Winter in Basel: Frozen Rhine

As from last week, winter has definitely started in Basel. Some people like it, others don't. I personally am happy that it's getting colder. For me, it is kind of odd when it's too warm outside during the holiday season. I mean, with the holidays just around the corner, how is the Christmas spirit going to set in when it's over 10 °C outside and no snow in sight? For those of you who don't like these cold temperatures, be happy it's not as cold as it was a few hundred years ago when it got so cold, the Rhine river in Basel froze over :-):

The so called Rheingefrörne occurred on January 24, 1463. Carpenters and menials had to supervise the bridge during the night and break up the ice to make sure the wooden piers did not get damaged. On February 3, the city sent 30 men to the frozen river to break up the ice, which they did not manage to do after two days for the ice was too thick. All that was left was to wait for warmer temperatures...

The Rhine in Basel also froze over on January 10, 1514. On the fourth day, the citizens of Basel went on to the ice with drums and pipes and made music together (I guess to make the best out of the situation :-)). In the following days, many people went to the frozen River out of curiosity. Thereby, some of them slid around the Käppelijoch (for more information on the Käppelijoch, see this post), since this apparently helped to overcome a toothache (at least they forgot about it because all their other body parts were frozen stiff). When it got a little bit warmer on January 24 and the ice still hadn't melted, they decided to break up the ice. After two days they had succeeded in breaking up a part of it and soon the rest of the ice melted too.

The old wooden bridge (Mittlere Rheinbrücke) in Basel

In an old guild hall on Freie Strasse, a poem once described the Rheingefrörne of 1514:

Von der Pfalz bis zu Klingental

Bestund von der Kälte überall

Der Rhein, darauf man tanzen pflag,

Dasselbig währet auf acht Tag,

Da zählt man fünfzehnhundert Jahr

Vierzehn dazu, das ist wahr

Thanks for stopping by and happy Thursday!





source: http://www.altbasel.ch/fragen/rhein-zugefroren.html
photo credit: photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/dongga/4350220977/">dongga BS</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/">cc</a>
photo credit: http://www.nmb.bs.ch/forschung/forschung-geowissenschaften/theo/theo-2-bildergalerie.htm