Gewann

Designation (also Gewannflur, Gewand in southern Germany) for the division of the arable land of a municipality into usually three sections, the so-called Gewanne. The division into three sections resulted from the three-field economy practised at that time. Depending on the number of farms, these were divided into strips or plots of land of equal size, which were cultivated by compulsory cultivation (enforced regulation on the part of the community, the owners as a whole or the respective landlord). This means that the work on all the plots of land had to be carried out at the same time.

The advantage of these elongated parcels was that only a few turns (which are very time-consuming), i.e. reversals, were necessary, dAs a typical characteristic of a parcel, the length is at least ten times the width. In the course of time, the division of inheritance often resulted in extreme fragmentation. The often fanciful names allow conclusions to be drawn about the location in terms of climatic or soil conditions or even former agricultural use. These are, for example, Am Galgenberg, Auf der Ley (reference to slate), Schöne Aussicht and Im Nassen Loch. Such Gewanne are particularly common in south-western Germany and in central Germany, for example in the Neckar and Rhineland regions, in Rhineland-Palatinate, in Hesse and in Franconia.