Treis-Karden


Treis-Karden is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Cochem-Zell district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It was the seat of the former like-named Verbandsgemeinde until 1 July 2014. Since then, it is part of the Verbandsgemeinde Cochem. Treis-Karden is a state-recognized tourism resort.

Geography

Location

The municipality lies on the river Moselle, roughly 10 km east-northeast of Cochem.

History

According to the latest research findings, Treis had its first documentary mention in 762 as trisgodros villa publica. The document in question is actually a 10th-century copy in Prüm Abbey’s Liber aureus. There were holdings at Treis owned by Polish queen Richeza, Count Palatine Ezzo's daughter, who apparently donated her property in 1051 and 1056 to the Brauweiler Monastery near Cologne. Beginning in the 11th century, Saint Castor's Foundation in Karden had, by way of donations and purchases, important landholdings. In 1103, Ravengiersburg Monastery obtained by way of trade with St. Stephan in Mainz an estate in Treis. The name Karden is a modern form of the name for a Roman vicus, named in the latter half of the 5th century as Cardena by the geographer of Ravenna. In the late 6th century, Karden was the centre of a greater parish out of whose college of priests arose Saint Castor's Foundation in the 9th century. In 926, an exchange agreement contained the reference in Karadone, and in the 11th century, Karden was named as villa Cardiniacus
Saint Castor is held to have founded a Christian community in Karden as early as the 4th century. Castor's bones went in the 9th century mostly to Saint Castor's Church in Koblenz. In antiquity and in the Middle Ages, Karden was a place of importance whose history was defined by the collegiate foundation that existed here until 1802. Karden was the centre of an archdeaconry. The foundation's provost was through personal union one of the five archdeacons of the Archbishopric of Trier.
Treis was the main centre of the Trechirgau. When this gau's counts, the Berthold-Bezeline family, died out in the late 11th century, it led to a whole series of disputes. For their part, the Counts of Salm-Rheineck sought to bring Treis along with its environs under their yoke. As early as 1121, Heinrich V destroyed the castle to support Count Palatine Gottfried von Calw. Apparently, Otto von Salm had only just had the castle newly built. In the struggle waged by Otto II von Rheineck against Hermann von Stahleck over the Rhenish Electoral Palatinate, Treis eventually fell under Electoral-Trier lordship in 1148, remaining there until the late 18th century.
Beginning in 1794, both centres lay under French rule. In 1815 they were assigned to the Kingdom of Prussia at the Congress of Vienna. Since 1946, they have been part of the then newly founded state of Rhineland-Palatinate. On 7 June 1969, the two centres, until then each a separate municipality, were merged to form the new municipality of Treis-Karden.

Politics

Municipal council

The council is made up of 16 council members, who were elected at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairman.
The municipal election held on 7 June 2009 yielded the following results:

Mayor

Since 2019, Hans-Josef Bleser is Treis-Karden's mayor. He succeeded Philipp Thönnes.

Coat of arms

The German blazon reads: Wappen geviert. In Feld 1: ein goldener Stern in Schwarz, in Feld 2: im goldenen Feld ein roter Einhenkelkrug, in Feld 3: eine blaue Lilie in silbernem Feld, in Feld 4: in schwarzem Feld ein goldener Hammer, umwunden von zwei goldenen Schlangen.
The municipality's arms might in English heraldic language be described thus: Quarterly, first sable a mullet of five Or, second Or a jug with one handle to sinister gules, third argent a fleur-de-lis azure, and fourth sable a hammer palewise coiled in opposite directions around which two serpents of the second.
The mullet can already be found in the 1519 Treis court seal; it was also borne as a charge by the Castle Counts of Treis. The one-handled jug refers to the potter's craft, which was practised throughout Roman times in Karden. Several pieces of this kind can be found in the Foundation museum. The lily appears in the seal of the Collegiate Foundation in Karden from the latter half of the 13th century; it also refers to Mary, the church's former patron. The hammer with two snakes wound onto it refers to the arms borne by the family Broy in Karden. It can be found on several tomb slabs and the winged altar in the Foundation church, as well as on the door lintel of the so-called Burghaus.
In 1977, municipal council commissioned heraldic artist A. Friderichs and local historian H. Ritter to submit designs for a coat of arms. At a session on 18 July of that year, council chose the design that the municipality now bears as its arms, although they insisted on a slight modification to the charge in the second quartering, which was originally to have been an amphora. The arms have been borne since 14 February 1978.

Culture and sightseeing

Buildings

The following are listed buildings or sites in Rhineland-Palatinate’s Directory of Cultural Monuments:

Karden

The name of the building Haus Korbisch is a corruption of the German word Chorbischof.

Museums

Transport

Karden railway station is served by Regional-Express trains running between Koblenz, Trier and Saarbrücken.

Gallery