Renningen: All just natural theatre?
In 1990, the Stuttgart Regional Council decided to declare the Längenbühl near Renningen in the Böblingen district a nature reserve. The reason: the intention was to preserve an ehamlige reed sandstone quarry with "varied quarry faces and spoil heaps" including flora and fauna worth seeing. What certainly doesn't catch the visitor's eye at first glance are the sprouting rock carnation, the Gebbba toad and the fire salamander. The huge stone walls, which are said to play a role as the home of rare moss species, are more likely to catch the ey
Along the paths around the Natural Theatre, there are hundreds of metres of dry stone wall stretches to be discovered under moss, woody plants and foliage.
Of all places, it was there that they came up with the idea of a stage for a natural theatre, which, however, only puts on performances twice a year. But you literally can't see the wood for the trees. One is namely around the site of an allegedly former quarry, which raises some questions. In the northern area of Längenbühl there is a 210-metre-long rock face that runs in a west-east direction and once practically bends off at right angles twice. The longest piece alone is 130 metres.
The "nature" theatre stage in the midst of this megalithic backdrop looks like a foreign body to me.
Ancient dry stone walls also in the immediate area of the natural theatre setting. At least these remains have not been completely removed. What has already been destroyed is unknown.
... also in the rear part of the supply building.
Not far from the forest tavern, until not so long ago, there was a rock cave, almost 10 metres long, which opened out into a small chamber. There was already a lot of rock on the floor that had come down from the ceiling over time. Peter Söhngen wrote an impressive report on this when the cave was still accessible, and tells of a place where our ancestors took astronomical measurements in presumably impressive form (For more details see Link).
Shortly after its discovery/excavation, the cave was filled in by the authorities. A common procedure - supposedly to increase security on site. There was no interest in an investigation.
Here is the site where the cave once was:
As with the example of the Jägerhaus (near Heilbronn), we are once again dealing with a demolition wall that is not a demolition wall by any stretch of the imagination, but is only sold to us as such. At first as well as at second glance it becomes clear that classical quarry work - if at all - can only have played a subordinate role here. The lower half of the supposed demolition wall is as smooth as if it had been sanded down. No protrusions, jagged rocks - everything is as smooth as a child's bottom. This is by no means the demolition edge of a mining operation. Neither then, nor now. I will therefore let the pictures speak for themselves in order to appeal to common sense. Even if no one among the readers calls himself a mining professional. And: No, there are no such quarry edges. Believe me, I am in quarries practically every month.
Acute angles in the area of the car park on both sides of the alleged demolition edge, which extends over 200 metres. Such break-off edges cannot be realised unless one has special tools that would also leave corresponding traces. In any case, this place has nothing to do with classic quarry work.
The image below shows that the sanding was done in different layers/stages, with the next higher layer protruding further than the images below (3+4). On the other side, the phenomenon is in the opposite direction, i.e. the work was done from top to bottom. In the first and second picture, however, it is likely that they were "cut" from the bottom to the top.
From here on, the lower layers stand out more.
The overall wall runs in an east-west direction.
Outcrops of the former natural wall were cut off precisely and with sharp edges. Power saws are certainly capable of cutting off individual sections at protrusions. But such huge areas? And finally, one should ask the question: When is this supposed to have happened ... ?
The imposing wall now forms the back wall of a car park.
One may therefore ask the question - if not a quarry, then what are we dealing with? Here we are on speculative ice. Basically, the deeper you dig and the more details you look at, the more interesting and mysterious it becomes. On the one hand, there are the numerous or innumerable dry-stone walls, which are supposed to be sold to us as spoil heaps - as they were during our stay in the Jägerhaus.
Again and again, sections of rock appear that seem to have been smoothly trimmed. Directly at right angles or in higher strata, natural stone walls sometimes directly adjoin, which are sometimes barely visible under moss and run.
Again and again, smooth rock faces alternate with dry stone walls - often slightly offset one above the other. Could we be dealing here with the remains of pyramid structures that continued in steps upwards? Had the closed rock wall at the bottom once been used as a stable base for the pyramid? In any case, one can assume that this was a large complex.
I am not mincing my words here when I say that we are dealing with a vast number of cairns or a cairn complex that was once coherent and is probably battered in many places. You have to have the chutzpah to ignore or talk down such facts. There are perfectly preserved dry stone wall structures everywhere, up to 5 metres or more high. We cannot seriously be fooled into thinking that we are dealing with randomly heaped up rubble, some of which displays such geometric precision. Even if they (archaeologists of modern times) meant that the overburden was behind the walls. No, it is not there either, or that would be completely unusual. Why would they have created such elaborate wall constructions for this? Some of them are directly adjacent to the supposed demolition wall.
Although one finds traces of workmanship everywhere that suggest quarrying, these are also quite different. In other places you can also see the hatch patterns, which are not due to classical quarrying techniques.
Even away from the car park, one repeatedly comes across smooth rock faces that would make an impressive backdrop if vegetation did not take possession of them (or if archaeology had a well-founded interest in uncovering them).
As the rediscoverer of this possible cult site Bernd Krautloher had already expressed in 2018: "Thousands of people have gone to the Nature Theatre since 1956 and no one has recognised the cult site as such." Those who have doubts about this are welcome to present more plausible solutions.
One of the few times that the local press cares about this issue - here is an article from 2020.
Anyone who would like to come and see the nature theatre is cordially invited:
