Schleswig (Low German: Sleswig, Danish: Slesvig, angeldän. Sljasvig) is a medium-sized town in Schleswig-Holstein on the Schlei bay. It is the district town of the Schleswig-Flensburg district, the former capital of the Duchy of Schleswig and is also known as the judicial capital of the state, because - for historical reasons - it is the seat of the state constitutional court, as well as three other higher courts and the public prosecutor's office.
The city name comes from Old Norse and means Bay of the Schlei or Port of the Schlei.
Schleswig
was first mentioned as Sliasthorp in 804 (Danish form: Sliestorp).
The ending thorp (translated village) indicates that it is a
sub-settlement.
The Viking settlement on Haddebyer Noor
called Haithabu was expanded into a trading center by King Gudfred
(Göttrik) in 808 and destroyed by Slavs in 1066. The question of
whether the germ cells of today's opposite city of Schleswig were
only founded after the destruction of Haithabu or whether they had
existed for a number of years has so far been a controversial issue
in research. In any case, medieval Schleswig took over Haithabu's
legacy as a center of Northern European trade - together with the
western port at Hollingstedt, which had existed since the Viking
Age: the land route between the Baltic and North Sea was
particularly short here.
Swedish Vikings under their King
Olaf conquered the area around 900. In 934 the East Franconian King
Heinrich I defeated Olaf's son Canute I and made Haithabu subject to
tribute. King Otto I founded the diocese of Schleswig in 947. In
983, the Danish Viking King Harald Blauzahn temporarily recaptured
the area. A few decades later, the emperors finally gave up the
Schleswig mark and Schleswig fell back to the Danish crown. Around
this time, the focus of settlement finally shifted from Haithabu to
today's Schleswig.
Bishop's residence in the Middle Ages
The chronicler Adam von Bremen reported in detail as early as 1076
on the importance of Haithabus and Schleswig. A synod was held in
Schleswig under Archbishop Adalbert von Bremen, to which
representatives from all over Northern Europe were invited. The
first bishops of Schleswig were Harald (Haroldus), Poppo and
Rodolphus.
Saxo Grammaticus mentions the cathedral for the
first time in 1134. He reports that the Danish King Niels wanted to
flee from the brothers of the St. Knudsgilde in the cathedral, but
was slain because he had Jarl Knud Lavard, the son of his older
brother Erik Ejegod, killed in 1131, who belonged to the Schleswig
family had been popular.
The residence of the bishops was
initially a castle, which is now located under Gottorf Castle and
was first mentioned in 1161, when the Schleswig Bishop Occo moved
his seat to the castle island after the destruction of his
Alt-Gottorf Castle northwest of Schleswig. The castle remained in
the possession of the bishop until 1268, after which it was given to
the dukes of Schleswig in exchange for Schwabstedt castle and in
1340 passed to the Counts of Schauenburg who ruled Holstein. The
bishop's palace was then the Königsteinsche Palais at
Norderdomstraße 15, the Rumohrenhof. As long as the Catholic diocese
of Schleswig existed, the court was the center of the episcopal
property administration. The origins of the building go back to the
middle of the 15th century. The builder is said to have been Bishop
Nicolaus Wulf (1429–1474). After the death of the last Catholic
bishop Gottschalk von Ahlefeldt in 1541, the building had different
owners. After the cathedral chapter was dissolved in 1773, the court
was sold to Baron Johann Ludwig von Königstein, who had the old
buildings rebuilt and given their current appearance.
Schleswig had to relinquish its role as a supraregional trading
metropolis of the north to Lübeck in the 13th century, but at that
time it was still a trading center of regional importance, but in
the late Middle Ages the regional primacy also passed to Flensburg:
the Schlei was for the merchant ships of that time often not deep
enough.
In 1486 the missal Missale Slesvicense, set by the
printer Steffen Arndes, was published for the pen in Schleswig as an
important early North German print.
From 1344 a total of three medieval leprosories can be
identified in Schleswig; the first was built in today's St. Jürgen
district and gave the district its name because St. Georg (Low
German: St. Jürgen) was the patron saint of all leprosories in
Schleswig-Holstein. From 1392 another leprosy can be found on the
Gallberg, which was called Laurentius Hospital and Sikenhus
("hospital"). The third leprosarium was built on Hesterberg in the
15th century.
