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93-632: The name of the town was Kösen until 1935. Bad Kösen, and the nearby Rudelsburg castle with its memorials to the German Student Corps , is the location of the annual convention of the Kösener Senioren-Convents-Verband . In sight of the Rudelsburg is the ruin of the nearby Saaleck Castle . Bad Kösen was the seat of the former Verwaltungsgemeinschaft ("municipal association") Bad Kösen . Pforta

186-506: A siphōn installed on their prow under the forecastle , but additional devices could also be placed elsewhere on the ship. Thus in 941, when the Byzantines were facing the vastly more numerous Rus' fleet, siphōn s were placed also amidships and even astern. The use of tubular projectors (σίφων, siphōn ) is amply attested in the contemporary sources. Anna Komnene gives this account of beast-shaped Greek fire projectors being mounted to

279-514: A black mortar at midday sun. Also in equal amounts of each ingredient mix together black mulberry resin and Zakynthian asphalt, the latter in a liquid form and free-flowing, resulting in a product that is sooty colored. Then add to the asphalt the tiniest amount of quicklime. But because the sun is at its zenith, one must pound it carefully and protect the face, for it will ignite suddenly. When it catches fire, one should seal it in some sort of copper receptacle; in this way you will have it available in

372-502: A box, without exposing it to the sun. If you should wish to ignite enemy armaments, you will smear it on in the evening, either on the armaments or some other object, but in secret; when the sun comes up, everything will be burnt up. In naval warfare, the Byzantine emperor Anastasius I ( r.  491–518 ) is recorded by chronicler John Malalas to have been advised by a philosopher from Athens called Proclus to use sulfur to burn

465-544: A bronze tube similar to that which the rustics call a squitiatoria , "squirt," with which boys play, they spray [it] at the enemy. Another, possibly first-hand, account of the use of Greek fire comes from the 11th-century Yngvars saga víðförla , in which the Viking Ingvar the Far-Travelled faces ships equipped with Greek fire weapons: [They] began blowing with smiths’ bellows at a furnace in which there

558-551: A church. As the latter incident demonstrates, the Byzantines could not avoid capture of their secret weapon: the Arabs captured at least one fireship intact in 827, and the Bulgars captured several siphōn s and much of the substance itself in 812/814. This was apparently not enough to allow their enemies to copy it (see below ). The Arabs used various incendiary substances similar to the Byzantine weapon, but were never able to copy

651-478: A fiery whirlwind on the faces of the enemies. At the same time, the reports by Western chroniclers of the famed ignis graecus are largely unreliable, since they apply the name to all incendiary substances. In attempting to reconstruct the Greek fire system, the evidence from the contemporary literary references provides the following characteristics: The first and, for a long time, most popular theory regarding

744-489: A large-scale Prussian military exercise in the area in 1853, the provincial classes invited King Frederick William IV to breakfast at the castle. The drinking hall in the inner courtyard, which was built in the same year, is probably a product of this visit. The hall took the form of a roofed seating area that was open to the courtyard and replaced the old straw roof that had been held up by simple tree trunks. In 1863, Hermann Allmers from Rechtenfleth near Bremen composed

837-490: A long tube on wheels was used which blew flames forward using a large bellows . The Graeco-Roman treatise Kestoi , compiled in the late 2nd or early 3rd century AD and traditionally ascribed to Julius Africanus , records a mixture that ignited from adequate heat and intense sunlight, used in grenades or night attacks: Automatic fire also by the following formula. This is the recipe: take equal amounts of sulphur, rock salt, ashes, thunder stone, and pyrite and pound fine in

930-690: A particular attraction for visitors and lies on the Romanesque Road ( Ger : Straße der Romanik ), a tourist route . Rudelsburg sits atop a rocky shell limestone ridge, approximately 85 metres (279 ft) above the river Saale and above Saaleck, a suburb of Bad Kösen in the Burgenlandkreis district in Saxony-Anhalt , Germany . Since 2010, the area has been part of the municipality of Naumburg . Archaeological finds seem to indicate that an early Bronze Age settlement existed on

1023-499: A process was held at the Rudelsburg on 4 June 1616. At the time, a caretaker still lived in the castle, which was accessible via a narrow road. The courtyard was covered in grass. Besides a small room with a wooden pulpit, the usable remains of the castle included the dungeons with their very strong doors. Towards the end of the Thirty Years' War in 1640, Swedish troops set fire to the Rudelsburg. Following this third destruction,

