The Erdmannshöhle is a stalactite or flowstone cave in the village
Hasel between
Schopfheim
Schopfheim is a town in the district of Lörrach in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated on the river Wiese, 10 km north of Rheinfelden, and 13 km east of Lörrach.
The town is the birthplace of Gisela Oeri, Max Picard, and A ...
and
Wehr Wehr may refer to:
* WEHR, a former radio station owned by Penn State University
* Wehr, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
* Wehr, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany
* Wehr, a village in Selfkant, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
People with the surname
* D ...
, 20 km east of
Lörrach
Lörrach () is a town in southwest Germany, in the valley of the Wiese, close to the French and the Swiss borders. It is the capital of the district of Lörrach in Baden-Württemberg. It is the home of a number of large employers, including the ...
in
Baden-Württemberg
Baden-Württemberg (; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million inhabitants across a ...
in
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
.
[Black Forest]
The Erdmannshöhle in Hasel
/ref>
Name
The word Erdmannshöhle is comparable to earth man's hole and composed of the three German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...
s Erde (earth), Mann (man) and Höhle (cave). Erdmann is also a German forename and a surname. As a forename it was often given to show the connection with the earth.
In the Baroque
The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...
the Republic of Venice
The Republic of Venice ( vec, Repùblega de Venèsia) or Venetian Republic ( vec, Repùblega Vèneta, links=no), traditionally known as La Serenissima ( en, Most Serene Republic of Venice, italics=yes; vec, Serenìsima Repùblega de Venèsia, ...
sent mineralogical prospectors to the countries north of the Alps
The Alps () ; german: Alpen ; it, Alpi ; rm, Alps ; sl, Alpe . are the highest and most extensive mountain range system that lies entirely in Europe, stretching approximately across seven Alpine countries (from west to east): France, Sw ...
to look for the raw materials which were necessary for glassmaking
Glass production involves two main methods – the float glass process that produces sheet glass, and glassblowing that produces bottles and other containers. It has been done in a variety of ways during the history of glass.
Glass container ...
. These prospectors were called "Venetians" everywhere else and only in the Black Forest they were called "Stumm-Männle" (meaning "dumb little men", because they did not speak with the local people) were mostly very small, wore an ankle-long tunic with a hood like the cowl of a monk and carefully avoided contact. These mysterious migrants who worked underground, entered with an empty sack which was filled when they came out of the mountain are obviously the prototype of what the legend turned into the "little men of the earth" who were seeking or hiding treasures in the dark galleries of the mountains.
Legend
In the present case there is a legend which speaks of ''Erdmännlein'': this is the diminutive
A diminutive is a root word that has been modified to convey a slighter degree of its root meaning, either to convey the smallness of the object or quality named, or to convey a sense of intimacy or endearment. A (abbreviated ) is a word-formati ...
of ''Erdmann''. Männlein can be translated as ''manikin'' or ''little man'' (dwarf). ''Erdmännlein'' - or its variant ''Erdmännchen'' - is also the German word for meerkat
MeerKAT, originally the Karoo Array Telescope, is a radio telescope consisting of 64 antennas in the Meerkat National Park, in the Northern Cape of South Africa. In 2003, South Africa submitted an expression of interest to host the Square Kilom ...
, a cute little animal that can resemble a tiny man.
According to the legend the "little men of the earth" who gave their name to the Erdmannshöhle were small men which were hardworking and kind and above all helpful.[Hasel]
Tourism
/ref>
Description
Caves are seldom in the Black Forest
The Black Forest (german: Schwarzwald ) is a large forested mountain range in the state of Baden-Württemberg in southwest Germany, bounded by the Rhine Valley to the west and south and close to the borders with France and Switzerland. It is t ...
, because in the predominant rock
Rock most often refers to:
* Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids
* Rock music, a genre of popular music
Rock or Rocks may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
types, which are granite
Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...
and buntsandstein
The Buntsandstein (German for ''coloured'' or ''colourful sandstone'') or Bunter sandstone is a lithostratigraphy, lithostratigraphic and allostratigraphy, allostratigraphic unit (a sequence of rock strata) in the Subsurface (geology), subsurface ...
, its formation is rare. Very different is the situation in the mountain massif of the Dinkelberg between High Rhine
The High Rhine (german: Hochrhein) is the name used for the part of the Rhine that flows westbound from Lake Constance to Basel. The High Rhine begins at the outflow of the Rhine from the Untersee in Stein am Rhein and turns into the Upper Rhine ...
, Wiese valley and Wehra
Wehra is a river of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It passes through Todtmoos and Wehr and flows into the Rhine downstream of Bad Säckingen.
See also
*List of rivers of Baden-Württemberg
A list of rivers of Baden-Württemberg, Germany:
A
* Aa ...
valley where muschelkalk
The Muschelkalk (German for "shell-bearing limestone"; french: calcaire coquillier) is a sequence of sedimentary rock strata (a lithostratigraphic unit) in the geology of central and western Europe. It has a Middle Triassic (240 to 230 million ye ...
predominates which allows the formation of holes by erosion processes.[Hasel]
Erdmannshöhle
/ref>
The largest stalactite in the cave, which is mentioned in the Guinness Book of Records, has a height of more than 4 meters and is 2 meters thick at the bottom. Its estimated age is about 135000 years.
External links
Welcome to the realm of the little men of the earth! German
English video
Erdmannshoehle-Hasel-stalactite-cave on www.blackforest-tourism.com; English
Opening hours; German
Entrance fees; German
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Erdmannshohle
Caves of Germany
Show caves in Germany
Black Forest
Geography of the Black Forest
Landforms of Baden-Württemberg
Lörrach (district)
Baden