Scheid (Eifel)

Scheid is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Vulkaneifel district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Obere Kyll, whose seat is in the municipality of Jünkerath.GeographyLocationThe municipality lies in the Vulkaneifel, a part of the Eifel known for its volcanic history, geographical and geological features, and even ongoing activity today, including gases that sometimes well up from the earth.Scheid is the northwesternmost place in the Vulkaneifel district. It lies roughly 1 km northwest of Hallschlag on a mountain ridge. Its elevation is 593 m above sea level.NameThe name Scheid might best be explained as coming from the German word Wasserscheide, cognate with, and meaning the same as (at least in some varieties of English) the word “watershed”, for south from Scheid flows the Hallschlager Bach and north from the village flows the Scheider or Gonsbach. Still others derive the name from the road junction here in Roman times, when the road from Trier to Cologne and Aachen branched at what is now Scheid (scheiden means “divide” or “split” in German; this is cognate with the English word “shed” ). On the other hand, placename researchers hold that the name is not German at all. They derive it from the old Celtic word keito-n, meaning “wood” or “forest” (cf. Welsh coedwig and Breton koadeg).