Charlemagne's Rhine bridge

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Coordinates: 50 ° 0 ′ 22 ″  N , 8 ° 16 ′ 39 ″  E

Carolingian Rhine Bridge
Convicted Connection Mainz - Mainz-Kastel
Crossing of Rhine
place Mainz ( Germany )
construction Wooden bridge with stone pillars
overall length ~ 750 m
start of building 803
completion 813
construction time ten years
Status Destroyed
closure 813
location
Charlemagne's Rhine Bridge (Rhineland-Palatinate)
Charlemagne's Rhine bridge
Mainz in Roman and Frankish times
Map of Roman-Franconian mainz.png
The bridge connected Mainz on the left bank of the Rhine with Kastel and Elisabethenstrasse in the direction of Wetterau
p1

The Rhine bridge of Charlemagne was a wooden bridge over the Rhine between Mainz and Kastel , in the reign of Charlemagne on the foundations of the former Roman Bridge was built. This only larger Rhine bridge from the early Middle Ages burned down shortly after its completion. The building has been handed down in writing, but there are no clear archaeological findings.

history

As early as the 1st century AD, the Romans built a permanent bridge over the Rhine near Mainz, the so-called Roman Bridge . This wooden bridge on stone pillars existed until the 5th century. Some of the pillar remains in the river were preserved until the 19th century and served as anchor points for the ship mills in the Rhine. From the Rhine crossing the Elisabethenstraße led as a dead straight Roman road in the direction of Nida , the later Heddernheim and from there on to Wetterau . It also had a connection to the Antsanvia , an old road to Thuringia . The diocese of Mainz extended eastwards to Thuringia, and since Boniface and his successor Lullus , Mainz had been the metropolitan seat of a church province that was established in Charles's time a. a. the dioceses of Halberstadt , Würzburg and Eichstätt included. A traffic connection to the east was of great importance for Mainz and it was easier to build bridges due to the existing Roman remains.

Carolingian bridge building

Since large bridges were not otherwise built in the early Middle Ages, the peculiarity of the construction of the Rhine bridge is already highlighted by Charles' contemporaries and mentioned in various sources, including the Reichsannalen and the Annalis qui Einhardi dicuntur .

In addition, in his compilation of the Regesta Imperii , Johann Friedrich Böhmer also mentions the bridge in Einhard's Vita Karoli Magni as well as in the Annales de gestis Caroli Magni imperatoris of Poeta Saxo and in the Gesta Karoli Magni Notkers .

Einhard lists the construction of the Rhine bridge near Mainz in addition to the construction of the Aachen Palatine Chapel and the Ingelheim Imperial Palatinate ; he describes it as a five hundred two- step long wooden bridge, the construction of which took ten years of hard work and which was very skilfully built. As a supervisor of the royal buildings, Einhard probably directed the construction of the bridge himself. Because of his skills as a builder, Einhard was nicknamed Beseleel at the court of Karl .

The bridge burned down in 813, while Karl was still alive. Referring to Notker's descriptions, ferrymen, worried about their existence, had allegedly set fire to the bridge. Karl had considered rebuilding the bridge instead of wood in stone. Karl died in 814, the year after the bridge was destroyed.

The contemporary sources name Charlemagne as the builder to whom the bridge is generally attributed. The involvement of Einhard is occasionally pointed out.

construction

It is believed that the Roman stone pillars were reused for Karl's bridge construction. Remains of foundations on the west bank in the area of ​​the Sautanz were found in 1736 and 1740; these lay in the extension of the remains of the Roman bridge and were interpreted as Carolingian. The construction technology of the Carolingian bridge was probably similar to the originally existing Roman one. The actual bridge platform was built on the existing pillars with wooden beams.

meaning

The Carolingian bridge construction in Mainz is not only worth mentioning as the only large early medieval bridge construction, but also in particular because no more bridges were built over the Rhine between Basel and the Netherlands for several centuries. In 1263 the standing Rhine bridge Breisach was mentioned, a solid wooden bridge. Apparently it already existed in 1212. And from 1388 the Lange Bruck , a wooden yoke bridge, was available near Strasbourg . The first "solid" bridge of modern times on the Rhine downstream from Basel was the Cologne Cathedral Bridge , begun in 1855 , a lattice girder bridge on stone pillars that was in use from 1859.

