Nienover
Encyclopedia
Nienover is a rural housing estate
which is part of Bodenfelde
. It is located in the Solling
and contains one of the largest deserted medieval towns in northern Europe.
hunters and gatherers. During the Neolithic
period, the area was farmed. Later, during the Bronze
and pre-Roman Iron Age
s, there was scattered settlement
. Permanent settlements came during the 8th and 9th centuries. Hethis, the site of what later became the Frankish
Corvey Abbey
, was founded in 815.
The Counts of Dassel
founded their castle in Nienover ca.
1100. About 1200, they chose the castle as their main residence and a town was founded to the west of it. The town was destroyed twice, first in 1220, probably by the Bishops of Paderborn and then by the Guelphs in 1270. Under pressure, the Counts of Dassel sold the rights of way
to the House of Welf in 1270 and the castle was sold to the Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel
in 1303. The castle was later destroyed in the Thirty Years' War
(1618-1648.) The Guelphs then built a new castle, today owned by a horse breeding
farm.
and his research team discovered an abandoned village
, near the castle in 1992. No one in the neighboring towns had had any idea of the lost medieval village and the news caused a "sensation". The land was untouched, the medieval town having never been rebuilt, which made it an excellent site for archaeological exploration. The site has now become a large medieval archaeology
project, at times involving some 90 archaeologists and assistants at once a total of several hundred over the years of the work.
Researchers and students, coming from several countries, have uncovered evidence of the defensive wall
s guarding the city and the town's three streets, which met at one end. Among the 150 buildings discovered, they have found pottery shards; items in silver, bronze and iron; coins; arrowheads and crossbow
bolts. The researchers have also found evidence of a deep moat
with the town wall. Remains of fire, the arrowheads and crossbow bolts tell of a violent struggle ca.
1270 and the many coins and other items suggest the residents left hurriedly. Stephan reported finding a broken roll of coins in the corner of one cellar and in other houses, sterling from Canterbury
, pennies from Corvey and pfennig
e from Mecklenburg
and Pomerania
.
Many of the houses had a furnace or foundry
where the archaeologists found that large bronze bells, iron wheels, book clasps and jewelry had been cast, also metalsmiths where swords, lance
s, building hardware and nails were forge
d. The excavation also uncovered a brewery with a deep cellar and three wells. Initially, the archaeologists thought the residents abandoned the town because they had felled so many trees to fuel their forges and foundries and needed better access to more trees, but the researchers came to the conclusion that neither that nor the plague
were the cause.
In the Schmeeson Village Project, the remains of what appeared to be a church were excavated in 2005. Initially, Stephan and his team thought they had found a small, squarish building, but in 2004, the site was covered by brush. The local historical society, which supports the project, came out and cleared the site, allowing the researchers to see they had been standing on a mound of stones of various sizes. They also found evidence of plaster and mortar around the entire area. Their excavations in the summer of 2005 uncovered remains of a structure 9 by 16 m (29.5 by 52.5 ft), with a considerable number of ceramic and metal finds. The 100 metal finds weighed over 20 kilograms (44.1 lb). In 2006, Arno Beyer of the University of Kiel
took samples of soil from the site for further research. The trenches that were dug for this purpose went to the natural bedrock
and revealed numerous posthole
s, as well as ceramic finds pre-dating the church, providing researchers with evidence of a community.
Excavation work in Nienover has produced finds dating earlier, as well. There have been prehistoric finds, such as burial mounds and pottery, as well as those dating from the 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th centuries.
A medieval-style house has been reconstructed over an excavated cellar by the building historian Hubertus Michels. It will be part of a recreated medieval environment showing the town as it would have looked in 1230, with buildings for work and business, animal stalls and garden area and costumed portrayals of village life. Construction is being supervised by Stephan and other researchers. The project will have historic preservation
status.
purchased the castle at Nienover in 2005, but sold it to Mireille van Meer, a Dutch horse breeder. Stephan, who spent twelve years researching and excavating the site, criticized Hartmut Möllring (CDU
), state finance minister
, for selling the castle at a "fire sale
price" without bothering to secure the rights to continue the scientific work to its conclusion and ending "a unique opportunity in Germany" to investigate an untouched medieval site. As a result, a large part of the site's 150 buildings cannot be researched.
