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Since 1930 - our forest mill has a long tradition - up to the fifth generation

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Waiblingen - place of kings and emperors

In the course of the colorful and exciting historical development of Waiblingen, there is a period of time which, due to its lordly character, appears to be particularly intertwined with general European history. It is the period from the 8th to the middle of the 13th century when Waiblingen was the residence of emperors and kings, and the royal families of Salier and Staufer were called the "Heinriche von Waiblingen", and finally Waiblingen was the name of the followers of the Hohenstaufen who lived on in Italy as the Ghibellines for a long time.
* Sönke Lorenz

A short walk through the history of Waiblingen

The location of the later village Waiblingen was extremely favorable for a settlement: very close to the extremely fertile loess areas of the Schmidener Feld on a hill above the river Rems, on the water, but protected from floods. In addition, very centrally in the "Waiblinger Bucht" with the possibility of controlling the access to the Remstal from there (both south along the Schurwald and north around the Korber Kopf).
It is therefore no wonder that many traces of human settlement have been found since the Neolithic Age. During the Roman period there was a pottery near the outdoor swimming pool for a good 100 years (around 150 to 260 AD). This was one of the largest in the Roman Empire north of the Alps, in which crockery was burned for use by soldiers on the Limes (north and east of Lorch in the Remstal).

Waiblingen in the Middle Ages

At the end of the Great Migration from the 5th century AD, people from the Germanic tribe of the Alamanni settled in this area. More than 200 of them were buried (including around Grabenstrasse) west of the watch tower. The name “Waiblingen” (as with many -ingen places) also indicates Alemannic settlers: The settlement of the square, which has not been interrupted since then, begins with them, even if one cannot speak of a “city” for a long time. Later, in AD 496, the Alamanni were defeated by the Franks and thus became part of the Frankish Empire. Christianity came with the Franks: the first Christian church was built on the site of today's Michaelskirche around 750 at the latest, which was responsible for the population in the entire lower Rems Valley (from the later towns of Strümpfelbach to Hegnach and Hohenacker).

At that time Waiblingen seems to have become a kind of administrative center for the Carolingians: The great-grandson of Charlemagne, Emperor Karl III., Held a court day here in 885 and was here several times, like other German Carolingians. A good 140 years later, Waiblingen is owned by the Salier emperors, the "Heinriche von Waiblingen", as they were called. The best known of them, Heinrich IV. ("Walk to Canossa"), married his daughter Agnes in 1079 to the Duke of Swabia, Friedrich I, the builder of Hohenstaufen Castle. So the lower Remstal becomes Staufer possession. And the Hohenstaufen people are now taking the name from the Salians: They proudly call themselves “Waiblinger”, a name that is mainly known in the Italian form “Ghibellines”. The name "Staufer" only came into use later.

It is therefore clear: The Waiblingen square is very closely connected to the German imperial history of the early and high Middle Ages.  Waiblingen  Today it rightly calls itself a Staufer town. From the Staufer period itself, only the lower part of the high watchtower probably comes from; otherwise, as in other historically significant places, the vicissitudes of history have left nothing. After the fall of the Staufer around 1250, the previously open settlement of Waiblingen gradually fell into the hands of the Counts of Württemberg. At the end of the 13th century. she owns one
City wall, a mayor and other typical urban professions. At the time, the people of Württemberg were the only ones to give the young city their own coat of arms, the three stag sticks, as a city seal. Only now can one speak of a “City of Waiblingen”. At the beginning of the 14th century, however, Count Eberhard I chose Stuttgart as his residence. Waiblingen becomes a Württemberg country town like others, and the town shares the fortunes of the county like others. At the beginning of the 14th century, for example, an attempt to become independent from the rule of the counts in the so-called "Reich War" by joining the imperial city of Esslingen failed. On the other hand, the city benefits from the mostly quiet development in the 15th century. There is a lot of construction going on: Waiblingen gets an outer wall ring (Zwingermauer), in accordance with the modern requirements of city defense, with three specially fortified gate towers. The Michaelskirche is greatly enlarged in the late Gothic style to its present form, the Nonnenkirchle chapel is added, as is the infirmary chapel far to the east of the city. A first town hall and the Count's Castle are rebuilt. The castle is often the residence of non-ruling members of the count's family, especially the brothers Ludwig I and Ulrich V.