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1116-631: A second time in 1450. The inner keep was burnt to the ground during this incident. At the division of the lands of the House of Wettin in 1485 , the Rudelsburg was attributed to the Albertine line. Rudolph von Bünau auf Teuchern and Günther von Bünau auf Gröbitz sold the Rudelsburg and the surrounding outworks to Hans Georg von Osterhausen in 1581 to cover their debts. The castle, which had been barely maintained until then, began to fall into decay during this period. Although Groitzsch still describes

1209-616: A willow tree, saltpeter ( sale ardente ), alcohol, sulfur, incense, tar ( pegola ), wool, and camphor ; the concoction was guaranteed to "burn under water" and to be "beautiful". The chief method of deployment of Greek fire, which sets it apart from similar substances, was its projection through a tube ( siphōn ), for use aboard ships or in sieges. Portable projectors ( cheirosiphōnes , χειροσίφωνες) were also invented, reputedly by Emperor Leo VI. The Byzantine military manuals also mention that jars ( chytrai or tzykalia ) filled with Greek fire and caltrops wrapped with tow and soaked in

1302-475: Is an Ortsteil of Bad Kösen. This Burgenlandkreis location article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Rudelsburg The Rudelsburg is a ruined hill castle located on the east bank of the river Saale above Saaleck , a village in the borough of Naumburg in the county of Burgenlandkreis in Saxony-Anhalt , Germany . The Rudelsburg was built in the Middle Ages by

1395-725: Is not due to chronological confusion of the events of the siege, it may suggest that Kallinikos introduced an improved version of an established weapon. The historian James Partington thinks it likely that Greek fire was not the creation of any single person but "invented by chemists in Constantinople who had inherited the discoveries of the Alexandrian chemical school". The 11th-century chronicler George Kedrenos records that Kallinikos came from Heliopolis in Egypt , but most scholars reject this as an error. Kedrenos also records

1488-503: The siphōn projecting it, and the special training of the siphōnarioi who used it. Knowledge of the whole system was highly compartmentalised , with operators and technicians aware of the secrets of only one component, ensuring that no enemy could gain knowledge of it in its entirety. This accounts for the fact that when the Bulgarians took Mesembria and Debeltos in 814, they captured 36 siphōn s and even quantities of

1581-398: The siphōn -projected substance described by Byzantine sources. A second view, based on the fact that Greek fire was inextinguishable by water (some sources suggest that water intensified the flames), suggested that its destructive power was the result of the explosive reaction between water and quicklime . Although quicklime was known and used by the Byzantines and the Arabs in warfare,

1674-683: The Bishop of Naumburg and served to secure trade routes such as the Via Regia through the Saale Valley. The Rudelsburg was a point of conflict between the bishops of Naumburg and the Margraves of Meissen belonging to the House of Wettin . The castle occasionally served various noble families as a residence, until it was destroyed in the Thirty Years' War and thereafter fell into disrepair. In

1767-633: The Black Sea (e.g., the wells around Tmutorakan noted by Constantine Porphyrogennetos) or in various locations throughout the Middle East. An alternate name for Greek fire was " Median fire" ( μηδικὸν πῦρ ), and the 6th-century historian Procopius records that crude oil, called " naphtha " (in Greek: νάφθα náphtha , from Old Persian 𐎴𐎳𐎫 naft ) by the Persians, was known to

1860-654: The German Democratic Republic (GDR). The owner, a member of the nobility, lost his possessions, and the castle was attributed to the town of Bad Kösen. The student organisations which found themselves on the territory of the GDR moved to the west. The KSCV’s congress was held from 1954 to 1994 in Würzburg , near to the Fortress Marienberg . The Rudelsburg and Bad Kösen were but a memory for

1953-465: The Normans . It is often regarded as an at least partial "recipe" for Greek fire: This fire is made by the following arts: From the pine and certain such evergreen trees, inflammable resin is collected. This is rubbed with sulfur and put into tubes of reed, and is blown by men using it with violent and continuous breath. Then in this manner it meets the fire on the tip and catches light and falls like

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2046-548: The Wartburg , discussions began as to whether the Rudelsburg should also be restored. These discussions were further provoked by a storm in December 1868, which brought down parts of the perimeter walls. Work to restore the perimeter walls in the west and in the south began in 1870. The partial reconstruction of the castle began a year later under the leadership of the master builder, Werner, from Bad Kösen, using plans drawn up by

