Dithmarschen
Dithmarschen is a district in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. It is bounded by the districts of Nordfriesland, Schleswig-Flensburg, Rendsburg-Eckernförde, and Steinburg, by the state of Lower Saxony, and by the North Sea.
From the 13th century up to 1559 Dithmarschen was an independent peasant republic within the Holy Roman Empire and a member of the Hanseatic League. It repulsed attempts by larger fiefs to annex it, whether physically or legally. Dithmarschen was recognized as an imperial fief by the emperor, who summoned the peasants to send representatives to royal assemblies and the Imperial Diet. Its heyday was from the consolidation of its government in 1447 to its final conquest by the King of Denmark in 1559, though the Danish were still compelled to leave Dithmarschen with a considerable degree of autonomy.
Geography
The district is located on the North Sea. It is embraced by the Elbe estuary to the south and the Eider estuary to the north. Today it forms a kind of artificial island, surrounded by the Eider river in the north and the Kiel Canal in both the east and southeast. It is a rather flat countryside that was once full of fens and swamps.To the north it borders on Nordfriesland and Schleswig-Flensburg, to the east on Rendsburg-Eckernförde, and in the southeast on Steinburg. Its landward boundaries have remained basically the same since the times of Charlemagne. Land reclamation, however, has almost doubled the size of Dithmarschen as land has been wrested from the sea.
The main roads and rail lines in Schleswig-Holstein follow a north–south direction, making Hamburg its most accessible city. Exemplary is the most important railway line in the district, the Marsh Railway, and the main roads, Bundesautobahn 23 and Bundesstraße 5
The district has a maximum north–south length of 54 kilometers and an east–west length of 41 kilometers. The highest point, near Schrum in the geestland, is above sea level and the lowest point, near Burg, is below sea level.
Dithmarschen's landscape owes its character to the North Sea. From west to east Dithmarschen consists of the Wadden Sea, marshes, bogs, and the geestland. The North Sea had a higher sea level 6,500 years ago than today and the coastline then ran along the geestland. About 4,500 years ago, geestland structures were connected by sand and gravel depositions that formed spits. Bogs, lakes, and swamps emerged as the area behind the spits no longer flooded. After the first plants took root, the land transformed first to salt marshes and finally to marshes. These marshes rank among the most fertile of Germany's soils. Vegetable farming in Dithmarschen produces the highest yields in Schleswig-Holstein.
Since about the 8th century, the people of Dithmarschen have been living on warfts for protection from the sea. In the 12th century, they began building dikes to protect their pastures and fields. Since about the 15th century, they have been reclaiming land from the sea.
Flora and fauna
While the Geest has some woods, trees are found in marshlands only in the form of wind protection around houses or villages. Traditional are the : tree rows with strong undergrowth to protect agricultural land from the wind.Several bogs are present in Dithmarschen. A special position is taken by the "Weißes Moor", the only bog still existing in a quite-natural shape in the Schleswig-Holstein marsh land.
Part of the Schleswig-Holstein Wadden Sea National Park is in Dithmarschen. It is the most important natural habitat in the district. Many molluscs can be found here, including bivalves, gastropods, worms and crustaceans, which provide food for larger animals. Fish use the Wadden Sea as a "kindergarten" where they can raise their offspring in a protected environment. Although many species of birds settle permanently in the Wadden Sea, many others use it only as a winter habitat or as a resting place. Typical birds in Dithmarschen are dunlins, red knots, bar-tailed godwits, northern lapwings, ringed plovers, Eurasian oystercatchers, many species of duck and gull, sandwich terns, pied avocets, brent geese and barnacle geese. 200,000 common shelducks alone come in August. The shelducks lose their feathers in the Wadden Sea and therefore are unable to fly for around three weeks. The majority of common shelducks in Northwestern Europe travel to the area at this time. Large salt marshes are located along the Friedrichskoog coast and in the Neufeld Bay.
Three sand banks, Trischen, Tertius and Blauort are in the sea. They are some of only a few still-natural habitats along the German coast, and they are of importance to sea birds and seals. After futile attempts in the 1930s to make them habitable to humans, they are now part of the national park, closed to public access. Many birds preferring wet grasslands live in the Eider-Treene Valley.
