Dhronecken

Dhronecken is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Bernkastel-Wittlich district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.GeographyLocationDhronecken lies between Trier and Saarbrücken, on the Hunsrückhöhenstraße (“Hunsrück Heights Road”, a scenic road across the Hunsrück built originally as a military road on Hermann Göring’s orders), 9 km from the Autobahn A 1 towards Morbach. In the Dhronecker Mulde (hollow), the Kleine Dhron forms where two brooks meet. This river flows down a dale to the small river Dhron, which then empties into the Moselle.Dhronecken belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Thalfang am Erbeskopf, whose seat is in the municipality of Thalfang.HistoryEarly timesDhronecken lies in what is known to be the oldest tribal heartland of the Celts, whose lands, about 500 BC, stretched from the Middle Danube to Lorraine (Hallstatt culture), and who spread only in later centuries into what is now France. Burying grounds and, even more so, hill fortifications bear witness to those times. The Hunnenring – not far away, near Otzenhausen – is a mighty example.