Owl pit
| Owl pit
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 Burglar funnel of the owl pit |
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| Location: | Swabian Alb , Germany | |
| Height : | 748 m above sea level NN | |
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Geographic location: |
48 ° 5 '56.6 " N , 9 ° 7' 27.5" E | |
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| Cadastral number: | 7920/09 | |
| Geology: | limestone | |
| Type: | Karst cave | |
The owl pit is a sinkhole between Gutenstein and Oberschmeien in the Sigmaringen district , about 60 meters west of the Schmeien– Nusplingen road . The sinkhole, classified as a natural monument and also as a protected geotope under the name Doline Eulengrube & Höhle , has a burglar funnel about twelve meters in diameter and eight meters deep. At the bottom of the funnel is the entrance to a limestone cave, which is 38 meters long and 21 meters deep.
There are legends about the owl pit . The sinkhole, which according to these legends goes down to the depths of the Danube, is said to have been inhabited at times by the ghost Hudelmann and the owl pit woman .
At the beginning of the 21st century the sinkhole was repeatedly misused for illegal waste disposal. Members of the mountain rescue service and the Swabian Alb Association take on the care and cleaning of the natural monument on a voluntary basis.
The legend of the owl pit woman
It is said about the owl pit that in earlier times hikers often met a female almost in dwarf form there, that there rose from the depths. It asked the wanderers for the way to Untermeien. If you answered her, she kept asking questions. However, she had led strangers on the wrong path and left them wandering around for days. As the sinkhole narrowed, the female owl pit appeared less and less. So it says in the song of the owl pit woman:
“In the distance, well-known to the legend,
there is a large sinkhole called the owl pit.
Often a woman of her own kind rises from her depths,
probably only dwarf-sized, but finely cleaned and delicate.
And hikers who go down into the valley of the Danube
often see the stranger standing alone on the way.
'Where are you going to Unterschmeien?', The strange woman asks
and keeps asking , as often as you tell her.
It also often happened that hikers - I am told -
would ask the woman herself if she missed the path;
Mistaken by him,
they often criss-crossed the desolate corridors for days , pursued by need and urgency.
And to whom she appeared in the field and also in the forest,
did not hesitate long, tried to escape.
Because every soul always dreads in their presence
and one sees the spirit of evil in their image.
Often when the peasants had lunch together
, the old woman came up to them from the forest.
And made himself comfortable in her company
and ate from a piece of bread she brought with her.
Whoever was there around her,
she would kindly offer everyone to enjoy her 'good bread'.
But nobody ate and what they
put was covered with the earth of the field.
So it is still feared, although it has been a long time since
it appeared so openly, it rarely comes back.
The owl pit no longer looks so horrible,
collapses more and more, narrows from year to year.
Recently a boy walked past
the disreputable pit, full of exuberance, checked how big it was
and called out: 'You pit woman, come out again.'
Her head showed her - the boy ran home '. "
literature
- Hans Binder , Herbert Jantschke: Cave guide Swabian Alb. Caves - springs - waterfalls . 7th completely revised edition. DRW-Verlag, Leinfelden-Echterdingen 2003, ISBN 3-87181-485-7 , p. 248 .
- Jürgen Meyer: Wild caves, grottos, rock nests: 100 mysterious cavities between the Alb and the Danube , Oertel & Spörer, Reutlingen 2011, p. 63, ISBN 978-3-88627-479-6 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Helmut Stroppel: Mountain rescue service cleans the owl pit . In: Schwäbische Zeitung , September 23, 2014
- ^ Anton Birlinger: Legends and fairy tales from Swabia . Jazzybee Verlag, 2012, p. 194. ISBN 978-3-8496-0289-5 .
- ^ A b Johann Georg Theodor Grasse: Book of legends of the Prussian state , Volume 2. Carl Flemming Verlag, 1871, p. 666f.
- ↑ Louis Egler : From the prehistory of Hohenzollern: Legends and stories. Tappen, 1861, p. 66f.