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Die Madonna von Kappel am Rhein |
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The River Rhine. Just as any countryside, every place no matter how small has its unique and unmistaken characteristics. The natural characteristics of its location, the historical development over the centuries, the peculiarity of its folk life, the economy and the bustle of its inhabitants as well as many other traits form a rich and meaningful picture to the attentive observer. But only their relation to the whole picture gives those pieces of the puzzle their true meaning. We want to understand that small piece of the world that we call home and where we are so deeply rooted in its whole natural and spiritual meaning.
The Rhein which flows majesticly not far from Kappel has always played such an important role in the history of the .village that it became a true river of fate. The power of its violent nature as well as its characteristics as a border between Germany and France brought its occupants often enough bad luck and ruin. In former times the wild and uncontrolled course of the river destroyed again and again whatever the village people created with industriousness and knowledge. But with never ending courage and faithfulness to their home town they rebuild their homes and fields after each catastrophy in a constant battle with nature. And over time the first settlement of a few fishing cabins at the high banks of the Rhein changed into a magnificent village.
But not only the hostile violence of the wild river threatened the village and its inhabitants, the close border, too, brought, misery and distress to the peaceful village. In the middle ages at the height of the German empire the upper Rhine valley -- being considered one of most important countrysides -- was still situated in the center of the empire. After the decline of the supremacy of the German nation the Lorrainese-Burgundian empire began to shatter and France advanced towards the Rhine. The border between the two big nations fighting for the european predominance moved further and further east. The upper Rhine land became a highly disputed bone of contention in a century-lasting struggle for power. Due to the war many hard times came upon our village at the border and still alive in everyone's memory are the awful events of the last war when the upper Rhine valley became a battle-field once again.
The Setting The view from Kappel's church steeple offers the overwhelming picture of a blessed countryside. The east displays the black forest, the west shows the Vosges mountains from the gate of Burgundy to the Palatian mountains. In the south you'll see the "Kaiserstuhl " covered with vines placed between the mountains but north there is the tower of the Strassburg Cathedral. All of this is surrounded by the garden of the Rhineland: fields, meadows, forest, looking like a carpet, and everywhere an almost inestimable number of villages and towns; and there, like a shimmering bracelet is the wide river surrounded by its green, wooded banks and meadows. Truely a countryside that makes your heart beat faster with love and pride!
The effect of this open and wide space shows in the economic and historic development of our little home town. It seems as if it is located in the center of a huge power field and then again it seems to be located at the end of a space, at the edge where everything close by appears to be almost out of reach.
If we drew a line through the center of the Rhine, from "Huenersedel" which is the highest point of the central black forest and behind the former town "Ettenheim" which has been connected with Kappel for the longest time over to the rise of the northern Vosges mountains, the "Donon" and the "Hochfeld" behind mountain "Ottilie" then the line would cross the river at "Kappel" and "Rheinau".
This line shows us -just as a mirror would- both sides of the Rhine valley: both the same in their geological formation, the development of their traditions, their history, their economy -- just as two halves of a split apple -- so that we can comprehend the absurdity of the separation that happened here.
At the edge of the mountains we first see the premountain zone with its fertile hills. Then in the plain we'll distinguish between three different zones: the boggy area, the high banks and finally the Rhine valley. A long time ago the brooks of the black forest were flowing north in the boggy area on our side of the river along the premountain zone, before the were able to force their way through the barrier of the high banks to the Rhine.
Settlement This moist and boggy strip was avoided for a long time by the settlers. Therefore, we will find the earliest settlements in our area at the edge of the mountains, on the dry slope and rise at the edge of the plain. The settlers who followed settled down on the gravel and sand areas of the high banks that were created by the ballast of the Rhine and that were covered with sand by the dry winds.
Following was a third group of settlers in the boggy area. The Rhine valley on the other side, which is the bed of the wide river that flows in a countless number of rivulets and changes its direction again and again always was man's enemy. It hasn't been long that the valley's cultivation has been possible.
This is how the settlement of our area may have happened: at first the villages at the edge of the mountains developed- Ringsheim, Ettenheim, Altdorf, Mahlberg [See map] and also Oschweier which is located on the Schuttkegel of the Muenster valley. During the second extension phase the villages on the high banks - Rust, Kappel, Wittenweier - developed and at last Grafenhausen which fought the boggy area with its trench The first settlers, wheher it was the not completely settled hunters and fishermen who changed their residences frequently or the farmers who were looking for arable land and pasture, were lured by the strip of dry land along the river valley that stood out against the boggy area. During the tide, the water rose up to this flat ridge of land which was mostly just a few meters high but it was safe and the settlers found favourable places to build their new homes. The location away from the restless passage at the edge of the mountains protected the new settlement from war and robbery.
Sunken Cities The high banks of Kappel must have been habitable very early on. Here, the people from Halstatt erected a mound for their prince during prehistoric times, and this is also where the village Triesloch is located of which J.V.von Scheffel suspected that it was named after the latin word "thesaurus" which means treasure and refers to the legendary gold treasures of the prince's grave.
Whether Triesloch was destroyed by flooding or during the Swedish war can't be said today. Maybe the location of the close by Kappel convinced the inhabitants of Triesloch to resettle since so many of the small villages were in danger of wild animals and wandering riff-raff.
This whole wild and romantic area between Rhine and Elz is surrounded by legends of natural phenomena and sunken cities that supposedly were located nearby and have now disappeared. According to this old tale a city by the name of Elz was located north of Triesloch where Rhine and Elz approach each other but there are no traces left of it today. There is also a similar story about the Alsatian city Rheinau. It is said that Rheinau used to be located on this side of the Rhine. In 1514, a flood is said to have taken all of its homes and the inhabitants rebuilt their homes on the opposite side of the river.
According to old reports, Rheinau was located in the area called "Kraemerinsel-Azelkopf", and in an episcopal paper dated back to the 14th century it says "Capella prope Rinowe", so that one has to assume that Rheinau and Kappel used to be located side by side and were not separated by the Rhine. Therefore, whatever reminds us of the sunken cities remains half legend and half historical reality.
A person swimming in the clear water of the Rhine or the Taubergiessen may suddenly find remainders and remnants of old walls deep below, forgotten witnesses of a past life. A person looking at the Rhine and its surrounding countryside, the meadows and productive fields, and who's standing on the bridge watching the boats go by cannot imagine what this area looked like 150 years ago and how it has changed since.
River Tamed Johann Gottfried Tulla, the ingenious Rhine master builder, wrote in 1825 when he submitted his plans for correction: "The Rhine is one of the strangest streams of Europe because of its size, its connection with glaciers and most of the Switzerland lakes, its waterfalls of Schaffhausen and Laufenburg, because of the change of its course in old and new times, because of the difference in its falls, its speed and its river bed, because of the size of its scope and its present flooding area and finally because of its mouths into the ocean and its use for shipping.
The banks of this river had to be inhabited even more since the Rhine valley consisted mainly of productive soil and since the shipping eased trade and travel. With the convenience to live close to the river also came great trouble and danger, many villages disappeared, several have been pushed from their original location and a few were relocated from one to the other side of the river.
Map showing Kappel am Rhein
in Lahr, Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany
(click to enlarge)