History
High Middle Ages
In medieval times the marshland villages of Dithmarschen enjoyed remarkable autonomy. Neighbouring princes often tried to bring Dithmarschen under their control.After 1180 Prince-Archbishop Siegfried ceded Dithmarschen, which was supposed to belong to his Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen, to his brother Bernhard III, Duke of the younger Duchy of Saxony. In his new position of Duke of Saxony he held the Land of Hadeln, opposite of Dithmarschen on the southern bank of the river Elbe. Adolf III of Schauenburg, Count of Holstein, at enmity with the Ascanians, had de facto taken a loose possession of Dithmarschen. It fell to Bernhard to regain the territory, but he failed, only forcing Adolf to accept his overlordship of Dithmarschen.
Prince-Archbishop Hartwig II prepared a campaign into Dithmarschen, which, while religiously belonging to the Archdiocese of Bremen, and represented by its subsidiary chapter at Hamburg Concathedral, rejected secular overlordship from Bremen. He persuaded Adolf III to waive his claim to Dithmarschen, in return for being paid regular dues to be levied from the Ditmarsians after subjugation. In 1187 and 1188 Hartwig and his ally Maurice I, Count of Oldenburg, heading their troops, invaded Dithmarschen. The free peasants promised to pay him dues, only to ridicule and renounce Hartwig, once he and his soldiers had left. The Ditmarsians gained support from Valdemar, steward of the Duchy of Schleswig and Bishop of Schleswig. Hartwig, owing dues to Adolf III and the soldiers' pay to Maurice I, was trapped and could not afford to wage a second war.
In 1192 the Bremian Chapter elected Valdemar as its new Prince-Archbishop. Valdemar welcomed his election, hoping his new position could be helpful in his dispute with Duke Valdemar of Schleswig and his elder brother Canute VI of Denmark. Before entering the Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen he won the support of Dithmarschen.
Late Middle Ages
In the 15th century the Ditmarsians confederated in a peasant republic. Though several times neighbouring princely rulers, accompanied by their knights and mercenaries, attempted to subjugate the independent peasants to feudalism, they were unsuccessful. In 1319 Gerhard III was repelled in the. After Eric IV, Duke of Saxe-Lauenburg had raided Dithmarschen, the Ditmarsians blamed his son-in-law, Albert II, Count of Holstein-Rendsburg, for complicity, who then used this as a pretext for his own unsuccessful conquest attempt in 1403, dying during the campaign from inflicted injuries. In 1468 Dithmarschen allied with Lübeck to protect their common interest as to commerce and containing the spreading feudalism in the region. Based on the Hanseatic obligations and privileges from the pact signed with Lübeck, Ditmarsians had established trade with Livonia and neighbouring Baltic destinations in the 15th century. Both parties renewed their alliance several times and it thus lasted until Dithmarschen's final defeat and Dano-Holsatian annexation in 1559.In 1484 Magnus of Saxe-Lauenburg, then vicegerent of the Land of Hadeln, failed to subjugate the free Frisian peasants in the Land of Wursten, a de facto autonomous region in a North Sea marsh at the Weser estuary, which was under the loose overlordship of the Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen. This foreshadowed a series of feudal attempts to subdue regions of free peasants, an alarming signal for the Ditmarsians and the free peasants in other marshes in the area.
In April 1499 Count John XIV of Oldenburg invaded the Weser and North Sea marshes of Stadland and Butjadingen, both of which the Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen claimed overlordship over, in order to subject their free peasants. Bremen's prince-archbishop Johann Rode tried to form a military alliance to repel these invasions, and prevent further ones, first rallying the cities of Bremen, Hamburg and Stade, as they considered the areas downstream of the rivers Elbe and Weser their own front yard: essential for their free maritime trade connections. Rode won the Ditmarsians too, for a defensive alliance to protect Wursten, concluded on 1 May 1499. On 1 August the alliance, now also including Buxtehude, committed themselves to supply 1,300 warriors and equipment to defend Wursten and/or invade Hadeln.
Conversely, John V and his son Magnus of Saxe-Lauenburg had already allied with Henry IV the Elder of Brunswick and Lunenburg, Prince of Wolfenbüttel, on 24 November 1498, to conquer Wursten. Henry IV obliged to send 3,000 landsknechts, who should gain their payment by ravaging and plundering the free peasants of Wursten, once successfully subjugated.
