Vogelherd

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A bird hearth is a trapping site where various birds have been caught. The bird-catcher was to the 19th century, a popular pastime and upper social classes. Depending on the season and species of bird, different bird traps were usually used. In addition to fixed flocks of birds, there were also other forms of bird hunting . While the bird hearth is usually used to describe trapping sites for small birds, bird pastures also include trapping sites for hunting birds.

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Many field names (Am Vogelherd, Vogelsperre, Vogelsberg, Zum Vogelfänger, Vogler, Vogelherdhöhle, etc.) are reminiscent of such areas. Some of these trapping sites have already been proven archaeologically or archivally or have been handed down on contemporary illustrations.

In Bavaria, some suspected or confirmed flocks of birds have been preserved as rectangular or oval elevations ( earthworks in Taitinger wood ). Some so-called Roccoli (Rockerl) can also be found here. These are mounds of earth that were either specially raised for this purpose or that could originally have been tower mounds or prehistoric burial mounds . The engraver Michael Wening also handed down this special form, originally from southern Italy , on one of his engravings (Kaysersberg tower). In Ticino there were even stone observation towers on such mounds. For example, flocks of birds were on the Schmausenbuck in Nuremberg . Until the ban in 1806, the birds were lured there by so-called bird broth (water points) and caught with liming rods and nets for later consumption.

The archaeological rediscovery of this type of ground monument was, so to speak, a by-product of the topographical monument surveying. Before that, many flocks of birds were occasionally mistaken for small fortifications or long-hill graves or were even exposed to esoteric interpretations.

literature

The alley Finkenherd in Quedlinburg. The inscription under the street sign reads: The legendary place where Heinrich, Duke of Saxony, is said to be offered the German royal crown

Johann Nepomuk Vogl describes in his ballad Herr Heinrich Sitz am Vogelherd (1835) how King Heinrich the Vogler was offered the royal crown near a Vogelherd . This is a historical legend whose decorations (including Heinrich was never emperor, always only German king) are not confirmed in the historical context, even if the legendary Finkenherd is shown as a historical location in Quedlinburg to this day . There is a similar tradition for the Wallburg Pöhlde , which is also called König Heinrichs Vogelherd , and for the village Heinrichshagen am Vogler.

  • In Theodor Fontane's ballad Archibald Douglas (1854), the aged Count Douglas reminds the Scottish King Jacob “of the lake and the Vogelherd” , where they once hunted together.
  • Hermann Kerscher: Il Roccolo - Das Rockerl : In: The archaeological year in Bavaria 1990. Stuttgart, 1991, p. 183 ff.
  • Hermann Kerscher: Bird herd in northeast Bavaria . In: The archaeological year in Bavaria 1991. Stuttgart, 1992, p. 201 ff.
  • Kurt Lindner : The hunt in the early Middle Ages . Berlin, 1940.
  • Karl Otto Sauerbeck: 'Mr. Heinrich was sitting at the Vogelherd'. Observations on medieval bird hunting and its symbolism. In: Specialized prose research - Crossing borders. Volume 10, 2014, pp. 57-79.

See also

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