The Devil's Crown part 2: Hasungen

Across the valley from the Wichtelkirche is a plateau-topped hill called Hasungen. In the early eleventh century, a monk called Heimerad, having been kicked out of the monastery of Hersfeld after a squabble with the abbot, came wandering north through Hessia. He visited a place called Kirchberg, where he somehow got himself accused of breaking into the church and committing 'sacrileges' within it, and was expelled. Then he went to a place called Kirchditmold, where he managed to annoy the local priest so profoundly that he was chased away by dogs.

Why everyone hated the hapless Heimerad so much is a mystery. In any case, he eventually ended up on D) Hasungen, where he lived as a hermit for a few years. After his death, he was proclaimed a saint and a monastery was founded on the site.

This account, written about 1085, is the earliest mention of a Christian presence on Hasungen. One must always read hagiography through a very critical lens, however, and it seemed strange to me that Heimerad should choose this particular hill at random. He came from Hersfeld in southern Hessia, which was itself originally founded under Boniface's personal direction as a hermitage. I suspect that Heimerad came to Hasungen deliberately because there was already a hermitage there known to the monks of Hersfeld, and this hermitage may have dated back 250 years to the conversion period.

The Warme valley - the curving white line shows the 'arms' of Heilerbach combe, which faces towards D) Hasungen

This is a 250-year wide leap of faith, true, but the landing is cushioned somewhat by the two stream names near the hill: A) Heiligenbach and B) Teufelsborn, 'holy beck' and 'devil's spring' respectively. Such names were most likely coined during the conversion period, when pagan rituals at springs were still going on, and there were missionaries about who were able to 'demonise' them.

In the Vita Bonifatii, a biography of Boniface written a few years after his death, the author writes how some Hessians "continued to offer sacrifices, secretly or openly, at groves and springs" even after they were baptised. In a letter dating from 738, the pope himself wrote an open letter to the Hessians in which he urged them not to return to "the sacrifices to the dead or prophecies at groves and fountains... which used to happen within your borders."

Typical pagan nonsense

Teufelsborn may have been one such spring that the missionaries successfully associated with devil worship. Heiligenbach, then, just under a mile to the north, was perhaps the site of early baptisms.

But what of Hasungen itself? I was talking to Herr K one evening and he happened to mention that every summer solstice the flat top of Hasungen attracted 'funny people' who went there to watch the sun rise. The dawn sun, it seems, rises precisely between the rocks of Helfenstein. My jaw dropped when he said this. My earlier hunch about Helfenstein and the solstice had been right - but it was dawn, not dusk, that was important, and Helfenstein was the place to look at rather than the place to be - I had gone to the wrong place at the wrong time!

Looking from D) Hasungen to F) Helfenstein, the line shows where the solstice sun rises

A couple of mornings later, since it was only a week or so past the equinox, I rose early, drove out to Hasungen and climbed to the top to watch the sunrise. Unfortunately it was too foggy to see anything.

Not the most impressive sunrise ever

I've risen early two or three times since, but each time the weather has defeated me, and by now the alignment of the dawn sun and Helfenstein has probably been lost. But here's a photo I stole from the internet which shows what I missed:

The solstice sunrise smack bang on top of Helfenstein!

The combination of early Christian hermitage, sacred place-names and this astronomical phenomenon all point towards Hasungen being a focus of intense pagan activity somehow connected to the solstice. Early missionaries had a choice when they came across a cult site. They could either divert the people elsewhere, or they could elbow in and take over the place itself.

Here I think we see both tactics. First, there was a sacred spring below the hill that might have been used year-round by locals and travellers seeking to win the favour of the gods. The missionaries rebranded this spring 'Teufelsborn' and pointed people towards another nearby stream which they used for baptisms, and which consequently became known as 'Heiligenbach'.

Second, there was the hill of Hasungen. This was not so simple: diverting the people elsewhere would do no good, since they might still be drawn to the hill at the solstice - even Boniface could not change the fact that Hasungen offered a unique viewing platform for this astronomical event. So the logical tactic was to appropriate the hill itself, thereby controlling access to it. If the pagans couldn't get up onto the hill, they couldn't perform their rituals. Instead it became the site of a Christian hermitage, a place for solitary monks to retreat, fast, pray and enter into personal combat with the devil - and what better place to do it than here, kneeling on the soft grass of the summit, looking across the valley to the embracing arms of Heilerbachtal, the Wichtelkirche and Helfenstein?

Looking north-east from Hasungen, across the Warme valley is the combe which has Helfenstein at its head (you can see the horn-like outcrops at the centre)

Yet Hasungen was just an outpost of Satan, a place where his deluded followers sacrificed to demons. The early hermits had not conquered the devil, but forced themselves into his direct line of sight when the solistice sun rose, menacing and red, from the crags of Helfenstein. Helfenstein was the real seat of the devil, and it will be the next stop on this tour.