Rode then waged feud against John V of Saxe-Lauenburg on 9 September 1499. The allied forces, with the Ditmarsians invading by crossing the Elbe, easily conquered the Land of Hadeln, and defeated Magnus.
While the cities desired a peaceful front yard without another's powerful influence, the Ditmarsians instead favoured the favour of autonomy of the free peasants. Hamburg and the Ditmarsians fell out with each other. On 16 September 1499, a landsknecht hired by Hamburg slew Cordt von der Lieth, a member of the Bremian ministerialis, causing the Otterndorf Strife. The landsknecht created rumours that it had instead been a Ditmarsian who had slain von der Lieth, and fled after. Hamburg's landsknechts then attacked the uninvolved Ditmarsians and slew 76 men in their military camp near Otterndorf. Consequently, Dithmarschen cancelled its alliance with Rode, Bremen and Hamburg, and the Ditmarsians returned home. Hamburg aimed at reestablishing its rule in Hadeln, as it had wielded between 1407 and 1481 when Saxe-Lauenburg had given Hadeln to Hamburg as security for a credit. The relationship between Dithmarschen and Hamburg then turned icy, and Ditmarsians captured, according to the traditional wrecking custom, wrecked Hamburgian ships and their freight, if they foundered around the shores of Dithmarschen. The parties only reconciled in 1512.
By 20 November 1499 Magnus hired the so-called of 6,000 ruthless and violent mostly Dutch and East Frisian mercenaries, commanded by Thomas Slentz, prior operating in the County of Oldenburg. The Black Guard invaded the Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen, passing through and ravaging areas in the Prince-Bishopric of Verden and the Brunswick-Lunenburgian Principality of Lunenburg-Celle, leaving behind a wake of devastation in the countryside and especially in the looted monasteries.
Finally, on Christmas Eve, arriving down the Weser in Lehe, the Black Guard tried to invade Wursten. However, the free peasants there repelled their attack near Weddewarden on 26 December. So the Guard turned northeastwards, looting Neuenwalde Nunnery underways, into Hadeln, repressing the joint forces of Rode and the cities – lacking support by Bremian knights and the Ditmarsians –, recapturing it for Magnus in early 1500.
Rode then converted Henry IV the Elder to his column, with Henry the Elder and his troops then hunting the Black Guard. Magnus, unable to pay the mercenaries so that they turned even the more oppressive for the local population, was like the Sorcerer's Apprentice, who could not get rid of "the spirits that he called". By mid-January 1500 King John of Denmark hired the Guard and guaranteed for its safe conduct first southeastwards via Lunenburg-Cellean Winsen upon Luhe and Hoopte, crossing the Elbe by Zollenspieker Ferry to the Hamburg-Lübeckian bi-urban condominium of Bergedorf and Vierlande.
File:Max Koch Schlacht bei Hemmingstedt.jpg|thumb|right|The Battle of Hemmingstedt in a history painting of 1910 by Max Friedrich Koch, assembly hall of the former District Building in Meldorf. From there the Black Guard headed northwestwards again through Holstein in order to join more of King John's forces recruited in Holstein and by the Kalmar Union. These forces then invaded Dithmarschen in order to subject the free Ditmarsians. The Ditmarsians took a vow to donate a monastery in honour of the then national patron saint Mary of Nazareth if they could repel the invasion. On 17 February 1500, in the Battle of Hemmingstedt, the outnumbered Ditmarsians, led by Wulf Isebrand, defeated the invading armies and thus destroyed King John's dream of subjecting Dithmarschen.
In 1513 the Ditmarsians founded a Franciscan Friary in Lunden fulfilling their vow. However, the Hamburg concathedral chapter, holding the ecclesiastical jurisdiction, demanded its say in appointing the prebendaries. After years of dispute, the Council of the 48, the elected governing body of the farmers' republic of Ditmarsh, decided to found a Gallicanist kind of independent Catholic Church of Dithmarschen in August 1523, denying Hamburg's capitular jurisdiction in all of Dithmarschen. The chapter could not regain the jurisdiction, including its share in ecclesiastical fees and fines levied in Dithmarschen. After violently repelling the first preaching of proponents of the Reformation, slaying Henry of Zutphen in December 1524, Lutheranism nevertheless started to win over Ditmarsians. In 1533 the Council of the 48 turned the Ditmarsian Catholic Church into a Lutheran state church.