Gunzenhausen Limes Watchtower (Wp 14/4)
About
The tower on the Vorderer Schlossbuck above Gunzenhausen measured a modest 4.7 by 6.3 meters, set into a stretch of the Raetian limes that ran alongside an older prehistoric ring wall. District archaeologist Ludwig Eidam first excavated the site in 1887, and Bavaria's state monument office returned in 1980 to re-examine and reconstruct its ground plan. Like most of the Raetian watchtower line, it belongs to the stone-built phase of the frontier and postdates this snapshot by decades.
What happened here
A small stone tower with a timber top, sited so that it can see the next one along the line. Half a dozen men live in it. They watch the ground in front, and they watch the tower on either side. A signal — fire and smoke at night, something visible by day — passes a warning down the chain far faster than a rider can, though it can only carry a message that was agreed in advance. The rest of the time it is a lookout post on a road, a river crossing or a frontier line, and the work is boredom punctuated by inspections. Supplies come up from the fort behind. Towers on a frontier stand within sight of each other for hundreds of miles.
Sources
Nearby
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