Womrath
Encyclopedia
Womrath is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality
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 Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis (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 Kirchberg
Kirchberg (Verbandsgemeinde)
Kirchberg is a Verbandsgemeinde in the Rhein-Hunsrück district, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Its seat is in Kirchberg.The Verbandsgemeinde Kirchberg consists of the following Ortsgemeinden :...

, whose seat is in the like-named town
Kirchberg, Rhein-Hunsrück
-History:Archaeological finds make it clear that by 400 BC, the Treveri, a people of mixed Celtic and Germanic stock, from whom the Latin name for the city of Trier, Augusta Treverorum, is also derived, had settled here...

.

Location

The municipality lies on a ridge in the Hunsrück
Hunsrück
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...

, roughly 4 km southeast of Kirchberg and 12 km east of Frankfurt-Hahn Airport
Frankfurt-Hahn Airport
-Cargo airlines:-Other facilities:AirIT Services AG, a subsidiary of Fraport, has its head office in Building 663 at Hahn Airport.-References:*Active Air Force Bases Within the United States of America on 17 September 1982 USAF Reference Series, Office of Air Force History, United States Air Force,...

. Also belonging to the village is an outlying hamlet
Hamlet (place)
A hamlet is usually a rural settlement which is too small to be considered a village, though sometimes the word is used for a different sort of community. Historically, when a hamlet became large enough to justify building a church, it was then classified as a village...

 called Wallenbrück, in the Simmerbach valley.

Neighbouring municipalities

History

Womrath has been settled since the Stone Age
Stone Age
The Stone Age is a broad prehistoric period, lasting about 2.5 million years , during which humans and their predecessor species in the genus Homo, as well as the earlier partly contemporary genera Australopithecus and Paranthropus, widely used exclusively stone as their hard material in the...

, as witnessed by archaeological
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...

 finds made within municipal limits. From the times of the Celts, the Treveri
Treveri
The Treveri or Treviri were a tribe of Gauls who inhabited the lower valley of the Moselle from around 150 BCE, at the latest, until their eventual absorption into the Franks...

 (a people of mixed Celtic and Germanic
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...

 stock, from whom the Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 name for the city of Trier
Trier
Trier, historically called in English Treves is a city in Germany on the banks of the Moselle. It is the oldest city in Germany, founded in or before 16 BC....

, Augusta Treverorum
History of Trier
Trier in Rhineland-Palatinate, whose history dates to the Roman Empire, is often claimed to be the oldest city in Germany. Traditionally it was known in English by its French name of Treves.- Prehistory :...

, is also derived) and the Romans
Ancient 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....

 have come parts of a statue of Jupiter
Jupiter (mythology)
In ancient Roman religion and myth, Jupiter or Jove is the king of the gods, and the god of the sky and thunder. He is the equivalent of Zeus in the Greek pantheon....

, jewellery, clay pots, clay and copper urns.

The Romans built a road through Womrath linking the Trier
Trier
Trier, historically called in English Treves is a city in Germany on the banks of the Moselle. It is the oldest city in Germany, founded in or before 16 BC....

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...

 long-distance road at Dumnissus (now Denzen, an Ortsteil of Kirchberg) with the Nahe valley and going farther on to Cruciniacum (now Bad Kreuznach
Bad Kreuznach
Bad Kreuznach is the capital of the district of Bad Kreuznach, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is located on the Nahe river, a tributary of the Rhine...

). In 1924, evidence was found only 50 cm deep in the ground of a paved Roman road.

The area remained inhabited continuously. An estate in the Womrath area served the supply needs of the Counts of Sponheim
County of Sponheim
The County of Sponheim was an independent territory in the Holy Roman Empire which lasted from the 11th century until the early 19th century...

. On 16 October 1299, Womrath had its first documentary mention in an agreement on legal conditions in the Dill
Dill, Germany
-History:In Reichenbach Priory’s book of donated holdings is an entry from 1090 naming somebody called Landegerus de Tila. Whether this refers to Dill, however, is far from clear...

 area between the Lords of the “Further” and “Hinder” Counties of Sponheim, whose seats were in Bad Kreuznach
Bad Kreuznach
Bad Kreuznach is the capital of the district of Bad Kreuznach, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is located on the Nahe river, a tributary of the Rhine...

 and Enkirch
Enkirch
Enkirch is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Bernkastel-Wittlich district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.- Location :...

 respectively. Beginning in 1794, Womrath lay under 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...

 rule. In 1815 it was assigned to the Kingdom of 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...

 at the Congress of Vienna
Congress 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,...

. Since 1946, it has been 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 ....

.

Werner of Womrath

In 1287 came news from Bacharach
Bacharach
Bacharach is a town in the Mainz-Bingen district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Rhein-Nahe, whose seat is in Bingen am Rhein, although that town is not within its bounds....

 of the supposed murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...

 of a boy, Werner of Womrath
Werner of Oberwesel
Werner of Oberwesel ; b. 1271 in Womrath, Hunsrück; d. 1287) was a 16-year-old boy whose unexplained death was blamed on Jews, leading to revenge killings of Jews across Europe. He was long worshipped as a Catholic saint, and his memorial day was 19 April...