2139-488: The cheirosiphōn also throwing the ignited substance. In its earliest form, Greek fire was hurled onto enemy forces by firing a burning cloth-wrapped ball, perhaps containing a flask, using a form of light catapult , most probably a seaborne variant of the Roman light catapult or onager . These were capable of hurling loads of around 6 to 9 kg (13 to 20 lb) a distance of 350–450 m (380–490 yd). Although

2232-612: The 19th century, which included chemist Marcellin Berthelot . This view has subsequently been rejected, since saltpeter does not appear to have been used in warfare in Europe or the Middle East before the 13th century, and is absent from the accounts of the Muslim writers – the foremost chemists of the early medieval world – before the same period. In addition, the behavior of the suggested mixture would have been very different from

2325-506: The Arab ships and burned them with all hands. Thus it was that the Romans returned with victory and discovered the sea fire. The accuracy and exact chronology of this account is open to question: elsewhere, Theophanes reports the use of fire-carrying ships equipped with nozzles ( siphōn ) by the Byzantines a couple of years before the supposed arrival of Kallinikos at Constantinople. If this

2418-560: The Byzantine expansion in the late 9th and early 10th centuries. Use of the substance was prominent in Byzantine civil wars, chiefly the revolt of the thematic fleets in 727 and the large-scale rebellion led by Thomas the Slav in 821–823. In both cases, the rebel fleets were defeated by the Constantinople-based central Imperial fleet through the use of Greek fire. The Byzantines also used the weapon to devastating effect against

2511-522: The Byzantine method of deployment by siphōn , and used catapults and grenades instead. Greek fire continued to be mentioned during the 12th century, and Anna Komnene gives a vivid description of its use in a naval battle against the Pisans in 1099. The use of hastily improvised fireships is mentioned during the 1203 siege of Constantinople by the Fourth Crusade , but no report confirms

2604-566: The Crusades. Original Byzantine sources called the substance a variety of names, such as "sea fire" ( Medieval Greek : πῦρ θαλάσσιον pŷr thalássion ), "Roman fire" ( πῦρ ῥωμαϊκόν pŷr rhōmaïkón ), "war fire" ( πολεμικὸν πῦρ polemikòn pŷr ), "liquid fire" ( ὑγρὸν πῦρ hygròn pŷr ), "sticky fire" ( πῦρ κολλητικόν pŷr kollētikón ), or "manufactured fire" ( πῦρ σκευαστόν pŷr skeuastón ). Incendiary and flaming weapons were used in warfare for centuries before Greek fire

2697-528: The French fleet (1338-1346). The citizens of Naumburg burnt down the Rudelsburg during their siege, and there were deaths and injuries on both sides. It seems that the castle was not rebuilt, as it is not mentioned in any official document for several decades after this event. The next mention of the castle dates to 1383, when the Schenk family from Saaleck belonging to the House of Vargula are named as masters of

2790-529: The GDR. The first congress took place in Bad Kösen in 1995. The Rudelsburg was once again put to use for this purpose, which required extensive work to restore the castle. Bad Kösen's infrastructure also had to be upgraded, for the congress was now much larger than it had even been before the war. The monuments at the Rudelsburg have also been successively restored since unification. These works have been financed by

2883-639: The Greeks as "Median oil" ( μηδικὸν ἔλαιον ). This seems to corroborate the availability of naphtha as a basic ingredient of Greek fire. Naphtha was also used by the Abbasids in the 9th century, with special troops, the naffāṭūn , who wore thick protective suits and used small copper vessels containing burning oil, which they threw onto the enemy troops. There is also a surviving 9th-century Latin text, preserved at Wolfenbüttel in Germany, which mentions

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2976-765: The KSCV's new self-confidence. As a consequence, the annual meeting at the Rudelsburg became more sedate and ceremonial. Speeches held at the monuments and patriotic songs were fixtures in the annual Pentecost programme in the German Empire. In the Empire and the Weimar Republic , life-size copies of the Rudelsburg monuments were made and sold to interested buyers in Germany and Austria. In 2007, these laboriously produced objects are still to be found from time to time in antique shops. In 1913, Paul Schreckenbach wrote

3069-517: The KSCV, with donations from individual student bodies, but also with donations from individual members. Greek fire Greek fire was an incendiary weapon system used by the Byzantine Empire from the seventh to the fourteenth centuries. The recipe for Greek fire was a closely-guarded state secret ; historians have variously speculated that it was based on saltpeter , sulfur , or quicklime , but most modern scholars agree that it

