Project Details
Projekt
Within the network of fluvial ports. Efficiency and infrastructural development of inland waters and their vessels
Subject Area
Prehistory and World Archaeology
Ancient History
Early Modern History
Medieval History
Ancient History
Early Modern History
Medieval History
Term
from 2015 to 2020
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 276025678
As a rule, trading centres depend on their infrastructural links to regional and transregional traffic systems. The research on ancient overland routes has already a long tradition. In contrast, there is a considerable lack of studies concerning waterways that eventually transformed trading centres into harbours. Navigation on seas and larger lakes required human interference with nature only for the creation of landing and transshipment points. In order to make navigation possible on rivers, however, much larger infrastructural changes were required: river beds had to be cleared, towpaths were created, and already existing disturbances of the cultural landscape (such as mill and fishing weirs) had to be removed. When, how, and on whose account these measure were implicated in Central Europe, is currently not known. The project aims to fill this gap by collecting a suitable amount of data, especially concerning the findings of inland vessels, but also combing them with written and iconographic sources. This will be achieved in close cooperation with the already existing projects -Binnenhäfen im fränkisch-deutschen Reich- and -Fossa Carolina-. It is essential to cast a close look upon sources beyond the chronological frame of this project, e.g. to evaluate river descriptions from the 16th and 17th centuries. Only an integration of insights gained from these sources makes it possible to demonstrate larger developments. By comparing and contrasting the usage histories of the rivers Main and Neckar differing patterns of developments will be demonstrated and integrated into the binary correlation of -ships and harbours-. Moreover, a catalogue of archaeologically attested inland vessels in Central Europe is going to be prepared, which will help to establish a chronological typology of boats and ships on a larger scale from which more insights into their impact on harbour shapes will be gained. Taking the Carolingian flat-bottomed boat Krefeld-Gellep III as an example to apply modern measuring and testing methods, which are common in modern ship construction, we will be able to determine the performance of Early Medieval transportation systems. The project aims at establishing a model of anthropogenous river development and transport in the Early and High Middle Ages, which will form a solid basis for our understanding of harbour structures of this age.
DFG Programme
Priority Programmes
