Hochstein (Elstra)
| Hochstein | ||
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.JPG) Childish view of the Hochstein |
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| height | 448.9 m above sea level HN | |
| location | Bautzen district , Saxony , Germany | |
| Mountains | Lusatian highlands | |
| Coordinates | 51 ° 10 '50 " N , 14 ° 6' 47" E | |
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| rock | West Lusatian granodiorite | |
| particularities | The Schwarze Elster rises on the slope of a side mountain | |
The Hochstein , also called Sibyllenstein (Sibinnen-Stein, Sibillenstein or Sybillen-Stein), Upper Sorbian Žiwiny , is a 449 meter high mountain in Upper Lusatia in the Saxon district of Bautzen . It is the highest point in the north-west Lusatian mountainous region .
The mountain, which is wooded all around, is located between Ohorn in the west, the Ohorner Steinberg in the north, the Kindisch district of the city of Elstra in the east and Rammenau in the south. The Schwarze Elster rises at an altitude of 317 meters on its side mountain, the top . The Große Röder also rises southwest of the Hochstein.
The summit of the mountain is crowned by a striking double rock formation made of Lusatian granodiorite . Depressions in it indicate that the square was a prehistoric place of sacrifice and cult. A fire blazing on the summit would have been visible from afar from any direction. Today the all-round view is severely restricted by the trees.
The Forsthaus Luchsenburg excursion restaurant is located in the forest southwest of the Hochstein .
Surname
In a border document from 1213 the mountain top was referred to as the "White Stone". On the Saxon miles sheets from 1780-1825 the rock is registered as "The Sybillen-Stein". The name Hochstein, which is common today, occurs several times in Upper Lusatia. For example, there is the Hochstein near Kleindehsa and the Hochstein near Königshain . The name Sybillenstein was possibly introduced to prevent confusion with other high stones. The extent to which mythological priestesses based on ancient traditions or simply the wife of a manor owner in Rehnsdorf were the godfathers of the naming , as favored today, remains open.
Say
The residents also called the summit rock " Teufelskanzel ". The northern rock platform was referred to as the “devil's tabletop” on which “the spirits danced a clearly deepened circle”. Also depressions were shown, which were called the quarter, the muzzle and the little measure and in which one suspected sacrificial bowls. The devil is said to have measured the grain in it. If he recognized a fraudster as a result, he is said to have "turned his head". The legend also reports of large underground corridors with gold treasures, some of which the river has "brought up whole bits". It was also believed that the " wild hunt " was up to mischief in the forests on the Hochstein . A single large stone below the northern cliff is called the riding horse. The sibyllic “oracle to Hohenstein” was compared with the presumed oracle from “Question Mountain near Cunewalde” ( Czorneboh ). The magpie, as the namesake of the river that rises on the eastern mountain slope, was believed to be the god animal of the Ostara. The approximately 3 meter large bowl-like depression on the tabletop or dance floor was also known as the sacrificial and blood bowl. Here you could also see the place of great sacrificial and signal fires. The legend reports that the rock is said to have been much higher and sank under the weight of human sins to the present height. The pagan gods, who were once sacrificed on the rock, are said to have withdrawn into the mountain out of anger at the people's turning to Christianity and sometimes let out a violent rumble of thunder. The Sybillenstein was seen with Czorneboh, Bieleboh and the Keulenberg near Oberlichtenau in the same context of pre-Christian religiosity.
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Religious place of worship
In 1769 the Pulsnitz rector Gottfried Ekart made an inscription in the Sybillenstein, which considered the rock worthy of research. Inspired by the inscription, the poet Oertel took the view that the rock had been piled up by human hands to form a "bed" and wrote a poem for this idea:
Your majestic sight.
Even more immortal is the spirit that called
the rock together.
(...)
In front of the altar stood the
praise of the holy people, the praise of the Eternal,
the bard's gentle song floated from the rock .
(...)
In 1825, Dr. Johann Gottfried Bönisch that the summit rock was a "sacrificial altar" of the goddess Ostra ( Ostara ). In the name "Sibillenstein" he saw the "unadulterated" tradition of former priestesses ( Sibyls , Allruns , Thruhten ) who once lived in the rock caves and predicted the future for people.
Bönisch reported that until 1822, on the night before Easter, the spring water of the Black Elster , which rises on the mountain slope, was dammed in the surrounding villages in order to bathe the cattle and themselves in the healing Easter water on Easter morning at sunrise . The dams could only be opened again at sunset.
In 1886 a bronze “battle ax” was found 150 meters from the rock. Later, forest workers also found some "bronze or iron spikes" which were thrown away before they could be examined. On the neighboring Ohorner Steinberg there is a ring wall, which is popularly called "Burgstall" or "Alte Schanze" and which was once believed to be a cult site . Due to a lack of archaeological finds, the origin and function have remained undetermined until today.
The Hoch- or Sybillenstein is not far from the largest earthwork castle in Upper Lusatia near Ostro . It was made around 2500 BC. Founded in BC and used as a fortification over several cultural epochs until the Middle Ages. The area around Ostro Castle also belonged to the heartland of the Milzener , the ancestors of today's Sorbs .
