Wolf-Dieter Tempel

Wolf-Dieter Tempel (born August 15, 1937 in Celle ; † March 7, 2017 in Hemsbünde-Worth ) was a German archaeologist.

Career

Wolf-Dieter Tempel's interest in archeology was aroused as a schoolboy through history lessons and at the age of 13 through an excursion to the Pfahlbaumuseum Unteruhldingen . After finishing school, he trained as a landscape gardener from 1956 to 1958 . After a short time he decided to take the second educational path and began studying at the University of Göttingen in 1961 .

He studied German as a major and prehistory and early history as a minor. Soon he was majoring in Prehistory and Protohistory and Folklore and Anthropology as a minor. After two semesters in Tübingen, he returned to Göttingen. As a student he worked a. a. on excavations in Haithabu , in the Bryggen Hanse district in Bergen, Norway, and in Manching . In 1969 he received his doctorate with the thesis “The three-layer combs from Haithabu. Studies on the ridges of the Viking Age in the North Sea coastal area and Scandinavia ”. He had visited numerous museums in the Netherlands, Northern Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Norway to record the find. His doctoral supervisor and mentor was the Göttingen professor Herbert Jankuhn .

After completing his studies, he took up a position at the Roman-Germanic Commission in Frankfurt am Main. The Schleswig-Holstein State Museum followed. In 1972 he went back to Lower Saxony, where he was employed in the Department of Soil Monument Preservation in the Lower Saxony State Administration Office in Hanover until 1974. He was responsible for the Osnabrück administrative region . During this time, the excavation and implementation of the east walde megalithic grave in Emsland took place. The preoccupation with large stone graves has remained one of his main interests in archaeological monument preservation ever since.

His professional activity changed fundamentally as a result of the regional and administrative reform in Lower Saxony in the 1970s. When the technical responsibility for cultural monuments passed to the four district governments , he was transferred to the district government of Lüneburg . Tempel and his excavation technician Jens von Dein set up their own archives and files using the holdings of the state administration office. The district-related archaeological library of the department can also be traced back to him.

His systematic preoccupation with the landmarks led to many excavations. Examples are the urn cemeteries in Barchel , Issendorf and Gudendorf as well as the settlement excavations in Uthlede and in the settlement chamber of Rullstorf .

District Archeology Rotenburg (Wümme)

In 1979 the Rotenburg (Wümme) district set up a district archaeologist position, which was filled by Wolf-Dieter Tempel. His first excavations in the district covered the Migration Period burial ground of Barchel that for closed Bereisung visit by the Lower Saxony Prime Minister Ernst Albrecht got. According to Issendorf , this excavation was also marked by his preference for the period of the first millennium AD. Through his work on the subject, he became a member of the International Saxon Symposium (working group on the archeology of the Saxons and their neighboring peoples in northwestern Europe).

Important sites for him during his time as a Rotenburg district archaeologist were Barchel (immigration burial ground), the Steinfeld large stone grave , Granstedt (Neolithic burial mound), Groß Meckelsen (settlement from the Roman Empire), Wittorf (early medieval settlement; burial ground from the younger Bronze Age and earlier Iron Age; fortifications the pre-Roman Iron Age). and the early medieval Heilsburg near Wiersdorf .

Wolf-Dieter Tempel built an archaeological library in Rotenburg, the basis of which was Willi Wegewitz's private library, which he acquired in 1995 . With over 8000 media, it is the largest archaeological specialist library in the Elbe-Weser triangle .

Wolf-Dieter Tempel was involved in founding and promoting archaeological working groups in Celle , Gifhorn and Fallingbostel . In his archaeological area of ​​responsibility in Rotenburg (Wümme) , he founded the Archaeological Society in the district of Rotenburg (Wümme) in 1997 .

Communal archeologies

In the administrative district of Lüneburg, Tempel suggested the establishment of communal archeologies in Stade , Rotenburg (Wümme) , Verden and Lüchow-Dannenberg , which is why the Lower Saxon state archaeologist Henning Haßmann called him "Nestor of communal archeology in Lower Saxony" on the occasion of his 65th birthday.

Editing

From 1986 onwards, Tempel provided an annual account of the activities of the Rotenburg district archeology (Wümme) with the archaeological reports . At first they were a chronicle of finds with an activity report, published in the Rotenburger Schriften. Since they became more and more extensive and the need to publish larger works became apparent, in 1990 he founded the series of archaeological reports of the district of Rotenburg (Wümme) , which are published by the Archaeological Society (since 1997) and the district of Rotenburg by the district archaeologist . To date (2019) 21 volumes have been published. Tempel was responsible for the first ten volumes.

literature

• Stefan Hesse : Laudation for the 70th birthday of Dr Wolf-Dieter Tempel . In: Die Kunde NF 58 , 2007, pp. 1–2. ( Online )
• Stefan Hesse, Jan Joost Assendorp : Obituary for Dr. Wolf-Dieter Tempel (August 15, 1937 - March 7, 2017) . In: Stefan Hesse (Ed.): In search of archaeological traces. Commemorative letter for Dr. Wolf-Dieter Tempel (August 15, 1937 - March 7, 2017). Archaeological reports of the district of Rotenburg (Wümme) 21 , Oldenburg, 2018, pp. 9–21.
• Stefan Hesse / B. Temple: List of Dr. Wolf-Dieter Tempel. In: Stefan Hesse (Ed.): In search of archaeological traces. Commemorative letter for Dr. Wolf-Dieter Tempel (August 15, 1937 - March 7, 2017). Archaeological reports of the district of Rotenburg (Wümme) 21 , Oldenburg, 2018, pp. 31–49.

Web links

• Dr. Wolf-Dieter Tempel died at Kreisarchäologie Rotenburg (Wümme) on March 16, 2017

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Wolf-Dieter Tempel: At the edge of archeology. Encounters and experiences , Oldenburg, 2011, pp. 13-14.
2. ↑ H. Steuer: Archaeological similarities and interdependencies over decades. Wolf-Dieter Tempel zum Gedächtnis , In: Stefan Hesse (Hrsg.): On archaeological search for traces. Commemorative letter for Dr. Wolf-Dieter Tempel (August 15, 1937 - March 7, 2017). Archaeological reports of the district of Rotenburg (Wümme) 21 , Oldenburg, 2018, pp. 23–30.
3. ↑ N. Boes: New investigations on the migration period cemetery of Barchel, Ldkr. Rotenburg (Wümme). In: Stefan Hesse (Ed.): In search of archaeological traces. Commemorative letter for Dr. Wolf-Dieter Tempel (August 15, 1937 - March 7, 2017). Archaeological reports of the district of Rotenburg (Wümme) 21 , Oldenburg, 2018, pp. 155–174.
4. ↑ Wolf-Dieter Tempel: 23 years of district archeology. Archaeological reports of the Rotenburg district (Wümme) 10 , 2003, pp. 9-20.
5. ↑ Wolf-Dieter Tempel: Excavations at the Heilsburg near Wiersdorf, Heeslingen community. Archaeological reports of the district of Rotenburg (Wümme) 8 , 2000, pp. 27–56.
6. ^ Henning Haßmann: Greetings from the regional archaeologist. In: U. Masemann (ed.): Research on archeology and history in Northern Germany. Festschrift for Dr. Wolf-Dieter Tempel on his 65th birthday, Rotenburg (Wümme) , 2002, pp. 13–15.