Ellingen Castle

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Ellingen Castle
Alternative name Sablonetum
limes ORL - ( RLK )
Route (RLK) Rhaetian Limes,
route 14
Dating (occupancy) around AD 120 (± 5)
to around AD 233
Type Vexillation fort
unit unknown vexillatio
size 90 × 80 m = 0.72 ha
Construction a) wood-earth
b) stone fort
State of preservation partially reconstructed
place Ellingen
Geographical location 49 ° 3 '50 "  N , 10 ° 59' 17"  E Coordinates: 49 ° 3 '50 "  N , 10 ° 59' 17"  E
height 450  m above sea level NHN
Previous So-called Second Ellingen Roman Camp (west)
ORL 71a Fort Theilenhofen (west)
Subsequently Oberhochstatt Fort (southeast)
Backwards ORL 72 Weissenburg Castle (south)
Upstream Fortlet Gündersbach (northwest)

The Ellingen Fort ( Latin Sablonetum ) is a Roman military camp that secured a section of the border fortifications near the Rhaetian Limes . The UNESCO World Heritage Site was built around 700 meters east of the town of Ellingen in the Weißenburg-Gunzenhausen district in Bavaria . The place received its special importance through its extensive exploration with modern means.

location

The Roman fortification is located on a plateau east of Ellingen, around 1.8 kilometers south of the Limes and just under four kilometers north of the next larger military base in Weißenburg-Biriciana . From the fort it was not possible to see the upstream, lower border fortifications directly. There was only visual contact with the northeastern Wp 14/33 and with the northwestern towers at the Limes crossing on the Swabian Rezat . This topographically unfavorable location has not yet been clarified.

Research history

As the field name "In der Burg", on which the camp stands, suggests, the knowledge of an old fortified structure was probably never completely lost. After information from general and Limes researcher Karl von Popp (1825-1905), who referred to this field name, the discovery and first investigation by the pharmacist Wilhelm Kohl (1848-1898), a route commissioner of the Reich Limes Commission (RLK) , took place in 1895. , instead of. The excavations at that time, however, only yielded unsatisfactory results. The fort was not published separately by the RLK, but only as part of the route descriptions, so that no ORL number is available.

It was not until the three years from 1980 to 1982 that extensive archaeological excavations were carried out again by the Nuremberg branch of the Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation as part of the land consolidation . The lead archaeologist Harald Koschik was able to research almost the entire fort area as well as large parts of the adjacent vicus . Following the archaeological work, a partial reconstruction of the fort was carried out in the area of ​​the northern front with gate and corner towers. This should give the impression of a ruined Roman garrison site.

  • Findings of the Reich Limes Commission

  • Castle Ellingen
    location

  • Ellingen Castle
    floor plan

  • Fort Ellingen
    corner towers, south gate and moat profile

  • Fort Ellingen
    building of the vicus

Building history

The Ellingen fort was built in the early Hadrian era, probably around the year 120 as part of the final expansion of the Raetian Limes. An older construction phase, which was characterized by a fence made using the wood and earth technique, was followed by a second phase of expansion with a stone wall around the year 182 under Commodus . Extensive renovation work was also carried out inside the fort during this period. The reconstruction of the year 182 as well as the ancient name of the camp are attested by a building inscription. Their content is translated as follows:

The emperor Caesar Marcus Aurelius Commodus Antoninus Augustus, Germanic conqueror, greatest Sarmatian conqueror, with tribunician power, consul for the third time, father of the fatherland, the wall with the gates was replaced by stones by the Castellum Sablonetum on the order of Quintus Spicius Cerialis, the imperial legate with representative authority, under the consulate of Mamertinus and Rufus through the Singulares Pedites, under the direction of Aurelius Argivus, centurion of the 3rd Italian Legion .

The Latin name Castellum Sablonetum can be roughly translated as “Lager am Sand”. The Raetian governor Quintus Spicius Cerialis named in this building inscription had already one year earlier, shortly after taking office, expanded the previous wood and earth fort Böhming in the Altmühltal with a department of the 3rd Italian Legion ( Legio III Italica ) in Regensburg to let.

The Ellinger fortification was probably given up in the Alemannic Wars by 233 at the latest. The date 229, which is often mentioned in older publications, is discarded in more recent research. It was probably evacuated as planned, as no fire and destruction horizons pointing in another direction could be detected.

