Friedrichstaler Canal
The Friedrichstaler Canal is an artificial waterway almost two kilometers long in the Lippe city of Detmold in North Rhine-Westphalia , which was laid out from 1701 to 1704 on the instructions of the Lippe Count Friedrich Adolf . He connected the residential palace with the baroque country estate Friedrichstal south of Detmold, which no longer exists . The canal was built exclusively for court rides in gondolas. Shipping was stopped again in 1748 for cost reasons. The water gradient at two of the three locks on the canal was now used to operate mills. The canal system is an important monument of baroque hydraulic engineering.
Course of the canal
The canal is located in the southern part of the city of Detmold and extends from the Schlossgraben in the north to the Obere Mühle in the south. It begins on Bruchberg at the northern end of the castle moat and then uses the built moat that follows the arch of the former city wall and ends at Willy-Brandt-Platz. It then runs in a straight line in a south-westerly direction along the Neustadt on the left and the avenue on the right. After a slight bend, it passes a waterfall, the location of an earlier lock, and after a few hundred meters reaches the Obere Mühle. A weir interrupts the course of the Berlebecke . Water is diverted from the small river coming from the Teutoburg Forest to feed the canal, while the Berlebecke then flows as a bones stream in a north-westerly direction through the Detmold city area and flows into the Werre .
A dam was built in 1701 to dam the Berlebecke at the height of today's Upper Mill. As a result, a small, circular lake was created that was used to regulate the flow of water in the canal. Three locks were installed to compensate for the height differences along the canal. The first lock was on Bruchberg (at that time Bruchpforte), the second on the waterfall and the third on the Upper Mill, which, however, did not yet exist at that time. There was also a drawbridge at Hornschen Tor (today Willy-Brandt-Platz) and at Bruchpforte .
Surname
Before the construction of the facilities in Friedrichstal, the Pöppinghausen dairy was located on today's Inselwiese in the valley between the Büchenberg in the east and the Schützenberg in the west. Countess Amalie, wife of Count Simon Henrich , bought the no longer profitable dairy in 1681. She not only took care of the agriculture, but also had several buildings built, including the still existing Crooked House . Count Simon Henrich's successor was Count Friedrich Adolf, who renamed the area from Pöppinghauser Kamp to Friedrichstaler Kamp . Later, the entire area from Hornschen Tor to Krumme Haus was called Friedrichstal . Today, the Friedrichstal park landscape encompasses the entire historical waterway and path connection from the Residenzschloss to the Inselwiese.
history
City expansion
Although located away from the centers of power at that time, an absolutist ruling sovereign ruled at the beginning of the 18th century in the small county of Lippe . Detmold's lordly builder in those years was Count Friedrich Adolf, who ruled from 1697 to 1718. When he took office, Detmold was still surrounded by a medieval city wall, a quarter of the city area was taken up by the count's castle with its fortifications. In front of the city gates were the pastures and fields of the approximately 1100 arable citizens .
The well-traveled and art enthusiast Friedrich Adolf had previously spent three years in Paris and Holland and then one year in Italy . The Palace of Versailles with its parks evidently made a great impression on him. The canals and canals in Holland were probably the model for his plan to connect the existing residence and a country estate planned around 1,200 meters outside the city walls by water.
The canal was integrated into the city expansion outside the city wall consisting of the new town , which was supposed to alleviate the housing shortage in the old town, and the new palace .
Specialists from several European countries were involved in the planning and construction, such as the French, Italian plasterers and the Dutch hydraulic engineering expert Hendrick Kock. There was no master builder from Lippe and so the Hamburg painter Hans Hinrich Rundt was initially assigned the overall architectural planning. Apparently he did not work satisfactorily, because Friedrich Adolf finally took on this task himself.
In 1708, Count Friedrich Adolf issued the Neustadt privilege, which guaranteed citizens willing to build in the Neustadt free building plots with twenty years of tax exemption and which was not revoked until 1745.
Sewer construction
In 1701, excavation work began on the canal and the three locks. Numerous Detmold craftsmen and business people were entrusted with work and farmers and soldiers were used for earthworks. First of all, the moat was expanded to a width of around eight meters and enclosed by lining walls. The canal followed the Berlebecke coming from the Teutoburg Forest . The straight part in front of the second lock is particularly reminiscent of Dutch models. Behind the third and last lock in the area of today's Obere Mühle, the canal widened in a circular manner and flowed around a circular island before it ended in a bay. There was the square four-tower island with an illusionary moated castle backdrop. After just three years, in 1704, the canal was completed.
For the trip on the canal, two different sized gondolas were built for the transport of people and a material ship called a trek school . The gondolas were moved forward with pegs , while the material ship was towed with horses on a towpath .
