Page - 265 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

Gabriel Zeilinger 16 Water asanEconomicResourceandasan Environmental ChallengeWithin theUrbanisation Processof theRhineValley in the 13th Century Abstract:Themedieval urbanisationof Europe, not least in itsmanifestation in the regionpre- sentedhere, embraced thewholenatural landscapeaswell as the social landscape.Water–as an indispensable prerequisite for human settlement –was a recurring topic for urbanmagis- trates– even in the relativelyhumid regionsnorth of theAlps. In this contribution, exemplary aquatic aspects of the urbanisation of the Upper andMiddle Rhine Valley in the 13th century will be examined. The analysis shows oncemore howmany facets and forms ofwater had to bemadeuseof, regulatedandnegotiated inpolitical conflicts–betweentownlordsandtowns- people and within the communes. But also the environmental challenges which particularly floods (in themselvesoftena falloutofdeforestation forurbanisation)posedfor townsare taken into account. In doing so, themethodological problemswith the scarcity of given sources in this relatively earlyurbaneraof theMiddleAges (in this region) areweighed throughout. Water was – and still is – an indispensable prerequisite for human culture and settlement,1 evenmore so of denser settlement in towns. To provide for the dietary, commercial, and the transport-relateddemandforaccess towaterwasamajor task formedievalurbanmagistrates– evenintherelativelyhumidregionsnorthof theAlps.Butwaterwasnotonlyasourceofenergy ofdifferentkinds tobeused, itwasalsoanatural force tobe reckonedwithand tobeconfined. And, thirdlybutnot least,water, or rather the rights tomakeuseof it,wasalsoabattlefield for powers on different levels of society.2 Thus, water is – or rather should bemore of – a core aspectofpre-modernurbanhistory.3ThemedievalurbanisationofEurope,not least itsmanifes- tation intheregionpresentedhere,which is–moreconcisely–theUpperandtheMiddleRhine Valley (i.e. betweenBasel andBonn), included inmanyways thewhole natural landscape as wellas thesocial landscape.4This isnotonlyapostulationbymodernresearch;eventhemedie- val contemporaries could see that connection: around 1300, an anonymous chronicler within the ranks of the then still relatively young Dominican convent in Colmar wrote a fascinating report in Latin on the ‘conditions inAlsace at the beginning of the 13th century’.5 In this quite remarkabledescription,which intends,not least, topointout thepositiveeffectsof theDomini- cans’ arrival in that historic landscape on the left bank of the Upper Rhine, the Anonymous coversawhole rangeof topics fromIntellectualandEcclesiastical toCulturalandevenEnviron- mental History. Amongmany other things, he points out that Strasbourg and Basel – the old Roman and Episcopal cities, respectively, on the River Rhine –were still ‘poor in their walls andbuildings’ around100yearspreviously, ‘still poorer in termsofprivatehomes’. Therewere few fortified houses andhardly anywindows therewhichwould carry the light into them.He goeson to state thatColmar, Schlettstadt (Séléstat), Rufach (Rouffach),Mülhausen (Mulhouse) and other smaller settlements ‘were not even cities then’ – around 1200 – implying (and for everyone to be seen) that theywerenow, around 1300. This passage captures in anutshell the rapid and relatively dense urbanisation of his region, Alsace, where, in the course of the 1 Huber-Rebenich et al. 2017. 2 Schubert 2002, 65–107. 3 Cf. e.g. theolder publicationMaschke–Sydow1978. 4 Cf. e.g. Schreg 2013 for the supra-local, even rural consequences of urbanisation. 5 ‘De rebusAlsaticis ineuntis saeculiXIII’, in:Pertz 1861, 232–237.The followingquotes inEnglishare theauthor’s translationof theLatin edition. OpenAccess.©2020Gabriel Zeilinger, publishedbyDeGruyter. Thiswork is licensedunder theCreative CommonsAttribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives4.0 License. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110677065-016