaty of Lunéville
, the Rhineland
officially became French territory and all French laws came into force. The Code civil des Français
was introduced in 1804.
the following year, the Rhineland was awarded to Prussia. Krummenau found itself in the Bürgermeisterei (“Mayoralty”) of Rhaunen in the Bernkastel district, which in turn was in the Regierungsbezirk
of Trier.
In Prussian times, the village’s population began to swell, until it reached a point that was not sustainable. This forced some of the poorer people to take the risk of emigrating
. From 1846 to 1851, nobody emigrated, at least not with official approval. Thereafter, however, history mentions 13 emigrants from that time.
In this time, Krummenau was rather literally off the beaten track. No road led through the village. The Rhaunen
-Weitersbach
-Horbruch
sealed road ran by the village through the “Crummer-Wald” (forest), not through the village. Nevertheless, the villagers were expected to pay for the upkeep of the stretch near the village. There were dirt paths leading to nearby villages such as Wahlenau
, Niederweiler
and Laufersweiler
, but they were only passable by freight cart. There was also only one bridge across the Idarbach/Altbach in the village centre, built of stone and dating most likely from 1806. Another bridge was eventually built in 1912. The school
house was dedicated in 1913.
The Bernkastel district was lucky enough to see work on its electrical supply begun at just the right time; it was far enough along before the outbreak of the First World War for there to be no need to suspend work. By 1915, it was working. The neighbouring Simmern district, on the other hand, saw all preparations for such a project stop for the duration.
The Mobilization Order on 1 August 1914 shook Krummenau badly, for nobody had seriously expected a war. The quiet village was thereafter affected more and more by the war. The problem of supplying food for the war effort had already been foreseen at the outbreak of the war, but it was not until 1915 that a system was introduced for this purpose. From one year to the next, Krummenau had to contribute ever greater amounts of grain
and potato
es, as well as vegetables, straw
, hay
, oil-bearing crops, butter
and eggs. It did not help matters that so many men were called into the forces to fight for the Kaiser; the bulk of the work thus fell to women, children and the elderly. Schools gave schoolchildren time off classes to help with the work (indeed, in 1915 school was out for 7½ months after the schoolteacher was conscripted
). The workload was eased somewhat by help from Russia
n and later also French and British
prisoners of war
, who were housed at the old schoolhouse, and guarded by a man from Horbruch. One of the Russians escaped. There were 10 prisoners of war in Krummenau in 1918.
That same year, the Kaiser was overthrown, the monarchy was abolished and the Great War came to an end with Germany’s defeat. Four times Krummenau had to put up with German soldiers lodging in the village on their way home from the front. The village was choked with people, horses and carriages. The soldiers made themselves at home anywhere: on farms, in barns, in stables, in meadows. Only the odd Frenchman and American
showed up in the village looking for food.
Krummenau lost four men in the war; they were either killed
or missing in action
.
brought Germany democracy, and the first election for the National Assembly on 19 January 1919 drew great interest in Krummenau. Sixty-nine votes were counted in the village: 44 for the Democrats, 11 for the Socialists and 14 for the Centrists.
The French occupied the Rhineland, and thereby the Hunsrück too, until 1930. They took a particularly heavy toll on the Hunsrück by felling an extraordinarily great number of trees. This was part of the war reparations imposed on Germany.
In 1932 and 1933, there was a great roadbuilding project in Krummenau together with water supply and sewerage projects. The district road was built through the village at last, changing the village centre forever. The old bakehouse had to be torn down to make way for the road.
By 1929, the political situation in Germany had become ominous. The National Socialists under their leader Adolf Hitler
were gaining in popularity, and this would soon usher in a new era.
in 1933, terror was legalized and racism
became a political principle.
In Krummenau, unlike in many Hunsrück villages, the mayor, Adolf Zirfaß, was allowed to remain in office, while his peers elsewhere were removed by decree and replaced with mayors who were more receptive to the Nazis’ way of doing things. He held the office until 1945. The nearest Party Ortsgruppe, to which Krummenau belonged, was in Horbruch. There was no open opposition to the Nazi régime in Krummenau. A few villagers were brave enough to continue business with Jews, as they had always done, even after the Nazis forbade it.
It was also during the Third Reich
– in 1935 – that Flurbereinigung
was begun. This was, however, interrupted when the Second World War broke out.
Once again, prisoners of war were detailed to work in Krummenau. They were French, and were housed at the old rectory in Horbruch and were guarded by a man from that village. They were to be kept away from the locals, and were forbidden even to eat at the same table.
Shortly after war broke out, the schoolroom was seized by the military authorities. Schooling was for a while held at a private house. School had been reduced to three days each week by 1941 because the teacher had to fill in for another in Weitersbach. School was reduced even further once the teacher himself was called upon for military service. It was irregular until 1946; for a while, children attended school in Horbruch.
Beginning in 1944, the Hunsrück was subject to air raid
s. In March 1945, the Idar Forest
was carpet-bombed
by the Allies
, with about 200 to 300 bombs falling within Krummenau’s limits, mainly in the woods, damaging 10 to 12 hectares of forest. It is to this day a puzzle as to why this was done, for there were no military facilities in this part of the Idar Forest at this time. There may have been a link with the munitions offloading railway depot at Hochscheid, whose very existence may have led to the supposition that there was a munitions storage facility in the Idar Forest. There were five forestry workers in the danger zone at the time of the bombing, but nobody was wounded.
