Quedlinburger Landgraben
The Quedlinburg waiting and ditch system is a medieval defense system with which the area around Quedlinburg was warned and protected against the intrusion of armies and robbers. The good state of preservation of individual waiting areas and the recognizability of parts of the Landwehr should be emphasized .
Land moat
The wall- trench systems with dense hedgerows were located along the boundary of the district in order to prevent army hordes and robbers from entering or their rapid retreat. For example, the townspeople's herds could be protected from cattle theft.
The length was 42 km.
Field maintenance
Field watchdogs are locally called the watch towers of the medieval defense system. They were probably built from the second half of the 13th century until around 1320 on mountains on the boundary as an early warning system (Lehofwarte, Heidbergwarte, Steinholzwarte , Altenburgwarte , Aholzwarte); secured important road and path connections (Sültenwarte on the way to Badeborn , Lethturm on the road to Gernrode , Ilenstedter or Gaterslebener Warte on the way to Gatersleben and on the old military road from Ermsleben to Halberstadt , Bicklingswarte on the way to Rieder and on Kohlweg) and reported Danger to the city of Quedlinburg by means of smoke and fire signals. The guard at the Hammwarte temporarily served as a signal receiver on site, but the tower keeper at the market church tower was always used . They were surrounded by a fortified courtyard, which served as a refuge for farmers and shepherds working in the fields .
Monument protection
At the end of the 19th century, the Altenburgwarte and the Steinholzwarte were converted into observation towers.
Friends of nature and homeland carried out necessary repairs in the 1960s and 1970s. At the beginning of the 1990s, the city of Quedlinburg had these control rooms repaired and Seweckenwarte and Bicklingswarte converted into observation towers by installing spiral staircases. Especially from the Seweckenwarte, east of Quedlinburg, one has a panoramic view of the Harz and the Harz foreland .
In 2005, the "Wartenverein" was founded as a support association for the maintenance of the Quedlinburg waiting system, which aims at a historical reconstruction of the fortifications for the Leth Tower with the adjacent Landwehr.
literature
- Falko Grubitzsch in: Georg Dehio : Handbook of German Art Monuments . Saxony-Anhalt. Volume 1: Ute Bednarz, Folkhard Cremer and others: Magdeburg administrative region. Revision. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich et al. 2002, ISBN 3-422-03069-7 , page 741 f