Page - 229 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

UlrichMüller 14 Harbourscapes ThreeExamples fromEarly toHighMedievalNorthern Europe Abstract: The port as an interface between the town and its (maritime-fluvial) hinterland is a place of complex spatial interactions. Habourscapes take thismultidimensionality andmulti- vocality into account. In this paper, the concept of habourscapes is presented to describe the multidimensionality of ports as anurbanarea. Starting fromAppadurais’ concepts of (-)spaces and (-)flows, the contribution attempts to explore five ‘scapes’ to presentmultiple interwoven practices.This isdoneusingthreeexamples(Haithabu,Schleswig,Lübeck),whichparadigmati- cally represent specific ‘developmentphases’ of urbanity aswell as specific ‘port types’. In the travel journal of the Norwegianmerchant Ottar and the Anglo-SaxonWulfstan, which was inserted into a translationof PaulusOrosius’Historiarumadversumpaganosmadearound 890,we findevidenceof one journeymadebyWulfstan in thegeographical introductory chap- ter: Sciringes heale he cwæðþæt he seglode on f dagan to þæmporte þætmon hætætHæþum, se stentbetuhWinedum7Seaxum7Angle 7hyrð inonDene.1HelmoldvonBosaucompletedhis Slavenchronik (Chronica Slavorum) around 1167. After the Slavic centre of Bukuwas destroyed, CountAdolf II vonSchauenburg sought out a locationwhere anewcitymight be founded.He chose a 13mhighmoraine, set between the Trave andWakenitz rivers. In the year 1143, there wasaport at this location:Videns igitur industrius vir competetiam loci portumquenobilemcepit illic edificarecivitatemvocavitqueeamLubeke,eoquonon longeabessetaveteriportuet civitate, quamHenricusprincepsolimconstituerat.2 In theSchleswig towncharter laws, codifiedcirca in 1200, the Schlei inlet is noted as a royal bodyofwater in §86.3Whoevermightwish to erect a buildingon thewaterfrontneeded theapprovalof thebailiff.Whether travel journal, chronicle, or legal written source, all three of these historical documents not only name concrete geo- graphical locations, theyalsoallmention theport as an interfacebetween the seaand the city. According toCarsten Jahnke, aport is a rechtlichdefinierterLandungsplatzaneinemGewässerabschnitt […].Die rechtlicheEntwicklungdesHafenbegrif- fes istmit derAusbildungdes Stadtrechts verbunden. ImHafen gewährte der Landesherr periodisch oder ganz- jährig FremdenKaufmannschutz [und]Marktschutz […] sowohl auf demLandals auch zuWasser. Dieses setzt gefestigteVorstellungenüber die Eigentumsverhältnisse über Flüsse, dasMeer unddie Strände voraus.4 Portandharbourcitieshavebeencentres for trade, culture,andcommercesince time immemo- rial.Wulfstan andHelmold showus that the location of a harbour plays a decisive role: geo- graphical factors suchasaccessibility andwater-depth, currents, andwind favour thedevelop- ment of a port. However, both of these texts, aswell as the Schleswig towncharter, show that apolitical culture favouringmaritime trade canalsopromote this development. Urbanagglomerationscanbe identifiedas ‘hubs’withindynamicnetworks.Byconstituting foci of cultural, social, political and economic forms of interaction, ‘urbanscapes’ stand out 1 ‘From Sciringes heal he says that he sailed for five days to the port town that was calledHaepum (Hedeby), which is locatedamongst theWendsandSaxonsandAngles and is property of theDanes’. Batley 2007, 47. 2 Helmold 1, 57, 8–16. 3 Jessen 1996. 4 ‘[…] legallydefinedmooring locatedbyabodyofwater […].The legaldevelopmentof the ideaofaport isbound to thedevelopmentof themunicipal laws.Arulercouldextendperiodicalorall-year-roundprotectionto foreigners engaged inmerchantor tradeactivities,on theshoreaswellasonthewater.This requiresset conceptsconcerning theownership rightsheldover rivers, the sea, and shore’. Jahnke 2011, 649–652. OpenAccess.©2020UlrichMüller, publishedbyDeGruyter. Thiswork is licensedunder theCreativeCommons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives4.0 License. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110677065-014