As Germany’s looming defeat in the war became ever more obvious, enthusiasm for the Nazi régime sank ever deeper. The Volkssturm
was organized in March 1945 as a last-ditch effort, and two tank traps were built in Krummenau, but on the night of 16 March, German troops retreated through the village on their way to Rhaunen and the river Nahe
. Soon thereafter, on the morning of 17 March, the Americans marched in from Trarbach
and Wahlenau
, but did not stay, moving onwards. There was luckily no fighting in the village, as there was in Schlierschied
. For Krummenau, the war was over. Six men from Krummenau had fallen or gone missing.
by United States forces. Adolf Zirfaß asked to be released from his mayoral duties in early April 1945, but was not replaced until August, when Otto Bonn was made commissary mayor. By this time, French forces had relieved the Americans of their occupational duties about a month earlier.
In 1946, Krummenau became part of the then newly founded state
of Rhineland-Palatinate
. It was grouped into the Amt of Rhaunen, the district of Bernkastel and the Regierungsbezirk of Trier. Democracy was reintroduced after 12 years of Nazi dictatorship
, but participation at the first elections for the Bundestag
was very low.
It took a long while before all the German prisoners of war came home. One local man, Heinrich Bartenbach, did not get home until October 1949.
Also arriving in Krummenau, as elsewhere in Germany, were refugees. The population had risen from 118 in 1948 to 129 in 1950. Town and city dwellers also came into the countryside seeking food.
house that had been the only one in the village with a mansard roof
. It was torn down in 1977.
In 1958, there were 8 cars in Krummenau. Given the dearth of public transport in Krummenau, cars were viewed as a necessity, and through the years, their numbers rose. By 1984, there were 48. The rise in popularity of motoring spurred improvements to the local roads. Work on tar
ring roadways to neighbouring villages, however, was not finished until the late 1960s.
In the wake of the Second World War, the Allied occupiers established many military facilities in the Hunsrück, and Krummenau was affected by this process, too. The French built a munitions depot covering 127 ha of the Idar Forest, ten to twelve hectares of which lay within Krummenau’s limits (the rest was in neighbouring Weitersbach). The depot was taken over in 1963/1964 by the Bundeswehr
. The depot contributed to the local economy as an employer, and a few local civilians were employed there as watchmen. The depot has since been converted into a storage facility for military replacement parts.
Military manoeuvres, which were common throughout rural areas in the Bonn Republic
, were also undertaken in the woods near Krummenau, and in 1963, there was a nasty accident. Some children from Krummenau who were playing in the woods found some ordnance in the forest that had been left behind by soldiers and lit some of the powder that they had gathered together from it. Nine-year-old Berthold Weiskopf sustained burns to both his hands and his face.
The valley road to Bernkastel was finally opened in 1972, after first being proposed in 1920. Its construction required some realignment of roadways through Krummenau. One stretch of road was straightened so that it no longer had two right angle
s in it, right near each other, and another stretch now goes through an underpass right in the village. The river also had to be channelled through a steel pipe (owing to a contingency that the planners had failed to foresee), and the old Bauernmühle (“Farmer’s Mill”) downstream from Krummenau had to be torn down to make way for the new road. The road’s construction also involved blasting in several places. The road has been a double-edged sword for Krummenau. On the one hand, traffic through the village has increased, but on the other hand, it has also increased tourism
, for the road is quite scenic and affords good views of the valley.
Despite opposition expressed at a citizens’ meeting in 1968 to having Krummenau transferred from the Bernkastel district to the Birkenfeld district, the state administrative reformers got their way and the whole Amt but for Lindenschied and Woppenroth was transferred to the Birkenfeld district in the Regierungsbezirk of Koblenz in 1970. The Amt administration in Rhaunen became a Verbandsgemeinde administration.
A new building development was opened in Krummenau in 1983 called “In der Spießwiese”.
at Krummenau, but according to oral tradition, there was one called Saint Lawrence’s here once, which stood until the Reformation
was introduced in 1555. It is furthermore said that it was a popular pilgrimage
site. The people of Laufersweiler
, according to this oral tradition, have now stolen this monastery and it is now in Laufersweiler. The village church, built in 1747, supposedly stands across the street from where the monastery once was. The mighty oaken beams of the church’s galleries, it is said, as well as the beams from the old Kroll house, torn down in 1977, were taken from the old monastery.
at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairman.
The municipality’s arms
might in English heraldic
language be described thus: A fess azure between Or a monster with a wolf’s head and eagle’s body sans legs displayed gules, its breast charged with a cramp palewise sable, and argent a gridiron palewise of the fourth.
The monstrous charge
above the line of partition – also found in the Verbandsgemeinde arms – is a reference to the village’s former allegiance to the Waldgraves and Rhinegraves and to its former inclusion in that noble house’s high court region, for it is the charge that appeared in the court seal. The charge below the line of partition, the gridiron, is Saint Lawrence’s attribute, thus representing the church’s patron saint. The church was originally consecrated to him in 1086, although the current church is from 1747. The fess stands for the brook that flows through the village.
’s Directory of Cultural Monuments:
Spanning the Idarbach is a slate
arch bridge onto one of whose spandrels the old churchtower clock, with its figures in gold leaf, has been mounted.
is a railway station on the Nahe Valley Railway (Bingen
–Saarbrücken
).
Municipalities of Germany
Municipalities are the lowest level of territorial division in Germany. This may be the fourth level of territorial division in Germany, apart from those states which include Regierungsbezirke , where municipalities then become the fifth level.-Overview:With more than 3,400,000 inhabitants, the...
belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde
Verbandsgemeinde
A Verbandsgemeinde is an administrative unit in the German Bundesländer of Rhineland-Palatinate and Saxony-Anhalt.-Rhineland-Palatinate:...
, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld
Birkenfeld (district)
Birkenfeld is a district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is bounded by the districts of Sankt Wendel , Trier-Saarburg, Bernkastel-Wittlich, Rhein-Hunsrück, Bad Kreuznach and Kusel.- History :...
district
Districts of Germany
The districts of Germany are known as , except in the states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein where they are known simply as ....
in Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz. English speakers also commonly refer to the state by its German name, Rheinland-Pfalz ....