So far there are two dendrochronological dates from Ellingen . They date from A.D. 126 and 145.

Findings

The two-gate fort, approximately 90 × 80 meters in size, was oriented with its main street axis ( Via praetoria ) in a north-south direction. In its last phase of expansion, it was surrounded by a stone wall, the rounded corners of which were reinforced with single towers and the gates on the north and south fronts with double towers. A simple pointed ditch ran around the wall, an average of five to six meters wide and two meters deep. In terms of type and size, the Castellum Sablonetum is similar to the castles in Böhming and Halheim .

A raised earth ramp served as a battlement and at the same time to stabilize the walling. Right-angled, gravel-paved roads subdivided the inner surface of the camp. The main road running between the north and south gate was interrupted by a building. These are probably the remains of a staff building ( principia ) of the fort that has been reduced to the flag shrine ( Aedes ) . This rump principle gave rise to the consideration that the garrison of the fort could have been a non-independently operating vexillatio (delegation, detachment) of a larger auxiliary group and not an independent number , especially since inscriptions did not show any numbers in Raetia. It is therefore quite possible that the Pedites singulares named in the building inscription not only built the fort, but also occupied it.

The interior structures were largely built in half-timbered construction. A large part of the eastern half of the camp was covered by a large building that housed the teams. In this double barrack there were 24 contubernia (communal rooms of eight men each). Two other buildings in the north-west and north-east of the camp are also seen as possible team barracks with ten further contubernia , so that the maximum occupancy of the Ellingen fort could have been over 260 men. These more recent research results have invalidated older assumptions that the fort was occupied by two centuries of 80 men each. It is also possible to have two infantry centers reinforced by a cavalry division .

The buildings in the southern part probably represented fabricae (workshops), the larger building in the south-west corner of the camp was possibly a praetorium (commandant's residence). The massive wall foundations west of the Principia obviously belonged to a horreum (granary). A Valetudinarium (military hospital) may be assumed, but could not be proven with certainty. A sufficient supply of drinking water was guaranteed via at least five or six wells.

The vicus , the civilian settlement of the fort, extended east of the fort. There was also a small fort bath here.

  • Partly reconstructed building inscription in the Roman Museum Weissenburg

  • Partially reconstructed Praetorial Front in 2011: North-eastern corner of the fort with an indicated moat

  • Partially reconstructed Praetorial Front 2006: View from the east of Porta praetoria

  • Partially reconstructed Praetorial Front 2011: northwest corner with a trench in front

  • Partially reconstructed Praetorial Front 2007: View from the west of the north-western corner of the fort

  • Partially reconstructed Praetorial Front 1991: View from the west of the defensive wall

Lost property

The extensive finds from the archaeological excavations are exhibited in the Roman Museum in Weißenburg .

Monument protection

As a section of the Upper German-Rhaetian Limes, the Ellingen Fort and the facilities mentioned have been part of the UNESCO World Heritage since 2005 . In addition, they are protected as registered ground monuments within the meaning of the Bavarian Monument Protection Act (BayDSchG) . Investigations and targeted collection of finds are subject to authorization, accidental finds must be reported to the monument authorities.

See also

literature

Web links

  • Fort Ellingen on the website of the German Limes Commission (accessed on March 18, 2012)
Commons : Kastell Ellingen  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ^ Günter Ulbert , Thomas Fischer : The Limes in Bavaria . Theiss, Stuttgart 1983, ISBN 3-8062-0351-2 , p. 80
  2. ↑ Werner Zanier : The Roman fort Ellingen (= Limes researches 23) Zabern, Mainz, 1992, ISBN 3-8053-1264-4 . P. 12.
  3. ↑ Werner Zanier : The Roman Fort Ellingen (= Limes Research 23), Zabern, Mainz 1992, ISBN 3-8053-1264-4 . Pp. 12, 291.
  4. ↑ C. Sebastian Sommer : Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, Marc Aurel ...? - To date the systems of the Raetian Limes . In: Report of Bayerische Bodendenkmalpflege 56 (2015), pp. 321–327; here: p. 142.
  5. ↑ Marcus Reuter: Excursus on the problem of numeri in Raetia . In Ders .: Studies on the numeri of the Roman army in the middle imperial period. In: Report of the Roman-Germanic Commission. 80, 1999, ISSN  0341-9312 , pp. 357-569, here: pp. 419-422. (At the same time: Freiburg (Breisgau), Univ., Diss., 1996).