Schleswig-Tegelnoor wrecks
The Schleswig-Tegelnoor wrecks are the remains of a small boat flotilla from the 17th century that have been preserved in the sediments of the former Tegel noores near Schleswig . The Tegelnoor, a small bay in the Schlei Baltic Sea fjord , has been cut off from the larger body of water and silted up since 1969. The wrecks were first described in 1822, examined and mapped in 1859, and finally rediscovered and dated in 1996. The reference is 54 ° 30 '20.2 " N , 9 ° 32' 46.8" O .
The first description in 1822
Already in the years 1818 and 1822 these shipwrecks became visible in extreme weather conditions. In 1818 four ships had been seen and an iron ship's cannon had been stolen from one of them. The Schleswig chronicler and instrument maker Johann Christian Jürgensen (1744-1823) had described the finds in 1822.
Investigation and mapping 1859
“The unusually strong south-westerly storm that raged here (in Schleswig) on January 11th (1859) drove the water out of the loop so strongly that the ships mentioned in Juergensen's description of Schleswig, which are sunk at the so-called Öhr , partly Came out ”. Thus begins the report written in Danish by the surveyor and Rittmeister Wilhelm von Sommer, who was in the service of the Royal Danish Army. Von Sommer uncovered one of the ships on that day and documented the findings in the manner of his time. It was the first ship archaeological investigation in Northern Europe.
The reports of 1822 and 1859 provided a wealth of details. Four ships were initially sighted. In 1818, the gunsmith Gätke broke open a surviving deck of the “ship initially lying on land”, found and recovered a small boat cannon. As far as Gätke was able to uncover the hold, only bricks were found as cargo, and it was therefore assumed that the ship “was diligently sunk with it”. Four years later, Holmer Fischer examined the four wrecks and again found bricks and some tiles. According to the information provided by those involved, the vehicles were approximately 15 meters long and four meters wide.
In 1859 von Sommer described the construction of the ship “a”, which was closest to the country, and made a true-to-scale drawing of the 11 meter long and almost 4 meter wide shipwreck. He also gave an indication of the depth of the find: the water had fallen “five feet”, or around 1.5 meters, and the frame heads protruded from the soft sediment. Forty years earlier, the wreck is said to have had the stern decorated with the "head and tail of a snake" "according to old people". However, the surveyor finally drew a map of the site, on which he entered the position and arrangement of the ships. On this map you can see two rows of ships lying in the keel line, which extend across the Noor access. The upper, northern row consists of four, the southern of three naves. So von Sommer had recognized three more ships. Presumably the water level in the Schlei had fallen lower than in 1818/1822, so that further wrecks could be seen on the west bank. The wrecks were also lower there and only barely visible. It is therefore quite possible that other wrecks were or are still lying on the western bank of the Noores.
The rediscovery in 1996
In January 1996, the Schleswig archaeologist Willi Kramer undertook a search for the wrecks last seen 140 years before during a severe frost. For this purpose, a tight network of drill holes was created with a Pürckhauer boring stick. The surveyor's sketch from Sommer turned out to be astonishingly accurate: after just a few hours of searching on the east side of the former Noore, solid resistance was encountered at a depth of 1.90 meters. As a result, it was then possible to feel the outline of a ship (Schleswig-Tegelnoor-Wrack 1) at least nine meters long and a little over three meters wide. The contact points were marked with wooden stakes and measured to the national coordinates; the depths of impact were also taken into account. The following day, the wreck of a second ship was discovered, which is only three meters from the first boat find (Schleswig-Tegelnoor-Wrack 2) with the same orientation. The ship was originally at least 15 meters long and four meters wide. However, this wreck has only been preserved over a length of eight meters.
Archaeological research and dating
At a location near Schleswig-Tegelnoor-Wrack 1, a small, 1.20 x 1.50 meter large excavation area was created. In severe forest, which allowed the sides of the pit to freeze, it was possible to reach parts of a ship made of oak 1.40 meters below the surface (= 1.20 meters below sea level).
The structure of the ground at the site showed that the two ships had been sunk on an old bank. They are slightly inclined in the longitudinal axis. In the transverse axis, they should be more or less on a level keel. The recorded parts of the ship are between 2.25 and 1.20 meters below sea level, which agrees with von Sommer's statements ("Water had sunk five feet below normal"). The structure of the floor also indicated that these two ships had not been discovered in 1859; the soil layers were namely undisturbed. Von Sommer's report also confirms this: On the one hand, he found his wrecks “a” and “b” intact over the entire length, which does not apply to Schleswig-Tegelnoor wreck 2. On the other hand, wreck “a” was made of pine planks, and only the frames and the continuous keel were made of oak. Schleswig-Tegelnoor wrecks 1 and 2, on the other hand, as the drillings show, are made entirely of oak. The number of sunk ships has increased from seven to nine ships, with wrecks hidden under old bank mud on the west side of the Noores.
A total of four wood samples could be taken which, according to investigations by the Dendrochronological Laboratory Göttingen - DELAG (Dr. Leuschner), all come from the same tree: The planks, which were very inconveniently sawn tangentially for dendrochronological work, showed growth times from 1506 to 1608; however, there was no sapwood or wood edge , so that a date can only be given with the statement "after 1608". This is a rather vague statement. More years of growth may have passed before the sampled timber has been felled and processed. With a wood dating you only get a construction time of the ship, but not the time in which the ship was wrecked. In this case, the event of sinking or sinking can only be searched for and assumed over a larger time frame. This timeframe should be cautiously described with the indication “first half of the 17th century”.