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Rhaunen
Rhaunen (Verbandsgemeinde)
Rhaunen is a Verbandsgemeinde in the district of Birkenfeld, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. The seat of the Verbandsgemeinde is in Rhaunen....
, whose seat is in the like-named municipality
Rhaunen
Rhaunen is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the seat of the like-named Verbandsgemeinde.-Location:...
.
Location
The municipality lies in the HunsrückHunsrück
The Hunsrück is a low mountain range in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is bounded by the river valleys of the Moselle , the Nahe , and the Rhine . The Hunsrück is continued by the Taunus mountains on the eastern side of the Rhine. In the north behind the Moselle it is continued by the Eifel...
north of the 746 m-high Idarkopf in the Idar Forest
Idar Forest
The Idar Forest is part of the Hunsrück low mountain range in the German federal state of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.- Geography :...
. The municipal area is 61.6% wooded. The Idarbach flows through the village.
Neighbouring municipalities
Krummenau borders in the north on the municipality of Niederweiler, in the east on the municipality of LaufersweilerLaufersweiler
Laufersweiler is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
and in the west on the municipality of Horbruch
Horbruch
Horbruch is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Rhaunen, whose seat is in the like-named municipality.-Location:The municipality lies...
.
Constituent communities
Also belonging to Krummenau is the outlying homestead of Weylandsmühle.First documentary mention
On 20 November 1086, Krummenau had its first documentary mention in a donation document From ArchbishopArchbishopric of Mainz
The Archbishopric of Mainz or Electorate of Mainz was an influential ecclesiastic and secular prince-bishopric in the Holy Roman Empire between 780–82 and 1802. In the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy, the Archbishop of Mainz was the primas Germaniae, the substitute of the Pope north of the Alps...
Wezilo
Wezilo
Wezilo, died 1088, was Archbishop of Mainz from 1084-88. He was a leading supporter of the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV in the Investiture Controversy, and of Antipope Clement III.A priest in Halberstadt, Wezilo owed his promotion to the support of Henry IV...
. A manuscript from the late 18th century – kept at the archive of the Museum of Wasserburg-Anholt of the Prince of Salm-Salm in Isselburg
Isselburg
Isselburg is a town in the district of Borken, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located on the river Issel, near the border with the Netherlands, and approximately 10 km west of Bocholt.-Division:...
-Anholt in Westphalia
Westphalia
Westphalia is a region in Germany, centred on the cities of Arnsberg, Bielefeld, Dortmund, Minden and Münster.Westphalia is roughly the region between the rivers Rhine and Weser, located north and south of the Ruhr River. No exact definition of borders can be given, because the name "Westphalia"...
– is the only record of this. The original was a donation document whereby Wezilo granted Saint Christopher’s Church at Ravengiersburg
Ravengiersburg
Ravengiersburg is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Simmern, whose seat is in the like-named town...
an estate in the village of Lindenschied
Lindenschied
-History:In 1345, Lindenschied, which was then under the High Court of Rhaunen, had its first documentary mention. The document itself stated Lindenschied’s, and several other villages’, legal status, which at this time was disputed, perticularly as to these villages’ rights and boundaries, between...
and also three mansos in Runa und Crummenauwe in pago Nachgowe (“oxgang
Oxgang
An oxgang or bovate is an old land measurement formerly used in Scotland and England. It averaged around 20 English acres, but was based on land fertility and cultivation, and so could be as low as 15.Skene in Celtic Scotland says:...
s in Rhaunen
Rhaunen
Rhaunen is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the seat of the like-named Verbandsgemeinde.-Location:...
and Krummenau in the County of the Nahegau
Nahegau
The Nahegau was in the Middle Ages a county, which covered the environs of the Nahe and large parts of present-day Rhenish Hesse, after a successful expansion of the narrow territory, which did not reach the Rhine, to the disadvantage of the Wormsgau...
”). Such pious gestures to the church were not unusual in mediaeval
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
Germany, but they did come with conditions. This particular donation, for instance, required the recipient to say a Mass
Mass (liturgy)
"Mass" is one of the names by which the sacrament of the Eucharist is called in the Roman Catholic Church: others are "Eucharist", the "Lord's Supper", the "Breaking of Bread", the "Eucharistic assembly ", the "memorial of the Lord's Passion and Resurrection", the "Holy Sacrifice", the "Holy and...
each Friday for the donor’s salvation
Salvation
Within religion salvation is the phenomenon of being saved from the undesirable condition of bondage or suffering experienced by the psyche or soul that has arisen as a result of unskillful or immoral actions generically referred to as sins. Salvation may also be called "deliverance" or...
and also to sing a Requiem
Requiem
A Requiem or Requiem Mass, also known as Mass for the dead or Mass of the dead , is a Mass celebrated for the repose of the soul or souls of one or more deceased persons, using a particular form of the Roman Missal...
for him when he died. There is some question as to whether the manuscript writer, J. G. F. Schott, falsified the document just so that he could earn money by selling it, but whatever happened in the 18th century, it is highly likely that Krummenau is older than 900 years anyway.
Roman times to the Middle Ages
The RomansAncient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
could never feel altogether safe in the Hunsrück in what they called Germania Superior
Germania Superior
Germania Superior , so called for the reason that it lay upstream of Germania Inferior, was a province of the Roman Empire. It comprised an area of western Switzerland, the French Jura and Alsace regions, and southwestern Germany...