There is a detailed documentation of the sewer construction, from the costs, labor and materials used. Even the names of the suppliers, craftsmen, doctors and pharmacists involved were recorded and later evaluated by the Detmold city historian Friedrich Richter. This refers to more than a hundred names of Detmold citizens, whose services, however, were partly forced by traditional servility. That means they had to work for free for their rule. The same was true for the labor of the soldiers paid by the Land of Lippe. From the doctor and pharmacist bills it can be seen that there was one dead and some injured during the construction work. Two men were convicted of stealing the copper tap of a fountain and therefore executed on the gallows on the Jerxer Heide in December 1714.
Take the gondola
From the Residenzschloss to the Hornschen Tor
The counts, together with the court, boarded the festively decorated gondolas at a landing stage at the castle and then drove slowly, pushed by poles, on the water of the castle moat to the break gate. There was a height difference of several meters between the castle moat and the adjoining moat, which had to be overcome with a lock. The stones from the lock chamber can still be seen in the bank reinforcement. However, nothing can be seen of the drawbridge there, over which the citizens' cattle were driven daily from the city through the Bruchpforte to the Hude .
Under the eyes of curious onlookers from Detmold, who occupied the canal bank, the company drove the built moat along the city wall. The moat widened shortly before the Hornschen Tor (today Willy-Brandt-Platz) and formed a slightly larger water surface. There was a junction for the fire ditch, which filled the gutters in the streets of the city with extinguishing water. In addition, this place on the canal was used by Detmold washer women until the beginning of the 20th century. From Hornschen Tor the post route led to Horn and on to Paderborn , as well as a junction to Hiddesen . The gondolas passed a second drawbridge there, over which the path to Hiddesen led, and then swiveled into the wide, almost dead straight canal, with the stern turned towards the city.
From Hornschen Tor to Friedrichstal
In the years that followed, the so-called Neustadt , a row of ten houses, was built on the left side of the canal . Their uniform appearance was mandatory and each client had to purchase a copy of a binding construction drawing. These houses were mainly inhabited by higher court officials and their families. On the right, western side, the still existing avenue was laid out between two rows of linden trees. The urban complex on the Neustadt was intended as preparation for the Favorite , which Friedrich Adolf built as a widow's residence for his second wife, Amalie von Solms. This representative building changed its name several times. In addition to Favorite , it was called Neue Favorite , Friedamadolfsburg and, after renovations in the 19th century, the Neues Palais . It is known today as the New Palace and houses the Detmold University of Music .
The palace garden behind the palace was surrounded by a wall and the citizens of Detmold were not allowed to enter. He had a connection to the canal through the fountains and water features built there. Between 1850 and 1860 the garden was redesigned by court gardener Carl Limberg in the style of English landscape gardens and received several water features. These obtained the water they needed either directly from the sewer or from an elevated tank that was also fed with water from the sewer via a turbine.
The second lock, now a waterfall, was located at the level of the palace garden. With the sparse flowing water in the canal, each lock would have taken some time. Next, the gondolas passed another new building from those years, the Neuer Krug , which also belonged to Countess Amalie and represented a pleasant source of income due to the associated brewing and tapping license. The half-timbered building, completed in 1711, is still completely intact, but was at times threatened with demolition. The building was only listed as a historical monument in 1995 due to massive public protests. In 1999 the Detmold Summer Theater initiative began with the renovation. Since 2003 the summer theater has been used again as a venue and is also part of the Friedrichstal complex.
The third lock followed just a few hundred meters further. It was located in a dam that was raised in 1701, with which the Berlebecke was dammed into a small lake. Hendrick Kock built a sluice into this dam, which had to overcome a height difference of around four meters. The walls made of carefully hewn stone blocks can still be seen clearly. The lock gates were rotatably mounted in the blocks with a vertical, semicircular hollow. After the canal navigation had ceased in 1748, the Obere Mühle was built in 1752 at the level of the dam and operated until 1958. In the former lock, three waterwheels connected one behind the other, whose axle bearings are visible in the lock wall. At the same time, a weir system consisting of ten sandstone pillars was built, in which adjustable wooden panels regulated the water flow.
In Friedrichstal
Above the dam there was a lake in which there was a small artificial island with all kinds of colorful poultry. The canal led on to a second island with an almost quadrangular floor plan, the four-tower island on which the pleasure palace was to be built, the actual destination of the gondola ride. The boats moored there and the company disembarked to pass the time in the Friedrichtal valley. A square main building was planned with a large hall and pavilions at its four corners. In fact, only four towers were built between 1701 and 1704 at the corners of the island from which it got its name. The archaeologist Martin Salesch carried out excavations between 1996 and 1998, with the result that the towers consisted of wooden structures with slate roofs and glass windows.
