Customs house (Langenfeld)

Customs House City of Langenfeld (Rhineland) Coordinates: 51 ° 8 ′ 29 ″  N , 6 ° 56 ′ 34 ″  E
Height :	49 m above sea level NN
Location of Zollhaus in Langenfeld (Rhineland)

Zollhaus (Langenfeld) is the name of a location in the Richrath district of the city of Langenfeld on the former Mauspfad .

The location of the village

New customs house in Richrath

The location north of the Riethrather Bach and west of the Rietherbach location is on Hildener Strasse , an old north-south trade connection through the Rhineland . An old customs house immediately north of the Riethrath brook and the new customs house about 100 m further north in the direction of Hilden gave their name to the former farmers, which in 1816 had just 33 inhabitants.

The Richrather Wegzoll

General

At the former customs house, located on the former mouse path , road tolls were levied to maintain the path. However, large sums of money were not spent on such road maintenance. Therefore, one may be medieval trade routes also not as well-developed remote trade routes imagine. Rather, it was footpaths that were kept free by frequent walking and on which the undergrowth of the forest was cut back from time to time. The attitude of the people towards the streets at the time was particularly decisive for the poor road conditions. So they wanted to travelers not to be rapidly progressive come to preload and cars - repairs to shoeing and nights to earn. In addition, there was fear that troops could march in on well-developed roads . Sometimes you even kept the trips with the car even harmful, because it allows the public good is detrimental. Another reason for bad road conditions just in the local area was the competition of merchant ships on the Rhine .

The name 'mouse path'

The name mouse path is sometimes associated with the collection of tolls , as the falsified name mouse tower for toll tower expresses. Another obvious explanation of the name is also offered by name research with the derivation of mouse = moss (see also names such as Dachauer Moos , Erdinger Moos ) for moor , because the path mostly runs through formerly wide moor areas to the right of the Rhine. Incidentally, the name musipad has also been handed down for the path through the moor.

Course of the 'mouse path'

The aforementioned mouse path ran in Langenfeld in a north-south direction over today's Hildener Strasse , Richrather Strasse , Talstrasse , Hagelkreuz , Opladener Strasse and Rosendahlsberg in the direction of Wupper and Dhünn . This path connected the Rheingau, Limburg an der Lahn , Altenkirchen , Siegburg , Cologne-Dünnwald , Opladen , Langenfeld , Hilden and Essen , where it reached the Hellweg . The name changed, however: South of Limburg Hühnerstraße today it was called Bundesstraße 417 , north of Hilden Butenweg , while the name Mauspfad became established in the middle section between Hilden and Sieg . It was laid out on the middle terrace of the Rhine, safe from floods .

This path has often been referred to as a rural death road or a grave road . Characteristic of the path is that it is accompanied along its entire length between Sieg and Ruhr by settlement and grave finds from the Hallstatt and La Tène periods . However, since it has no finds from the Stone Age , it is believed that it was only used in the Iron Age . In the High Middle Ages, the route was the connection between the Hanseatic cities of Cologne , Dortmund , Bremen , Hamburg and Lübeck and may be regarded as an important Hanseatic street at this time. The find of the Mercury statuette fits well into this picture .

The importance of the mouse path declined with the Battle of Worringen in 1288, which subsequently led to the rise of Düsseldorf (conferring city ​​rights ). In addition, the city of Düsseldorf was expanded in 1384 and 1394 and, from the 15th century, it was expanded into a residential city . With the growing importance of Düsseldorf, the trade route also shifted to the Via Publica, which runs parallel to the west . The decline of Dortmund after the Dortmunder Feud and Soest Feud as well as the noticeable decline of the Hanseatic League around 1500 also added to this.

To the customs post

It is not known when the customs house was established and since when catering has been operated there. A combination of restaurant and customs house, however, is already for the year 1415/1420 in connection with unlawful duty collection known. A landlord in Richrath was named for the first time in a document dated September 23, 1358. Possibly it was the one who ran the customs house at that time. A connection between customs and gastronomy is still proven from two petitions from 1492. At that time asked the wife of the publican Gertrud Huysmann in two letters to the rulers , one may her husband inaugurate again that he due to a scheming lord of House Graven , a Junkers had of Zedlis lost. He had accused him of poaching the game of the Dückeburg hunting area . A few weeks later, the former customs officer killed a thief in self-defense or in an emergency , which led to a second petition . Apparently, however, the person addressed did not react and it can be assumed that the Hausmanns - as threatened in the second letter - will have looked for a new home in the distance.

To the local situation

General

In addition to the customs station existed (and still exist) peasant farms. In addition, there were 18 wool spinners in Richrath for 1781/1789 and 49 weavers for both parishes . The term “weaver” included cloth makers , linen weavers and woolen weavers , farmers and their families who worked at home , mostly in winter , processing wool , cotton , flax , silk , velvet and plush . This Sideline - crafts are also known for the local situation Customs House.

More recently, graveling has been carried out in the direction of Hilden . Two dredging holes from this period are now used for fishing . There are some businesses and plans are in place to create a new business park in the direction of the railway line .

The gallows at the customs house

In the vicinity of the presumably oldest Langenfeld customs post with the oldest known inn in Langenfeld, there was also an old court house . For example, a gallows place is known for the location , which was located at the height of today's Rheinbahn stop at Zollhaus for bus lines 785 and 790 in the direction of Hilden. A field name Am Galgenberg has been preserved to this day for the place, a good 300 m north of the Troisdorf-Mülheim-Morsbroich-Opladen-Immigrath-Richrath-Speldorf railway , owned by the former Rheinische Eisenbahngesellschaft . And it fits with the aforementioned mouse path that, in addition to burial grounds on the Rosendahlsberg ( Neuburger Hof ) and the Hagelkreuz , another burial ground from Germanic times was found.

The legend of the customs house

A legend about the customs house and the gallows in this location was recorded in 1988 for a collection of legends of the Rheinische Post . However, it is wrongly titled with "Der Gemarkenhund in Immigrath" and also has a copyright notice that is completely excessive for this genre . Therefore, the story printed there is freely retold here.

The Zollhaus, a former toll station of the old mousepath from the Middle Ages, is located on the border of the Richrather and Hildener districts . Already in Germanic times the thing was held only a few steps from there , in which the disputes of the people were negotiated . In the Middle Ages, a gallows was set up at this point in order to immediately enforce the judgments of a court sitting there. As a deterrent, the hanged men remained on the gallows until ravens and crows had pecked the meat almost completely from their bones . One did not shy away from even leading the processional path from St. Martin directly past this place of execution . So it is not surprising that even today, in some dark nights, a large, black dog roams around this place , which is generally only called the district dog .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j} Rolf Müller, " Stadtgeschichte Langenfeld Rheinland ", Verlag Stadtarchiv Langenfeld 1992
2. ↑ ^{a b c} Friedhelm Görgens, Langenfeld , Droste, Düsseldorf 1984
3. ↑ Helge Dettmer, Rheinische and Bergische Sagen, Märchen und Legenden , Phönix-Verlag, Leun / Lahn 1988