3162-576: The Memoirs of the Lord of Joinville during the Seventh Crusade . One description of the memoir says "the tail of fire that trailed behind it was as big as a great spear; and it made such a noise as it came, that it sounded like the thunder of heaven. It looked like a dragon flying through the air. Such a bright light did it cast, that one could see all over the camp as though it were day, by reason of

3255-442: The Rudelsburg as arx pulcherrima ("most beautiful castle") in his 1585 work Descriptio Salae fluvii eidemque adjacentium urbium, arcium etc. ( Description of the river Saale and the surrounding towns, castles, etc. ), a record from 1612 indicates that the lord marshal of Osterhausen employed a stonemason and a carpenter to provide "necessary support of the sagging beams, girders and rafters". According to Osterhausen court records,

3348-599: The Rudelsburg from 22 April to 30 July 1348. The sources relate that an “instrumentum” was brought to bear during the siege that could shoot Greek fire . This must have been some early form of gunpowder and is thought to be one of the first records of the use of firearms in a siege in Germany . The only earlier recorded use of ordnance dates back to the siege of the town of Meersburg on Lake Constance by Ludwig von Bayern in 1334. The oldest reports in all of Europe are from Italy ( Florence 1326, Cividale 1331) and from

3441-488: The Rudelsburg was abandoned on 14 April 1641 and the inhabitants moved to the nearby Kreipitzsch property. The nobles from Creutz(en) are believed to have been the owners of the Rudelsburg from 1671 to 1771. In 1690, they tried to establish the status of the (uninhabited) castle as a possession owing direct allegiance only to the emperor ( Reichsunmittelbarkeit ) in a court process in the imperial court in Wetzlar . In 1770,

3534-511: The aim of disrupting the enemy formation. Although both Leo VI and Nikephoros Phokas claim that the substance used in the cheirosiphōnes was the same as in the static devices used on ships, Haldon and Byrne consider that the former were manifestly different from their larger cousins, and theorize that the device was fundamentally different, "a simple syringe [that] squirted both liquid fire (presumably unignited) and noxious juices to repel enemy troops." The illustrations of Hero's Poliorcetica show

3627-480: The bow of warships: As he [the Emperor Alexios I ] knew that the Pisans were skilled in sea warfare and dreaded a battle with them, on the prow of each ship he had a head fixed of a lion or other land-animal, made in brass or iron with the mouth open and then gilded over, so that their mere aspect was terrifying. And the fire which was to be directed against the enemy through tubes he made to pass through

3720-517: The bronze tank under pressure. This led to the relocation of the pressure pump between the tank and the nozzle. The full-scale device built on this basis established the effectiveness of the mechanism's design, even with the simple materials and techniques available to the Byzantines. The experiment used crude oil mixed with wood resins, and achieved a flame temperature of over 1,000 °C (1,830 °F) and an effective range of up to 15 meters (49 ft). The portable cheirosiphōn ("hand- siphōn "),

3813-407: The cantor emeritus, Johann Friedrich Förtsch, described the Rudelsburg as follows: “The inner courtyard is covered in the rubble of the various ceremonial halls, chambers, weapon and storage rooms, kitchens, underground vaults, cellars and corridors, which have collapsed. It is thus impossible to say how everything used to be arranged.” Nonetheless, ever more visitors came to the Rudelsburg. During

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3906-513: The church and installed there a number of families belonging to the nobility of service (retainers to a lord whose status was far above that of the peasantry but who nonetheless did not belong to the ranks of the high nobility). A source from 1271 names 12 different castellans . A priest is mentioned for the first time in 1293. During a dispute with the noble Curtefrund, the citizens of Naumburg led by their captain Johann von Trautzschen laid siege to

3999-536: The citadel, seated in Rottelsburg. A loan certificate of the Dukes of Saxony, who belonged to the House of Wettin , dated 2 April 1441 names the brothers Rudolf, Günther and Heinrich von Bünau as the owners of the Rudelsburg. Apparently they owned no land other than that on which the castle stood. During the fratricidal war between Friedrich and Wilhelm of Saxony , the Rudelsburg was besieged and destroyed for

4092-431: The composition of Greek fire held that its chief ingredient was saltpeter , making it an early form of gunpowder . This argument was based on the "thunder and smoke" description, as well as on the distance the flame could be projected from the siphōn , which suggested an explosive discharge. From the times of Isaac Vossius , several scholars adhered to this position, most notably the so-called "French school" during

