Atlantis of the North Sea

[Otto]

Rungholt

Rungholt was a wealthy city in Nordfriesland, northern Germany. It
sank beneath the waves when a storm tide (the first "Grote Mandrenke")
in the North Sea tore through the area on January 16, 1362.

Rungholt was situated on the island of Strand, which was rent asunder
by another storm tide in 1634, and of which the islets of Pellworm,
Nordstrand and Nordstrandischmoor are the only remaining fragments.

Relics of the city were being found in the Wadden Sea until the late
20th century, but shifting sediments have carried the last of these
into the sea. In the 1920s and 1930s, some remains of the city were
exposed; they suggest a population of at least 1500 to 2000, which is
fairly large for that region and time, and it is likely that Rungholt
was a major port. Legend has greatly exaggerated its size and wealth,
however.

Impressed by the fate of the city, the relics, and not least legend's
excessive descriptions, the German poet Detlev von Liliencron wrote a
poem about this lost city which starts with the words: "Heut bin ich
über Rungholt gefahren, die Stadt ging unter vor fuenfhundert Jahren".
(Today I travelled across Rungholt, the City went under five hundred
years ago)

Local myth has it that one can still hear the church bells of Rungholt
ringing when sailing through the area on a stormy night.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rungholt


Atlantis der Nordsee

German documentation, ZDF, 19.09.2010

http://terra-x.zdf.de/ZDFde/inhalt/22/0,1872,8111926,00.html