Residence of the Dukes of Gottorf
After the Reformation, almost all of the city's numerous churches
and monasteries disappeared, with a few exceptions. Some of them
were broken down to the foundations, which was shown during
excavations of the Maria Magdalena Church of the Dominican
monastery. On the other hand, numerous aristocratic palaces were
built within the city limits, in which the high officials of the
flourishing duchy resided.
After the division of the country
in 1544, the city became the residence of the dukes of
Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf. These initially remained closely linked
to the Danish crown in terms of foreign policy, but in the 17th
century they led an increasingly independent policy.
At least
38 women were convicted and executed in witch hunts between 1548 and
1551. The place of execution was the market square. The trial files
have been preserved in the Schleswig city archive. In 2014, the
church and mayor Arthur Christiansen remembered the victims of the
witch trials in a memorial service in Schleswig Cathedral.
Under Duke Friedrich III. From Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf the
Gottorfer Hof flourished. Chancellor was Johann Adolph Kielmann von
Kielmannsegg. The following artists were active on the farm at this
time: painter Jürgen Ovens (Rembrandt's student), the carver Hans
Gudewerdt the Younger. The court scholar Adam Olearius described his
travels to Moscow (1633) and Persia (1636) in 1647. A little later,
the dukes also obtained an imperial privilege to found a university,
when Schleswig was initially also under discussion before it was
finally settled in Kiel.
In 1711 the two suburbs of Lollfuß
and Friedrichsberg were incorporated. Schleswig, Lollfuß and
Friedrichsberg were merged to form the "combined city of Schleswig".
Schleswig got a first mayor for the whole city.
After the
Great Northern War (1700–1721) and the associated victory of Denmark
over the Duchy of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf, the Gottorf shares in
the Duchy of Schleswig fell to the Danish king, who was also Duke of
Schleswig. This meant serious economic disadvantages for the city of
Schleswig, as it lost its position as the ducal residence of a
partially sovereign state.
After the loss of the residence
function for the Gottorf dukes, who had ruled the Duchy of Schleswig
in their shares since 1658, Gottorf Castle now became the seat of
the Supreme Court as well as the government and judicial authority
for the entire Duchy of Schleswig, later (1834) as part of a
judicial and administrative reform also seat of a common government
for both duchies (Schleswig and Holstein). Since the Duke of
Schleswig, as the Danish king, stayed mostly in Copenhagen, he
always appointed a governor to Gottorf.
Under the governor
Landgrave Carl von Hessen (1744–1836), Schleswig once again
experienced a cultural heyday. In 1836/1843 the government and the
court were separated and the duchy's assembly of estates was
re-established. The state hall of the town hall served as the
conference room of this “parliament”. Schleswig itself had around
11,000 inhabitants at that time.
From 1840, the German-Danish
conflict became the dominant theme in the city, whose citizens
mostly sided with the German Schleswig-Holsteiners. Among other
things, the Schleswig-Holstein song was created in Schleswig, it was
enthusiastically sung from 23 to 25 July 1840 at the singing
festival of the Schleswig-Holstein song boards in Schleswig. The
text comes from the Schleswig advocate Chemnitz, the music from C.
G. Bellmann, cantor at St. Johannis Monastery. At the same time the
first blue-white-red (Schleswig-Holstein colors) banner was shown.
In 1848 the Schleswig-Holstein uprising of the German-minded
population of Schleswig and Holstein against the rule of the Danish
king in the duchies broke out. On 23/24 April 1848 came the battle
of Schleswig. In this conflict, known as the “Easter Battle”, the
Danish troops were expelled from the city of Schleswig, but at the
end of the warlike years of 1851 the Kingdom of Denmark had won over
the Schleswig-Holstein movement. As a result, Schleswig and Holstein
remained as duchies initially linked to the Danish monarchy through
a personal union. The Duchy of Schleswig with the city of Schleswig
retained its position as a fiefdom of the Kingdom of Denmark, while
Holstein remained a member of the German Confederation.
The
ducal authorities within the entire Danish state were finally
reorganized. As a result, Schleswig lost all of the ducal government
authorities, and the Schleswig Assembly of Estates met from 1852 in
the State House in Flensburg.