4185-405: The described intensity of Greek fire. Consequently, although the presence of either quicklime or saltpeter in the mixture cannot be entirely excluded, they were not the primary ingredient. Most modern scholars agree that Greek fire was based on either crude or refined petroleum , comparable to modern napalm . The Byzantines had easy access to crude oil from the naturally occurring wells around

4278-469: The destructiveness of Greek fire is indisputable, it did not make the Byzantine navy invincible. It was not, in the words of naval historian John Pryor, a "ship-killer" comparable to the naval ram , which, by then, had fallen out of use. While Greek fire remained a potent weapon, its limitations were significant when compared to more traditional forms of artillery: in its siphōn -deployed version, it had

4371-546: The earliest analogue to a modern flamethrower , is extensively attested in the military documents of the 10th century, and recommended for use in both sea and land. They first appear in the Tactica of emperor Leo VI the Wise , who claims to have invented them. Subsequent authors continued to refer to the cheirosiphōnes , especially for use against siege towers ; Nikephoros II Phokas also advises their use in field armies, with

4464-486: The early 19th century the Rudelsburg became a popular tourist destination thanks to the romanticisation of mountains and the rise of hiking as a pastime. From 1855 onwards it achieved national renown as the annual meeting place of the Kösener Senioren-Convents-Verband , the oldest union of student fraternities with delegates from all German-speaking countries . The Rudelsburg still maintains

4557-446: The equally state-owned limestone factory in Bad Kösen. The first attempts to revive the old student traditions began in the GDR in the 1960s. Much however had already been forgotten, and information and materials first had to be collected in secret. In the early years of the 1980s, the first new fraternities in the GDR were founded, at first secretly and then ever more openly. The Rudelsburg and other traditional meeting points featured in

4650-509: The famous song An der Saale hellem Strande (On the bright bank of the Saale) whilst resting at the castle during a hike along the river in 1826: In this song, the castles on the Saale are decaying ruins that serve only to inspire the imagination. There is as yet no mention of drinking and celebrations or of the Rudelsburg as a venue for events. The attractiveness of the castle rose however with

4743-750: The first monument erected by members of the students’ corps was unveiled. The Gefallenensäule (English: Pillar to the Fallen) was established in honour of those members who had fallen in the Franco-Prussian War . The Emperor William I Obelisk was unveiled in 1890, followed in 1896 by the Young Bismarck Memorial. The last of this first round of monuments was erected in 1926 in honour of those who fell in World War I. ( See below: Monuments ) The partial reconstruction by Mothes,

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4836-446: The fleet inventories. The process of operating Haldon and Byrne's design was fraught with danger, as the mounting pressure could easily make the heated oil tank explode, a flaw which was not recorded as a problem with the historical fire weapon. In the experiments conducted by Haldon in 2002 for the episode "Fireship" of the television series Machines Times Forgot , even modern welding techniques failed to secure adequate insulation of

4929-478: The founding of the German Empire in 1871 and the erection of the monuments in the area near the outer keep marked a completely new phase in the history of the Rudelsburg. While youthful appreciation of nature and the romantic scenery had been pivotal in the first half of the century, the Rudelsburg now became a symbol for the members of the KSCV. The KSCV was a strong ally of the state, which was reinforced by

5022-490: The great mass of fire, and the brilliance of the light that it shed." In the 19th century, it is reported that an Armenian called Kavafian approached the government of the Ottoman Empire with a new type of Greek fire he claimed to have developed. Kavafian refused to reveal its composition when asked by the government, insisting that he be placed in command of its use during naval engagements. Not long after this, he

5115-470: The historical novel The last Rudelsburger , which is set in the 14th century and which reflects the conservative Prussian values of his time. There were no student meetings at the Rudelsburg during World War I , but the tradition was restarted after the end of the war. In 1926, the Löwendenkmal (English: Lion Monument) was unveiled with great pomp. This ceremony was seen as a symbol of the members of

5208-503: The ingredients of what appears to be Greek fire and the operation of the siphōn s used to project it. Although the text contains some inaccuracies, it identifies the main component as naphtha. Resins were probably added as a thickener (the Praecepta Militaria refer to the substance as πῦρ κολλητικόν , "sticky fire"), and to increase the duration and intensity of the flame. A modern theoretical concoction included

