Discovering your own ancestors

A museum in Baden-Württemberg tells early medieval history

Delving into the past can be incredibly exciting. Especially when it concerns the history of your own ancestors or close relatives. Those interested in history can, for example, discover the life of the Alemanni in eastern Baden-Württemberg - partly with recently evaluated scientific findings.

What you can expect:

Finds from all over southern Germany

The Alemanni were an early medieval population group from Central Europe. Their settlement and ruling areas were mainly in what is now Baden-Württemberg, Alsace, Bavarian Swabia, German-speaking Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Vorarlberg. In the Ellwangen Alamannic Museum, their time is brought back to life in many different ways: archaeological finds from all over southern Germany offer an overview of five centuries of Alemannic settlement from the 3rd to the 8th century AD.

The focus is on the nearby Lauchheim, where the largest Alamannic cemetery with valuable grave goods and the associated settlement with a manor house and richly furnished farm burial chambers were discovered between 1986 and 2005. A stroke of luck that provides unique insights into life in an early medieval village. Some of the excavations are still being scientifically investigated, so that previously unpublished results can often be found in the museum.

Experience the museum

The Alamannic Museum in Ellwangen is located in the Nikolauspflege building, one of the oldest surviving poorhouses and hospices in southwest Germany. The house was built in 1593 under the prince-provost of Ellwangen, Wolfgang von Hausen, whose coat of arms also adorns the exterior façade. The best way to experience early medieval life is on one of the tours offered by the museum. As can be read at www.alamannenmuseum-ellwangen.de, visitors to the biographical tour will meet a guide in Alamannic costume. During the family tour, children can spin the flour mill, let the shuttle whizz on the loom or try their hand at being an Alamannic shield bearer.

Reproductions of turned wooden objects from the life of the Alamanni. Photo: djd-k/City of Ellwangen

In courses you can learn how to cook like the Alemanni or how to make a lyre. Another special feature this year is the photo exhibition "You are World Heritage" by the German Limes Road Association. The award-winning photos from a competition of well-known and lesser-known places along the Limes Road will be on display here until the beginning of July. The pictures show exciting and unusual perspectives and invite you to discover new travel destinations on the Upper Germanic-Raetian Limes - Europe's largest archaeological monument.