Frankenberg (Eder) () is a town in Waldeck-Frankenberg district, Hesse, Germany.
The mountain at a ford over the Eder north of the Burgwald range was for a long time a fortified place, playing an especially important role under the Franks in the Saxon Wars. The town was built in 1233-1234 by the Thuringian Landgrave at the junction of two trade routes. The renovated Old and New Town have many half-timbered houses. In 2018 the town adopted the additional name "Philipp Soldan Stadt".
Geography
Frankenberg lies between the Burgwald range in the south and the Breite Struth (hills) in the northwest, where the river Nemphe empties into the Eder. North of the town, the Nuhne empties into the same river at the constituent municipality of Schreufa. It is north of Marburg.
Neighbouring municipalities Frankenberg borders in the north on the municipality of Vöhl, in the east on the town of Frankenau, in the southeast on the municipality of Haina, in the southwest on the municipality of Burgwald, in the west on the municipality of Allendorf, and in the northwest on the town of Lichtenfels (all in Waldeck-Frankenberg).
‡ Dörnholzhausen, 70 inhabitants Friedrichshausen, 384 inhabitants Geismar, 1011 inhabitants Haubern, 530 inhabitants Hommershausen, 169 inhabitants Rengershausen, 390 inhabitants Rodenbach, 168 inhabitants Röddenau, 1737 inhabitants Schreufa, 1183 inhabitants Viermünden, 804 inhabitants Wangershausen, 201 inhabitants Willersdorf, 611 inhabitants
Population figures as at 2012
History At the foot of the mountain on which the town of Frankenberg was built crossed two old military and commercial roads. From the area of the lower Main, from the Burgwald range, came the Weinstraße ("Wine Road"), crossing the Eder through a ford and then going on through the heights on the river's left bank to Westphalia. From the west came the Siegener Straße ("Siegen Road") over the Lahn-Eder watershed, leading round the mountain to the north and further on into Lower Hesse.
Frankish times
After the Hesse area had been swallowed up into the Frankish domains about the year 500, the well-defended mountain became involved in the quarrels of heightened military importance with the Saxons who lived north of the Eder. The mountain had already been fortified by the Franks in earlier times. As the number of Saxon incursions nevertheless rose in the early 8th century, Charles Martel had strong defences built, ensuring their efficacy by maintaining a constant presence there. These measures served during the Saxon Wars (772 to 804) as the base for Frankish counterattacks far inside the Saxons' territory, earning the Weinstraße new importance as a route of advance, connection and supply. After the Saxons had been subjugated and Christianized, the fortification became redundant. The building works, left as they were to decay, kept alive the memory of the Franks.
Town's founding Whether the mountain was further used for living is not known with any certainty. There might have been storage and trading places for travellers and merchants who were passing through town. Only in the early decades of the 13th century does history once again shed light on "the Frankenberg". The Thuringian-Hessian Landgraves were trying to forge a connection between their holdings in Upper Hesse and those in Lower Hesse by somehow getting around the County of Ziegenhain that lay between them. This plan was at odds with what the Archbishops of Mainz, who were, for their part, also expanding, from the west into the Wohra Valley, had in mind. The Landgrave of Thuringia struck back at the Archbishops decisively. Since the Frankenberg had passed to the Landgraves in 1122 and lay in the Vogtei of the Vögte von Keseberg, he chose, right in the middle of the Mainz county of Battenberg, on the boundary between the court regions of Röddenau and Geismar, to build a castle, and furthermore a town, disregarding all of the local lords' objections.
On the uppermost peak of the mountain, which fell away steeply on three sides, appeared the castle, commanding the whole middle Eder Valley. Onto this was built a ward, which also enclosed the ecclesiastical area. Right behind this, going by exact plans (as can be seen in the town's layout), the town was built. The mountain ridge and the mountainside that dropped so sharply off to the north were embraced by the great marketplace. Splitting the marketplace in two, with the town hall built at its west end, is something that might have been done sometime later. A further intention can be seen beyond simply making the town into a stronghold. This lay in also giving the town economic strength by using its advantageous location on the trade roads. The new town's people were from the surrounding villages and hamlets, having been resettled in town or, in some cases, having voluntarily moved there. In the course of time, 16 former living places around town were forsaken, but many of their names live on in names given fields and meadows. Frankenberg was soon girt by a mighty town wall. Of the 25 towers and gates, only the Hexenturm ("Witches Tower") still stands today; all five town gates have vanished.