Waiblingen in modern times

The Peasants' War in 1525 and the introduction of the Reformation by Duke Ulrich in 1534 lead to some unrest in Waiblingen (as in many Württemberg cities). But the catastrophe comes 100 years later in the Thirty Years' War: After the victory of the imperial family near Nördlingen in 1634, they burn the entire city down completely within the city walls. Of around 400 families before the fire, only around 30 survive. Reconstruction begins only hesitantly from 1642; it takes about 150 years until the previous population is reached again.

After the turmoil of the Napoleonic era, people in the 19th century Biedermeier reflect on the supposedly "great times" of the medieval past. The Swabian circle of poets, including Kerner, Mörike and Uhland, gathered in the apartment of the Waiblingen magistrate Karl Mayer on the market. The romantic Achim von Arnim wrote the first historical novel in Germany in 1817, “The Crown Guard”, which began in the Waiblinger Hochwachtturm. But soon the noises of the beginning industrial revolution disturb the idyll: from 1857
The brick industry in Waiblingen (“city of good clay”) flourishes, the silk weaving mill is established, from 1861 the Remstal railway runs, from 1876 the Murrtalbahn. The residential development is now rapidly expanding beyond the city walls in the direction of the two railway lines. Waiblingen's further history in the 19th and 20th centuries largely follows the history of the German Empire, which existed from 1871. Neither from the catastrophic times of the First and Second World Wars nor from the Weimar and Nazi periods can be reported that would stand out in an extraordinary way from the history of other cities.

With a few exceptions, the city was spared bomb damage during World War II. The city shared the difficulties of the post-war period with those of other cities, including the astonishing boom ("economic miracle") after the currency reform of 1948. As a result, industrial activity and the number of inhabitants increased considerably. With the community and district reform 1972-1975 Waiblingen became the "large district town" and the middle center of the Rems-Murr district newly formed from the districts of Backnang and Waiblingen.

A journey through an eventful history

 

The Romans
By shifting their border to the east around 150 AD, the Romans took up most of today's district area. The Upper Germanic Limes ran 35 kilometers from north to south in the east of the district until the Romans were driven out by the Alemanni in 259/260 AD. In the High Middle Ages, an invisible border in the north of the district separated the Swabian from the Franconian tribal language area.

The middle age
The Murrhardt Monastery was built around 800 when the monastery was founded. The Augustinian Canons' Monastery in Backnang was established in 1116 by the Margraves of Baden as a further spiritual branch. The Carolingians can be seen as the first tangible landlords in the district. In the year 885, Emperor Karl III. (the fat one) in Waiblingen.

 

Murrhardt Monastery

 

Eastern fort of the Romans in Welzheim

The Hohenstaufen
Waiblingen came into the hands of Duke Friedrich I of Swabia, the Staufer, before 1100. The Staufer dynasty was the leader in today's district until its decline. After the decline of the Staufer, the Counts of Württemberg managed to gain a foothold in the Hohenstaufen camp, along with other dynasties, from what was probably their first seat in the southwest, the western edge of the Schurwald.

Cradle of the people of Württemberg and Baden
The two ruling families of Württemberg and Baden had their first burial sites here in the Rems-Murr district - the Counts of Wirtemberg in the collegiate church in Beutelsbach, the Margraves of Baden in the collegiate church in Backnang.

 

Collegiate Church in Beutelsbach

 

City of Backnang

Waiblingen official seat
At the end of the Middle Ages, as a territorial state, Württemberg already ruled almost the entire district area. In addition to Asperg, Leonberg and Stuttgart, Waiblingen is one of the four offices that are documented in the oldest warehouse registers of the County of Württemberg from around 1350. Around this time the division of a bailiwick (office) emerged. Since then, Waiblingen has continuously been the seat of an official or district administration.

