As always, it's taking me a while to get around to posting — this time about my trip. But here are some photos and videos showing the goings on in Rothenburg on September 3-5.
The videos spend a lot of time on the field smithy, because the videographer is associated with it. But you can also see a good deal of what was happening. The group in the opening shot of the first video is the Junge Schar, the "young troop." They are the group I met on my first visit to Rothenburg in 1984. Next is the Spielmannszug, the "marching band," at the opening ceremonies on Friday evening. A little over a minute in, the Junge Schar are singing one of their songs. Then we get the Saturday evening fireworks.
The second video opens with the Friday evening fireworks at the city hall. Then we go to the field smithy (Feldschmiede) adjacent to the Spielmannszug's place. At 3:57 and again at 5:37 we see the man who plays former mayor Georg Nusch, who in the festival play saves the conquered city from pillage and destruction (and the City Council from being beheaded) by drinking a 3 1/4 liter beaker of wine at a single draft (chug-a-lug). At 6:39 you see the flag bearer of the Junge Schar. The bandage and blood are part of his costume because in the play he is a wounded messenger who comes to report to the City Council on the bad turn of events in the city's defense. At 9:40 the man in the middle, with the beard, is a former member of the Junge Schar who visited me with his wife and daughters a couple of years ago. On Sunday he made a nail for me. Of course it had to go in my checked suitcase.
The link at the bottom of the page takes you to a piece from Bavarian Television. It begins with a report from Regensburg, but at 5:30 there is a report from Rothenburg. Of course it's all in German, but you can still see the video. There are the pikemen, who would use their 10 foot long pikes to try to stop a cavalry attack, and a coin minting operation.
And here's a video of the Spielmannszug performing in the marketplace. The square is surrounded on all four sides by buildings (City Hall to the left), and as the drumbeats echo off the walls, you feel them as well as hearing them.
The weekend offers groups portraying all eras of the city's history from 1274, when it received its charter as an imperial free city.
An der Grabstätte von Kronprinzessin Cecilie
1 week ago
2 comments:
Hi Joe it looks impressive, but will have a closer look tom., I'm glad you had some good times, will be back later. :)
Martin — thanks for commenting. I hope you found the stuff interesting. I've always realized that my experiences in Rothenburg were very different from my everyday life. I have finally come to realize that the participants' experiences during the festivals are also very different from their everyday lives. But it's still a wonderful privilege to have been taken into their activity to a far greater extent that the usual tourist, to become in some way a sharer, a Mitteiler and to some degree to be accepted as one of them.
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