The Osterwald is a ridge (up to ) in the

Calenberg Uplands The Calenberg Uplands

Nesselberg The Nesselberg is a ridge up to high in the Calenberg Highland which, together with the Kleiner Deister and the Osterwald, forms a group of three contiguous hill regions in the northwestern part of the Leine Uplands. It lies between Altenhagen I ...

and the

Kleiner Deister The Kleiner Deister is a ridge of hills (up to ) in the Calenberg Uplands which, together with the Nesselberg and the Osterwald, forms a group of three adjacent hill ranges in the northern part of the Leine Uplands. It lies between Springe and Elda ...

forms a unified group of three adjacent ranges in the

Leine Uplands The Leine Uplands (german: Leinebergland, ) is a region in Germany's Central Uplands which forms a part of the Lower Saxon Hills and lies along the River Leine between Göttingen and Hanover. It borders on the Weser Uplands in the west, the Inners ...

. It lies between

Coppenbrügge Coppenbrügge is a municipality in the Hamelin-Pyrmont district, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated approximatively 15 km (10 miles) east of Hamelin. The Municipality covers the following villages: * Bäntorf * Behrensen * Bessingen * B ...

Eldagsen Springe is a town in the district of Hanover, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated near the Deister hills, southwest of Hanover. Town structure * Springe (core settlement, seat of the mayor), population 13,184 * Bennigsen, population 4, ...

and

Elze Elze () is a town in the district of Hildesheim, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated on the river Leine, approximately west of Hildesheim. The municipality of Elze also comprises the villages of ''Esbeck, Mehle, Sehlde, Sorsum, Wittenburg'' ...

in the North German state of

Lower Saxony Lower Saxony (german: Niedersachsen ; nds, Neddersassen; stq, Läichsaksen) is a German state (') in northwestern Germany. It is the second-largest state by land area, with , and fourth-largest in population (8 million in 2021) among the 16 ...

Geography

The Osterwald is located in the

Calenberg Uplands The Calenberg Uplands

north of the Leine Uplands that border on the

Calenberg Land The Calenberg Land (german: Calenberger Land) is a historic landscape southwest of Hanover in Germany, roughly formed by the countryside between the Leine and the Deister hills. The name of this region comes from the Principality of Calenberg rule ...

there. It lies about halfway between

Hamelin Hamelin ( ; german: Hameln ) is a town on the river Weser in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Hamelin-Pyrmont and has a population of roughly 57,000. Hamelin is best known for the tale of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. H ...

in the west and

Hildesheim Hildesheim (; nds, Hilmessen, Hilmssen; la, Hildesia) is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany with 101,693 inhabitants. It is in the district of Hildesheim, about southeast of Hanover on the banks of the Innerste River, a small tributary of the Lei ...

in the east and between the villages of

in the southwest and

in the north and

in the east. In terms of natural regions it belongs to the

Lower Saxon Hills The Lower Saxon Hills (german: Niedersächsisches Bergland) are one of the 73 natural regions in Germany defined by the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN). Geographically it covers roughly the same area as the Weser Uplands (german: Weserb ...

and borders on the Calenberg Loess Börde in the north and east. The districts of

and

Hameln-Pyrmont Hameln-Pyrmont is a districts of Germany, district (''Landkreis'') in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is bounded by (from the north and clockwise) the districts of Schaumburg, Hanover (district), Hanover, Hildesheim (district), Hildesheim and Holzminde ...

and the region of

Hanover Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the 13th-largest city in Germany as well as the fourth-largest city in Northern Germany ...

meet near the Triangular Rock (''Dreieckiger Stein'') not far from the Shepherd's Hut (''Sennhütte''). On the southern rim of the Osterwald is the eponymous village of

Osterwald Osterwald is a community and part of the Joint Community (''Samtgemeinde'') of Neuenhaus in the district of Grafschaft Bentheim in Lower Saxony. The community consists of the centres of Osterwald, Alte Piccardie and Hohenkörben (Veldhausen parish ...

in the municipality of

Salzhemmendorf Salzhemmendorf is a village and a municipality in the Hamelin-Pyrmont district, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated approximately 20 km east of Hamelin and 31 km west of Hildesheim Hildesheim (; nds, Hilmessen, Hilmssen; la, Hild ...

. The Osterwald spreads southeast of the valley of the Gehlenbach and Gelbbach streams, through which the state road (the ''

Landesstraße ''Landesstraßen'' (singular: ''Landesstraße'') are roads in Germany and Austria that are, as a rule, the responsibility of the respective German or Austrian federal state. The term may therefore be translated as "state road". They are roads t ...

'' 422) runs from Coppenbrügge in the southwest to Eldagsen. Immediately north-northwest of this valley is the hill of

. On the other, southern, side of Coppenbrügge is the knife-edge ridge of the

Ith The Ith () is a ridge in Germany's Central Uplands which is up to 439 m high. It lies about 40 km southwest of Hanover and, at 22 kilometres, is the longest line of crags in North Germany. Geography Location The Ith is immediatel ...

