Lead mountain (desert)

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Explanation board for the fortifications.

Bleiberg was a medieval mountain town on the stairs near Sachsenburg , a district of the town of Frankenberg in Saxony . Founded in the middle of the 13th century, the settlement fell desolate again about 100 years later . Archaeological and archival research since the early 1970s led to the discovery of the walled mountain town of Bleiberg, which was mentioned twice in sources from the 14th century. The remains are protected as a ground monument.

Location and description

The desert is located near the highest point of the staircase about one kilometer west of Sachsenburg. A system of ditches and ramparts surrounds the wooded area, which has a diameter of about 300 to 400 meters and a total area of ​​about 12 hectares. Over 180 Schachtpingen and 43 remains of houses have been found in the uneven terrain . The shafts reached a depth of well over 10 meters.

history

Building in the Bergstadt Bleiberg open-air museum

Intensive mining for silver and copper probably did not begin at this point until after 1232, when the area came to the Wettins as a result of the Mildenstein tithing dispute and the mountain freedom created by Otto von Meißen led to a revival of mining. Ceramic and coin finds, which are dated around the year 1250, prove this. Obviously there was rapid growth with pits and houses close together. Pit houses that were up to two meters deep mark the first settlement, which was later replaced by houses at ground level. The houses had stone foundations, but were otherwise built of wood. Finds of toys and spindle whorls show that this was not just a mining settlement, but that the miners' families also lived here. A total of over 1000 people is assumed, a considerable size in relation to the population at the time.

It is believed that Bleiberg fell again in the middle of the 14th century. The exact cause is unknown. Water ingress , but also the demographic and economic consequences of the outbreak of the plague in 1347 , bad harvests and famine, but also the drop in raw material prices are named directly or indirectly as the cause. Other mining towns shared the same fate, and the towns only survived where there was an established infrastructure.

Bleiberg is only mentioned twice: in 1318 and 1390, when the settlement was probably already abandoned. In the 16th century, mining on the staircases is said to have been shut down for a long time and Bleiberg is not mentioned. A legend from the 18th century tells of a town at this point.

Discovery story

Extensive archaeological excavations were carried out by Wolfgang Schwabenicky from 1977 to 1998 . First he explored the area as a teacher with students in a working group he led and, since 1988, as head of the "District Office for Monument Preservation in Mittweida ". The excavations brought significant results on medieval mining in Central Europe and the settlement history of this area. The knowledge gained up to that point was presented in 1991 in a Berlin dissertation by Schwabenicky and numerous other essays (published together as a book in 2009), primarily in the archaeological specialist literature. A project funded by the VW Foundation intensified the research between 1992 and 1994.

From 2005 to 2007 the University of Bamberg followed up on these excavations with three excavation campaigns led by Hauke ​​Kenzler . In addition to the training of students, the focus was on creating terrain models with the help of 3-dimensional exploration methods. The pre-dating of the settlement to 1200 is controversial. However, it is supported by the dendrochronological dating of the mining in Dippoldiswalde to the time around 1180 which has now taken place . The early start of Freiberg mining around 1170 can no longer be seen as an isolated case.

literature

  • Wolfgang Schwabenicky: High medieval mountain towns in the Saxon Ore Mountains and Ore Mountains foreland . In: settlement research . tape 10 , 1992, pp. 195–210 ( online [PDF; 29.4 MB ]).
  • Wolfgang Schwabenicky: The medieval silver mining in the Ore Mountains foreland and in the western Ore Mountains with special consideration of the excavations in the desert mountain town of Bleiberg near Frankenberg . Klaus Gumnior Verlag, Chemnitz 2009, ISBN 978-3-937386-20-1 .
  • Hauke ​​Kenzler: Structure and development of the mountain town on the staircase. Results of the archaeological investigations from 2005 to 2007 . In: Work and research reports on the preservation of monuments in Saxony . tape 50 , 2008, p. 263-306 ( online ).

Web links

Commons : Bleiberg  - collection of images, videos and audio files
Commons : Freilichtmuseum Mittelalterliche Bergstadt Bleiberg  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Wolfgang Schwabenicky: Pit houses and houses at ground level in the desert mountain town of Bleiberg near Sachsenburg, town of Frankenberg / Sa. In: Forum urbes medii aevi . tape 2 , 2004, p. 6–15 ( online [PDF; 167 kB ]).
  2. ^ Yves Hoffmann: The story of Dippoldiswalde up to the end of the first mining period around 1400 . In: Work and research reports on the preservation of monuments in Saxony . tape 51/52 , 2009, pp. 409 ( online [PDF; 2.1 MB ]).
  3. ^ Christiane Hemker: Archeology in Dippoldiswalde . In: Regina Smolnik (Ed.): Aufbruch underground. Status and tasks of mining archaeological research in Saxony . Saxon State Office for Archeology, Dresden 2011.
  4. ^ Hauke ​​Kenzler: Mining and colonization. The role of the mining industry within the medieval settlement history of the Ore Mountains . In: ArcheoMontan 2013, proceedings for the international symposium, Kadań (Czech Republic) September 26-28, 2013, p. 160

Coordinates: 50 ° 56 '23.1 "  N , 13 ° 1' 43.5"  E