After the German-Danish War in 1864, the duchies of Schleswig and
Holstein became an Austro-Prussian condominium. After the German War
(1866) they were annexed by Prussia.
With the equality of
Jews in the North German Confederation in 1869, a small Jewish
community emerged in Schleswig, which dissolved again by the First
World War due to the emigration of many of its members to larger
cities.
The city of Schleswig replaced Kiel as the seat of
the upper president from 1879 to 1917 and was the capital of the
Prussian province of Schleswig-Holstein until 1945. The
Schleswig-Holstein Provincial Parliament continued to meet in the
old state hall until 1904. During the Prussian period, from 1888 to
1894, the 112 meter high Schleswig cathedral tower was built.
Under Prussian rule, Schleswig was also a garrison town until
the end of the First World War. On November 9, 1866, the regimental
staff and the 3rd battalion of the newly established Prussian 84th
Infantry Regiment came to the city. The 1st and 2nd battalions
followed in 1890 and 1892. One battalion was in Gottorf Castle,
while the barracks on Moltkestrasse were built in 1892 for the other
battalions. In 1867 the regiment was named "Schleswigsches
Infanterie-Regiment Nr. 84" and was renamed in 1888 in honor of
General von Manstein in "Infanterie-Regiment von Manstein
(Schleswigsches) Nr. 84". It was dissolved again after the 1918
revolution. In 1866 the newly established Prussian Hussar Regiment
No. 16 came to Schleswig. In 1867 it was named "Schleswig-Holstein
Hussar Regiment No. 16". In 1872 Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria
was nominally head of the regiment, the name of which was changed to
"Hussar Regiment Emperor Franz-Joseph of Austria, King of Hungary
(Schleswig-Holstein) No. 16". Gottorf Castle was his barracks until
it was dissolved after the revolution of 1918.
At the
beginning of the First World War in 1914, the church bells rang from
7 a.m. to 8 a.m. in Schleswig on the occasion of the mobilization
and the population was initially enthusiastic about the armed
forces. The city's public buildings, such as the seat of the
provincial government, the train station, the post office, the
Reichsbank and the town hall, were occupied by the military, and on
August 3 the hussar regiment moved out and on August 8 the von
Manstein regiment also left the city . Ultimately, Schleswig
suffered around 270 casualties in the First World War, for whom a
memorial made of gray granite was erected in 1920 in the cathedral
cemetery and in 1926 on the corner of Flensburger Strasse and
Neuwerkstrasse.
During the Weimar Republic, Count Ulrich von
Brockdorff-Rantzau from Schleswig became the first Foreign Minister
of the young German Republic. Mainly the Social Democrats, the
National Liberals and the German Nationals were elected (as an
example the result of the Reichstag election on May 20, 1928 -
11,557 voters in Schleswig, votes SPD 3,300, DVP 2,120, DNVP 1,313,
DDP 810). During the Kapp Putsch at the beginning of 1920, fighting
broke out in Schleswig between the garrison in Gottorf Castle, which
had joined the anti-democratic coup attempt, and armed workers loyal
to the government. In 1936 a memorial stone was erected on the
castle to commemorate the putschists who were killed in the process.
Supplemented by an explanatory inscription, this stone is still in
place today.
The NSDAP also had a strong base in Schleswig
early on. In 1925, the Schleswig local group of the party was
formed, whose members initially mostly came from rural areas
(Fahrdorf, Busdorf, Tolk). In the Reichstag election of July 1932,
the NSDAP received 50.7 percent of the vote, more than all other
political groups combined. At the end of 1932 the local NSDAP group
had 700 members. One reason for this success was also the situation
of the local newspaper market, which was dominated by the
Schleswiger Nachrichten. From 1930 the newspaper developed into a
mouthpiece for the NSDAP and thus contributed to making National
Socialism a majority in Schleswig. In addition, there was the high
affinity of the agricultural functionaries in the city and district
of Schleswig to the NSDAP.
During the twelve years of the “Third Reich” around 4,000 people
from Schleswig were members of the NSDAP. From 1933 to 1937 the
barracks were built on the freedom. Furthermore, in 1935 the
original colors of the city arms of Schleswig were changed from
blue-red to blue-gold. Heraldic principles are said to have been
decisive for this.