, now widely believed to have been a victim of a sexual crime. His body had been found washed up on the riverbank near Oberwesel
Oberwesel
Oberwesel is a town on the Middle Rhine in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Sankt Goar-Oberwesel, whose seat is in the town.-Location:...

. Rumours spread that he had been ritually murdered by Jews on Good Friday
Good Friday
Good Friday , is a religious holiday observed primarily by Christians commemorating the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and his death at Calvary. The holiday is observed during Holy Week as part of the Paschal Triduum on the Friday preceding Easter Sunday, and may coincide with the Jewish observance of...

 (some texts hold that it was Maundy Thursday
Maundy Thursday
Maundy Thursday, also known as Holy Thursday, Covenant Thursday, Great & Holy Thursday, and Thursday of Mysteries, is the Christian feast or holy day falling on the Thursday before Easter that commemorates the Last Supper of Jesus Christ with the Apostles as described in the Canonical gospels...

). Werner had been employed by a Jewish family. This led to pogrom
Pogrom
A pogrom is a form of violent riot, a mob attack directed against a minority group, and characterized by killings and destruction of their homes and properties, businesses, and religious centres...

s against Jews along the Middle Rhine
Middle Rhine
Between Bingen and Bonn, Germany, the Rhine River flows as the Middle Rhine through the Rhine Gorge, a formation created by erosion, which happened at about the same rate as an uplift in the region, leaving the river at about its original level, and the surrounding lands raised...

 valley and to processions of “Christian charity” to Oberwesel, where Werner had lived, and to Womrath, his home village.

Despite many tries, Werner was never canonized
Canonization
Canonization is the act by which a Christian church declares a deceased person to be a saint, upon which declaration the person is included in the canon, or list, of recognized saints. Originally, individuals were recognized as saints without any formal process...

, but a “Feast of Saint Werner” was nonetheless regularly held until 1963, when the Catholic Diocese of Trier officially struck it off the liturgical calendar once Catholic church historians had shown the feast to be untenable given the contradictions within the Werner legends themselves. The blood libel
Blood libel
Blood libel is a false accusation or claim that religious minorities, usually Jews, murder children to use their blood in certain aspects of their religious rituals and holidays...

 in the case of Werner of Oberwesel, as he is now called, nowadays seems quite typical of the times. In Bacharach, the Rheinromantik ruin of “Saint Werner’s Chapel
Chapel
A chapel is a building used by Christians as a place of fellowship and worship. It may be part of a larger structure or complex, such as a church, college, hospital, palace, prison or funeral home, located on board a military or commercial ship, or it may be an entirely free-standing building,...

” still stands.

Schinderhannes

In the 17th and 18th centuries, the outlying hamlet of Wallenbrück was home to Johannes Bückler’s (“Schinderhannes
Schinderhannes
Johannes Bückler , nicknamed Schinderhannes, was a German outlaw who orchestrated one of the most fascinating crime sprees in German history. He was born at Miehlen, the son of Johann and Anna Maria Bückler. He began an apprenticeship to a tanner, but turned to petty theft. At 16 he was arrested...

’s”) forebears. They worked as knacker
Knacker
A knacker is a person in the trade of rendering animals that are unfit for human consumption, such as horses that can no longer work. This leads to the slang expression "knackered" meaning very tired, or "ready for the knacker’s yard", where old horses are slaughtered and made into dog food and glue...

s in this otherwise unoccupied hamlet (today, ten people live there). The Simmerbach, which flows by Wallenbrück, then formed the border between the Margraviate of Baden
Baden
Baden is a historical state on the east bank of the Rhine in the southwest of Germany, now the western part of the Baden-Württemberg of Germany....

 and the County of Sponheim
County of Sponheim
The County of Sponheim was an independent territory in the Holy Roman Empire which lasted from the 11th century until the early 19th century...

, thereby making it a point of interest to anyone on the edges of society.

Religion

Today’s Evangelical
Evangelical Church in Germany
The 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, which has a congregation of 161 Womrathers, was built in 1773, and from 1774 to 1912 was used as a simultaneous church
Simultaneum
A shared church, or Simultankirche, Simultaneum or, more fully, simultaneum mixtum, a term first coined in 16th century Germany, is a church in which public worship is conducted by adherents of two or more religious groups. Such churches became common in Europe in the wake of the Reformation...

. The Evangelical parish of Womrath, which belongs to the church district of Simmern-Trarbach, has been parochially tied to the Evangelical parish of Dickenschied
Dickenschied
-History:-Prehistory and early history:The Dickenschied area was settled as early as the New Stone Age, as witnessed by finds in the neighbouring municipalities of Woppenroth and Gemünden...

 since 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...

, and obliged to adhere to Reformed
Reformed churches
The Reformed churches are a group of Protestant denominations characterized by Calvinist doctrines. They are descended from the Swiss Reformation inaugurated by Huldrych Zwingli but developed more coherently by Martin Bucer, Heinrich Bullinger and especially John Calvin...

 beliefs. Between 1934 and 1937, in the time of 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...