5301-490: The members of the students’ corps. The Rudelsburg decayed further during this time, as did the monuments that had been erected there. Some larger metal pieces were melted down and reused. As it was common to take the names of tourist attractions to designate products produced in a particular area, the name “Rudelsburg” was used to name a car radio produced in the state-owned radio factory in Halle and various products produced in

5394-508: The membership of both of the most important political decision-makers of the time, Otto von Bismarck and Emperor Wilhelm II . With the founding of the Verband Alter Corpsstudenten (English: Federation of old members), the KSCV, which had until then only counted students amongst its members, had a new source of income in the form of contributions from the “old men”. The Rudelsburg became a platform for celebrations of

5487-444: The mouths of the beasts, so that it seemed as if the lions and the other similar monsters were vomiting the fire. Some sources provide more information on the composition and function of the whole mechanism. The Wolfenbüttel manuscript provides the following description: ...having built a furnace right at the front of the ship, they set on it a copper vessel full of these things, having put fire underneath. And one of them, having made

5580-461: The oldest union of German student fraternities. The site of the KSCV's annual meeting was soon moved to Bad Kösen, and a meeting took place in the Rudelsburg for the first time in 1855. From this time until World War I , the Rudelburg served every year as a social meeting point during the annual meeting in Bad Kösen. In 1867, following the celebration of the 800th anniversary of the restoration of

5673-407: The only two sources that explicitly mention that the substance was heated over a furnace before being discharged; although the validity of this information is open to question, modern reconstructions have relied upon them. Based on these descriptions and the Byzantine sources, John Haldon and Maurice Byrne designed a hypothetical apparatus as consisting of three main components: a bronze pump, which

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5766-623: The onslaught of the Muslim conquests . Within a generation, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt had fallen to the Arabs, who in c.  672 set out to conquer the imperial capital of Constantinople . Greek fire was used to great effect against the Muslim fleets, helping to repel the Muslims at the first and second Arab sieges of the city. Records of its use in later naval battles against the Saracens are more sporadic, but it secured victories during

5859-409: The owner of the Rudelsburg ordered that the walls of the outer keep be torn down in order to reuse the stones for construction on the property, but a worker was permanently injured in an accident, and this was interpreted as a bad omen. The work was stopped. The outer keep was almost completely destroyed at this point in time, and it is probably only as a result of this accident that the ruined inner keep

5952-482: The plans of the GDR students. On 20 June 1987, the fraternity Salana Jenensis organised the first ceremonial drinking session of the GDR student fraternities at the Rudelsburg. At the first such meeting, just 19 participants were present, some of whom had arrived by using rafts or bath tubs made of zinc to travel along the Saale. This was to be a reference to the tradition of boat trips on the Saale which can be seen in many old depictions. This ceremonial drinking session

6045-411: The research into Greek fire. Despite this almost exclusive focus, Greek fire is best understood as a complete weapon system of many components, all of which were needed to operate together to render it effective. This comprised not only the formula of its composition, but also the specialized dromon ships that carried it into battle, the device used to prepare the substance by heating and pressurizing it,

6138-419: The resins into a fluid mixture. The substance was pressurized by the heat and the use of a force pump. After it had reached the proper pressure, a valve connecting the tank with the swivel was opened and the mixture was discharged from its end, being ignited at its mouth by a flame. The intense heat of the flame made necessary the presence of heat shields made of iron (βουκόλια, boukolia ), which are attested in

6231-493: The royal building officer in Saxony, Oskar Mothes. During these works, the entrance and the bridge were repaired. The knight's hall with its staircase and side room were restored. A large breach in the wall was closed in the north-eastern corner and windows were cut in the old northern wall. A canon that had been captured in the 1870-71 Franco-Prussian War was placed on the bridge. These works were complete by Easter 1872. In 1872,

6324-527: The same period, the masters of the castle belonging to the family of the barons von Schönberg planted grapevines on the southern slope of the hill. One of the former vineyard workers, Gottlieb Wagner, known as “Samiel”, began to look after the ruins. From 1824 onwards, he offered food and drink from the Kreipitzsch property to visitors. Franz Kugler , a student from Stettin studying in Berlin , composed

6417-417: The secrets of its composition, as it was "shown and revealed by an angel to the great and holy first Christian emperor Constantine " and that the angel bound him "not to prepare this fire but for Christians, and only in the imperial city". As a warning, he adds that one official, who was bribed into handing some of it over to the Empire's enemies, was struck down by a "flame from heaven" as he was about to enter

