Where the Danube Flows Into the Brigach

 

MAGYARUL

The source of the Danube is a topic that is better not to get involved, because its complexity requires at least the extent of a whole book. The Breg, the Brigach, the source well, statues, memorial plaques, river kilometer markers, and so on are crammed together here in such astonishing density within a few dozen square kilometers that it is easy to get lost in trying to comprehend it all. The ambiguity of physical geography and the philosophy of science creates many interesting and even absurd situations, one of which is the subject of this article.

One of the famous sources of the Danube is located in the Fürstemberg castle gardens of Donaueschingen, southwest of St. John (the Baptist) Church, in a circular pool that has taken its present form since 1875. Although it was fenced in earlier, the water from this spring originally flowed freely to the east, joining the Breg and Brigach streams at their natural confluence, from where the Danube took its name. However, man's role in shaping the landscape has also transformed this distinguished hydrographic point, with the water from the spring now flowing southwards from the basin through a 100-meter-long subterranean channel.

DANVVII CAPVT EXORNAVIT 

proclaims the Latin inscription above the confluence, deliberately supplemented with the German imperial genealogy, at the point where this underground canal ends, above which stands a Greek-style kiosk erected by German Emperor Wilhelm II in 1910. The inscription on it should refer to the Danube, but it is about the man who adorned the river with his own power and erected a historicizing antique marble temple at this somewhat less important point than the spring pond. The structure, known locally as the Little Danube Temple (Donautempelchen), was actually a gift to Prince Maximilian Egon II Fürstemberg, who was a close friend of the emperor. The source of the Danube is still owned by the princely family, and the original design documents for the small temple, on the basis of which it was renovated in 2016, are also in their possession. 

Descriptions and postcards mention that this Danube church stands on the banks of the Brigach stream, and then gloss over the absurd hydrographic situation whereby the stream flowing from the source of the Danube is in fact nothing more than a tributary of the Brigach. It then continues its channeled journey eastward for another 1-1.3 kilometers under the name Brigach until it reaches the mouth of the Breg, where it can once again be called the Danube.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)