In 1935, the fishing settlement of Holm,
surrounded by water, was connected to Fischbrückstraße and the ditch
was filled in. With the construction of Knud-Laward-Straße as an
access to the barracks, the Holm has not been an island since then.
Communists, Social Democrats and Jews were persecuted by the
National Socialists and deported to concentration or extermination
camps. Several hundred patients from the Hesterberg and Stadtfeld
sanatoriums, including over 200 children, were also murdered as part
of the euthanasia program.
In the second half of the war
there were 15 camps for forced laborers with a total of around 500
places in Schleswig. The mostly Polish and Soviet forced laborers
were mostly employed in smaller companies, but around 80 of them
worked in the Oellerking rope and tarpaulin factory, mainly for
military needs.
The militarily insignificant Schleswig was
largely spared from the bombing of the Allies during the Second
World War. Various monuments (including the larger than life-size
Bismarck statue from Rathausmarkt, the cannon monument to Kaiser
Wilhelm I at the government building, the bronze figures from the
Reventlou-Beseler monument in front of the district court, the
Germania monument on upper Michaelis-Allee) were melted down to save
them To be able to use metal for war production. The monuments were
never restored even after the war ended. Instead of the Bismarck
monument, a fountain now adorns Schleswig's market square.
On
May 4, 1945, Hans-Georg von Friedeburg signed the surrender of all
German troops in northwest Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark on
behalf of the last Reich President Karl Dönitz, who had previously
resigned in Flensburg-Mürwik with the last Reich government. In the
days that followed, the city of Schleswig was also occupied by
British troops.
From May 10, 1945, the British confiscated
numerous buildings to accommodate their soldiers, including many
villas for the accommodation of English officers. On May 12th,
Gottorf Castle and its entire inventory were confiscated by the
British, on May 16 the Seefliegerhorst auf der Freiheit, Gewese
Luisenbad and its bathing beach, the boat sheds of the
Schleisegelclub and the beach hall. Furthermore, the owners of
private sailing boats had to make their ships available. The
Michaeliskirche served as an English garrison church since May 16.
By February 1948, the British seized a total of 151 houses with
2,490 rooms and 73,556 m² of living space, including 59 private
houses with 456 rooms. As a result of the confiscations, 1,800
people had to be housed elsewhere.
Schleswig had 26,213
inhabitants in the post-war period. In addition, there were 9,767
refugees from the former German eastern regions and evacuees from
the bombed cities, a total of around 36,000 people. Due to food
shortages, there was great hunger throughout the city.
On
October 12, 1945, the British occupying forces imposed a ban on
flags with Danish or Schleswig-Holstein colors to prevent conflict
of nationalities. After the Second World War, the Danish minority
made efforts to join the Kingdom of Denmark. Since the members of
the Danish minority received food aid from Scandinavia, residents
who professed to be part of the Danish minority after the end of
National Socialism were suspected by German-minded people of purely
material motives and insulted as "bacon Danes".
As a result
of the conversion of the Prussian province of Schleswig-Holstein
into a German federal state by the British military government from
1946, Schleswig lost its prominent role among the cities of
Schleswig-Holstein and Kiel became the state capital. Plans to move
the University of Kiel to Schleswig for this purpose were not
implemented. The British soldiers were later replaced by the
Norwegian military as the occupying power.
The first municipal election in the new federal state of
Schleswig-Holstein took place on October 24, 1948. In Schleswig, an
electoral alliance between the CDU and SPD won. This achieved a
total of 12,286 votes in Schleswig. The SSW, as a party of the
Danish minority, received 7187 votes from the entire population and
the left-wing extremist KPD 305 votes. As a result, 20 German and 7
Danish-minded members were elected to the city council. Of the 20
German representatives, 12 belonged to the CDU and 8 to the SPD. Due
to the clear German election victory, the city hall and the
cathedral tower then hoisted the blue, white and red national colors
that the military government had recently approved.
To
compensate for the loss of political and administrative functions as
the state capital, Schleswig also became the seat of the Higher
Regional Court, the State Archives, the State Museum for Art and
Cultural History and the State Archaeological Museum after the
Second World War. Schleswig is thus today a cultural and judicial
center of the federal state of Schleswig-Holstein.