Galgeninsel

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Galgeninsel
Galgeninsel.png
The Galgeninsel. Foreground: the bridge in Lindau. Antoni Remm, 1579
Geography
Coordinates 47°33′00″N9°42′14″E / 47.55000°N 9.70389°E / 47.55000; 9.70389 Coordinates: 47°33′00″N9°42′14″E / 47.55000°N 9.70389°E / 47.55000; 9.70389
Adjacent bodies of waterBay of Reutin, Obersee, Bodensee
Area0.0016 km2 (0.00062 sq mi)
Length0.066 km (0.041 mi)
Width0.046 km (0.0286 mi)
Administration
1836 map showing the Galgeninsel still clearly as an island Lindau 2-Blatt 852.jpg
1836 map showing the Galgeninsel still clearly as an island

The Galgeninsel is a peninsula on the shore of Lake Constance near Lindau in the Bay of Reutin in Germany.

Peninsula A piece of land that is bordered by water on three sides but connected to mainland.

A peninsula is a landform surrounded by water on the majority of its border while being connected to a mainland from which it extends. The surrounding water is usually understood to be continuous, though not necessarily named as a single body of water. Peninsulas are not always named as such; one can also be a headland, cape, island promontory, bill, point, fork, or spit. A point is generally considered a tapering piece of land projecting into a body of water that is less prominent than a cape. A river which courses through a very tight meander is also sometimes said to form a "peninsula" within the loop of water. In English, the plural versions of peninsula are peninsulas and, less commonly, peninsulae.

Lake Constance lake in Germany, Switzerland and Austria

Lake Constance is a lake on the Rhine at the northern foot of the Alps, and consists of three bodies of water: the Obersee or Upper Lake Constance, the Untersee or Lower Lake Constance, and a connecting stretch of the Rhine, called the Seerhein. These waterbodies lie within the Lake Constance Basin, which is part of the Alpine Foreland and through which the Rhine flows.

Germany Federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe

Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central and Western Europe, lying between the Baltic and North Seas to the north and the Alps, Lake Constance and the High Rhine to the south. It borders Denmark to the north, Poland and the Czech Republic to the east, Austria and Switzerland to the south, France to the southwest, and Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands to the west.

Contents

Geography

The Galgeninsel peninsula lies 550 metres east of the island of Hoy and about 200 metres south of the loading sidings of Reutin's goods yard, and covers an area of around 1,600 square metres. The territory of the peninsula belongs to the borough of Lindau and Gemarkung of Reutin.

Island Any piece of sub-continental land that is surrounded by water

An island or isle is any piece of sub-continental land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. An island in a river or a lake island may be called an eyot or ait, and a small island off the coast may be called a holm. A grouping of geographically or geologically related islands is called an archipelago, such as the Philippines.

Hoy (Lake Constance) island in Lake Constance, Germany

Hoy is an uninhabited island in Lake Constance in Germany. It lies 400 metres east of the island of Lindau in the Bay of Reutin and 100 metres south of the lakeshore near the mouth of the Oberreitnauer Ach.

A Gemarkung is a parcel of land recorded in the cadastre in the countries of Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Gemarkung registers record the parcels' location, usage and geomorphology and the like qualities, however, the rights to the land are kept in the Grundbuch. A Gemarkung is made up of a number of, usually contiguous, plots of urban (Grundstücke) or rural land (Flurstücke). Between the levels of Flurstück and Gemarkung is often found the level of Flur, usually a tract of open land or forest.

History

The Galgeninsel was originally the island on which the gallows of the Free Imperial City of Lindau stood. Even today, a hole can be seen in a mighty stone block which once held the heavy gallows post. A 16th-century map still shows the Galgeninsel as an island, but not in the correct geographical location. A view of the town dating to the early 18th century gives no indication of whether it was an island or peninsula at that time, because it only appears at the edge of the picture. An 1836 map still clearly shows the Galgeninsel as an island or several islands. [1] Later maps show the Galgeninsel as a peninsula. By 1856, the remains of a prehistoric settlement were observed in the lake near the Galgeninsel. More recent investigations, as part of the planned expansion of the goods year in 2005, did not yield archaeological finds however. The Galgeninsel and the surrounding Bay of Reutin (Reutiner Bucht) have been designated as a nature reserve.

Gallows structure for execution

A gallows is a frame, typically wooden, from which objects can be hung or “weighed.” Gallows were thus widely used for public weighing scales for large objects such as sacks of grain or minerals, usually positioned in markets or toll gates. The term was also used for a framework from which an ship’s anchor might be raised so that it no longer sat on the bottom, i.e., “weighing [the] anchor.” In modern usage it has come to mean almost exclusively a scaffold or gibbet used for execution by hanging.

<i>Naturschutzgebiet</i> nature reserve in Germany, category of protected area within German Federal Conservation Law

A Naturschutzgebiet is a category of protected area within Germany's Federal Nature Conservation Act . Although often translated as 'Nature Reserve' in English, the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN) refers to them as 'Nature Conservation Areas'.

There is a story of a macabre test which a criminal who was under the death sentence had to undergo. His arms were tied tightly across his back, he was released on Galgeninsel and marched towards Inselstadt, which was a few hundred metres away. The criminal succeeded in making his way through the water, which is deep even at low tide, and reached the mainland. He thus regained is life and freedom.

Lindau (island) island

On the island of Lindau in the eastern Lake Constance is the Altstadt of the Bavarian county town of Lindau, which occupies the eastern part of the island. The island of Lindau, which forms 2% of the area and 12% of the population of the entire town, is one of the town's ten administrative districts. The district is just called Insel ("Island").

The last person to be sentenced as a result of the witch trials in Lindau was Maria Madlener. She was executed by sword on 4 August 1730 on the Galgeninsel.

In 2017 the Galgeninsel was the setting of the German TV film, Die Toten vom Bodensee – Der Wiederkehrer.

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References

  1. "Die Urpositionsblätter der Landvermessung in Bayern – Lindau II und Umgebung im Jahre 1836; Blatt 852" (JPG; 307 KiB). Bayerische-landesbibliothek-online.de (in German). Bayerische Landesbibliothek Online. Retrieved 2015-02-24.

Literature