. Beginning in the mid 4th century AD, Germanic peoples
Germanic peoples
The Germanic peoples are an Indo-European ethno-linguistic group of Northern European origin, identified by their use of the Indo-European Germanic languages which diversified out of Proto-Germanic during the Pre-Roman Iron Age.Originating about 1800 BCE from the Corded Ware Culture on the North...
were thronging into the region. Before the Franks
Franks
The Franks were a confederation of Germanic tribes first attested in the third century AD as living north and east of the Lower Rhine River. From the third to fifth centuries some Franks raided Roman territory while other Franks joined the Roman troops in Gaul. Only the Salian Franks formed a...
cut a swath of destruction along their path and took the land along the Moselle and on the Hunsrück into their ownership about 475, Roman colonist families left the area and withdrew along with Roman troops. Only the higher areas of the Hunsrück were left more or less untouched. A new settlement process began with farmsteads, clearings, village foundings and the division of the land into Gau
Gau
Gau may refer to:* Gau, a Cantonese vulgar word* Gau , German term for a shire * Gau , another name for the French wine grape Gouais blanc* Gau, a character in Final Fantasy VI...
e.
Throughout the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
, the old Roman road and a “grey cross” at the crossing of this road with the path from Krummenau to Hirschfeld
Hirschfeld, Rhineland-Palatinate
Hirschfeld is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Kirchberg, whose seat is in the like-named town.-Location:The municipality lies...
formed important reckoning points for the borders of the sovereign area to which Krummenau belonged. “Aus dem kroen Kruytz in die Steynstraß immer dann die Steynstraß hin” reads one of many border descriptions from 1509 (“From the grey cross onto the Stone Road and then always down the Stone Road”). Furthermore, a 1508 Weistum likewise mentions the “grey cross” as part of a border description (a Weistum – cognate
Cognate
In linguistics, cognates are words that have a common etymological origin. This learned term derives from the Latin cognatus . Cognates within the same language are called doublets. Strictly speaking, loanwords from another language are usually not meant by the term, e.g...
with English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
wisdom – was a legal pronouncement issued by men learned in law in the Middle Ages and early modern times). Even as late as 1711, a map marked a cross on the old Roman road at that spot, even though protocols from as early as 1461 had noted that it had long ceased to be there. There was, however, a “grey stone”.
Krummenau belonged to the High Court Region
Blood court
Blood Court or high justice in the Holy Roman Empire referred to the right of a Vogt to hold a criminal court inflicting bodily punishment, including the death penalty.Not every Vogt held the blood court...
of Rhaunen, within which the Waldgrave
Waldgrave
The noble family of the Waldgraves or Wildgraves descended of a division of the House of the Counts of Nahegau in the year 1113....
s of Schmidtburg, later those of Dhaun, sat as the lords of the high court, which as a high court had the power to hand down death sentences
Capital punishment
Capital punishment, the death penalty, or execution is the sentence of death upon a person by the state as a punishment for an offence. Crimes that can result in a death penalty are known as capital crimes or capital offences. The term capital originates from the Latin capitalis, literally...
.
On 29 September 1399, Johann and Friedrich, Waldgraves at Dhaun, enfeoffed Count Palatine Ruprecht (who the very next year became Rupert, King of Germany) with the court and people at Krummenau, for which they received a charter of protection for this and other villages. In 1461 and 1469, the Waldgraves of Dhaun and Kyrburg were mentioned as lords of the high court. In 1493, 1508 and 1558 it was the Waldgraves of Dhaun. The court passed in 1633 to the Dhauns, who had now become the Rhinegraves of Dhaun. Beginning in 1789, sovereign rights passed to the Princes of Salm-Salm. In each case, the villagers were under serfdom
Serfdom
Serfdom is the status of peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to Manorialism. It was a condition of bondage or modified slavery which developed primarily during the High Middle Ages in Europe and lasted to the mid-19th century...
.
French Revolutionary and Napoleonic times
Immediately affected by the French Revolutionary WarsFrench Revolutionary Wars
The French Revolutionary Wars were a series of major conflicts, from 1792 until 1802, fought between the French Revolutionary government and several European states...
in the late 18th century was the Hunsrück. Great havoc was wrought as French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
n and Austrian troops marched on through, taking their toll by demanding supplies and by encamping.
The winter of 1794-1795 must have been hard for the local people as well as for the French soldiers, many of whom were ill. The French did not stay long in any one place, not even in the winter, preferring to move elsewhere in search of supplies once they had depleted those nearby. The local schoolteacher in Krummenau, Korb, recorded plundering in the village by French soldiers.
The French swept the old feudal
Feudalism
Feudalism was a set of legal and military customs in medieval Europe that flourished between the 9th and 15th centuries, which, broadly defined, was a system for ordering society around relationships derived from the holding of land in exchange for service or labour.Although derived from the...
order away and the nobility was stripped of its powers and its holdings. Serfdom was abolished. A new administrative order was set up on the Rhine’s left bank after the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
ary model. Krummenau now belonged to the Department of Sarre, the arrondissement
Arrondissements of France
The 101 French departments are divided into 342 arrondissements, which may be translated into English as districts.The capital of an arrondissement/district is called a subprefecture...
of Birkenfeld, the canton
Cantons of France
The cantons of France are territorial subdivisions of the French Republic's 342 arrondissements and 101 departments.Apart from their role as organizational units in certain aspects of the administration of public services and justice, the chief purpose of the cantons today is to serve as...
of Rhaunen and the Mairie (“Mayoralty”) of Rhaunen. As of 1801, with the Treaty of Lunéville
Treaty of Lunéville
The Treaty of Lunéville was signed on 9 February 1801 between the French Republic and the Holy Roman Emperor Francis II, negotiating both on behalf of his own domains and of the Holy Roman Empire...