, Paul Schneider
Paul Schneider (pastor)
Paul Schneider was an Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union pastor who was the first Protestant minister to be martyred by the Nazis. He was executed at Buchenwald.-Early life:...

, who was later murdered by the SS
Schutzstaffel
The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...

 at Buchenwald
Buchenwald concentration camp
Buchenwald concentration camp was a German Nazi concentration camp established on the Ettersberg near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937, one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps on German soil.Camp prisoners from all over Europe and Russia—Jews, non-Jewish Poles and Slovenes,...

, worked in Womrath as an Evangelical clergyman. The Catholics, who belong to the parish of Dickenschied and who make up roughly one sixth of the population, have had their own chapel
Chapel
A chapel is a building used by Christians as a place of fellowship and worship. It may be part of a larger structure or complex, such as a church, college, hospital, palace, prison or funeral home, located on board a military or commercial ship, or it may be an entirely free-standing building,...

 west of the village, Saint Werner’s Chapel (Werner-Kapelle), since 1911.

Municipal council

The council is made up of 6 council members, who were elected by majority vote
Plurality 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: In Blau 3 (2:1) goldene Dornenkreuze.

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: Azure three crosses engrailed Or.

According to communication from the Koblenz State Archive to the town and Amt administration of Kirchberg (Hunsrück) dated 2 September 1965, a blazon for a coat of arms for “Johann von Womrath, Johannes von Womerod- Wepeling” had been established that had no mention of tincture
Tincture (heraldry)
In heraldry, tinctures are the colours used to emblazon a coat of arms. These can be divided into several categories including light tinctures called metals, dark tinctures called colours, nonstandard colours called stains, furs, and "proper". A charge tinctured proper is coloured as it would be...

s, as it had likely been composed going by a seal used by Johann von Womrath. In these old records it says: Im Schild 3 (2:1) Zackenkreuze, although Zackenkreuze has more the meaning of “crosses indented” (that is, with a zigzag edge) than what would be the correct term, namely Dornenkreuze (literally “thorn crosses”; rendered “crosses engrailed” in English heraldic language, that is, with “serrated” edges).

The former lordship over Womrath was led by the Counts of Sponheim
County of Sponheim
The County of Sponheim was an independent territory in the Holy Roman Empire which lasted from the 11th century until the early 19th century...

 of the “Further” County in Kreuznach, whose heraldic tinctures were Or and azure (gold and blue). These have been incorporated into the blazon, yielding Womrath’s modern coat of arms.

The remark “(2:1)” is not in the English translation of the blazon because this distribution of a triple 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...

 is considered the “default” in English heraldry.

Buildings

The following are listed buildings or sites 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 ....

’s Directory of Cultural Monuments:
  • Evangelical
    Evangelical Church in Germany
    The 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, Kirchplatz 2 – Early Classicist
    Classicism
    Classicism, in the arts, refers generally to a high regard for classical antiquity, as setting standards for taste which the classicists seek to emulate. The art of classicism typically seeks to be formal and restrained: of the Discobolus Sir Kenneth Clark observed, "if we object to his restraint...

     aisleless church
    Aisleless church
    An 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...

    , 1774
  • Eckstraße 2 – timber-frame
    Timber 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, partly solid or slated, hipped 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...

    , 19th century
  • Im Bangert 12 – estate complex; timber-frame house, partly solid or slated, marked 1857, timber-frame barn marked 1855
  • Saint Werner’s
    Werner of Oberwesel
    Werner of Oberwesel ; b. 1271 in Womrath, Hunsrück; d. 1287) was a 16-year-old boy whose unexplained death was blamed on Jews, leading to revenge killings of Jews across Europe. He was long worshipped as a Catholic saint, and his memorial day was 19 April...

     Catholic Chapel
    Chapel
    A chapel is a building used by Christians as a place of fellowship and worship. It may be part of a larger structure or complex, such as a church, college, hospital, palace, prison or funeral home, located on board a military or commercial ship, or it may be an entirely free-standing building,...

     (Wernerkapelle), west of the village – aisleless church, 1910/1911, architect Eduard Endler, Cologne
    Cologne
    Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...

  • Langenauer Mühle, on Kreisstraße (District Road) 6 east of the village – timber-frame bungalow, marked 1758, house possibly newer
  • Water cistern, on Kreisstraße 6 west of the village – plastered building with triangular gable, marked 1906

Economy and infrastructure

The formerly dominant industry, agriculture
Agriculture
Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...

, has all but vanished. All that is left is two fulltime agricultural businesses and one boarding stable.

Further reading

  • Albert Rosenkranz: Das Evangelische Rheinland, Band 1; Schriftenreihe des Vereins für rheinische Kirchengeschichte, Bd. 3; Düsseldorf: Kirche in der Zeit, 1956; S. 535f;
  • Dieter Diether: Die Gotteshäuser im Evangelischen Kirchenkreis Simmern-Trarbach; Kirchberg (Hunsrück): Kirchenkreis Simmern-Trarbach, 1998; S. 34f
  • Hotte Schneider: Womrath – Ein Dorf im Hunsrück; Womrath: Ortsgemeinde Womrath, 1999; ISBN 3-00-004779-4

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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