Page - 233 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

14 Harbourscapes 233 Fig. 3:Haithabu, developmentpha- sesof theharbour basedonarchaeo- logical excavations. bridgeheads, this offeredmooring possibilities for shipswith a deeper draught, and also of- fered smaller boats the possibility ofmooring alongside. It is conceivable that in this way a spatial separationof local and long-distance shippingwas formed. According to Kalmring, the use of the harbour area for the dumping of wastemeant that the necessarywater depth for appropriate shipswas gradually reduced until it was no longer available.22 This is theonlyexplanation for the furtherdevelopments that tookplaceat theend of the 10th andbeginningof the 11thcenturies, afterwhich thepier compriseda surface areaof 1475m2. In this case, there was less dumping of waste from the settlement, and rather more ‘commercialwaste’. This includedshippingequipmentandballastweights, aswell as evidence ofmaintenance and repair work for ships and the port buildings. Last but not least, a certain amount of cargowent overboardduring the loadingandunloadingprocesses. The geophysical testing and systematic inspectionof theHalbkreiswallbegun in the 2000s have yet to provide evidenceof any free spaces that couldhave served as amarketplace. This, and other comparable finds, gave Kalmring reason to accept the idea of a harbour market. DetlevEllmersused the termUfermarkt (beachmarket) tosignifygeneralareaswithevidenceof tradeorbartering.23However,Kalmring inparticularhasmade theeffort tocreatedifferentiated terminology. Harbour markets are markets located within port facilities;24 in contrast, beach markets are specifically connectedwith the actual landing places. The harbourmarket ofHai- thabuwould have been situated on the platforms themselves. The almost closed-off area, as well as the characteristic nature and distribution of finds such as coins andweights here, all support this theory. Furthermore, the platforms also offered space for storage and the display of goods –whether short-term for products like canvas and fabrics, or long-term, asmight be assumed for ballastweights. While there is ample evidence of the economic and related logistical functions of the port, its further uses are amatter of speculation, or rather very difficult to prove. Thus, aharbour is alwaysa judicial space, or itmaybeused formilitarypurposes. Social differentiationsarepart of everyday life in theport, just as theport itselfhasaplacewithinanecological system.These variedandinpart interwovenusesmaybediscussedwithreferencetoparticular findsorgroups of finds, but it is still not easy tomove fromgeneral statements to real knowledge in terms of individual cases. The harbour of Haithabuwas an urban space since at least the 10th century, indistinguishable at first glance from the rest of the urban structures surrounding it. This 22 Kalmring 2010, 440. 23 Ellmers 1990, 104–107. 24 Kalmring 2010, 443–448.