Hameln (Hamelin)

The local history museum in Hameln, in the Leist Haus, built 1585-89, a building typical of the Weser Renaissance style.

Hameln (spelled "Hamelin" in older English sources) is the source of the Pied Piper story. The medieval town, filled with half-timbered houses, lies on the banks of the Weser river where the smaller river Hamel joins it. Hameln is the center of the unique architectural style of the 16th and 17th centuries called the Weser Renaissance and the center of one of history's great mysteries what happened to the children of Hameln in 1284?

The starting point for the development of Hameln (Hamelin) was the construction of a Benedictine cloister as part of the missionary work undertaken in Saxony by the Imperial abbey of folder near the end of the eighth century. By the 11th century, Hamelin had developed into a market town and was first referred to in the documents of the time around 1200. After the Battle of Sedemünder in 1260, Hamelin joined the Duke of Guelph, Albrecht von Braunschweig, who sanctioned the freedoms and rights of the town.

Because of its location at the crossing of an important navigable river, Hamelin achieved significant prosperity especially by trading in grains and millstones. From 1426 until 1572, Hamelin was part of the Hanseatic lead. After the 30 Years' War and the seven years war, Hamelin became an impregnable fortified town and was considered the "Gibraltar of the North". Most of the fortifications were pulled down in 1808 during the French occupation by command of Napoleon.

The Pied Piper of Hameln (Hamelin)

In the year 1284 a mysterious man arrived in Hameln (Hamelin). He was wearing a multicolored coat of bright cloth, which led to his being called the Pied Piper. (Today is German, this figure is called the Rat Catcher - Rattenfänger - and that is the word you will see used all over the city). He claimed to be a ratcatcher, and he promised that for a certain sum of money that he would rid the town of all mice and rats. The citizens of Hameln (Hamelin) struck a deal, promising him his reward.

The ratcatcher then took a small pipe from his pocket and began to blow on it. Rats and mice immediately came from every house and gathered around him. When he thought that he had them all, he led them to the Weser River, where he pulled up his clothes and walked into the water. The animals all followed him, and were drowned and washed away in the current.

This is the oldest known illustration of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. It is from a painted glass window in the Marktkirche Church in Hameln, created by Augustin von Moersperg in 1592.

Once the citizens had been freed of their plague of rodents, they regretted having promised the ratcatcher so much money, so, using all kinds of excuses, they refused to pay him. Finally he went away, bitter and angry. He returned on June 26, 1284, St. Johns and St. Paul's day, early in the morning at seven o'clock, now dressed like a hunter, with a dreadful look on his face and wearing an unusual red hat.

Once again he put a small type to his mouth and filled the street with music. But this time it wasn't rats and mice that came out to him, but rather children: a great number of boys and girls for years old and older. Among them was the mayor's teenage daughter. The swarm of children followed the man, and he led them into a mountain, where they all disappeared with him.

All this was witnessed by a babysitter who, carrying a child in her arms, had followed them from a distance but had then turned around and carried the news back to the town. The anxious parents ran in droves to the town gates seeking their children. The mothers cried out and sobbed pitifully. Within the hour, messengers were sent everywhere up and down the river and by land inquiring if the children had been seen, but it remained a fruitless search.

A total of one hundred and thirty children were lost. Two, as some say, had lagged behind and returned to the town. One of them was blind and the other mute. The blind one was not able to point out the place where the children had been taken, but was able to tell how they had followed the piper. The mute one was able to point out the place, although he (or she) had heard nothing. One little boy in shirt sleeves had gone along with the others, but turned back to fetch his jacket and thus escaped the tragedy. When he returned, the others had already disappeared into a cave within a hill. The cave is still known.

Until the middle of the 18th century, the street in Hameln through which the children were led out of the town gate was called Quiet Street, because no dancing to music was allowed there. Indeed, when a wedding parade on its way to the church across the street, musicians had to stop playing.

The hill near Hameln, where the children disappeared, is called Poppenberg. Two stone monuments in the form of crosses have been erected there, one on the left side, and one on the right. Some say that the children were led into a cave and that they came out again in Transylvania. And this points to perhaps the most plausible explanation of the disappearance of 130 children from Hameln (Hamelin) on June 26, 1284: the eastward German colonization that occurred in that century. Territorial chiefs recruited or conscripted settlers for open land in Moravia, Pomerania, East Prussia and in the Baltic districts of the Teutonic Order of Knights. This view holds that the "children from Hameln (Hamelin)" became willing émigrés from the town of Hameln.

The citizens of Hameln (Hamelin) recorded this event in their town register, and they came today all their proclamations according to the years and days since the loss of their children. The following lines were inscribed on the town hall:

In the year 1284 after the birth of Christ
from Hameln were led away
one hundred thirty children, born at this place
led away by a piper into a mountain

On the new town gate was inscribed the Latin inscription:

Centumter denos cum magus ab urbe puellos
duxerat ante annos CCLXXII condita parta fuit.

(This gate was built 272 years after the magician led the 130 children from the town).

In the year 1572 the man had the story depicted in the church windows. The accompanying inscription has become largely illegible sense then. Today there are reminders of the Pied Piper throughout the town. There is a Pied Piper fountain in the town Hall Square and another in Oster Street, a glass window in the Market Church, as well as an inscription on the Pied Piper house, a Pied Piper relief in the town park, the Bürgergarten. All year-round visitors can listen to the Pied Piper Glockenspiel (Carrilon) in the rooftop gables of the Hochzeithaus (the Wedding House), and watch mechanical figures in acting the story of the Pied Piper as it plays three times a day (1:05 p.m., 3:35 P.m., and 5:35 p.m.). A short musical entitled rats is performed every afternoon from May until September on the terrace of this house at 4:30 p.m.. A longer play performed by amateur actors and historical costumes is performed every Sunday at noon from mid-May to mid-September and the same location. The Hochzeithaus (Wedding House) was built either citizens of Hameln (Hamelin) in 1610-17 as a community hall for festivals and represents the last building in town built in the Weser Renaissance style.

A completely different perspective of Hameln (Hamelin) is gained by walking up to the local viewpoint called the Klüt, which offers a slender panorama of the town and the Weser River Valley. The view might motivate the visitors take a bicycle trip up the Weser or a canoe or boat trip downstream.

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The Pied Piper Glockenspiel in Hameln

The Hochzeithaus (Wedding House), with the mechanical glockenspiel and setting for daily and weekly outdoor performances in the summer.