Rhenes

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Rhenen municipality
Flag of the municipality of Rhenen
flag 		Coat of arms of the municipality of Rhenen
coat of arms
province Utrecht Utrecht
mayor Hans van der Pas ( PvdA )
Seat of the municipality Rhenes
Area
 - land
 - water 		43.74  km 2
42.03 km 2
1.71 km 2
CBS code 0340
Residents 20,054 (Jan 31, 2019)
Population density 458 inhabitants / km 2
Coordinates 51 ° 58 ′  N , 5 ° 34 ′  E Coordinates: 51 ° 58 ′  N , 5 ° 34 ′  E
Important traffic route N225 N233 N416
prefix 0317, 0318
Postcodes 3910-3912
Website Homepage of Rhenen
LocatieRhenen.png
Template: Infobox location in the Netherlands / maintenance / map
Rhenes
Rhenen municipality

Rhenen ( listen ? / I ) is a municipality in the Dutch province of Utrecht . Audio file / audio sample

The municipality includes the small town of Rhenen, the villages of Achterberg and Elst and the farmers of Laareind .

Location and economy

Rhenen, which lies on the Rhine and was named after him, is in the extreme southeast of the province and borders on Wageningen in Gelderland . The city is located on a bottleneck between the heights of the "Utrechtse Heuvelrug" and the Veluwe . The "Gelderse Vallei", a valley between these two forest areas known for chicken farming , ends here.

Rhenen is six kilometers north of the next motorway ( Arnheim - Tiel - Rotterdam , Opheusden exit ).

Since 1981 there is again a railway connection to the line from Veenendaal to Utrecht in Rhenen .

The city has many small industrial and trading companies. But tourism is more important (forest nearby; Ouwehand Zoo ; war memorials).

history

According to archaeological findings, there were already Roman and Merovingian settlements within today's municipal boundaries . In 1938, for example, an important late antique depot was found in Achterberg . A large late Roman-early medieval burial ground was excavated on the Donderberg in Rhenen since 1951. Rhenen originated in the 8th century. The place developed into a border town between the diocese of Utrecht and the duchy of Geldern and received limited city ​​rights from the bishop in 1240 . In 1346, Bishop Johann von Arkel granted Rhenen the right to build a city fortification. In the neighboring Achterberg there had been a castle since 1156, which was destroyed and demolished in 1527, its stones were then used to repair the Rhen city wall. Thanks to the veneration of St. Cunera , see below, the city was a popular place of pilgrimage until the conversion to Protestantism around 1580 . In 1546, Emperor Charles V issued the city an Ordonnanz, a document containing the city's legal rules. It remained valid until 1804. In 1629, the “Winter King” of Bohemia , Friedrich V of the Palatinate , moved to Rhenen. His palace was destroyed around 1800 during the French era . In the meantime Rhenen, which because of its strategic location had always been a bone of contention between hostile lords and was therefore conquered and burned down several times, had come down to a provincial nest. The cultivation of tobacco , made possible by the appropriate sand the area, brought many residents to about 1,920 a meager livelihood. From 1885 to 1944, when the city was damaged by acts of war, it was on a railway line to Utrecht .

In May 1940, when Germany's troops invaded Holland at the beginning of World War II , they came across the Grebbe Line near Rhenen . Because the Dutch army command had insufficiently maintained and manned these defensive works, which were in themselves suitable, the German Wehrmacht was able to take them after three days of bloody fighting. Rhenen was almost completely devastated.

Rhenen was rebuilt in the post-war period. Many of the residents of the fairly quiet town commute to work, mostly to Veenendaal or Wageningen.

The legend of St. Cunera

Source: Exhibition in the Museum Het Rondeel, Rhenen.

Aurellus, Crown Prince of the former Kingdom of York in England , traveled with a group of fighters to the Holy Land to fight the pagans there. He was captured and locked in the dungeon of the ruler of Babylonia . His daughter Florencia took care of Aurellus and fell in love with him. They fled back to York, where Florencia was baptized. A Jew prophesied to him that Florenzia would give birth to a daughter who would bring happiness to many people and work many miracles .

In 337, Saint Ursula went on a pilgrimage to Rome with allegedly 11,000 virgins . Cunera was one of them. On the way back, the group came by ship to Cologne , where heathens attacked and killed the pilgrims. The "Rhine King" Rabbodus, however, let his eye fall on the beautiful Cunera, saved her, but had no sexual intercourse with her, since he was already married.

He brought her to his court in Rhenen, where Cunera led a pious, Christian life among the pagans. She was so reliable that the king entrusted her with all the keys of the court. But the queen became jealous of Cunera. She started telling other people bad things about her.

One day, when the king was sitting at table with his court and Cunera was serving him, the queen saw Cunera gathering the leftover food and hiding it in her apron to later distribute under the arms outside the palace. The wicked queen saw Cunera leave and reported this to her husband. The king called them back. Cunera got scared and asked God to save her from the anger of the royal couple. When Cunera opened her apron in front of the king, the food had turned into splinters of wood. The king punished his wife for lying, which turned her jealousy into hate. She and her maids devised a plan to kill Cunera.

Some time later, on October 28, 340, the king and his friends went hunting. The queen and one of her maids had free rein and strangled Cunera with her own scarf. They buried their body in the horse stable.

When King Rabbodus returned home, he missed Cunera and asked where she was. The queen said that Cunera's parents had come and taken their daughter with them. In the meantime the farmhands brought the horses to the horse stable where Cunera was buried. The noble animals refused to enter the stable, although the servants encouraged them and beat them. The horses went into another stable without any problems. In the evening a servant went back to the first stable, and look! burning candles appeared. The king was called. The corpse of Cunera was found, and the king punished his wife so severely that she madly committed suicide by throwing herself off the Grebbeberg. The maid ended up at the stake. The king had Cunera buried on a hill that is still called Cunera Hill.

Attractions

  • The late Gothic Cunera Church , built from 1492 to 1531 and restored in the 1950s, with its imposing rood screen and Cunera Tower , the city's landmark.
  • The Ouwehands Dierenpark zoo in the “Grebbeberg” forest .
  • The war memorials on the Grebbeberg, next to the zoo.
  • The local museum "Rondeel", including finds from Roman times and the early Middle Ages .
  • the Rhine Terraces.

  • Rhenen, war memorials

  • Rhenen, mill: de Binnenmolen

Personalities

Web links

Commons : Rhenen  - collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Rhenen in the Topographia Circuli Burgundici (Mathäus Merian)  - sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bevolkingsontwikkeling; regio per maand . In: StatLine . Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek (Dutch)
  2. ↑ Annette Wagner and Jaap Ypey: The cemetery on the Donderberg in Rhenen: Catalog. Leiden 2011 [1]