Allocation of the sunk Boostflotille
In the course of the Thirty Years' War , the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein were occupied by imperial troops in 1627 and 1629 . The League General Wallenstein had conquered Jutland within six weeks in 1627 . The Danish King Christian IV had to flee to the island of Zealand . Sinking and loss of the boat flotilla could have happened within this framework. The event can also be related to the siege of Gottorf Castle in 1629. The siege was the culmination of a pincer attack by Danish troops. This attack had originated from the west coast and the Sluice mouth. It was directed against the Gottorf Duke Friedrich III. , who had entered into an alliance of convenience with Wallenstein to alleviate the occupation burdens on his country.
Individual evidence
- ^ Willi Kramer: A boat flotilla from the time of the Thirty Years' War in the Schleswig Tegelnoor. In: Guide to Archaeological Monuments of the Schleiregion 49, 2007, 124-127; ders .: Report on the discovery of shipwrecks in Tegelnoor near Schleswig. In: Nachrichtenblatt Arbeitskreis Unterwasserarchäologie 3, 1996/97, 8 - 9; ders .: A boat flotilla from the time of the Thirty Years' War in Tegelnoor . In: Contributions of Schleswiger Stadtgeschichte 44, 1997, 36–41.
- ↑ Johann Christian Jürgensen: Nicolaus Helduader's Chronicle of the City of Schleswig from 1603 to 1822 continued and accompanied with comments and additions . Schleswig 1822, 13: “This little Noor excited Ao. 1818, January 15th, received general attention. A strong westerly wind, which in the end turned into a storm, drove the water out of the Schley so strongly that things lying deep in the ground became visible. Here now the Büchsenschmidt Gaetke, who lived not far from it and wanted to see how far the bank had been exposed, discovered 4 ships lying in the mud, which had lost their masts and partly the board, but still kept the covers. He hurried home, fetched his men, who came with iron bars, breaking tools, and shovels, stripped the ship, which was initially on the shore, from the silt lying on it, broke off part of the ceiling in order to see the inside, and found next to it Mast a cast iron gun in the form of a mortar for throwing balls or stones. As this was of particular interest to him, he brought several helpers together in great haste, and received the necessary horses from Chamberlain von Hedemann to bring the gun ashore and to be able to examine the cargo of the ship a little before the water returned . It was found that the whole room, as far as one could search, was densely laden with bricks, as if the ship had been diligently sunk with them. The other 3 ships could not be examined because the storm subsided and everything was soon under water again. Ao. 1822 on the 3rd of February there was again a strong south-westerly wind, which again bared the ships somewhat. At that time the police master had some fishermen come from the spar with boats and all sorts of equipment. They examined and found the ships almost every size and construction, broke some wood from them and found only bricks of the largest kind, such as are used for the wall of the cathedral, and some tiles in them. But the water soon came back. The ships were about fifty feet long, twelve feet wide, and proportioned like the other ships of such dimensions. Two such ships are said to have been seen at Mevenberg. "
- ^ Report by Wilhelm von Sommer. Copy in the KM (Archaeological State Museum Schleswig-Holstein) archive.
- ↑ “When I found out about this, I went there with the necessary workers. When the water was five feet below normal at eleven o'clock, we were able to get out to the nearest ship to land with the help of planks laid on the mud. That I had cleaned, partly to get precise knowledge of its construction, and to get it afloat and on land. I meant that knowledgeable men could, with the help of the construction, come to a conclusion about the time at which these ships were sunk, which, to my knowledge, is still in the dark. If my investigations are correct, there are seven ships here, of which only four are fully visible (the enclosed plan shows their position). I was able to completely clean, measure and draw the wreckage marked a, which was bored into the mud, only with the ends of the frames above it, and at the same time I allow myself a description of it with the enclosed crack. The wreck is still almost complete, with the exception of a few holes in the outer wall and the ends of the front and stern steves, which according to old people are said to have been decorated with the head and tail of a snake in 1818. The wreck is 36 feet long by 12 feet wide at the center. The ribs are 11 inches apart, but the middle ones were made up of several pieces. On top of the ribs, from the bow to the stern, was an oak plank twelve inches wide and three inches thick. The entire skeleton was made of oak, while the outer wall, which is partially pushed through and detached from the frames, is made of pine wood. The outer wall was attached to the ribs with wooden pegs, and the only iron I found was a bolt in the stern post. The planks were upright amidships, and bricks were built between them. These stones were of the finer red church stones, but the lime was very loose. The wreck described here has now been completely cleaned, and I think it is possible that it can, if desired, be lifted and taken ashore in the event of high water. The aforementioned iron bolt and two frames of the wreck marked b are in my custody and are available to the competent authority. Schleswig in January 1859, Wlh. v. Summer, Rittmeister, Royal Land Surveyor "
- ↑ Johann Christian Jürgensen: Nicolaus Helduader's Chronicle of the City of Schleswig from 1603 to 1822 continued and accompanied with comments and additions. Schleswig 1822, p. 13.
- ↑ Hamburger Abendblatt of July 17, 1998: “Unique find: Gunboats from the 30-year war”. Retrieved November 3, 2015 .
- ^ Hermann Kellenbenz : Schleswig in the Gottorf time 1544–1711. Schleswig 1985, 26 f.