Settlement Type

Catagorizing Marschland Villages

One characteristic of northwestern Germany is the variety of living and farming patterns concentrated in a small area. I have explored the impact of village patterns and settlement size in my conference paper, "Mapping Soil Structures, Village Types, and Market Patterns in East Friesland during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century," presented at to Social Science History Association meeting in Chicago, Novermber 2004.

Village typology based on housing pattern

Einzelhof (farmstead) = present on new and old Marsch, Geest, and low Moor.
Haufensiedlung (cluster village) = old Marsch, interior of Geest, none on Moor.
Reihen- or Hufensiedlung (row or chain village) = new Marsch, west side of East Frisian       Geest, the high Moor.
Schwarmsiedlung (dispersed village) = Geest and high Moor.
Fehnsiedlung (fen village) = on High Moor.

Village typology based on field (Flur) form

Reihenform = Hufendorf (in Marsch, Marschhufendorf, ex. Landschaftspolder).
Reihenform on Geest = long, narrow, rectangular fields (called "Upstreet"); was a late           medieval colonization form common in Weser and Elbe Marschlands.
Blockform = Haufendorf (or Warfdorf)
Kämpe = Geesthaufensiedlung (also called Gaste).
Fehnform = on High Moor, rectangular, more broad than wide, not greater than 10 ha,         differs from Reihenform in that it has canals.

Village typology based on shape

Runddorf (Rysum) = a special subset of Haufendorf with a round format.
Länglich-rundendorf = a special subset of Haufendorf with an oval format (i.e.,                     Hamswehrum).
Fehnkolonie = a Reihendorf situated along a canal with secondary canals (Wiecken) for         property lines

Size and distribution of villages by landscape type

 

area

settlements

square km

%

number

%

Marsch

1137.06

36.6

570

43.0

Geest

1091.25

35.1

631

47.7

Moor

764.04

24.5

108

8.2

Inseln

118.13

3.8

15

1.1

TOTAL

3110.48

100

1324

100

Distribution of population by settlement size

settlement size

population

number

percentage

individual

1 - 50

772

58.3

small

51 - 1000

524

39.6

medium

1001 - 2000

16

1.2

large

2001 - 5000

8

0.6

largest

more than 5000

4

0.3