wörter des jahres

The panel jury of the Society for the Germany Language (GfdS, Gesellschaft für deutsche Sprache) in Wiesbaden has submitted its selection for Word of the Year (see previously) chosing Wellenbrecher (Breakwater, in the sense of disrupting successive waves of viral outbreaks) as the overall top neologism of 2021. Runners-up included Pflexit for the mass-exodus of nursing staff (Pflegekraft) from the profession from burnout, stress and even threats of physical violence, Impfpflicht (mandatory vaccination), Ampelparteien, the English borrowing Booster over the German word Auffrischungsimpfung—which was the preferred term for second-dose, and the new formulation Funf nach Zwölf instead of Five Minutes to Midnight in addressing the climate crisis.

eka-iridium

First synthesised on this day in 1982 at the Darmstadt Institute for Heavy Ion Research (GIS, Gesellschaft für Schwerionforschung) the synthetic meitnerium (Mt) was given the above provisional designation following Grigory Mendeleev’s nomenclature for undiscovered atomic elements—the convention becoming a placeholder shortly before its discovery with the controversy over the honours and naming-system being overhauled.
The research-team wanted to recognise the previously overlooked contributions of physicist Lise Meitner for her pioneering work in nuclear fission and her co-discovery of the element protactinium with Otto Hahn. Curium being named for both Pierre and Marie Curie, meitnerium is the only element named for a non-mythological woman. Because of its half-life of mere seconds even in the most stable isotope, few of its chemical properties are known though study continues, and its periodic neighbours, hassium and darmstadtium, are both named for the above laboratory.

lullusglocke

Though we didn’t know what the belltower of the ruins of the monastery contained last time we visited Bad Hersfeld, we now know to check out next time the oldest, dated cast church bell in Germany, named after a sainted abbot of the town and later first archbishop of Mainz, Wessex-born Lullus. According to a highly abbreviated, Latin inscription the thousand kilogramme bell was moulded on this Feast of Saint John the Baptist in 1038. Hanging in the Katharinenturm amidst the church’s foundations and partial walls, it is rung to herald the town’s Lullusfest, held in the second week of October to commemorate the passing its namesake and other special occasions.

hippodamian plan

Via the always excellent Maps Mania, we are referred to a mapping project that twins cities based on similarities and correspondences found in the layout of their streets and boulevards. Medium to larger populated areas from all over the world can be found—Wiesbaden’s road network (see previously) sharing some features with Luxembourg, Singapore, Lviv, Haifa and Bologna. I wonder if visitors exchanging towns would have a better sense of orientation and be able to intuit their way around. As far I can tell, none of these arterially similar cities are also Sister Cities (Städtepartnerschaft, Jumelage). As opposed to a more organic ordering of streets, the title refers to the grid arrangement we fancy as a very modern and tidy imposition, for the eponymous city-planner of ancient Greek Miletus.

vitae bonifatius

Feted on this day on the occasion of his martyrdom (*675) on this day in 754 near Dokkum in Friesland, Boniface, from the Devon village of Crediton, was a leading figure of the Anglo-Saxon mission to the Frankish Empire and whose influence, reforms and alliances-including the union of the papacy with the Carolingian dynasty and the successor transnational organisations, like the Holy and Roman Empire of the Germans and the EU, and is celebrated as a missionary and uniter and peace-maker, the Apostle to the Germans acclaimed almost immediately after his death as patron of the country and Fulda, his major shrine. The basilica minor is not far away from the modern day town of Fritzlar where Boniface reportedly, dramatically chopped down the Donar Oak (considered sacred to Jupiter through interpretatio romana) to illustrate that no punishment would be meted out for this perceived desecration and went on to build a chapel dedicated to Saint Peter from the lumber. Winning converts, Boniface encouraged widespread destruction of pagan sites, especially sacred groves. Though probably only an inventive story, the saint is sometimes credited with the invention of the Christmas tree as a way to coopt and supplant native customs. Boniface and his retinue were killed by highway robbers en route to Frisia, hoping to find more followers in the north, their attackers sorely disappointed to find only books and manuscripts instead of treasure.

