The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1908-03-03
TABLED CITIES SUBMERGED.
Along the German Ocean. the Baltic
and Other Parts Of the World.

many Of the charming resorts dotting
the coast line Of the German ocean will
have been amused (and perchance in
terested) by the many tales and leg
ends related as to submerged cities
all supramundane trace of which has
now disappeared. OF such cities which
once were famous for their wealth. beau
ty and power, 1t is whispered that their
love Of luxury, their greed and cruelty
led to the offended and unseen Powers
Above causing the waves to rise in the
night and engulf them, forever. Not
only are such legends rife on the coast,
but even in inland German towns many
a lake is invested with a halo Of sim
liar mystery.
OF these latter cases two of the most
interesting relate to an old-time city
named Buckow which is said to rest
upon the bottom of Lake Schermuetzel,
in Brandenburg, while Lake Werbellin
"a most mysterious sheet of water, ac-
cording to folk-lore) conceals in its
bosom a town of the same name; all
that remains of this latter is the name
given to a small village, in memory OF
it's predecessor, which now stands not
far from the point WneEe lhe ioiiiei
town stood.
Although most of the stories rife In
Germany as to vanished towns in the
interior have no actual historical pasis,
or at best, slight one tthe Weroelnn
story being based upon the disappear
of the Ascanian castles built IN lloo-
ITO by Albert the Bear. Margrave, OF
Brandenberg and a contemporary OF
Frederick Barbarossa), this is not SO
on the coast; here the legends are al
well founded on fact, and. in most
cases the salient features have lost but
little of their original truth In the tell
ing.
The most striking Of all the legends
current in the coast towns of the Ger
i q
lost Dutch town of Stavoren at the
entrance to the Zuyder Zee. Here
there lived a rich and powerful wo-
man, whose pride, cruelty and selfish
ness aroused the anger of heaven, ana
caused the wicked and misguided city
portion of the city (where the good
people lived) was saved. and it's name
still cleaves to the small town of
Stavoren, which is well known to
every traveller going by water from
Amsterdam to Lecuwarden and Gron-
ingen. 1t is an undisputable fact that
in the thirteenth century, Stavoren
was a wealthy and powerful CONNER
cial city; however. due partly to the
port becoming choked with sand, and
partly to the eruption of the Zuyder
Zee in 1877, it rapidly lost it's import
ance, and at the present time what is
left of it only affords shelter to about
500 souls. The roofs and spires of the
now submarine buildings can, it is
said, be often seen far down in the
depths when the sea is still and the
weather is clear, while silent listeners
on Christmas eve will hear the distant
and muffied tone of church bells aris-
ing from the depths, only to break in
bubbles and ripples on the surface of
the Zuyder Zee.
Visitors to Sylt, the we'll known sea-
side resort and island in the North
sea, will doubtless remember the
small village of Winningstedt. AL
though its present population is only
fifty persons, 1t is none the less COM
memorative of the large numerical
town of Winningstedt. which went to
the bottom of the sea curing a great
food and storm which took place on
January 16, 1852.
Wenningstedt is by no means the
only town which once stood on the
shores Of Friesland and Holland only
to meet with destruction at the hands
| Cor rather billows) of "Old Hans as
| the Tristan Familiarity terms the North
| gea. AS a matter of fact, of all the
seas in the world it is the German
| ocean alone which can establish a rec
| ord for the number of towns, villages
and hamIets which it has either de-
| stroyed or engulfed. Since the
eleventh century "Old Hans" has
| devastated no less than 144 towns and
| villages either by swallowing them up
entirely or else by burying them under
| heaps of sand. The fate Of the Dutch
j town of Rungholt, which disappeared
| during a great storm in the year 1897,
/ IS still sung and told in story by the
present day fisherfolk of Holland.
| The Baltic sea has not such a bad
record in catastrophes as "Old Hans"
| Yet halo of romance is thrown around
| the legends told about this sea by the
| story of the wonderful town of Vineta,
chimes from whose church steeples
may, at the fall of eventide, be heard
pealing family from the depths of the
| ocean. In the 70s of the last century
| articles were still published in support
| of the sometime existence of a large,
| fabulously wealthy Wendish city named
| Vineta, which, in the middle ages, nest
led at the foot Of the stakelberg at
| Usedom, nearly at the same altitude at
which the hamlet of Damerow now
| stands The legend states it was total
| ly destroyed by a flood and earthquake
which occurred in the year 1888. At
one time the city of Vineta was marked
on the Prussian maps, but geological
and historical investigation made local
| ly by Prof. Virchow and others have
proved beyond doubt that a town never
| could have stood upon the site indi-
Gated
Researches into the origin of the leg
| end led to the remarkable discovery
| that the name of Vineta was nothing
more than a corruption of Jumneta
ana Jumne-the OLD WendlSh name OF
the modern town of Violin, or Julin
as 1t was called by the Danes. The re-
| ported fabulous wealth owned by
Vineta was to a certain extent true, as
Julin or Jumne waS-according to the
old historian Adam of Bremen-a very
large and remarkably wealthy town in
the tenth century, doing even then a
trade with Arabia, Asia and the coast
towns of northern Africa. To use the
historians own words, the old Wendish
town was certainly the greatest of all
| towns now existing in Europe" When
| the Danish King Waldemar the Great
| crushed out the power welded by the
Wends, he also destroyed Jumne by
| burning it to the ground in HIP; hence
| in this case the earthquake and flood