Heyday
The new municipality grew quickly, underpinned by a healthy merchant and craftsman class. It was a sign of the growing prosperity that already in 1286, after the church dependence of Geismar had been broken, building work began on the great Marienkirche (Church of Mary) – now known as the Liebfrauenkirche – which was built using the Elisabethkirche in Marburg as a model. Frankenberg buyers and sellers broadly fostered trade links, as witnessed not only by the weekly markets, but also by the four yearly fairs. The economic upswing also afforded a quick upward cultural development. Already in the 13th century, Frankenberg had a town school (Lateinschule), which reached its greatest heights about 1500. Onto the church, which had been completed in 1353, the Marienkapelle (Mary's Chapel) was built between 1370 and 1380, one of Thyle von Frankenberg's masterworks.
New Town's founding The steady population growth brought the need for a bigger town, and so, on the Landgrave's initiative, the New Town was established at the foot of the mountain towards the Eder. It rose along the Siegener Straße (a commercial road), even having its own administration, although it was still under the Old Town's church and court, and had no marketplace of its own. Only in 1556 was it united with the Old Town into one municipality.
The Great Fire and its aftermath On 9 May 1476, a fire broke out that burnt the whole New Town and Old Town down. Even the Liebfrauenkirche was burnt right out. Although the townsfolk promptly tackled the job of building their town over again, Frankenberg, which had hitherto been among Hesse's most important towns, never fully recovered from this catastrophic fire. In 1507, half the New Town burnt down again. The seat of the Amt of Frankenberg, which had existed since the 14th century and which included the town areas of Frankenberg and Frankenau as well as half the court region of Geismar, was relocated to the Wolkersdorf Hunting Lodge, itself built on the site of an old moat-ringed castle. Thus was born the Amt of Wolkersdorf, to which belonged the Röddenau lower courts (with the amalgamated courts of Rengershausen and Bromskirchen) and the Geismar court (the "Ämmetche"). Only in the 16th century was there once again an Amt of Frankenberg under which were united not only the town but also Rodenbach farm and the Wiesenfeld wine cellars. The Amt was united with the Amt of Wolkersdorf in 1604.
Frankenberg in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries
In the 16th century, the town was built anew. Only the Steinhaus ("Stone House") had withstood the fire right up to the roof. Building work on the stately new town hall, which is still the town's landmark today, was begun in 1509. After 1526, as was true throughout Hesse, the Reformation was introduced into Frankenberg by the preachers Ludwig Stippius and Caspar Tholde. The church reform forced by Landgrave Moritz in 1606 is responsible for destroying the apostle and saint statues in the church and the Marienkapelle. In Plague years between 1529 and 1611, the University of Marburg five times sought refuge within Frankenberg's walls. The Thirty Years' War (1618 to 1648) struck the town a heavy blow. Frankenberg's advantageous location at an important crossroads became the town's scourge, as it also did in later wars. Troops from both sides on their way through, and a long occupation by Imperial troops, brought immeasurable harm down on the town. Nearby, on the Totenhöhe ("Dead Man's Heights"), a battle was fought in 1646 between troops from Hesse-Darmstadt and troops from Hesse-Kassel (or Hesse-Cassel), with the latter reinforced by Swedish troops and winning the encounter.
Frankenberg up until the First World War Under Napoleonic rule (1806 to 1813), Frankenberg was home to the seat of a canton in the department of Werra in the Kingdom of Westphalia. In 1821, Frankenberg became district seat (Kreisstadt) of the newly formed district of Frankenberg, consisting of the former Ämter of Frankenberg, Hessenstein, Rosenthal and Haina, along with the court district of Viermünden. The district council – after 1834 provincial council – had its seat in the St. Georgenberg Monastery. Frankenberg had sunk down from a key town to an unnotable, mean little town. Its economic underpinnings, as had already been so in the Middle Ages, were the clothiers and the tanners. Whereas by the late 18th century the woolmen's and clothiers' guild had 106 members and the tanners' guild 46, by the middle of the 19th century, membership in the woolmen's and clothiers' guild rose to 140, and red and white tanning blossomed once again. Alongside other guilds, there was also at that time a stocking weavers' and glovers' guild. In the second half of the century, a noticeable downswing set in, which could even be seen in population figures (2,611 in 1787, 3,163 in 1867 and 2,787 in 1894). From 1590 to 1818, copper and silver ore was mined and smelted near Frankenberg. During the 19th century, various attempts were undertaken to get the mining industry running again, but in 1875, it was abandoned for good. Sights between Frankenberg and Geismar still bear witness today to the mining in days of yore, as do some placenames such as "Alte Hütte" ("Old Ironworks"), "Neue Hütte" ("New Ironworks") and "Zechenhaus" ("Colliery House"). Only when the railway reached Frankenberg did a new economic upswing, albeit a modest one, come to the town. In 1890, the Marburg-Frankenberg line was opened, and the Brothers Thonet from Vienna furthermore set up a chair-making factory near the railway station making use of the wealth of wood in the area. Ten years later, the line was extended through Korbach to Warburg, making connections to Westphalia. In 1908, the stretch of line to Bestwig was completed, and in 1910, so was the one to Berleburg.