In 1833 Friedrich August Wagner counted 16 ramparts and 1,022 burial mounds in the Saxon Duchy on the banks of the Black Elster . He saw this abundance in connection with the “sacrificial altar” at the source. In 1841 Karl Benjamin Preusker saw “ pagan sacrificial altars ” for a “ sun cult ” in the Sybillenstein and a number of other stone formations in Upper Lusatia . His assumption was based not only on ancient and ecclesiastical traditions but also on a report from 1614 in which von Heidenstein in Weigsdorf, then in Saxony, was still aware of such practices. Preusker saw a general religious connection between the rocks of Upper Lusatia and the megaliths of Europe.
Although it has not yet been possible to provide unequivocal evidence of the religious significance of the Sybil stone in prehistoric times, the multitude of prehistoric evidence in the vicinity of the mountain leaves the possibility open.
Solar phenomenon
Since 2008, the “Bruno-H.-Bürgel” public and school observatory in Sohland / Spree , department of archaeoastronomy , has been examining various rocks in Upper Lusatia for their suitability for calendar solar observations. The archaeoastronomical research project was given the name "Project Gods Hand " and the rock objects that show the calendar solar observation phenomenon are referred to as the " Sun Sanctuaries of Upper Lusatia ". At the Sibyllenstein the so-called Sibyllenhöhle was found suitable for calendar solar observations. An approx. 8 meter long, low north-south cave flows into the cave like a funnel. Around noon, the winter solstice sunlight shines through this cave into a narrow channel on the floor.
At the summer solstice, the sun shines straight through the cave at sunset, so that both observation lines cross and a spot of light is projected onto a neighboring stone formation in the east of the rock.
Since 2013, the Sibyllenstein has been the location of the "International Networking of Prehistoric Sun Sanctuaries" initiated by the Sohland Observatory on the day of archaeoastronomy.
Fire bowl, devil table and ghost dance area
Sibylle Cave with the sun shining through at the sunset of the summer solstice 2014
Sibyllenhöhle east access
Sources and further reading
Individual evidence
- ↑ Helmut Petzold: Winterfahrt auf den Hochstein , in: Das Rammenauer Brevier , 1988, Museum Barockschloss Rammenau in cooperation with the Fichte-Freundeskreis
- ↑ Miles leaves of Saxony, Berlin specimen, 1783, sheet 287, recording no .: df_dk_0002287, record No .: 70301497 obj
- ↑ Friedrich Bernhard Störzner , “What the homeland tells”, Part 1, 1904, pp. 238–244
- ↑ "New Lusatian Magazine", Volume 8, Dr. Johann Gottfried Bönisch, “The Hohnstein or Sibillenstein near Elstra, a sacrificial altar of the pagan deity Ostara or Alcis Numinis”, 1830, pp. 65–76
- ↑ Friedrich Bernhard Störzner , “What the homeland tells”, Part 1, 1904, pp. 238–244
- ↑ Lausizische monthly magazine 1796 - first part, Richter, "Der Hochstein bei Elstra", p. 9
- ↑ Lausitzisches Magazin 1787, pp. 241–243, Oertel, "Thoughts on the Hochstein"
- ↑ Dr. Johann Gottfried Bönisch, “Historical geographic-statistical topography or historical description of the city of Camenz. - Camenz ”, 1825, pp. 16-18
- ↑ Friedrich Bernhard Störzner , “What the homeland tells”, Part 1, 1904, pp. 238–244
- ↑ Lausitzer Bergland around Pulsnitz and Bischofswerda (= values of our homeland . Volume 40). 1st edition. Akademie Verlag, Berlin 1983, pp. 57-58.
- ↑ Friedrich August Wagner, "Egypt in Germany, or the Germanic-Slavic where not purely Germanic antiquities on the black Elster", 1833, introduction
- ^ Karl Benjamin Preusker "Upper Lusatian Antiquities", Society of Science in Görlitz, 1828 and "Views into the Fatherland Prehistory", 1841
- ↑ Infopack 2011, Sun Sanctuaries of Upper Lusatia , observatory "Bruno-H.-Bürgel" Sohland / Spree; Brochure “Archaeoastronomy”, “Bruno-H.-Bürgel” observatory, Sohland / Spree, 2015, p. 14
literature
- Karl Benjamin Preusker : The Sibyllenstein, Protschen and Flinsstein. In: Glimpses into the patriotic prehistory: customs, legends, buildings, costumes, tools, to explain the public and domestic folk life in pagan antiquity and Christian Middle Ages in the Saxon and neighboring countries; for educated readers of all levels , volume 2. Verlag der JC Hinrichsschen Buchhandlung, Leipzig 1841, page 216ff ( Google books )
- Karl Wilhelm Mittag : The Hochstein . In: Chronicle of the royal Saxon city of Bischofswerda . Friedrich May, Bischofswerda 1861, p. 616–617 ( digitized in the Google book search; full text in Wikisource ).
- Friedrich Bernhard Störzner : The Sibyllen- or Hochstein. In: What the Heimat tells . Arwed Strauch, Leipzig 1904, pages 238–244. ( Full text at Wikisource )
- Hochstein. In: Lausitzer Bergland around Pulsnitz and Bischofswerda (= values of our homeland . Volume 40). 1st edition. Akademie Verlag, Berlin 1983, pp. 57-58.
- Ralf Herold: The track of light - project of the gods - sun sanctuaries of Upper Lusatia. Sohland / Spree observatory, Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2020, ISBN 978-3-7519-5892-9
Video
- International Archaeoastronomy Day 2014 with an explanation of the calendar function of the Sibylle Cave