6510-505: The services offered by Wagner, so much so that the head of the district authorities in Naumburg asked Friedrich von Schönberg, the owner of the property, if it would be possible to open it officially for visitors. Consequently, a road was even built up to the castle. Gottlieb Wagner opened the first tavern in the castle in time for Easter 1827, although it was only open on Sundays at first. When word got around about this development amongst

6603-519: The ships of the rebel general Vitalian . Greek fire proper was developed in c.  672 and is ascribed by the chronicler Theophanes the Confessor to Kallinikos (Latinized Callinicus), a Jewish architect from Heliopolis , in Syria, by then overrun by the Muslim conquests : At that time Kallinikos, an artificer from Heliopolis, fled to the Romans. He had devised a sea fire which ignited

6696-557: The site of the Rudelsburg, which has been attributed to the Unetice culture . The discovery of the Nebra sky disk attracted public attention to this prehistoric civilisation and its elevated culture and provoked interest in the settlements in the region of Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia . The political, religious and economic importance of such settlements has not yet been established, but is the focus of intense research. The Rudelsburg castle

6789-482: The story, considered implausible by modern scholars, that Kallinikos' descendants, a family called Lampros , "brilliant", kept the secret of the fire's manufacture and continued doing so to Kedrenos' time. Kallinikos' development of Greek fire came at a critical moment in the Byzantine Empire's history: weakened by its long wars with Sassanid Persia , the Byzantines had been unable to effectively resist

6882-584: The student song Dort Saaleck, hier die Rudelsburg (There Saaleck, here the Rudelsburg). Although Allmers was himself not a student, he traveled with students in the Saale valley, and his song speaks of the new life within the walls of the castle. In the middle of the 19th century, the Rudelsburg became a regular meeting point for students’ corps, whose umbrella organisation the Kösener Senioren-Convents-Verband (KSCV) had been founded in Jena in 1848, making it

6975-550: The students in Jena, they marched on the Rudelsburg and, cheering loudly, occupied it for three days. The owner of the castle was honoured with a torchlight procession. The completion of the Thuringian Railway in 1849, which improved the access to the Rudelsburg, coupled with the gastronomic offerings, further increased the attractiveness of the castle and brought in visitors from further abroad, including for example students from Leipzig and Halle an der Saale. During

7068-494: The students’ corps attachment to the old imperial system and was reported throughout Germany and beyond. The last meeting of the KSCV at the Rudelsburg before World War II took place in 1934. The 1935 congress ended with the dissolution of the group by the National Socialists . During World War II , there were efforts at some universities to re-establish individual student bodies in secret. These were to include

7161-449: The substance itself, but were unable to make any use of them. The information available on Greek fire is indirect, based on references in the Byzantine military manuals and secondary historical sources such as Anna Komnene and Western European chroniclers, which are often inaccurate. In her Alexiad , Anna Komnene provides a description of an incendiary weapon, which was used by the Byzantine garrison of Dyrrhachium in 1108 against

7254-478: The substance were thrown by catapults, while pivoting cranes ( gerania ) were employed to pour it upon enemy ships. The cheirosiphōnes especially were prescribed for use at land and in sieges, both against siege machines and against defenders on the walls, by several 10th-century military authors, and their use is depicted in the Poliorcetica of Hero of Byzantium . The Byzantine dromons usually had

7347-426: The theory is refuted by literary and empirical evidence. A quicklime-based substance would have to come in contact with water to ignite, while Emperor Leo's Tactica indicates that Greek fire was often poured directly onto the decks of enemy ships, although admittedly, decks were kept wet due to lack of sealants. Likewise, Leo describes the use of grenades, which further reinforces the view that contact with water

7440-524: The umbrella organisation, the KSCV. To this end, a meeting was organised at the Rudelsburg in 1944, which ended with a ceremonial drinking session. Because of the chaos in the last months of the war, neither this new founding nor the attraction of the Gestapo ’s attention had serious consequences for those involved. After the end of World War II, the Rudelsburg was part of the Soviet occupation zone and later

7533-465: The use of pine tar and animal fat. A 12th-century treatise prepared by Mardi bin Ali al-Tarsusi for Saladin records an Arab version of Greek fire, called naft , which also had a petroleum base, with sulfur and various resins added. Any direct relation with the Byzantine formula is unlikely. An Italian recipe from the 16th century has been recorded for recreational use; it includes charcoal from

