Kugenhusen

Kugenhusen is a medieval deserted village near Einbeck in Lower Saxony. Once it stood east of the town, where potters shaped jugs and jars for Einbeck’s households. Excavations in the early 1990s uncovered eleven kilns and three tonnes of broken potsherds. Dendrochronology on wood remains placed the pottery’s working life between 1140 and 1230. Pollen studies showed the surrounding woodland had been cleared for fields and meadows. A later dig in the late 2010s found a pit where clay was dug, filled with more shards. Close by, archaeologists spotted the remains of an Iron Age farmhouse. The finds prove that people lived and worked here across centuries, from the Iron Age to the High Middle Ages. The landscape today is quiet farmland, but the earth still holds these traces of past industry. Visitors walk over gentle fields where the kilns once stood. Broken potsherds lie scattered in the soil, and information boards mark the dig sites. The air carries the scent of barley and rye that now grows where potters once stacked their wares. A short path links the medieval pottery zone to the Iron Age house remains, giving a sense of how long this spot has been shaped by human hands.