Housing estate
A housing estate is a group of buildings built together as a single development. The exact form may vary from country to country. Accordingly, a housing estate is usually built by a single contractor, with only a few styles of house or building design, so they tend to be uniform in appearance...
which is part of Bodenfelde
Bodenfelde
Bodenfelde is a municipality in the district of Northeim, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated on the right bank of the Weser, approx. 35 km north of Kassel, and 30 km northwest of Göttingen at the southwest border of the Solling-Vogler Nature Park.-History:Bodenfelde was first...
. It is located in the Solling
Solling
The Solling is a range of hills up to high in the Weser Uplands in the German state of Lower Saxony, whose extreme southerly foothills extend into Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia....
and contains one of the largest deserted medieval towns in northern Europe.
Local history
The area was used by MesolithicMesolithic
The Mesolithic is an archaeological concept used to refer to certain groups of archaeological cultures defined as falling between the Paleolithic and the Neolithic....
hunters and gatherers. During the Neolithic
Neolithic
The Neolithic Age, Era, or Period, or New Stone Age, was a period in the development of human technology, beginning about 9500 BC in some parts of the Middle East, and later in other parts of the world. It is traditionally considered as the last part of the Stone Age...
period, the area was farmed. Later, during the Bronze
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a period characterized by the use of copper and its alloy bronze as the chief hard materials in the manufacture of some implements and weapons. Chronologically, it stands between the Stone Age and Iron Age...
and pre-Roman Iron Age
Pre-Roman Iron Age
The Pre-Roman Iron Age of Northern Europe designates the earliest part of the Iron Age in Scandinavia, northern Germany, and the Netherlands north of the Rhine River. These regions feature many extensive archaeological excavation sites, which have yielded a wealth of artifacts...
s, there was scattered settlement
Settlement
Settlement may refer to:*Consolidation , a process by which soils decrease in volume*Human settlement, a community where people live**Israeli settlement, communities inhabited by Israeli Jews in territory that came under Israel's control as a result of the 1967 Six-Day War**Urban settlement **Rural...
. Permanent settlements came during the 8th and 9th centuries. Hethis, the site of what later became the Frankish
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...
Corvey Abbey
Corvey Abbey
The Imperial Abbey of Corvey was a Benedictine monastery on the River Weser, 2 km northeast of Höxter, now in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany....
, was founded in 815.
The Counts of Dassel
County of Dassel
The County of Dassel emerged shortly after the turn of the 11th and 12th centuries when, after the extinction of the male line of the Billungs, its seat in Suilbergau, north of the Solling hills was divided into the domains of Einbeck and Dassel. Reinold of Dassel was able to secure rights...
founded their castle in Nienover ca.
Circa
Circa , usually abbreviated c. or ca. , means "approximately" in the English language, usually referring to a date...
1100. About 1200, they chose the castle as their main residence and a town was founded to the west of it. The town was destroyed twice, first in 1220, probably by the Bishops of Paderborn and then by the Guelphs in 1270. Under pressure, the Counts of Dassel sold the rights of way
Easement
An easement is a certain right to use the real property of another without possessing it.Easements are helpful for providing pathways across two or more pieces of property or allowing an individual to fish in a privately owned pond...
to the House of Welf in 1270 and the castle was sold to the Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel
Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel
The Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel was a subdivision of the Duchy of Brunswick-Lüneburg, whose history was characterised by numerous divisions and reunifications. Various dynastic lines of the House of Welf ruled Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel until the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806...
in 1303. The castle was later destroyed in the Thirty Years' War
Thirty Years' War
The Thirty Years' War was fought primarily in what is now Germany, and at various points involved most countries in Europe. It was one of the most destructive conflicts in European history....
