Maschen is a village in the municipality of

Seevetal Seevetal (Northern Low Saxon: ''Seevdaal'') is a municipality in the district of Harburg (district), Harburg, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated approximately 20 km south of Hamburg, and 15 km west of Winsen (Luhe). Its seat is in t ...

in Hamburg district in the German state of

Lower Saxony Lower Saxony is a States of Germany, German state (') in Northern Germany, northwestern Germany. It is the second-largest state by land area, with , and fourth-largest in population (8 million in 2021) among the 16 ' of the Germany, Federal Re ...

. It lies south of

Hamburg Hamburg (, ; ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg,. is the List of cities in Germany by population, second-largest city in Germany after Berlin and List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, 7th-lar ...

on the northern edge of the

Lüneburg Heath Lüneburg Heath (, ) is a large area of heath (habitat), heath, geest, and woodland in the northeastern part of the state of Lower Saxony in northern Germany. It forms part of the hinterland for the cities of Hamburg, Hanover and Bremen and is ...

and within the

commuter Commuting is periodically recurring travel between a place of residence and place of work or study, where the traveler, referred to as a commuter, leaves the boundary of their home community. By extension, it can sometimes be any regular o ...

zone of the city of Hamburg. Maschen Marshalling Yard is the largest of its kind in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

and the second biggest in the world. It was opened in 1977. With its 9,266 inhabitants (), Maschen is the second largest village in

History

Maschen was first mentioned in the records in 1294 as ''Merschene'' (

Low German Low German is a West Germanic languages, West Germanic language variety, language spoken mainly in Northern Germany and the northeastern Netherlands. The dialect of Plautdietsch is also spoken in the Russian Mennonite diaspora worldwide. "Low" ...

= end of the marsh). In 1671 the first school was built; it has moved location several times since. Today Maschen Primary School is in the centre of Maschen next to the village hall. The town's historic tower clock has been restored and installed in the primary school. The '' Maschen disc brooch'' is an

Early Medieval The Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages, is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th to the 10th century. They marked the start of the Middle Ages of Europ ...

fibula The fibula (: fibulae or fibulas) or calf bone is a leg bone on the lateral side of the tibia, to which it is connected above and below. It is the smaller of the two bones and, in proportion to its length, the most slender of all the long bones. ...

, which was found on the late

Saxon The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony () which became a Carolingian " stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany. Many of their neighbours were, like th ...

grave field A grave field is a prehistoric cemetery, typically from Bronze Age and Iron Age Europe. Grave fields are distinguished from necropoleis by the former's lack of remaining above-ground structures, buildings, or grave markers. Types Grave fields c ...

near Maschen. The Hanover–Harburg railway line which opened in 1847 laid track through Maschen, which received its own stop in 1901, and its own station building in 1904–1905.

References

Villages in Lower Saxony {{hamburg-geo-stub