Hydrography

Numerous streams rise in the Osterwald, their waters flowing through the

Haller Haller is a surname of English and German origin. It is the last name of: * Albin Haller (1849–1925), French chemist * Albrecht von Haller (1708–1777), Swiss anatomist and physiologist, also notable for his contributions to botany * Albrecht v ...

and the

Saale The Saale (), also known as the Saxon Saale (german: Sächsische Saale) and Thuringian Saale (german: Thüringische Saale), is a river in Germany and a left-bank tributary of the Elbe. It is not to be confused with the smaller Fränkische Saale, ...

into the

Leine The Leine (; Old Saxon ''Lagina'') is a river in Thuringia and Lower Saxony, Germany. It is a left tributary of the Aller and the Weser and is long. The river's source is located close to the town of Leinefelde in Thuringia. About downriver, t ...

. The only exception is a stream that starts west of the ''Fast'' and passes through the Gelbbach and the Hamel into the

River Weser The Weser () is a river of Lower Saxony in north-west Germany. It begins at Hannoversch Münden through the confluence of the Werra and Fulda. It passes through the Hanseatic city of Bremen. Its mouth is further north against the ports of Bre ...

Places of interest

Monastery

On the eastern side of the Osterwald, behind the large, former monastic estate, lies Wülfinghausen Abbey, founded in the 12th century. The present abbey buildings only date to the beginning of the 18th century, however, thanks to several major fires. Since 1994 it has been occupied by a Protestant community of seven sisters.

Hillfort

About 1 kilometre west of Wülfinghausen Abbey on a spur-shaped foothill of the Osterwald is the ruined castle of Barenburg. This was a

hillfort A hillfort is a type of earthwork used as a fortified refuge or defended settlement, located to exploit a rise in elevation for defensive advantage. They are typically European and of the Bronze Age or Iron Age. Some were used in the post-Roma ...

site with an internal area of 5.5 hectares. The site is located in a strategically favourable position, because two sides are naturally protected by steep, rock faces and slopes. To the south security is provided by a roughly 300 metre long stone rampart with an outer rampart and protective ditches. Because no excavations have been carried out to date and there are no known finds, the construction period of the site has only been estimated as being in the pre-Roman

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...

. It could have been used as a

refuge castle A refuge castleCreighton, Oliver (2015). ''Early European Castles''. Bloomsbury. or refuge fort (german: Fliehburg, also ''Fluchtburg'', ''Volksburg'', ''Bauernburg'' or ''Vryburg'') is a castle-like defensive location, usually surrounded by rampa ...

until the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

, because it was part of the estate of the monastery.

Mining

Up to the mid-20th century

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

and

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dea ...

were mined in the Osterwald. Coal mining had a more-than-400-year-old tradition. The first prospecting for coal was carried out in 1585 by order of Duke

Julius of Brunswick The gens Julia (''gēns Iūlia'', ) was one of the most prominent patrician families in ancient Rome. Members of the gens attained the highest dignities of the state in the earliest times of the Republic. The first of the family to obtain the ...

.Steinkohleabbau im Osterwald, Calenberger Zeitung vom 13 October 2006 p. 13 Today the

Hüttenstollen Osterwald The Hüttenstollen, also Straßberger Hüttenstollen, was the central drainage adit in the Straßberg mining field and was also part of the Lower Harz Pond and Ditch System in the Harz Mountains of Germany. The adit lies at a depth of 50 m and is ...

is a

visitor mine A mine, i.e. an industrial facility for the underground extraction of mineral commodities, has three operating phases: it may be open or running, or closed or it may be a working museum. Most mines are simply closed once they are no longer product ...

and

museum A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make these ...

. In the Osterwald a Wealden Sandstone known as Osterwald Sandstone was broken and used extensively in the region as well as in the area of

in the

Gründerzeit (; "founders' period") was the economic phase in 19th-century Germany and Austria before the great stock market crash of 1873. In Central Europe, the age of industrialisation had been taking place since the 1840s. That period is not precisely ...

period.

Hills

The hills and elevations of the Osterwald include the following − with heights in metres above sea level (NN): * Fast (419.2 m) * Hoher Stuhl, 391.0 m * Ahrensberg, ca. 365 m * Ritterkreuz, ca. 360 m * Hohlenberg, 358.0 m * Hainholz, 298.0 m * Großer Rotehengst, 268.1 m * Limberg, 182.0 m * Kendelke, 141 m {{colend

Villages near the Osterwald

Dörpe Dörpe is a small river of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It flows into the Wupper near Hückeswagen. See also *List of rivers of North Rhine-Westphalia A list of rivers of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany: A * Aa, left tributary of the M� ...

* Ikenburg * Salzburg (with forester's lodge) *

Osterwald (Salzhemmendorf) Salzhemmendorf is a village and a municipality in the Hamelin-Pyrmont district, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated approximately 20 km east of Hamelin and 31 km west of Hildesheim Hildesheim (; nds, Hilmessen, Hilmssen; la, Hild ...

* Mehle * Oldendorf (Salzhemmendorf) with its hamlet of "Glashütte" * Sorsum * Wittenburg (with forester's lodge) * Klostergut Wülfinghausen * Farrensen (with forester's lodge) * Holtensen

References

External links

Information sheet on Hainholz Quarry
(pdf file; 227 kB) Central Uplands Ridges of Lower Saxony Hanover (region) Natural regions of the Weser-Leine Uplands