, the Rhineland
Rhineland
Historically, the Rhinelands refers to a loosely-defined region embracing the land on either bank of the River Rhine in central Europe....
officially became French territory and all French laws came into force. The Code civil des Français
Napoleonic code
The Napoleonic Code — or Code Napoléon — is the French civil code, established under Napoléon I in 1804. The code forbade privileges based on birth, allowed freedom of religion, and specified that government jobs go to the most qualified...
was introduced in 1804.
Prussian times
French rule was brought to an end in 1814 with the victory over Napoleon. At the Congress of ViennaCongress of Vienna
The Congress of Vienna was a conference of ambassadors of European states chaired by Klemens Wenzel von Metternich, and held in Vienna from September, 1814 to June, 1815. The objective of the Congress was to settle the many issues arising from the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars,...
the following year, the Rhineland was awarded to Prussia. Krummenau found itself in the Bürgermeisterei (“Mayoralty”) of Rhaunen in the Bernkastel district, which in turn was in the Regierungsbezirk
Regierungsbezirk
In Germany, a Government District, in German: Regierungsbezirk – is a subdivision of certain federal states .They are above the Kreise, Landkreise, and kreisfreie Städte...
of Trier.
In Prussian times, the village’s population began to swell, until it reached a point that was not sustainable. This forced some of the poorer people to take the risk of emigrating
Emigration
Emigration is the act of leaving one's country or region to settle in another. It is the same as immigration but from the perspective of the country of origin. Human movement before the establishment of political boundaries or within one state is termed migration. There are many reasons why people...
. From 1846 to 1851, nobody emigrated, at least not with official approval. Thereafter, however, history mentions 13 emigrants from that time.
Imperial Germany
In the last third of the 19th century, a few people from Krummenau moved to the industrial areas that had arisen by then, and the population began to shrink.In this time, Krummenau was rather literally off the beaten track. No road led through the village. The Rhaunen
Rhaunen
Rhaunen is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the seat of the like-named Verbandsgemeinde.-Location:...
-Weitersbach
Weitersbach
Weitersbach is a municipality in the district of Birkenfeld, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany....
-Horbruch
Horbruch
Horbruch is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Rhaunen, whose seat is in the like-named municipality.-Location:The municipality lies...
sealed road ran by the village through the “Crummer-Wald” (forest), not through the village. Nevertheless, the villagers were expected to pay for the upkeep of the stretch near the village. There were dirt paths leading to nearby villages such as Wahlenau
Wahlenau
Wahlenau is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, Niederweiler
Niederweiler
Niederweiler is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
and Laufersweiler
Laufersweiler
Laufersweiler is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, but they were only passable by freight cart. There was also only one bridge across the Idarbach/Altbach in the village centre, built of stone and dating most likely from 1806. Another bridge was eventually built in 1912. The school
School
A school is an institution designed for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is commonly compulsory. In these systems, students progress through a series of schools...
house was dedicated in 1913.
The Bernkastel district was lucky enough to see work on its electrical supply begun at just the right time; it was far enough along before the outbreak of the First World War for there to be no need to suspend work. By 1915, it was working. The neighbouring Simmern district, on the other hand, saw all preparations for such a project stop for the duration.
The Mobilization Order on 1 August 1914 shook Krummenau badly, for nobody had seriously expected a war. The quiet village was thereafter affected more and more by the war. The problem of supplying food for the war effort had already been foreseen at the outbreak of the war, but it was not until 1915 that a system was introduced for this purpose. From one year to the next, Krummenau had to contribute ever greater amounts of grain
GRAIN
GRAIN is a small international non-profit organisation that works to support small farmers and social movements in their struggles for community-controlled and biodiversity-based food systems. Our support takes the form of independent research and analysis, networking at local, regional and...
and potato
Potato
The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop from the perennial Solanum tuberosum of the Solanaceae family . The word potato may refer to the plant itself as well as the edible tuber. In the region of the Andes, there are some other closely related cultivated potato species...
es, as well as vegetables, straw
Straw
Straw is an agricultural by-product, the dry stalks of cereal plants, after the grain and chaff have been removed. Straw makes up about half of the yield of cereal crops such as barley, oats, rice, rye and wheat. It has many uses, including fuel, livestock bedding and fodder, thatching and...
, hay
Hay
Hay is grass, legumes or other herbaceous plants that have been cut, dried, and stored for use as animal fodder, particularly for grazing livestock such as cattle, horses, goats, and sheep. Hay is also fed to pets such as rabbits and guinea pigs...
, oil-bearing crops, butter
Butter
Butter is a dairy product made by churning fresh or fermented cream or milk. It is generally used as a spread and a condiment, as well as in cooking applications, such as baking, sauce making, and pan frying...
and eggs. It did not help matters that so many men were called into the forces to fight for the Kaiser; the bulk of the work thus fell to women, children and the elderly. Schools gave schoolchildren time off classes to help with the work (indeed, in 1915 school was out for 7½ months after the schoolteacher was conscripted
Conscription
Conscription is the compulsory enlistment of people in some sort of national service, most often military service. Conscription dates back to antiquity and continues in some countries to the present day under various names...
). The workload was eased somewhat by help from Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n and later also French and British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
prisoners of war
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...
, who were housed at the old schoolhouse, and guarded by a man from Horbruch. One of the Russians escaped. There were 10 prisoners of war in Krummenau in 1918.
That same year, the Kaiser was overthrown, the monarchy was abolished and the Great War came to an end with Germany’s defeat. Four times Krummenau had to put up with German soldiers lodging in the village on their way home from the front. The village was choked with people, horses and carriages. The soldiers made themselves at home anywhere: on farms, in barns, in stables, in meadows. Only the odd Frenchman and American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
showed up in the village looking for food.
