Page - 186 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

186 ElisabethGruber fishmarket or at theGraben. In themeantime, archaeological explorations have been able to retrace the routingof individual channels.29 The towncouncils had todealwith legal andeco- logical aspects of trades that neededwater andwhosewastewater had to bedischarged,with the shops of leather workers, tanners, or butchers being themain causes of water pollution. Complaintsaboutblockedor smelly sewers,dirtywateror rainwater splashing fromneighbour- inghousespresumablywerearecurringproblem, inparticular in theneighbourhoodofbathing facilities.Vienna, for instance,hadabout25 to30bathsbetween the14thand the16thcenturies, distributed over thewhole city; a fewwere also in the suburbs. In the inner city, these places mostlywereatmarketcornersandimportantstreets,withsevenontheAlserbach,asmallbrook running through the city. This, however, changedduring the 15th century,when thebrookwas diverted into themoat.What remainedwas the topographical description ‘at the former bath- house’.30Asprominentandgenerallyknownpointsof orientation,bathswereused invirtually all towns and cities as a spatial reference to describe the topographical position of individual buildings. ‘Opposite theHöllbath’ inKrems isonlyoneofnumerousexamplesof thiskindused inmunicipal deeds to describe locations.31 Only scarce information exists on the bathsmen- tioned in the 14th century for Krems and Stein: the Höll bath, the bath on theReisperbach (a brook) andone inStein.32 In 1396,HansderBader for theHöll bathpurchasedavineyard from Josef fromYbbsandhiswife, bothburghers inKremsandmembersof the Jewishcommunity.33 The example of Mautern on the Danube shows another problem a settlement on a river could be confronted with. Originally located on the northern side of the town wall near the Danube, the local bathhousewas literally flushed away. Anote in the deedof foundation suc- cinctly states: per Danubium effluxum.34 There is evidence that a number of settlements that were originallymentioned indeeds of foundation and chronicles of the 12th century as posses- sionsofGöttweigAbbeycouldnot stand the recurring floodingover timeandwereabandoned. An island in theDanubementioned in 1108with the name ‘MutheimerWerd’, which later be- came the property of theBenedictineAbbey ofGöttweig,was flooded several times during the centuries. Inthe18thcentury itwas finallyabandoned.35ThesettlementofKlebdorfnearHollen- burg, whichwasmentioned in the deed of foundation of the Göttweig church, met the same fatewhen itwasabandonedalready in the 14th centurydue to repeatedDanube flooding.36The Danube also swept away the settlements of Marquardsurfahr and Strunzenreut further down- stream.37ChristianRohr’s surveyonextremenaturalphenomenadealswith theeffectsofdisas- trous environmental events – like floods – on urban administrations in Austrian towns in a comprehensiveway.38 The topographical locationofKremsat the confluenceof a tributary to theDanube led toa number of other tasks regarding water management. Several entries in the account books of the townofKrems reported, during the 15th century, expenses forwooden constructions in the Kremsfluss (a brook). Thewoodenpiles fixed in thewater close to the inner townbridge over the streamprobably served to safelymove and pull ashore logs transported on thewater and toprotectman-madestructuresagainst colliding ice floats.39Woodenconstructions forembark- 29 Smetaczek 2005; Sudera 2005;Krause et al. inpress. 30 Hötzel 2016, 82–86;Horn 2005. 31 Brugger–Wiedl 2010, 70no.589 (1347May 20). 32 Kühnel 1967, 21. 33 Brugger–Wiedl 2018, 169no.2115 (1396May 28). 34 Maroli –Plöckinger 1983–1985, 179. 35 Fuchs 1901a, 32no. 18. 36 Fuchs 1901a, 6no.5. 37 Fuchs 1901a, 95no.83. 38 Rohr 2004;Rohr 2007;Rohr 2013. 39 Jaritz 1976, 24.