Talk:Almenum

Material from fy:Lúntsjerk could be useful. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:51, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Disputed

Substantial elements of the text (not only the first section) are based on 16th-century mythological stories (e.g. there has never been a cathedral in Almenum) and cannnot be supported by recent historical evidence. There are pretty good 20th- and 21th-century books on regional and urban history as well as on archaeology. I would think the page needs to be completely rewritten, presenting the mythicals part as a myth (hardly a medieval legend!). There is no known history before the building of an ordinary village church in the 12th century, which became the main church of the harbour town of Harlingen after the 1500s.Otto S. Knottnerus (talk) 12:24, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

So isn't it adequate to have the section titled Legendary origin, and each of three relevant paragraphs calling it a "legend" or a "story"? The Medieval history section is based on historic documents however. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:47, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, it's the medieval part which is almost completely fictional. Most of these stories have been invented in the late 16th century by Andreas Cornelius. Not even the incorporation story holds true, Almenum has always been the parochial church of Harlingen (1327: ecclesie Sancti Michaeli in Almeno et Hairlinghe), though it lay outside its ramparts. The etymology is very uncertain too and burdened with old stories. The ashes and postholes of two burnt wooden churches have been loosely excavated in 1958. They were built on a newly erected platform next to the village mound on a high salt marsh, "hardly before the 9th century". Archeologist suppose it was a commercial settlement, but there have been no high ranking finds linking the village to the regional elite (apart from a 10th-century comb from Haithabu). The 754 date is fictional, the comparatively large tufa church (10 by 20 meters) must have been from the 12th century, the still existing tufa bell tower is from the last quarter of the 12th century. There is a, however, an 13th-century legend that states that Magnus brought the (fictional) privilege of the Frisian freedom "in Almenum in sente Michaelis dome" which was by then a wooden church with a thatched roof. Apparently this story was told in the new harbour town of Harlingen to legitimize the position of their main church and the status of the local warlords. Harlingen was first mentioned 1228, Almenum in a parochial list 1256-1270. Harlingen nor Almenum had a place in the ecclesiastical hierarchy. The story of Magnus starts in the 1130s with the finding of a second corps of Saint Magnus in Rome, strenthening the position of the Emperor versus the Pope, who had his own relics in Anagni. Frisian crucaders supported the imperial cause in order to gain a more independence. Apparently they brought back some relics which gave their village church a higher status. Cf. Article Noomen 1989

By the way, it's a bit disturbing to see that so many English on Frisia, often written in bad English, have been contaminated by myth believers. The same holds true for pages in Frisian.Otto S. Knottnerus (talk) 11:37, 1 October 2018 (UTC)