Krummenau lost four men in the war; they were either killed
Killed in action
Killed in action is a casualty classification generally used by militaries to describe the deaths of their own forces at the hands of hostile forces. The United States Department of Defense, for example, says that those declared KIA need not have fired their weapons but have been killed due to...
or missing in action
Missing in action
Missing in action is a casualty Category assigned under the Status of Missing to armed services personnel who are reported missing during active service. They may have been killed, wounded, become a prisoner of war, or deserted. If deceased, neither their remains nor grave can be positively...
.
Weimar Germany
A new republican constitutionWeimar Republic
The Weimar Republic is the name given by historians to the parliamentary republic established in 1919 in Germany to replace the imperial form of government...
brought Germany democracy, and the first election for the National Assembly on 19 January 1919 drew great interest in Krummenau. Sixty-nine votes were counted in the village: 44 for the Democrats, 11 for the Socialists and 14 for the Centrists.
The French occupied the Rhineland, and thereby the Hunsrück too, until 1930. They took a particularly heavy toll on the Hunsrück by felling an extraordinarily great number of trees. This was part of the war reparations imposed on Germany.
In 1932 and 1933, there was a great roadbuilding project in Krummenau together with water supply and sewerage projects. The district road was built through the village at last, changing the village centre forever. The old bakehouse had to be torn down to make way for the road.
By 1929, the political situation in Germany had become ominous. The National Socialists under their leader Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
were gaining in popularity, and this would soon usher in a new era.
Nazi Germany
The National Socialist movement reached the Hunsrück rather later than it did other parts of Germany, namely about 1930. It appealed mainly to younger people. By 1932, a great deal of the Hunsrück’s inhabitants had chosen the Nazis as their party. With Hitler’s seizure of powerMachtergreifung
Machtergreifung is a German word meaning "seizure of power". It is normally used specifically to refer to the Nazi takeover of power in the democratic Weimar Republic on 30 January 1933, the day Hitler was sworn in as Chancellor of Germany, turning it into the Nazi German dictatorship.-Term:The...
in 1933, terror was legalized and racism
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
became a political principle.
In Krummenau, unlike in many Hunsrück villages, the mayor, Adolf Zirfaß, was allowed to remain in office, while his peers elsewhere were removed by decree and replaced with mayors who were more receptive to the Nazis’ way of doing things. He held the office until 1945. The nearest Party Ortsgruppe, to which Krummenau belonged, was in Horbruch. There was no open opposition to the Nazi régime in Krummenau. A few villagers were brave enough to continue business with Jews, as they had always done, even after the Nazis forbade it.
It was also during the Third Reich
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
– in 1935 – that Flurbereinigung
Flurbereinigung
Flurbereinigung is the German word used to describe land reforms in various countries, especially Germany and Austria. The term can best be translated as land consolidation. Another European country where those land reforms have been carried out is France...
was begun. This was, however, interrupted when the Second World War broke out.
Once again, prisoners of war were detailed to work in Krummenau. They were French, and were housed at the old rectory in Horbruch and were guarded by a man from that village. They were to be kept away from the locals, and were forbidden even to eat at the same table.
Shortly after war broke out, the schoolroom was seized by the military authorities. Schooling was for a while held at a private house. School had been reduced to three days each week by 1941 because the teacher had to fill in for another in Weitersbach. School was reduced even further once the teacher himself was called upon for military service. It was irregular until 1946; for a while, children attended school in Horbruch.
Beginning in 1944, the Hunsrück was subject to air raid
Air raid
Air raid refers to an attack by aircraft. See strategic bombing or the smaller-scale airstrike.Air raid may also refer to:*Air Raid , by the improvisational collective Air...
s. In March 1945, the Idar Forest
Idar Forest
The Idar Forest is part of the Hunsrück low mountain range in the German federal state of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.- Geography :...
was carpet-bombed
Carpet bombing
Carpet bombing is a large aerial bombing done in a progressive manner to inflict damage in every part of a selected area of land. The phrase invokes the image of explosions completely covering an area, in the same way that a carpet covers a floor. Carpet bombing is usually achieved by dropping many...
by the Allies
Allies of World War II
The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...
, with about 200 to 300 bombs falling within Krummenau’s limits, mainly in the woods, damaging 10 to 12 hectares of forest. It is to this day a puzzle as to why this was done, for there were no military facilities in this part of the Idar Forest at this time. There may have been a link with the munitions offloading railway depot at Hochscheid, whose very existence may have led to the supposition that there was a munitions storage facility in the Idar Forest. There were five forestry workers in the danger zone at the time of the bombing, but nobody was wounded.
As Germany’s looming defeat in the war became ever more obvious, enthusiasm for the Nazi régime sank ever deeper. The Volkssturm
Volkssturm
The Volkssturm was a German national militia of the last months of World War II. It was founded on Adolf Hitler's orders on October 18, 1944 and conscripted males between the ages of 16 to 60 years who were not already serving in some military unit as part of a German Home Guard.-Origins and...
was organized in March 1945 as a last-ditch effort, and two tank traps were built in Krummenau, but on the night of 16 March, German troops retreated through the village on their way to Rhaunen and the river Nahe
Nahe
The Nahe River is a river in Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland, Germany, a left tributary to the Rhine. It has also given name to the wine region Nahe situated around it....
. Soon thereafter, on the morning of 17 March, the Americans marched in from Trarbach
Traben-Trarbach
Traben-Trarbach on the Middle Moselle is a town in the Bernkastel-Wittlich district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the seat of the like-named Verbandsgemeinde and a state-recognized climatic spa .- Location :...
and Wahlenau
Wahlenau
Wahlenau is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, but did not stay, moving onwards. There was luckily no fighting in the village, as there was in Schlierschied
Schlierschied
Schlierschied is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
. For Krummenau, the war was over. Six men from Krummenau had fallen or gone missing.
