Trowel (Appenrode)
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| Location: | Appenrode, Nordhausen district, Thuringia | |
| Height : | 25 m | |
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Geographic location: |
51 ° 34 '29.6 " N , 10 ° 43' 4.9" E | |
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| Type: | Plaster cave | |
The Kelle is a gypsum cave near Appenrode in the Nordhausen district in Thuringia . It is considered to be the oldest natural monument in the district. Many parts of the original cave are no longer accessible due to a ceiling collapse. Due to the good documentation over the centuries, the trowel is an exemplary example of the decay of a gypsum karst cave.
Details of the cave
The trowel in its current form has a length of approx. 20 meters, a width of approx. 16 meters and is around 25 meters high at its highest point. The cave lake is a maximum of 6 meters deep.
In its original form, the cave was almost 100 meters long, 80 meters wide and 47 meters high. The cave lake covered almost the entire floor area.
history
Oral tradition tells that the trowel was used as a place of pilgrimage in the Middle Ages .
The first recorded mention was made in 1589 in a topographical map of the region. In 1591 there was a written mention of this cave in a letter from the rector of the Walkenrieder monastery school , Heinrich Eckstorm . Eckstorm was already able to provide an exact topographical description of the cave including size information at this time. He also describes the function as a place of pilgrimage. According to this, pilgrims are said to have descended from a nearby chapel into the cave, where a priest then dipped a cross in the cave water in a ceremony.
Towards the end of the 18th century, the cave ceiling of the ladle was opened to let daylight into the cave. This inevitably led to the porous gypsum rock gradually crumbling off and contributing to the decay of the cave. Around 1830, the ceiling of the cave finally collapsed. Until then it was considered one of the most beautiful caves in the Harz region for almost half a century . This was particularly influenced by the cave lake and the light falling through the ceiling opening, which is said to have created a romantic light.
Due to the geographic location of the cave in the restricted area of the western border of the GDR, it was inaccessible during the division of Germany.
Since the collapse, the cave can only be visited in its reduced form. It only consists of the sinkhole, a half-open grotto, a small pond and a natural bridge. You can still reach the cave floor via stairs.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Die Kelle - karst cave near Appenrode am Harz. Retrieved February 7, 2019 .
- ↑ The KELLE cave near Appenrode. Retrieved February 7, 2019 .
- ↑ a b Ingo Panse: Mysterious resin: In the magic of the night . Mitteldeutscher Verlag, Halle (Saale) 2017, ISBN 978-3-95462-826-1 , p. 72 ff .