In Mainz itself there was a ship bridge from 1632 to 1635 and from 1661 . A permanent bridge was only built in Mainz from 1860 onwards: the Mainz Südbrücke , a Pauli girder bridge on stone pillars. It was used from 1862.

literature

  • Ernst Wilhelm Heim: Over the former standing Rhine bridge between Mainz and Castel . Mainz, 1854. In: Association for research into Rhenish history and antiquities [ed.]: Images of antiquities in the Mainz Museum . Mainz, 1855.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Eric Schwarz: Natural disasters and phenomena in the 8th and 9th centuries and their perception in Franconian historiography [electronic resource] . GRIN Verlag GmbH, Munich 2011, ISBN 978-3-640-97045-2 , p. 93 .
  2. ^ A b Regesta Imperii RI I n. 477a: “The Rhine bridge built by Karl near Mainz is destroyed by fire; the plan to build a stone bridge instead of the wooden one is no longer implemented. Ann. r. Franc. (Unit), V. Karoli c. 17, 32 cf. Poeta Saxo V, 457, Mon. Sangall. I, 30, Simson Karl d. Size 2,510. "; Regest 477a . Regesta Imperii. Retrieved February 28, 2019.
  3. ↑ Cf. original text in Einhard : Vita Caroli Magni : “ Inter quae praecipua fere non inmerito videri possunt basilica sanctae Dei genitricis Aquisgrani opere mirabili constructa et pons apud Mogontiacum in Rheno quingentorum passuum longitudinis - nam tanta lat esti fluminis; qui tamen uno, antequam decederet, anno incendio conflagravit, nec refici potuit propter festinatum illius decessum, quamquam in ea meditatione esset, ut pro ligneo lapideum restitueret. ”; Einhardi vita Karoli Magni ( Latin ) Bibliotheca Augustana. Retrieved December 29, 2011.
  4. ↑ Heinz Löwe:  Einhard. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 4, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1959, ISBN 3-428-00185-0 , p. 396 f. ( Digitized version ).
  5. ^ Friedrich Wilhelm Bautz:  Einhard. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 1, Bautz, Hamm 1975. 2nd, unchanged edition Hamm 1990, ISBN 3-88309-013-1 , Sp. 1479-1480.  ( Article / beginning of article in Internet archive )
  6. ↑ See also: Franz Dumont, Ferdinand Scherf, Friedrich Schütz: "Mainz - The History of a City", p. 82
  7. ^ Heinz Leitermann : Two thousand years of Mainz. Images from the history of Mainz . Ed .: City of Mainz. Dr. Hans Krach, Mainz 1962, DNB  452793068 , p. 45 .
  8. ^ Ludwig Falck, Wilhelm Jung : Mainz. History and urban development . Neusser Druckerei u. Verl., Neuss 1986, ISBN 3-88094-564-0 , p. 5 .
  9. ↑ Bruno Funk, Wilhelm Jung: The Mainz town hall . With contribution from Helmut Neubach u. Otto Weitling . Mainz City Administration, Mainz 1974, DNB  740854909 , p. 20 .
  10. ^ Ernst Wilhelm Heim: Over the former standing bridge over the Rhine between Mainz and Castel . In: Association for the research of Rhenish history and antiquities (ed.): Illustrations of Mainz antiquities, booklet VI. With explanations. Mainz December 1854.
The next bridge upstream:
Schiffsbrücke (Mainz) (destroyed)
Südbrücke (Mainz) 		Bridges over the Rhine The next bridge downstream:
Theodor-Heuss-Brücke (Mainz)