Allied occupation
Krummenau was occupiedMilitary occupation
Military occupation occurs when the control and authority over a territory passes to a hostile army. The territory then becomes occupied territory.-Military occupation and the laws of war:...
by United States forces. Adolf Zirfaß asked to be released from his mayoral duties in early April 1945, but was not replaced until August, when Otto Bonn was made commissary mayor. By this time, French forces had relieved the Americans of their occupational duties about a month earlier.
In 1946, Krummenau became part of the then newly founded state
States of Germany
Germany is made up of sixteen which are partly sovereign constituent states of the Federal Republic of Germany. Land literally translates as "country", and constitutionally speaking, they are constituent countries...
of Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz. English speakers also commonly refer to the state by its German name, Rheinland-Pfalz ....
. It was grouped into the Amt of Rhaunen, the district of Bernkastel and the Regierungsbezirk of Trier. Democracy was reintroduced after 12 years of Nazi dictatorship
Dictatorship
A dictatorship is defined as an autocratic form of government in which the government is ruled by an individual, the dictator. It has three possible meanings:...
, but participation at the first elections for the Bundestag
Bundestag
The Bundestag is a federal legislative body in Germany. In practice Germany is governed by a bicameral legislature, of which the Bundestag serves as the lower house and the Bundesrat the upper house. The Bundestag is established by the German Basic Law of 1949, as the successor to the earlier...
was very low.
It took a long while before all the German prisoners of war came home. One local man, Heinrich Bartenbach, did not get home until October 1949.
Also arriving in Krummenau, as elsewhere in Germany, were refugees. The population had risen from 118 in 1948 to 129 in 1950. Town and city dwellers also came into the countryside seeking food.
Recent times
Beginning in the mid 1950s, the villagers’ economic situation improved generally, and the village’s economic structure underwent a shift. Older buildings were modernized inside and out. Widespread rental accommodation leased by the Americans stationed here also brought such modern conveniences as sanitary facilities, electric cooking appliances and so forth. One loss for Krummenau was the old, stately Kroll house, a timber-frameTimber framing
Timber framing , or half-timbering, also called in North America "post-and-beam" construction, is the method of creating structures using heavy squared off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large wooden pegs . It is commonplace in large barns...
house that had been the only one in the village with a mansard roof
Mansard roof
A mansard or mansard roof is a four-sided gambrel-style hip roof characterized by two slopes on each of its sides with the lower slope at a steeper angle than the upper that is punctured by dormer windows. The roof creates an additional floor of habitable space, such as a garret...
. It was torn down in 1977.
In 1958, there were 8 cars in Krummenau. Given the dearth of public transport in Krummenau, cars were viewed as a necessity, and through the years, their numbers rose. By 1984, there were 48. The rise in popularity of motoring spurred improvements to the local roads. Work on tar
Tar
Tar is modified pitch produced primarily from the wood and roots of pine by destructive distillation under pyrolysis. Production and trade in tar was a major contributor in the economies of Northern Europe and Colonial America. Its main use was in preserving wooden vessels against rot. The largest...
ring roadways to neighbouring villages, however, was not finished until the late 1960s.
In the wake of the Second World War, the Allied occupiers established many military facilities in the Hunsrück, and Krummenau was affected by this process, too. The French built a munitions depot covering 127 ha of the Idar Forest, ten to twelve hectares of which lay within Krummenau’s limits (the rest was in neighbouring Weitersbach). The depot was taken over in 1963/1964 by the Bundeswehr
Bundeswehr
The Bundeswehr consists of the unified armed forces of Germany and their civil administration and procurement authorities...
. The depot contributed to the local economy as an employer, and a few local civilians were employed there as watchmen. The depot has since been converted into a storage facility for military replacement parts.
Military manoeuvres, which were common throughout rural areas in the Bonn Republic
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
, were also undertaken in the woods near Krummenau, and in 1963, there was a nasty accident. Some children from Krummenau who were playing in the woods found some ordnance in the forest that had been left behind by soldiers and lit some of the powder that they had gathered together from it. Nine-year-old Berthold Weiskopf sustained burns to both his hands and his face.
The valley road to Bernkastel was finally opened in 1972, after first being proposed in 1920. Its construction required some realignment of roadways through Krummenau. One stretch of road was straightened so that it no longer had two right angle
Right angle
In geometry and trigonometry, a right angle is an angle that bisects the angle formed by two halves of a straight line. More precisely, if a ray is placed so that its endpoint is on a line and the adjacent angles are equal, then they are right angles...
s in it, right near each other, and another stretch now goes through an underpass right in the village. The river also had to be channelled through a steel pipe (owing to a contingency that the planners had failed to foresee), and the old Bauernmühle (“Farmer’s Mill”) downstream from Krummenau had to be torn down to make way for the new road. The road’s construction also involved blasting in several places. The road has been a double-edged sword for Krummenau. On the one hand, traffic through the village has increased, but on the other hand, it has also increased tourism
Tourism
Tourism is travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people "traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes".Tourism has become a...
, for the road is quite scenic and affords good views of the valley.
Despite opposition expressed at a citizens’ meeting in 1968 to having Krummenau transferred from the Bernkastel district to the Birkenfeld district, the state administrative reformers got their way and the whole Amt but for Lindenschied and Woppenroth was transferred to the Birkenfeld district in the Regierungsbezirk of Koblenz in 1970. The Amt administration in Rhaunen became a Verbandsgemeinde administration.
A new building development was opened in Krummenau in 1983 called “In der Spießwiese”.