up and atom

Via Present/&/Correct, we are referred to a curated cache Nuclear Engineering Wall Charts and vintage reactor diagrams from the collection of the University of New Mexico. The pictured diagram features the Biblis B Kernkraftwerke (AKW) near Worms, both A and B blocks were closed in March 2011 following the Fukushima and since permanently shut-down and slated for decommissioning. More to explore at the links above.

pflanzenwissenschaft

Active at a pivotal time that marked the transition in field of nature studies from hobbyists to professionals and one of the first to adopt the classification system of Carl Linnaeus in the German-speaking community, Catharina Helena Dörrien was born this day in 1717 (†1795). A talented painter, Dörrien researched and catalogued native plants and fungi of the Principality of Orange-Nassau with over fourteen hundred watercolour botanical illustrations and many of her works are in the collections of the Wiesbaden Museum.

zehn thesen für gutes design

Via Present /&/ Correct, we rather enjoyed this fine visual homage to the palette and aesthetic of industrial design artist Dieter Rams from Chad Ashley and Grey Scale Gorilla studios. The Wiesbaden native who famously articulated the principles of good design and called obsolescence a crime, and tried to adhere to these guidelines of innovation, utility, accessibility, honestly, durability and minimalism in everything he created is best known for his work for Braun, which in turn is paid tribute in Apple’s operating environment, including the skeuomorph for the calculator, the reel-to-reel tape recorder in the podcast icon and the World Clock (see also), praising Apple as one of the few company’s upholding excellence in design.

location scout oder deckname topas

Hearing that someone might be making a weekend of visiting nearby sites where films had been shot sounded like a fun activity and piqued my curiosity as to whether any might be in reach for me. I was surprised to come across this image from 1968 in the Stars and Stripes photographic archive of the filming of the 1969 release of the Cold War spy-thriller Topaz, the cinematic adaptation of Leon Uris’ novelisation of a real defection, the Sapphire Affair, that took place in 1962 directed by Alfred Hitchcock.  Here is the same building from last summer from a slightly different angle and perspective.
The story follows a French intelligence agent who becomes entangled in a spy ring and the geopolitical situation on the eve of the Cuba Missile Crisis. A high-ranking Soviet officer reveals that nuclear warheads will be placed in Cuba (mirroring the US installation in Turkey) and he and his family are evacuated to Wiesbaden. Filming also takes place in Copenhagen, Washington, DC, Paris, New York with Havana scenes filmed on a studio lot.

emgann ballon

Appointed by Carolingian emperor Louis the Pious to pacify rebellion on the far frontiers of the Frankish territories during a general assembly held at the court of Ingelheim in May of 831, Nominoë (Nevenoe) the Breton (see previously) was created first Duke of Brittany—solidifying his power and reputation, emerging victorious from the Battle of Ballon, fought on this day in 845, and halting incursions along the border by King of West Francia, Charles the Bald (Karl Voal/Karl der Kahle/Charles II dit le Chauve). A peace was brokered and the unified Breton people had carved out an identity and land of their own, with independence negotiated in 851 by Nominoë’s son Erispoe after the larger, more decisive Battle of Jengland, near Rennes, compelled Charles to sign the Treaty of Angers.

das wiesbadener manifest

Declared on this day in 1945 from their base of operations (collection point) in the occupied capital of Hessen, the officers that comprised the special commission of the Monuments Fine Arts and Archives organisation (the MFAA, the group also known as the Monuments Men) was a stern rejection that European treasure should be taken to the United States as plunder and the spoils of war.  The recovery and restitution efforts beginning earlier that summer, the programme’s first director CPT Walter I Farmer of the US Army Corps of Engineers received a large shipment of Nazi-looted art and antiquities, and soon the enormity of the task was apparent, prompting the issuing of the manifesto, announcing: “We wish to state that, from our own knowledge, no historical grievance will rankle so long or be the cause of so much justified bitterness as the removal for any reason of a part of the heritage of any nation even if that heritage may be interpreted as a prize of war.” Over seven hundred thousand objects and artefacts were catalogued by the organisation, stolen from museums (works from the Berlin Gemäldegalerie and Nationalgalerie including Botticelli, Rembrant, Rubens and Cranach), private collections, Jewish citizens and political dissidents and were kept safeguarded from reparation claims and trophies of war that had been taken back to America were repatriated, President Truman getting involved with the debate and ordering paintings and sculptures returned to Germany in 1948.