(1618-1648.) The Guelphs then built a new castle, today owned by a horse breeding
Horse breeding
Horse breeding is reproduction in horses, and particularly the human-directed process of selective breeding of animals, particularly purebred horses of a given breed. Planned matings can be used to produce specifically desired characteristics in domesticated horses...
farm.
Archaeological dig
Archaeologist Hans-Georg StephanHans-Georg Stephan
Hans-Georg Stephan is a German university professor specializing in European medieval archaeology and post-medieval archaeology.-Biography:Stephan was born in in Beverungen in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia...
and his research team discovered an abandoned village
Abandoned village
An abandoned village is a village that has, for some reason, been deserted. In many countries, and throughout history, thousands of villages were deserted for a variety of causes...
, near the castle in 1992. No one in the neighboring towns had had any idea of the lost medieval village and the news caused a "sensation". The land was untouched, the medieval town having never been rebuilt, which made it an excellent site for archaeological exploration. The site has now become a large medieval archaeology
Archaeology
Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...
project, at times involving some 90 archaeologists and assistants at once a total of several hundred over the years of the work.
Researchers and students, coming from several countries, have uncovered evidence of the defensive wall
Defensive wall
A defensive wall is a fortification used to protect a city or settlement from potential aggressors. In ancient to modern times, they were used to enclose settlements...
s guarding the city and the town's three streets, which met at one end. Among the 150 buildings discovered, they have found pottery shards; items in silver, bronze and iron; coins; arrowheads and crossbow
Crossbow
A crossbow is a weapon consisting of a bow mounted on a stock that shoots projectiles, often called bolts or quarrels. The medieval crossbow was called by many names, most of which derived from the word ballista, a torsion engine resembling a crossbow in appearance.Historically, crossbows played a...
bolts. The researchers have also found evidence of a deep moat
Moat
A moat is a deep, broad ditch, either dry or filled with water, that surrounds a castle, other building or town, historically to provide it with a preliminary line of defence. In some places moats evolved into more extensive water defences, including natural or artificial lakes, dams and sluices...
with the town wall. Remains of fire, the arrowheads and crossbow bolts tell of a violent struggle ca.
Circa
Circa , usually abbreviated c. or ca. , means "approximately" in the English language, usually referring to a date...
1270 and the many coins and other items suggest the residents left hurriedly. Stephan reported finding a broken roll of coins in the corner of one cellar and in other houses, sterling from Canterbury
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a district of Kent in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
, pennies from Corvey and pfennig
Pfennig
The Pfennig , plural Pfennige, is an old German coin or note, which existed from the 9th century until the introduction of the euro in 2002....
e from Mecklenburg
Mecklenburg
Mecklenburg is a historical region in northern Germany comprising the western and larger part of the federal-state Mecklenburg-Vorpommern...
and Pomerania
Pomerania
Pomerania is a historical region on the south shore of the Baltic Sea. Divided between Germany and Poland, it stretches roughly from the Recknitz River near Stralsund in the West, via the Oder River delta near Szczecin, to the mouth of the Vistula River near Gdańsk in the East...
.
Many of the houses had a furnace or foundry
Foundry
A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal in a mold, and removing the mold material or casting after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals processed are aluminum and cast iron...
where the archaeologists found that large bronze bells, iron wheels, book clasps and jewelry had been cast, also metalsmiths where swords, lance
Lance
A Lance is a pole weapon or spear designed to be used by a mounted warrior. The lance is longer, stout and heavier than an infantry spear, and unsuited for throwing, or for rapid thrusting. Lances did not have tips designed to intentionally break off or bend, unlike many throwing weapons of the...
s, building hardware and nails were forge
Forge
A forge is a hearth used for forging. The term "forge" can also refer to the workplace of a smith or a blacksmith, although the term smithy is then more commonly used.The basic smithy contains a forge, also known as a hearth, for heating metals...
d. The excavation also uncovered a brewery with a deep cellar and three wells. Initially, the archaeologists thought the residents abandoned the town because they had felled so many trees to fuel their forges and foundries and needed better access to more trees, but the researchers came to the conclusion that neither that nor the plague
Black Death
The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, peaking in Europe between 1348 and 1350. Of several competing theories, the dominant explanation for the Black Death is the plague theory, which attributes the outbreak to the bacterium Yersinia pestis. Thought to have...
were the cause.