The Friedrichstal gardens lay on the western slope of the Büchenberg and stretched down into the valley to the four-tower island. Countess Amalie, the mother of Count Friedrich Adolf, took over the Pöppinghausen dairy on the site in 1681 and converted the main building into a small castle. In 1695/96 she had an orangery built, the still existing Krumme Haus (today the administration of the open-air museum ). In addition, she began a three-tier terrace system, which was to become a special design feature of Friedrichstal. Count Friedrich Adolf continued the construction work that had started. In order to equip the fountains in the ponds with the necessary water pressure, a pond was built north of the facility (today a mill pond in the open-air museum). From there the water flowed in cascades via wooden and tin pipes to a second pond on the lowest terrace and to the gardens.
If the canal was completed relatively quickly, the buildings on the slopes of the Friedrichtal continued until around 1716. Directly south of the four-tower island, connected by a footbridge, was the Small Garden , also known as the Black Garden . There were found four arbors, accessible through arcades, a fountain and all kinds of foreign plants.
The baroque garden in Friedrichstal was equipped with water art, fountains and cascades, flower beds, arcades and stone sculptures. From 1705 the magnificent grotto , then known as the Lion Grotto, was built there. The walls were decorated with polished seashells and stucco. An octagonal tower had been erected over the cross vaulting of the ceiling, through the window of which light fell into the interior. The grotto was built in the area of the lower terrace. Extensive earthworks were required, and the construction of the tower was very costly. Prince Leopold III. 1855 had the grotto converted into a mausoleum and the coffins transferred from the stately crypt in the Detmold market church .
Broken finances
As sensational as these buildings may have been in their time, they had a devastating effect on state finances. When the count received the construction bill in 1715, he had built 39,044 thalers for the entire Friedrichstal complex, including the canal. How enormous this sum was can be seen when comparing a few individual items. The full-time skipper received an annual salary of initially 24 thalers, later 52 thalers, leather trousers cost two thalers at the time, a chair one thaler and a liter of beer eight pfennigs.
Over the years the count had put the entire state budget into his building projects. Although he added substantial amounts from his private income, the rest came from government sources of income. New taxes were constantly imposed on the subjects. Astonishing, cruelly excessive fines were collected for misconduct.
But that was not all. Even after completion of the buildings, high maintenance costs were incurred, since the facilities were apparently constantly threatened with decay. The ships kept getting water, so that they had to be overhauled at great expense. The lock chambers soon proved to be leaking and they had to be sealed with 51 pounds of leather as early as 1709. These repairs were repeated periodically using pitch and tar. The bridges also had to be constantly repaired, as well as the dam that dammed the Berlebecke to the lake, because it was repeatedly undermined by voles.
Despite all the lack of money, the count never failed to boast of the splendor of his buildings at celebrations and festivals. During a sumptuous feast, Tsar Peter the Great , who was in Bad Pyrmont for a spa treatment in 1716 , turned to the Count with the subtle words: Your lovers are too big for your small country! The Count's second wife, Amalie von Solms-Hohensolms, shared his preferences. Friedrich Adolf younger brother Ferdinand Christian's statement comes: My brother loved beyond measure, but it's more ... . The Count's ambition reached its limits, because the country with its 35,000 inhabitants was too small and poor to fully realize the plans. There was no lack of warning voices from responsible officials. For example, District President Christoph von Piderit (1668–1756) prevented the royal title applied for in Vienna in 1714 from being redeemed . After the award, it was only paid and redeemed in 1789 by Leopold I. zur Lippe with 5,773 guilders. This made him the first prince at Lippe.
Decay of the plant
When Friedrich Adolf died in Favorite Palace in 1718, he left behind a financially exploited land. His successor, Simon Heinrich Adolf , was not prepared, however, to restructure the ailing national budget through thrift, but continued to give magnificent receptions and celebrate brilliant parties. One of these festivals was the undoing of the large greenhouse and, indirectly, of the entire Friedrichstal complex. On October 2nd, 1729, a fir branch caught fire and it spread rapidly. Within a few hours, only smoke-blackened foundation walls remained of the New Orangery .
When the orangery was destroyed, the entire complex began to decline. The last gondola rides took place in 1748 during the tenure of Count Simon August . He also ordered the demolition of the four towers of the unfinished summer residence, including the entire masonry, and had the material sold. For 20 years, interested parties in Friedrichstal could purchase quarry stones as building material. After 1774 the backfilling of the lake above the dam began and the Berlebecke got its current bed. The two artificial islands were removed and the valley turned into a grassy area. It is still called Inselwiese today . Count Simon August also had the park redesigned in the English style. Four ponds, connected by canals, bridges and cascades, were the main elements of the new garden. In 1782 Simon August died and under Leopold I the gardens were no longer maintained. The ponds dried up and parts of the gardens were leveled under Princess Pauline . She also had the badly dilapidated grotto repaired. It was not until 1855/56 that Leopold III. converted into a mausoleum with a neo-Gothic facade. Count Friedrich Adolf and Princess Pauline, among others, found their final resting place there.