Monastery
It is far from certain whether there was ever a monasteryMonastery
Monastery denotes the building, or complex of buildings, that houses a room reserved for prayer as well as the domestic quarters and workplace of monastics, whether monks or nuns, and whether living in community or alone .Monasteries may vary greatly in size – a small dwelling accommodating only...
at Krummenau, but according to oral tradition, there was one called Saint Lawrence’s here once, which stood until the Reformation
Protestant Reformation
The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led...
was introduced in 1555. It is furthermore said that it was a popular pilgrimage
Pilgrimage
A pilgrimage is a journey or search of great moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a person's beliefs and faith...
site. The people of Laufersweiler
Laufersweiler
Laufersweiler is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany...
, according to this oral tradition, have now stolen this monastery and it is now in Laufersweiler. The village church, built in 1747, supposedly stands across the street from where the monastery once was. The mighty oaken beams of the church’s galleries, it is said, as well as the beams from the old Kroll house, torn down in 1977, were taken from the old monastery.
Population development
The following table shows Krummenau’s population figures for selected dates since 1515:| Year | Population |
| 1515 | 35 |
| 1556 | 50 |
| about 1599 | 32 |
| 1606 | 51 |
| 1620 | 30 |
| 1641 | 45 |
| 1733 | 12 subjects |
| 1815/1823 | 110 |
| 1835/1846 | 136 |
| 1871 | 140 |
| 1895 | 107 |
| 1910 | 115 |
| 1939 | 124 |
| 1948 | 118 |
| 1950 | 129 |
| 1961 | 124 |
| 1970 | 126 |
| 1980 | 112 |
| 1986 | 121 |
Municipal council
The council is made up of 6 council members, who were elected by majority votePlurality voting system
The plurality voting system is a single-winner voting system often used to elect executive officers or to elect members of a legislative assembly which is based on single-member constituencies...
at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairman.
Coat of arms
The German blazon reads: Schild durch einen blauen Balken geteilt, oben in Gold ein rotes Fabeltier mit einem Wolfskopf und weit geöffneten Schwingen belegt mit einem Wolfshaken. Unten in Silber ein schwarzer Rost.The municipality’s arms
Coat of arms
A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...
might in English heraldic
Heraldry
Heraldry is the profession, study, or art of creating, granting, and blazoning arms and ruling on questions of rank or protocol, as exercised by an officer of arms. Heraldry comes from Anglo-Norman herald, from the Germanic compound harja-waldaz, "army commander"...
language be described thus: A fess azure between Or a monster with a wolf’s head and eagle’s body sans legs displayed gules, its breast charged with a cramp palewise sable, and argent a gridiron palewise of the fourth.
The monstrous charge
Charge (heraldry)
In heraldry, a charge is any emblem or device occupying the field of an escutcheon . This may be a geometric design or a symbolic representation of a person, animal, plant, object or other device...
above the line of partition – also found in the Verbandsgemeinde arms – is a reference to the village’s former allegiance to the Waldgraves and Rhinegraves and to its former inclusion in that noble house’s high court region, for it is the charge that appeared in the court seal. The charge below the line of partition, the gridiron, is Saint Lawrence’s attribute, thus representing the church’s patron saint. The church was originally consecrated to him in 1086, although the current church is from 1747. The fess stands for the brook that flows through the village.
Buildings
The following are listed buildings or sites in Rhineland-PalatinateRhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz. English speakers also commonly refer to the state by its German name, Rheinland-Pfalz ....
’s Directory of Cultural Monuments:
- EvangelicalEvangelical Church in GermanyThe Evangelical Church in Germany is a federation of 22 Lutheran, Unified and Reformed Protestant regional church bodies in Germany. The EKD is not a church in a theological understanding because of the denominational differences. However, the member churches share full pulpit and altar...
church, Kirchstraße – small aisleless churchAisleless churchAn Aisleless church is a single-nave church building that consists of a single hall-like room. While similar to the hall church, the aisleless church lacks aisles or passageways either side of the nave separated from the nave by colonnades or arcades, a row of pillars or columns...
with ridge turretRidge turretA ridge turret is a turret build on the peak of a roof....
, marked 1747; décor; in the graveyard two tombs from the late 19th century - Hauptstraße – three one-arch bridges over the Altbach, 1806 and 1838/1839
- Hauptstraße 7 – three-naved, cross-vaultedGroin vaultA groin vault or groined vault is produced by the intersection at right angles of two barrel vaults. The word groin refers to the edge between the intersecting vaults; cf. ribbed vault. Sometimes the arches of groin vaults are pointed instead of round...
stable, about 1850/1860
Spanning the Idarbach is a slate
Slate
Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. The result is a foliated rock in which the foliation may not correspond to the original sedimentary layering...
arch bridge onto one of whose spandrels the old churchtower clock, with its figures in gold leaf, has been mounted.
Natural monuments
The roughly 400-year-old Kaisereiche (“Emperor’s Oak”) is protected as a natural monument. It stands some 500 m southeast of the village.Economy and infrastructure
Krummenau has a village community centre. Serving nearby Idar-ObersteinIdar-Oberstein
Idar-Oberstein is a town in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. As a Große kreisangehörige Stadt , it assumes some of the responsibilities that for smaller municipalities in the district are assumed by the district administration...
is a railway station on the Nahe Valley Railway (Bingen
Bingen am Rhein
Bingen am Rhein is a town in the Mainz-Bingen district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.The settlement’s original name was Bingium, a Celtic word that may have meant “hole in the rock”, a description of the shoal behind the Mäuseturm, known as the Binger Loch. Bingen was the starting point for the...
–Saarbrücken
Saarbrücken
Saarbrücken is the capital of the state of Saarland in Germany. The city is situated at the heart of a metropolitan area that borders on the west on Dillingen and to the north-east on Neunkirchen, where most of the people of the Saarland live....
).