History of the Brookmerland
The Brokmerland (today written Brookmerland) is a landscape and a historical territory, located in the west of East Friesland , which includes an area in and around the present-day communities Brookmerland and Südbrookmerland . The Brokmerland borders in the east on the Harlingerland and in the north on the Norderland . The historical Brokmerland is usually written in the documents with just an "o". The spelling “Broekmerland” can also be found occasionally with an elongation e , while today's municipalities with this name have chosen the spelling with the double o.
Origin of name
The name of the Brokmerland comes from the Old Frisian or Old Low German word brōk , which stands for a boggy ravine landscape that was hardly populated in the past. This stretched from the western edge of the East Frisian Geestrücken, from the Ley (Norder Tief) to the Flumm ( Fehntjer Tief ) and was interspersed with a number of shallow inland lakes, from the Great Sea to Sandwater .
In addition to a mer verschliffenes man with the Herkunftsanhägsel it . Brokmerland means "land of the men from the moor".
history
The Brokmerland was largely uninhabited until the early Middle Ages and was a natural border between the Federgau and the Emsgau on the one hand and the Gauen Norditi (Norderland) and Östringen on the other. This border also played a role in church history as it formed the dividing line between the diocese of Münster (Federgau and Emsgau) and the archdiocese of Bremen (Norderland and Östringen).
Archaeological finds indicate a sparse settlement around 800. There was a larger settlement from 1100 onwards. On the one hand, the dyke construction in the region was finished, on the other hand the Julian flood of 1164 pushed many people from the coast into the interior. In addition, there was the growing population in the High Middle Ages, which in East Friesland led to the development of such poor or empty areas through land development, the so-called internal colonization. The Brokmerland was made arable by settlers from the Krummhörner Marsch and the North and Aurich Geest. In the 11th / 12th In the 19th century, new settlements with the first churches were built here on the edge and the foothills of the Geest. The result of this process were the row villages with their upways .
The Brokmer are mentioned for the first time in the Östringer (Rasteder) Chronicle of 1148, which may indicate that they already had a certain importance at this point in time. From 1251 the Brokmänner appear as an independent state community, the Brokmerland, which was initially divided into three central districts, each with two main churches: Marienhafe and Engerhafe, Wiegsboldsbur and Burhafe (today individual farms in the Victorburer-Marsch), Bedekaspel and Südwolde (Blaukirchen). The church districts belonged to the diocese of Münster. The main meeting place of the Brokmannen was probably the Wiegboldsbur church at first .
Brokmerland experienced its heyday during the 13th century. During this time the large churches were built, of which the (formerly three-aisled) Marienhafe church is the largest. At that time it was the largest church in north-west Germany and in 1462 Pope Pius II donated indulgences for visiting the church, for donations to furnishings and for donations of money to maintain the church "curia beate Marie". The Bishop of Münster responded to the growing importance of the area by elevating it to its own church in the middle of the 13th century. Previously it was assigned to the Deaneries Uttum and Hinte. In addition, the bishop built a castle in Fehnhusen in the Engerhafe parish, later Oldeborg, which formed the nucleus of today's place.
The Frisian state parishes had a consular constitution, according to which the consuls and judges were elected by the people for a year. Political leadership and jurisdiction were in the hands of the people. Meetings of the representatives of the seven Frisian Zealand countries took place every year. The Upstalsboom is a meeting place from this time. Brokmerland had its own jurisdiction and, with the Brokmerbrief, its own constitution. This reports as the most detailed Frisian legal source of the state and court constitution of the Brokmerland, whose law was based on the will of the assembled people.
At the end of the 13th century, the Auricherland joined the Brokmerland and formed the fourth quarter of the state community. After the reign of the chief family tom Brok came to an end around 1450, the Auricherland separated again from the Brokmerland.
Chief time
This consulate constitution lasted until the middle of the 14th century. It then fell apart and was gradually replaced when powerful families took over the chieftainship . In Brokmerland this was the Kenesma family, who were awarded the title of chief in Brokmerland in the second half of the 14th century. Then she renamed herself tom Brok and built Brooke Castle next to the already existing episcopal castle in Oldeborg. The tom Brok later built a second castle in Aurich.
The capital Marienhafe developed into an important trading center during this time. After severe storm surges in 1374 and 1377, it even became a seaport. This made it possible to transport goods from Brookmerland to Münsterland by water. The mudflats of Leybucht and Kuipersand in front of Marienhafe take their name from the old three-aisled Marienhafer church. Their roof was covered on the north side with copper (Kuiper = Frisian-Dutch for copper) and on the south side with slate (Ley = old German for slate). The building showed initiates from the sea through the changing view of the copper and the slate side of the creeks and other bodies of water that remain passable at low tide . Without this knowledge, the place and its tide-dependent port were practically impregnable from the sea.
At the end of the 14th century, pirates around Klaus Störtebeker found refuge in Marienhafe. For this he reciprocated in the battle of the chiefs of Brookmerland for supremacy in East Frisia. Widzel tom Brok had opened the then still young port to the “Likedeelern” or “ Vitalienbrüdern ” under Klaus Störtebeker. They used the place as protection, to stack the stolen goods and to sell them. This was finally stopped by several punitive expeditions by the Hanseatic City of Hamburg , which were directed against the pirates and chiefs who sympathized with them. Marienhafe was saved from destruction due to its safe harbor. Faldern and Larrelt near Emden and other East Frisian buildings, on the other hand, were razed at that time .
The tom Brok had initially tried, with success, to establish sovereignty over the Friesland on both sides of the Ems. Ocko II finally inherited such large territories that he could call himself chief of East Friesland. In the following period, however, there were disputes between Focko Ukena and Ocko tom Brok, which turned into open acts of war. After Ukena's first victory over Ocko II at Detern in 1426, Focko allied himself with the Bishop of Munster and numerous East Frisian chiefs against Ocko, who was now limited to Brokmerland, and finally defeated him on October 28th in the Wild Fields . He was taken to Leer and was imprisoned for four years. In 1435 he died powerless as the last of his family in the north .
The following reign of Focko Ukena in Brokmerland was only a short interlude. After the people had just escaped the rule of tom Brok, many felt betrayed by the new rulers because they, like tom Brok , appeared to be ignoring traditional rights of Frisian freedom . So around 1430 an uprising arose in Brookmerland (today's spelling), which after an unfortunate attack by Focko on the Bremen city region on the Lower Weser, expanded into a general East Frisian popular uprising.
After the conquest of Oldersum and Aurich, the East Frisian regional associations and the smaller chiefs concluded the Freedom League of the Seven East Frisia on November 14, 1430 under the leadership of Chief Edzard Cirksena from Greetsiel . Around 1440 the Cirksena became judges and “guardians”, chiefs of the Brookmerland and the Auricherland, and after the interlude of the Ukena, they finally became the legacy of tom Brok. However, they had to take into account freedom of the municipalities and state law. The state parishes were newly constituted. So there was again a Brookmerland, an Auricherland and in the southwest of the Auricherland a separate southern region ( Bangstede , Ochtelbur , Riepe and Simonswolde ).
When the Cirksena was raised to the status of imperial count in 1464, they made the areas ruled by their castles into offices: the Brookmerland, like the Auricherland, from then on belonged to the Aurich office and split into the Nordbrookmer Vogtei with Osteel, Marienhafe and Siegelum and the Südbrookmer Vogtei with the parishes Engerhafe, Victorbur, Wiegboldsbur, Bedekaspel and Forlitz-Blaukirchen. In the following years the Brookmerland shared the fate of the county.