#rungholt

[medievalistsnet]

Uncovering Rungholt: Secrets of a Lost Medieval Town in the North Sea - Medievalists.net

Beneath the tidal flats of the North Sea lie the remnants of Rungholt, a medieval town lost to a storm in 1362. Recent discoveries are shedd

[ltwilliammowett]

Atlantis of the North Sea -Rungholt

"Today I drove over Rungholt, The town went down six hundred years ago. Trutz, Blanke Hans." "From the North Sea, the Murder Sea, separated from the mainland, The Frisian islands lie at peace. Trutz, Blanke Hans." "A single cry - the city is sunk, And hundreds of thousands have drowned. Trutz, Blanke Hans?"

Trutz, Blanke Hans by Detlef von Liliencron 1883

Rungholt is also often referred to as the Atlantis of the North Sea, as there are still many legends surrounding this town in the Wadden Sea.

Rungholt was a town on the island of Strand in the North Frisian Wadden Sea (North Germany) and sank during the Second Marcellus Flood, also known as the Grote Mandränke, on 16 January 1362.

The North Frisian Coast with its islands, Halligen and the Wadden Sea before 1362 (x)

Now, in the course of time, several cities have sunk, so the question arises as to what made Rungholt so special that it was called the Atlantis of the North Sea. Rungholt mined peat and extracted salt, which they sold well. According to legend, Rungholt was incredibly rich, a large city in the middle of the mudflats. According to one legend, this made the people arrogant and thought they could go against God, whereupon he punished them with the flood. Another legend says that at a drinking party, it must have been around 1300, a few men, wild with wine, got a pig drunk. They put a nightcap on it and put it to bed. They laugh, they bawl, they call the priest to anoint the terminally ill man. The priest refuses. The men threaten him with beatings, drag him to the bed and pour beer over his hosts. Outraged by the desecration of the sacrament, the priest prays to God. Rungholt shall atone. The following night, a storm comes up. And while the lords of the town still stand on the dikes, blinded by their wealth, and think they can defy Blanken Hans (which is also the name given to the raging North Sea in a storm), the tide rises four cubits high over the tops of the dikes, swallows the town and everyone in it drowns. It is said to lie at the bottom of the sea to this day, pleading for salvation.

Dike breach, engraving by Johann Martin Winterstein from 1675 (x)

Unfortunately, there are hardly any records and none from that time, which makes Rungholt so legendary and even makes many people doubt that it really existed. 

The first mentions date back to the 17th century and even these were initially questioned until a will was found in Hamburg. It dates from 1345 and has the full entry "Edomsharde, Kirchspiel Rungholt, Richter, Ratsleute, Geschworene, Thedo Bonisson samt Erben" (Edomsharde, Rungholt parish, judges, councillors, jury, Thedo Bonisson and heirs) as the addressee. To date, this is the only known document from the time before the town's demise. Obviously, Rungholt must have really existed and was even so large that it had its own church. The ethnologist and cultural historian Hans Peter Duerr even believes in a town the size of Hamburg, which had about 5,000 inhabitants at the time. He has evidence in the form of archaeological finds.

The first finds were made by fishermen in 1880, who found pottery shards, brick remains, large wooden remains and even plough marks from fields. Further finds were made in 1921 and 1940, where around 100 wells, the remains of about 28 terps, dike imprints and several supposed sluices were found, which later turned out to be sluices built by the inhabitants to drain the land.

Andreas Busch salvages beams of the so-called "Rungholtschleuse" (Rungholt sluice)1922 (x)

But is this really Rungholt or other towns that were also in the vicinity? There is a tendency to locate the town near the Hallig Südfall. But the Hallig has moved steadily eastwards over the centuries, and over time it has also migrated into the area of the vanished Rungholt. Today, therefore, it only reveals traces of a possible settlement at its north-western corner. But whether this is really Rungholt is questionable.

Storm tide,by Johannes Gehrs, 1880 (x)

This is still a matter of debate, but researchers have reconstructed the town as follows.

Rungholt was settled about a century and a half before the sinking. The houses, built of clay and grass sod, provided space for about 1000 inhabitants and stood on about 25 terps and on a dike about two metres high. Their livelihoods were based on livestock farming, seafaring, salt extraction from sea peat and trade. Around their settlement they cultivated grain, especially rye, on vaults.

The region today (x)

The fact that Rungholt stood on a dyke, on which the mounds were located and the area was drained, made the land quite unstable. The Second Marcellus Flood was not a light storm, but lasted for three days. The dykes gave way bit by bit, the water swept everything away and undermined Rungholt's land, forcing it to sink. But it wasn't just Rungholt that was affected: more than 100,000 people are said to have died in the floods, lands sank and entire villages disappeared from the map almost without a trace. This fate struck 28, according to other sources at least 32, villages. Which clearly left its mark on the landscape.

[bluehunterart]

Rungholt, the leopard seal. EF 26 stage banner.

[contremineur]

Heut bin ich über Rungholt gefahren, die Stadt ging unter vor sechshundert Jahren. Noch schlagen die Wellen da wild und empört, wie damals, als sie die Marschen zerstört. I have sailed over Rungholt town today, six hundred years ago it was washed away. The waves still pound there, wild and harsh, just as before, when they destroyed the marsh.

Detlev von Liliencron, from Trutz, Blanke Hans (1882)

Rungholt was a settlement in Nordfriesland, in what was then the Danish Duchy of Schleswig. Rungholt reportedly sank beneath the North Sea when a storm tide known as the second Grote Mandrenke (’great drowner of men’) hit the coast on 15th or 16th January 1362. Local myth has it that one can still hear the church bells of Rungholt ringing underwater when sailing through the area on a calm night.

The location of Rungholt shown on a map before the Burchardi flood in October 1634, when most of the island of Nordstrand was also lost to the sea. 

[anankesreich]

Wahrscheinlich lag es an dem wolkenverhangenen Mond, der die Szenerie in ein unwirkliches Licht tauchte, doch Janna konnte den Blick nicht von der offenen See wenden, die sich vor ihr bis hinaus in die Unendlichkeit zu erstrecken schien. Noch immer erklang das Silvesterläuten vom Dorf herüber, das Läuten, das allzu sehr an die Sage der untergegangenen und dennoch hörbaren Glocken von Rungholt erinnerte. Ann-Kathrin Wasle, Die Glocken von Rungholt #AnnKathrinsBuchschnipsel #Autorenleben #Autorin #Bücher #Geschichten #Schreiben #Bücherliebe #Zitat #ZitateundSprüche #ZitatdesTages #SpruchdesTages #Zitate #Rungholt #HistorischerRoman #Liebesroman #Nordsee #Husum #Meer #Nordseeküste #Nordseeliebe #StPeterOrding #Legende #Fantasy #Lovestory https://www.instagram.com/p/BsIqIJslH4t/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1a8aou8mad2be

[sadomina]

January the 17th 1362, the „Grote Mandrenke“ (Marcellus‘ Flood) wiped out the city of Rungholt. This day Hans von Rungholt found his eternal wet grave 🖤💀🖤 #doll #bjd #abjd #balljointeddoll #sadomina #ringdoll #zombie #undead #dead #drowned #rungholt #creepy #creepydoll #creepybjd #horror #horrordoll #dark #darkart #creepypasta

[sadomina]

I hear voices from the sea. Hans von Rungholt is calling. ☠️ #doll #bjd #abjd #balljointeddoll #sadomina #creepy #creepybjd #creepydoll #dead #horror #ghost #haunted #seaghost #rungholt #ringdoll

[dinofelissnow1985]

Unearthed: Atlantis of the North Sea - The Lost City of Rungholt