At the Residenzschloss you can find some of the 84 small pillars that once crowned the wall in the Great Garden . A fountain basin and a toad designed as a fountain figure can be found on Schlossplatz today. Many of the foreign plants that adorned the gardens in planters were carefully tended and reached a great age. But during the hard war winter of 1940/41, when the princely greenhouses were not heated due to lack of fuel, they all died.
Friedrichstal park landscape
From summer 1997 to July 1998 archaeological excavations were carried out on the former middle and upper terrace below the Krumme Haus in order to be able to reconstruct the structure of the baroque garden. The position of the terraces can still be seen, including the retaining walls of the lower terrace and the two curved stairways that led around the side of the grotto. The lock chamber of the canal in the area of the upper mill was monument of the month in Westphalia-Lippe in February 2004 .
The Detmold city council decided in a public session on August 30, 2007 to implement the plans for the redevelopment of the Friedrichstal park landscape . The canal and the neighboring area between the Residenzschloss and Inselwiese were to be rehabilitated in sections and in parts brought closer to the historical appearance.
The first phase of construction was completed in spring 2009 and inaugurated on April 19, 2009 and handed over to the public. The focus of the renovation work was in the area of the upper mill. From the end of the avenue, a staircase leads to a newly created pond, from which sediment-free water is led from the Berlebecke into the canal. Another measure was the construction of a fish passage to give fish and small organisms the opportunity to overcome obstacles (such as weirs or waterfalls ) during fish migration .
The promenade between the rows of trees on the avenue received a new water-bound surface and was partially paved. It got clear boundaries on both sides in the form of borders made of natural stone. As an additional delimitation of the lawns, a knee rail (knee-high railing) was set according to historical models. The canal itself was completely desludged and stone rollers were installed to stabilize the embankments.
After the inauguration of the first construction phase, the plans for the second construction phase are being worked on. This involves the renovation and redesign of the mill moat on Bruchberg and the moat from Bruchberg to Willy-Brandt-Platz in order to complete the overall Friedrichstal park landscape project.
At the beginning of 2009, the private Detmold Association of Friends of the Residence had six information boards set up along the canal with the theme of the Friedrichstal park landscape .
literature
- Andreas Ruppert: The Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold ( Lippe cultural landscapes , issue 14). Detmold 2009
- Martin Salesch: The baroque garden in Friedrichstal, the Detmold suburb and the title of prince. In Lippische Mitteilungen, 68/1999.
- Erdmute von Voithenberg: Park facilities in Detmold - yesterday and today. In: Heimatland Lippe 9/1987.
Web links
- Friedrichstal park landscape. (PDF; 3.0 MB) Regional Association Westphalia-Lippe (LWL). Retrieved May 14, 2013 .
- Monument of the month. February 2004, Regional Association Westphalia-Lippe (LWL). Archived from the original on May 21, 2011 ; Retrieved January 11, 2008 .
- History of Friedrichstal
- Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe: Friedrichstal park in LWL geodata culture
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Andreas Ruppert: The Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold . In: Lippischer Heimatbund (Ed.): Lippische Kulturlandschaften . tape 14 , 2009, ISBN 978-3-941726-13-0 , pp. 2 f .
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 27.
- ↑ a b c d e f g Erdmute von Voithenberg: Park facilities in Detmold - yesterday and today. In: Heimatland Lippe 9/1987.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. Pp. 2-4.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 29.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 6 f.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 11.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 19.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 22.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 23 f.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 25 f.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 27.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Reviews from Hertha Koenig: Die Lippische Rose. Pendragon, Bielefeld 2003, 2nd edition 2004. (PDF; 1.1 MB) In: Rosenland - Zeitschrift für Lippe history. No. 4, 2006, p. 33.
- ^ Andreas Ruppert: Friedrichstaler Canal in Detmold. P. 3.
- ↑ Planning of the city of Detmold ( Memento of the original from December 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 15 kB)
- ^ Regional Association Westphalia-Lippe: Overview Monument of the Month 1999-2014. ( Memento of July 3, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) (see Memorial of the Month February 2004 - Obere Mühle, Detmold; PDF; 38.3 kB).
- ^ Friedrichstal park landscape - 1st construction phase. (No longer available online.) City of Detmold, archived from the original on October 20, 2013 ; Retrieved October 19, 2013 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b c Inauguration of the Friedrichstal park landscape in 2009. (No longer available online.) City of Detmold, archived from the original on October 20, 2013 ; Retrieved October 19, 2013 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Information boards Friedrichstaler Kanal. Residenzfreunde Detmold eV, accessed on October 19, 2013 .
Coordinates: 51 ° 55 ′ 54 ″ N , 8 ° 52 ′ 35 ″ E