Kampen

is a municipality and seaside resort on the island Sylt, in the district of Nordfriesland, in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. It is located north of the island's main town, Westerland. The municipality is part of the Amt Landschaft Sylt. The local economy is dominated by tourism.EtymologyThe name Kaamp means "a marked out field".HistoryThe first mention of Kampen occurs in a tax registry from 1543. The village is considered to have been founded quite late, possibly as a result of people moving there from an earlier settlement destroyed by a storm.In 1767, the local Landvogt and some inhabitants bought land to the north of the village and established the Kampener Vogelkoje, a decoy. This was profitable over the next four decades and through 1921 yielded a total of 695,957 killed ducks.In 1803, Kampen consisted of 23 houses and 93 inhabitants (40 men and 53 women, of which 23 were seafarers). In 1853, King Frederick VII of Denmark ordered the construction of the Kampen lighthouse. In 1860, the number of houses had fallen to 22 and there were still 93 inhabitants, however, just three of them were seafarers. In 1864, Kampen became Prussian.For centuries, until around 1900, Kampen was a rural village shaped by agriculture. Shipping and fishing as well as other industries and crafts played a relatively smaller role in the village's development. Together with Wenningstedt, the village of Kampen constituted part of the so-called "Northern Villages" (Norddörfer) of Sylt. The church and school were shared due to the low number of citizens in the respective villages - so they could only be supported through a common effort.