As a reward for loyalty to Napoleon, Württemberg received not only new parts of the country but also the royal dignity in 1806. New administrative structures created a new division of offices. The area of the Rems-Murr district consists mainly of the four former regional offices of Schorndorf, Waiblingen, Welzheim and Backnang, from which the districts of Waiblingen and Backnang emerged in 1938.

After the district reform came into force in 1973, 31 cities and municipalities formed the Rems-Murr district

The crest

In gold (yellow) between two obliquely left blue wavy strips an obliquely left black deer pole.

The Rems-Murr district, formed in 1973 from the former district of Waiblingen and parts of the former districts of Backnang and Schwäbisch Gmünd, identified the black Württemberg stag in the golden shield and two blue wavy strips representing the rivers Rems and Murr, which were named after them, as figures of its symbol.
The stag bar speaks to the Württemberg past of the district area. At the same time, this heraldic figure is intended to remind us that the Counts of Württemberg formed their territory from Beutelsbach. The Ministry of the Interior awarded the coat of arms on November 4th, 1974.

The use of the district coat of arms is only possible with the written approval of the Rems-Murr-Kreis district office.

 

 

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Envious minds

 

There is a special feature in Waiblingen's old town:

envious people look down on you from many old houses, many menacingly, some friendly.  

 

Description:

In 1831 Alexander Cosmar used the term "Neidkopf" for the first time in folklore literature. He saw a connection between the stone heads and house inscriptions such as: "There are many who neit me but little who clothe me" or "and the Neiter defends so much; so history is what God wants". The word "envy" in the ancient language initially had the meaning "effort", "zeal" or "competition" and then in the Middle Ages it became the term we still use today for "not allowing someone something" or resentment in the sense of " Wish harm ".

The placement. On the one hand, they were house brands, which gave the house a visible character and served strangers as identification marks. On the other hand, the envious people showed a certain wealth of the client. But their real task was to protect against the "evil eye", a damaging spell that could withdraw milk from breastfeeding women or make babies consumptive without any physical contact - simply by looking at them. To avert this gaze, a gesture was used that has been known in all cultures for thousands of years: the bared tongue.

The origin. They were copies of ancient models that - coming from Italy during the Renaissance - were attached to mansions. One, the Gorgoneion, the head of Medusa, was already considered a symbol of defense against evil in ancient times. According to legend, Perseus chops off the head of Medusa and gives it to Athena, who uses him as a visible chest protector. An even older model can be found in the Egyptian auxiliary god Bes. His task was to protect pregnant women from witches and demons. This meaning was known to the people of the Renaissance, as evidenced by a woodcut work by Tobias Voices from 1577. The printing plate is entitled "Gorgoneum Caput" and shows a gorgon made from religious symbols of the Catholic Church. The economic and climatic changes (so-called Little Ice Age) from 1470 to 1750 led to a strengthening of the belief in witches in Northern Europe, the masks were now valued for their defensive function. The wish to protect oneself from witches was quite common: the "relatives" of the jealous heads, the bran puke, who represented the devil, soldier, Turk or Moor, should scare the evil witches and ghosts in order to avoid the contamination of the flour Grain fungus to prevent ergot.

The different envious heads:

Gorgon heads are snake-haired heads with oversized, fixating eyes. The tongue out is clearly visible.

Lion heads are often depicted in conjunction with a "teether". They have been a symbol of strength and a symbol of power for millennia. In Gothic they were an expression of the "angry part of the soul". As an evangelist symbol, the lion stands for Mark.

Wild men and soldiers with long-haired, bearded faces and threatening looks. One suspects the representation of Janissaries, an elite Turkish troop who were not allowed to wear full beards. Mixed faces have grim, wild heads and bared facial features, sometimes lion-like heads. A gorgon motif is often associated with an animal face in order to combine defense and threatening meaning.

Beautiful faces are "normally beautiful", male and female human heads with the hair fashion of their time, combined with personal names and god-related protective sayings. They were used from 1700 and serve to represent the builder and owner of the house.

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farmers lodge Waiblingen

Holiday apartment. Art, nature and animal experience

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