hausnummer

As the scaffolding came down and realising that my workweek apartment (previously here and here) had after its latest exterior paint job also embraced the trend, we appreciated these monumental numbers on the housing estates of Singapore—albeit these are funkier and more personable—captured by photographer Peter Steinhauer, via the always excellent Present /&/ Correct (check out their sundries).
One’s address writ-large makes for an interesting contrast and we’re noticing all the new blocks going up in the city recently. Much more to explore at the links above.

steinwand

Recently, H and I took a hike around a rock face (Felswand) at the foothills and steepening calved cliffs of the Maulkuppe, near the Milseburg.
A few climbers were out scaling the rocks—which are volcanic phonolite (Phonolith—sounding stone, named after the characteristic clink that this uncommon mineral makes when struck—we’ll have to be more attentive and listen next time) and not the more common basalt formations (see here, here and here) as we’d originally thought made up the mountain side. There are some one hundred climbing paths (Kletterrouten) on the Steinwand—which while it is on private property, is freely accessible for all.

daytrip: milseburg

Bright through very windy, H and I took a trip to another of the nearby peaks of the Rhön highlands (Mittlegebirge, mountain ranges that tend to not rise above the treeline and are forested the entire way up) and hiked up the Milseburg with views of the Wasserkuppe and the valleys beyond. This trapezoidal massif and extinct volcano is most significant for the remains of its ancient Celtic settlement—oppodium, which was one of the first well researched and preserved sites of its kind in central Germany and led to the establishment of societies to maintain places of cultural heritage and accord them protected status, beginning nearly a century and a half ago.
Though now covered in moss, the basalt stones still in parts comprise the base of defensive walls (see also) and foundations of domiciles and the abrupt abandonment of the fortress, first in 1200 and then again in 400 BC, suggests that the site set the scene for a clash of cultures between the Celts and the Germanic tribes of the area. At the top of the mountain is a chapel dedicated to Saint Gangolf, a Burgundian knight and wealthy landowner under King Pippin the Short, whom was killed 11 May in 760 for his express wish to renounce his worldly possessions by his wife’s lover.
Prior to his martyrdom, however, Gangolf had several heroic exploits including, reportedly, no less than vanquishing the giant Mils, who in league with the devil was preventing people from taking the sacrament of baptism by a monopoly of water sources—and generally causing crops to fail by withholding irrigation access. They shall not pass—Gangolf fought valiantly but had no refreshment to regain his strength for the next attack, and a local farmer, himself desperate, refused the knight any relief unless he paid an exorbitant price, which for all his wealth Gangolf could not muster. Resigned to defeat, he removed his helmet and on the spot where he laid it down, a new spring broke forth, still flowing to this day, and gave the knight the resolve he needed to finish off the giant and furnish the locals with a new source of clean water.
The devil entombed the defeated Mils and hence the Milsburg. No recent excavations have been undertaken but the mountain is protected from an archaeological standpoint as well as a being a nature preserve that welcomes visitors and remains a popular destination. Being stormy, it wasn’t the best conditions to be exposed on a summit but it is one that we’ll be able to explore again soon.

thoroughfare

Via the ever-excellent Maps Mania, we are introduced to the easy to use mapping tool City Roads that will generate a raster image of the traffic arteries of any conurbation around the world to download or even order up printed on a mug. From a civil engineering aspect, it’s notable how the negative spaces say as much or more about the character and charter of a city as the streets and roadways designed to navigate and negotiate around or past it and interesting to compare profiles of larger cities.

unwort des jahres

Whilst the jury is still out on the national Unwort of the Year for 2019 (previously), the Landeshauptstadt of Hesse, Wiesbaden the arbiter of the actual Word of the Year—has made a few selections of its own, reflective of state and local culture and politics.
While we’ve encountered all three of the finalists and agree that the signage proclaiming the shopping corridors of the pedestrian mall downtown to be a weapons-free zone irksome and depressing and the winner in the form of an unending major construction project that has had Autobahn traffic in a snarl for years on end a frustrating if not befitting champion, we most enjoyed reconnecting, re-engaging with those awful E-Roller, electro-scooters abandoned, crowding the sidewalks. Do you have a nominee for Unwort of the Year for your area?

