Retzin castle wall

Leichensee looking south on the forest with the Slavic rampart Retzin

The Retziner Burgwall is a Slavic castle wall on the southern bank of the Leichensee , between Löcknitz and Retzin-Expansion in the district of Vorpommern-Greifswald in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania . It is part of a castle complex that was located there in the 8th to 12th centuries.

The mighty hill fort at the northwest end of a long, narrow terrain spur on the southern high bank of the Leichensee is believed to have once been a temple castle of the Slavs in the Wilzen area , with a statue of the Slavic war and tribal god Triglaw , in which the inhabitants share their Slavic myths , religious beliefs and customs . The castle was probably built in the early Slavic period of the 8th century. It consisted of a 170 m long oval wall system that was open to the lake. The castle can count among the classic large Feldberg castles .

The legend

In connection with this there is an old legend , contained in the Ortschronik von Löcknitz:

“The Tempelburg am Leichensee is said to have been connected to the Löcknitz Castle on the Randow by a secret passage. This passage is said to have run underground from the Löcknitzer Castle to the Löcknitzer See and from there one is said to have come unseen via a narrow path that was covered by reeds and brush to the Tempelburg am Leichensee. Knowledgeable residents of Löcknitz want to have discovered the beginning of this secret passage in a shaft filled with rubble and stones in the Löcknitz Castle, which was built from bricks in the 13th century. ”Slavic and early German ceramic shards can be found on site.

In the saga of the castle wall in Slavic castle complexes in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania one can read: “A robbery castle is said to have once stood on the castle wall, the inhabitants of which threw the bodies of the robbed and slain into the lake, from which the lake was named Leichensee ... The occupants of the robber baron castle used chains that they had placed across the Randow to stop the passing ships, plunder them ... The robber baron who lived on the Retzin castle wall and on a neighboring castle is said to have been called Hans von Ramin .... After the death of the robber baron, the bell was sunk in the corpse lake, where it is supposed to sound on St. John's Day today .... "

Web links

Wikisource: The saga of the corpse lake  - sources and full texts

• Slavic castles in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania NZ
• Anglerverein Löcknitz: The legend of the corpse lake .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Förderverein Burgfried Löcknitz (ed.): Ortschronik von Löcknitz (Part I) , pp. 9–11.

Coordinates: 53 ° 26 '15 "  N , 14 ° 13' 48"  E