In the Schmeeson Village Project, the remains of what appeared to be a church were excavated in 2005. Initially, Stephan and his team thought they had found a small, squarish building, but in 2004, the site was covered by brush. The local historical society, which supports the project, came out and cleared the site, allowing the researchers to see they had been standing on a mound of stones of various sizes. They also found evidence of plaster and mortar around the entire area. Their excavations in the summer of 2005 uncovered remains of a structure 9 by 16 m (29.5 by 52.5 ft), with a considerable number of ceramic and metal finds. The 100 metal finds weighed over 20 kilograms (44.1 lb). In 2006, Arno Beyer of the University of Kiel
University of Kiel
The University of Kiel is a university in the city of Kiel, Germany. It was founded in 1665 as the Academia Holsatorum Chiloniensis by Christian Albert, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp and has approximately 23,000 students today...
took samples of soil from the site for further research. The trenches that were dug for this purpose went to the natural bedrock
Bedrock
In stratigraphy, bedrock is the native consolidated rock underlying the surface of a terrestrial planet, usually the Earth. Above the bedrock is usually an area of broken and weathered unconsolidated rock in the basal subsoil...
and revealed numerous posthole
Posthole
In archaeology a posthole is a cut feature used to hold a surface timber or stone. They are usually much deeper than they are wide although truncation may not make this apparent....
s, as well as ceramic finds pre-dating the church, providing researchers with evidence of a community.
Excavation work in Nienover has produced finds dating earlier, as well. There have been prehistoric finds, such as burial mounds and pottery, as well as those dating from the 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th centuries.
A medieval-style house has been reconstructed over an excavated cellar by the building historian Hubertus Michels. It will be part of a recreated medieval environment showing the town as it would have looked in 1230, with buildings for work and business, animal stalls and garden area and costumed portrayals of village life. Construction is being supervised by Stephan and other researchers. The project will have historic preservation
Historic preservation
Historic preservation is an endeavor that seeks to preserve, conserve and protect buildings, objects, landscapes or other artifacts of historical significance...
status.
Excavation halted
The German state of Lower SaxonyLower Saxony
Lower Saxony is a German state situated in north-western Germany and is second in area and fourth in population among the sixteen states of Germany...
purchased the castle at Nienover in 2005, but sold it to Mireille van Meer, a Dutch horse breeder. Stephan, who spent twelve years researching and excavating the site, criticized Hartmut Möllring (CDU
Christian Democratic Union (Germany)
The Christian Democratic Union of Germany is a Christian democratic and conservative political party in Germany. It is regarded as on the centre-right of the German political spectrum...
), state finance minister
Finance minister
The finance minister is a cabinet position in a government.A minister of finance has many different jobs in a government. He or she helps form the government budget, stimulate the economy, and control finances...
, for selling the castle at a "fire sale
Fire sale
A fire sale is the sale of goods at extremely discounted prices, typically when the seller faces bankruptcy or other impending distress. The term may originally have been based on the sale of goods at a heavy discount due to fire damage...
price" without bothering to secure the rights to continue the scientific work to its conclusion and ending "a unique opportunity in Germany" to investigate an untouched medieval site. As a result, a large part of the site's 150 buildings cannot be researched.
External links
- Archaeology of the Middle Ages in Germany. Retrieved January 16, 2011
- Schmeeson Village Project, official website. Retrieved January 16, 2011
- Short video (2:33) of village life in 1230 Video shows baking bread, a shop, making fire and other aspects of village life. Landkreis Northeim, official website. Retrieved January 16, 2011
- 16 photos of the reconstructed medieval house, May 2008 (click on any thumbnail to see the whole series) Landkreis Northeim, official website. Retrieved January 16, 2011