The UNESCO Convention, the application procedures and the various inventories of intangible cultural heritage aim to promote awareness and appreciation of cultural expressions – both within the communities and groups involved and beyond. But how does cultural heritage designation change the perception of practices?
Some communities get more attention and new resources for preservations, others suddenly even have too much of it, are literally overrun by interested people and hardly recognise themselves any more. In some communities, people want to use the title "intangible cultural heritage" to be able to "leave everything as it is"; for others, it is an incentive to use the perhaps newly acquired knowledge of their own history and significance to further develop their own cultural heritage. What ideas and what forward-looking action follow from this? And what has hardly been noticed by the public yet but is intangible cultural heritage?
In Furth im Wald in the Upper Palatinate, everything revolves around the "Drachenstich" play about spearing the dragon. The annual production is significant for the town in many ways. Around 20,000 guests recently visited the town during the performances alone. But the "Drachenstich" heritage also serves to create identity: it calls itself the "Drachenstich town", guests "go on holiday with the dragon" and there exists a Drachenstich stamp issued by Deutsche Post.
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The central figure in the story of the perpetual struggle of good against evil is the dragon "Tradinno", also affectionately known locally as "Fanny", which was newly developed in 2010. The "world’s largest walking robot", manufactured in the Upper Palatinate, also embodies the region’s art of engineering outside of the festival dramaturgy. Historical festival tradition is combined with state-of-the-art technology here.
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The "Friedensfeste" in Sennfeld and Gochsheim are based on the regaining of religious freedom after the Thirty Years’ War. Both festivals, which take place at the same time and just 2.5 km apart, originated as peace and church festivals with the "Plantanz" (the "plan" is the central square in the villages) and the "Planbaum", a decorated tree at their centre.
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While great importance is attached to wearing a Franconian festive costume in Sennfeld, the "Plankuchen" cake is the key element of the festival in Gochsheim. Beer tends to be served in Sennfeld, wine in Gochsheim. So despite all the similarity, their individual identities are always preserved. The future is embodied in the boundary stone festival, which has been celebrated together since 1999.
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Without a lime tree, there would be no "Lindenkirchweih" – the tree planted in the 17th century is firmly at the centre of this festival. A dance floor has been built into its crown for dancing and partying. Arboricultural knowledge, the skills of dance floor construction, the rules of the “Plantanz” dance and its embodiment in community church celebrations – all this depends on the healthy continuation of the cultural heritage’s leading botanical star, which was last extensively renovated in 2014.
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There was another look towards the future in 1990, when a young lime tree for dancing was planted nearby. Its branches have already been guided widthways using a wooden construction for several years, so a new dance floor can be built on them later. But the new tree is already being included in the church consecration festivities.
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Bamberg’s historic urban landscape reveals how intangible and tangible cultural heritage are interwoven. The architectural old town ensemble has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1993. One local feature are the gardens on city land, which have been used for local and long-distance supply since the 14th century. The knowledge and skills of gardening city dwellers are elementary components of the overall brick and green heritage.
The Bamberg World Heritage Centre makes the overall heritage’s landscape and cultivation references tangible through the "garden city – island city – mountain city" triad. This combines historical tangible and living intangible cultural heritage in the perception of the city.
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The intangible cultural heritage inventories grow with each application round, highlighting cultural diversity in an exemplary way. Much is still undiscovered in terms of its value as intangible cultural heritage, but some communities and groups may also not feel addressed, which will hopefully change soon.
What do you think – what should become part of the Bavarian Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage? Which groups and communities in Bavaria should be made more visible with their cultural expressions?
Everyone is invited to expand the knowledge of and about our common heritage!
Back to the start: Inheriting Culture. Intangible Cultural Heritage in Bavaria
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