DOI article:
Witthöft, Harald: Early Medieval mining and smelting in the Harz Mountains - historical perspectives
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.56859#0138
106
„pro 56 marc. Col. monete vel 50 marc, examinati argenti, quod Ramisberch
appellatur“, and „pro 56 marc. Coloniensium denariorum (12 sol. pro marca)
sive pro 50 marc, argenti de Ramesberch“.
Looking upon the economy in general, these developments of the 9th and 10th
centuries signal the truly revolutionary period of the 11th—13th centuries with their
fully developing mining industry, during which trade, the monetary system and
the economy as a whole gained a dynamic character, thus also explaining the
growing importance of Goslar and other cities around the Harz Mountains.21 In
1203 archbishop Adolf I. of Cologne again confirmed the custom tariffs for
Dinant merchant passing the city and crossing the Rhine on their way to Goslar:
„quod cives de Dynant in thelonio Coloniensi et in pondere, quod vulgo pundere
dicitur, talem habent justiticC. They had been valid „a temporibus KarolC.22
Such an industrial area should have attracted trade and traffic very early.
Again, sources are meagre. However, information from later centuries provides a
basis from which to disentangle this question. About 10 years ago Detlev Ellmers
has commented upon the fact that „even in such an emporium like Brunswick an
important economic factor as the port has nearly entirely slipped the historical
memory and thus laboriously to be reconstructed from the sources“. He was
wondering whether there might be other medieval German cities far inland too,
whose ports had entirely disappeared, or how far upstream small rivers had been
navigable, and what the boats that used them would have been like.23
In this context Ellmers mentions that about 800 the Frisians with their sea-
going ships (koggeförmige Küstenfahrzeuge) were for example able to steer up
the Weser to Corvey and up the Leine to Elze, only c. 40 km away from the
western rim of the Harz Mountains. An average water level of 60 cm seems to
have been sufficient for small boats in the 10th century to reach Fulda via the
Hörsel. Places, accessible to the Frisians, took on central functions
(zentralräumliche Funktion) the more so when these places were ecclesiastical
settlements, out of which early cities in this region developed (ELLMERS 1985,
248).
Finally, a rare source from 1055 reveals the location of a market at the river
Leine at Nörten near Göttingen only 25 km from the Western Harz - and again
21 Most recently: Britnell, Campbell 1994. Kaye 1998.
22 Urkundenbuch 1876, 61: 1203 February 13. The written evidence for these tariffs
dates back into the early 12th century: Bingener 1998, 26 sq.
23 Ellmers 1985, 243. - Recent archaeological research in the old city of Brunswick is
e. g. successfully concentrating on remains of early medieval metalwork.
„pro 56 marc. Col. monete vel 50 marc, examinati argenti, quod Ramisberch
appellatur“, and „pro 56 marc. Coloniensium denariorum (12 sol. pro marca)
sive pro 50 marc, argenti de Ramesberch“.
Looking upon the economy in general, these developments of the 9th and 10th
centuries signal the truly revolutionary period of the 11th—13th centuries with their
fully developing mining industry, during which trade, the monetary system and
the economy as a whole gained a dynamic character, thus also explaining the
growing importance of Goslar and other cities around the Harz Mountains.21 In
1203 archbishop Adolf I. of Cologne again confirmed the custom tariffs for
Dinant merchant passing the city and crossing the Rhine on their way to Goslar:
„quod cives de Dynant in thelonio Coloniensi et in pondere, quod vulgo pundere
dicitur, talem habent justiticC. They had been valid „a temporibus KarolC.22
Such an industrial area should have attracted trade and traffic very early.
Again, sources are meagre. However, information from later centuries provides a
basis from which to disentangle this question. About 10 years ago Detlev Ellmers
has commented upon the fact that „even in such an emporium like Brunswick an
important economic factor as the port has nearly entirely slipped the historical
memory and thus laboriously to be reconstructed from the sources“. He was
wondering whether there might be other medieval German cities far inland too,
whose ports had entirely disappeared, or how far upstream small rivers had been
navigable, and what the boats that used them would have been like.23
In this context Ellmers mentions that about 800 the Frisians with their sea-
going ships (koggeförmige Küstenfahrzeuge) were for example able to steer up
the Weser to Corvey and up the Leine to Elze, only c. 40 km away from the
western rim of the Harz Mountains. An average water level of 60 cm seems to
have been sufficient for small boats in the 10th century to reach Fulda via the
Hörsel. Places, accessible to the Frisians, took on central functions
(zentralräumliche Funktion) the more so when these places were ecclesiastical
settlements, out of which early cities in this region developed (ELLMERS 1985,
248).
Finally, a rare source from 1055 reveals the location of a market at the river
Leine at Nörten near Göttingen only 25 km from the Western Harz - and again
21 Most recently: Britnell, Campbell 1994. Kaye 1998.
22 Urkundenbuch 1876, 61: 1203 February 13. The written evidence for these tariffs
dates back into the early 12th century: Bingener 1998, 26 sq.
23 Ellmers 1985, 243. - Recent archaeological research in the old city of Brunswick is
e. g. successfully concentrating on remains of early medieval metalwork.