Ep. 118: The Hanseatic League - 14th century Politics -Pirates
History of the Germans from the Middle Ages to Reunification
Dirk Hoffmann-Becking
4.9 • 551 Ratings
🗓️ 31 August 2023
⏱️ 45 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
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Summary
In 1878 workmen building the Speicherstadt, the magnificent city of warehouses in the harbour of Hamburg made a gruesome discovery. In the mud of the Grasbrook, an island at the entrance of the medieval harbour of Hamburg emerged two piles of wood connected by a wooden bar. An ancient beacon guiding ships. What made it so special was what was nailed on to the bar, human skulls. Whoever these men were, they had been decapitated and their heads displayed as a warning. One of these skulls was quickly identified as that of Klaus Störtebecker, the notorious pirate.
The skulls were brought to the Museum für Hamburgische Geschichte, the Museum for the history of Hamburg. There they reconstructed the facial features of Klaus Störtebecker so that vistors can get a better picture of what Hamburg’s greatest nemesis looked like.
If you leave the museum and turn right you quickly get to Simon von Utrecht Strasse, named after the man who captured Störtebecker on his agile small cog, the Bunte Kuh, the painted Cow.
Störtebecker was brought to the Grasbrook where he and his 72 companions were beheaded on October 20, 1401. As his last wish, Störtebecker asked that all the men he could walk past after his head had fallen should be freed. That wish was granted, but when the headless pirate had passed 11 of his shipmates, one of the members of the city council tripped him up and in the end all of his men were killed, including those he had walked past.
Hundreds of books have been and will still be written about Störtebecker and Simon von Utrecht. Some of those I have devoured as a child and this is why it hurts so much to have to tell you – all a lot of nonsense. Störtebecker lived and robbed until 1413, 12 years after his execution, which is a long time for a headless corpse. And Simon von Utrecht was just a lad when he allegedly seized Hamburg’s greatest adversary.
The story may be a tall tale, but piracy and the Victual Brothers were real and they were a real threat to the Hanse, or at least I believe it was.
The episode webpage with transcripts and further links is available here
The music for the show is Flute Sonata in E-flat major, H.545 by Carl Phillip Emmanuel Bach (or some claim it as BWV 1031 Johann Sebastian Bach) performed and arranged by Michel Rondeau under Common Creative Licence 3.0.
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To make it easier for you to share the podcast, I have created separate playlists for some of the seasons that are set up as individual podcasts. they have the exact same episodes as in the History of the Germans, but they may be a helpful device for those who want to concentrate on only one season.
So far I have:
Salian Emperors and Investiture Controversy
Fredrick Barbarossa and Early Hohenstaufen
The Holy Roman Empire 1250-1356
The Reformation before the Reformation
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to the history of the Germans, episode 118, Pirates. |
| 0:10.6 | In 1878, workmen building the Speicherstadt, that magnificent city of warehouses in the |
| 0:16.0 | harbour of Hamburg, made a gruesome discovery. In the mud of the grass brook, an island at the entrance |
| 0:22.6 | of the medieval harbor of Hamburg emerged two piles of wood, connected by a wooden bar, an ancient |
| 0:28.6 | beacon guiding ships. What made it so special was what was nailed onto the bar. Human skulls. |
| 0:36.6 | Whoever these men were, there had been decapitated and their heads |
| 0:41.1 | displayed as a warning. One of these skulls was quickly identified as that of Klaus Sturtebecker, |
| 0:48.2 | the notorious pirate. The skulls were brought to the Museum for Hamburgshache History, the museum of the history of Hamburg. There, they |
| 0:57.9 | reconstructed the facial features of Klaus Sturtebecker, so that visitors |
| 1:02.0 | can get a better picture of what Hamburg's greatest nemesis looked like. |
| 1:06.6 | If you leave the museum and you turn right, you quickly get to |
| 1:10.1 | Simon von Utrecht |
| 1:11.7 | Strauss, named after the man who captured Sturtebecker on his agile small cog, the Buntecuh, |
| 1:18.1 | the painted cow. |
| 1:20.8 | Once caught, Sturtebecker was brought to the grass brook, where he and his 72 companions |
| 1:25.9 | were beheaded on October 20, 1401. |
| 1:29.3 | As his last wish, Sturtebecker asked that all the man he could walk past after his head had fallen should be freed. |
| 1:37.3 | That wish was granted. |
| 1:40.3 | But when the headless pirate had passed 11 of his shipmates, one of the members of the |
| 1:45.5 | city council tripped him up, and in the end all of his men were killed, including those |
| 1:50.6 | he had walked past. |
| 1:53.3 | Hundreds of books have been and will still be written about Sturtebecker and Simon von |
... |
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