5-7-5

The cynical, suspicious part of me that prone to insidious conspiracy and thoughts that immediately retreat to somewhere dark in every fun application that triangulates one’s whereabouts is just a cutely disguised ploy to harvest one’s data and commodify it is often vanquished (possibly an instinct that should be overcome) as it was with this non-proprietary mapping service that generates haikus based on the address (or coordinates if you choose to disclose them) we are referred to by Nag on the Lake and Maps Mania.
The poetry is a bit hit-or-miss but the element of serendipity is fun and keeps ones poking around. Nearby, I especially liked “The warm belly of the bus / High up in the trees / Branches of the tree” discovered while zeroing in on my actual spot.

zipfelbund

Since the inception of the holiday, the date of formal reunification rather than events leading up to it chosen in 1990, the chief celebrations have cycled through several host cities, usually state capitals.
Wiesbaden was the setting of 1999’s festivities and created the Compass Confederation, settlements that represent the geographical extremes (see also) of Germany:
the cardinal points being List on the Island of Sylt in the North, Selfkant in the West, Görlitz in the East and Oberstdorf in the South, the towns honoured annually as co-celebrants. Though it took decades longer for the German map to have these extremes and present borders, the most westerly municipality of Nordrhein-Westfalen, Selfkant, was annexed by the Netherlands as war reparations in 1949. The allocation of this single district was the much diminished outcome of an original demand for Aachen, Köln, Münster and Osnabrück, pared down significantly when the Dutch failed to garner support from the US for it. After three years of negotiations at the Hague, the territory was returned to West Germany (see also the Kleine Wiedervereinigung) in August 1963—with the exception of a hill and surrounding glade called Duivelsberg/Teufelsberg which the Netherlands retains and maintains as a nature reserve.

reisebüro

Though one could always question the decision of the UK government to refuse a bailout to the world’s oldest tour company, Thomas Cook collapsing after one hundred and seventy-eight years of operation and a victim of progress plus its own mismanagement—especially when repatriation costs are already approaching half of the requested funds to keep the company solvent, Germany has chosen to intervene in the case of its domestic affiliates with the state stepping in to offer a bridge loan to keep the company—headquartered in Oberursel (previously)—whilst it restructures.

grube messel

On my way back to my workweek apartment, I finally took the opportunity to explore the Messel pit, a UNESCO World Heritage site though probably singular among that group for not yielding up its treasures and those that have been unearthed belong in collections spread across the globe. Though the outline of the caldera seems apparent now, the volcanic lake that gives to researchers on average a well preserved fossil specimen once every quarter hour would not exist as it does today, looking back and documenting in great detail a snap-shot of life circa forty-eight million years ago during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, if not for a series of accidents, beginning with quarry operations in 1859, when oil shale was discovered.
I happened to arrive just in time to take the last tour of the day, the only way to venture down into the pit. Miners back at the time were discovering fossils in this Lagerstätte but due the depositional characteristics of the formation (most remains discovered are not petrified or mummified but captured as fleetingly delicate impressions) but after a few hours’ dehydration, the fossils would disintegrate into a big fish tale. Demand and war drove digging which waxed and waned over the years, the quarry being used as a place to store the rubble of Darmstadt after its destruction during WWII, and during the early 1970s, the place was nearly turned into a permanent landfill (the war also created a make-work site to employ locals breaking bricks—and as amateur palæontologists while the economy recovered) until the decision was overturned by strong protests and the land was purchased by the state of Hesse. Hobby fossil-hunters developed a resin-transfer technique to preserve fossils once exposed outside of their containing matrix around this time and has been widely adopted as standard practise. Constant pumping keeps the ground water from welling up and universities continue slow and careful excavation.
We were able to inspect some recent discoveries, the slates kept from dehydrating in a water bath and were privileged to pass around a fish fossil (see also). Though the mascot of the Messel Pit is Ida, the singular Darwinius Masillæ—a transitional lemur-like creature that also had characteristics prefiguring the simians, primates being distinguished in the main by the wetness or dryness of their noses—the site was finally elevated in 1995 with UNESCO status not because of any individual find, including crocodiles, giant squirrels and nine pairs of copulating turtles caught in the act—far predating Pompeii, but rather because of the sheer volume and scientific rigour that it took to share what one uncovered, which underscores the problem of preservation.