A Lucerne Legend and the Real Story Behind It
A famous painting on Lucerne's Chapel Bridge (Panel No. 1) shows an old city legend. It pictures a giant man with a tree trunk standing next to a normal-sized man.
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| The Giant of Reiden, shown on panel no. 1 of the Chapel Bridge | Image: Zentralgut.ch |
A Giant for the Whole City
The story is this: In 1577, an oak tree fell during a storm near the town of Reiden. When workers cleared it, they found huge bones.
Early "scholars" studied the bones. They calculated that they belonged to a giant who was almost 5 meters (16 "Werck Schuh") tall.
The discovery became an important matter for the city. One of the largest bones was brought to Lucerne and put on display in the City Hall (Rathaus) as proof. The city hired a painter, Hans Heinrich Wägmann, to paint the giant on the City Hall tower.
The city clerk, Renward Cysat, wanted a better opinion. He asked the famous doctor Felix Platter from Basel. In 1584, Platter announced his own calculation: the giant must have been 5.6 meters tall!
This "proof" made the people of Lucerne proud. The discovery of the giant fit perfectly with the city's other important symbol: the "Wild Man" (Wilder Mann). The Wild Man is the supporter of Lucerne's coat of arms and can be seen in many places (like the Hotel Wilder Mann, the Wild Man Fountain, the paintings on the Clock Tower and the Historical Museum ... ).
The Giant of Reiden now served as "proof" of this heritage and supported the ideal of Lucerne's people, who saw themselves as wild, free, and independent.
A Scholar Solves the Riddle
For more than 200 years, people admired the bone in the City Hall. But then came the Age of Enlightenment.
The government of Lucerne wanted to know the scientific truth. They sent some of the bones to the best expert at the time: Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, a famous scholar in Germany.
Blumenbach studied the pieces and sent his clear diagnosis back to Lucerne: It was not a giant. It was a mammoth!
This solved the mystery. The "Giant of Reiden" is now known as the first scientifically recognized mammoth discovery in Switzerland.
Today, the "giant bones" are on display at the Lucerne Nature Museum (Natur-Museum Luzern).
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| Bones of the Giant of Reiden, photo taken at the Lucerne Nature Museum |
Sources are listed in the German version