7626-512: The use of Greek fire. This might be because of the general disarmament of the Empire in the 20 years leading up to the sacking, or because the Byzantines had lost access to the areas where the primary ingredients were to be found, or even perhaps because the secret had been lost over time. Records of a 13th-century use of "Greek fire" by the Saracens against the Crusaders can be read through

7719-698: The various Rus' raids on the Bosporus , especially those of 941 and 1043 , as well as during the Bulgarian war of 970–971 , when the fire-carrying Byzantine ships blockaded the Danube. The importance placed on Greek fire during the Empire's struggle against the Arabs led to its discovery being ascribed to divine intervention. The Emperor Constantine Porphyrogennetos ( r.  945–959 ), in his book De Administrando Imperio , admonishes his son and heir, Romanos II ( r.  959–963 ), never to reveal

7812-493: Was based on petroleum mixed with resins , comparable in composition to modern napalm . Byzantine sailors would toss grenades loaded with Greek fire onto enemy ships or spray it from tubes. Its ability to burn on water made it an effective and destructive naval incendiary weapon, and rival powers tried unsuccessfully to copy the material. Usage of the term "Greek fire" has been general in English and most other languages since

7905-415: Was designed to keep together the inheritance of the family. In the 19th century, the Rudelburg became a meeting point for romantically-minded hikers, especially for students from Jena , Leipzig and Halle . By this time, the castle was desolate, and devoid of all infrastructure. There was no entrance into the courtyard of the central keep and there were no sealed rooms, just rubble and debris. In 1818,

7998-471: Was established in 1050 as a border fortification and was extended around 1150, with the addition of the central and outer keeps. Not far away on the western knoll is the ruin of Saaleck Castle . Rudelsburg was officially mentioned for the first time in 1171 under the name Rutheleibisberg. Heinrich III, Margrave of Meissen , received the castle from the Bishop from Naumburg in 1238 as recompense for services to

8091-407: Was fire and there came from it a great din. There stood there also a brass [or bronze] tube and from it flew much fire against one ship, and it burned up in a short time so that all of it became white ashes... The account, albeit embellished, corresponds with many of the characteristics of Greek fire known from other sources, such as a loud roar that accompanied its discharge. These two texts are also

8184-518: Was invented. They included sulfur-, petroleum -, and bitumen -based mixtures. Incendiary arrows and pots or small pouches containing combustible substances surrounded by caltrops or spikes, or launched by catapults , were used by the 9th century BC by the Assyrians and were extensively used in the Greco-Roman world as well. Thucydides mentions that in the siege of Delium in 424 BC

8277-489: Was not necessary for the substance's ignition. Zenghelis (1932) pointed out that, based on experiments, the result of the water–quicklime reaction would be negligible in the open sea. Another similar proposition suggested that Kallinikos had discovered calcium phosphide , which can be made by boiling bones in urine in a sealed vessel. On contact with water it releases phosphine , which ignites spontaneously. Extensive experiments with calcium phosphide also failed to reproduce

8370-417: Was poisoned by imperial authorities, without their ever having found out his secret. As Constantine Porphyrogennetos' warnings show, the ingredients and the processes of manufacture and deployment of Greek fire were carefully guarded military secrets. So strict was the secrecy that the composition of Greek fire was lost forever and remains a source of speculation. The mystery of the formula has long dominated

8463-510: Was preserved. With the death of Friedrich Adolph von Creutz in 1774, the male line of the family was extinguished. This thwarted the plans to establish the Reichsunmittelbarkeit of the Rudelsburg. In the following years, the counts from Zech and the counts from Brühl are named briefly as the owners of the Rudelsburg. The family von Schönberg bought the castle in 1797 and established an entailment, i.e. an indivisible trust that

8556-483: Was the first officially registered traditional student meeting in the history of the GDR. From this year on, the Rudelsburg was the annual meeting point for the student fraternities which had been founded in the GDR before 1990. In 1990, they joined in the Rudelsburg Alliance. In 1990 (sometimes even before German Reunification ), the first student bodies began to return to their old university towns in

8649-420: Was used to pressurize the oil; a brazier, used to heat the oil (πρόπυρον, propyron , "pre-heater"); and the nozzle, which was covered in bronze and mounted on a swivel (στρεπτόν, strepton ). The brazier, burning a match of linen or flax that produced intense heat and the characteristic thick smoke, was used to heat oil and the other ingredients in an airtight tank above it, a process that also helped to dissolve

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