12/26/838First documented storm surge in the North Sea; Approximately 2,500 deaths in what is now the Netherlands. 2/17/1164First Julian flood: 20,000 dead; First collapse of the Jade Bay, major damage in the Elbe area. 1/16/1219First Marcellus flood: 36,000 dead:...
River as a landscape – Nilotic landscapes
The "Palestrina Mosaic" or "Nile mosaic of Palestrina", a town near Italy's capital Rome, is a late Hellenistic floor mosaic depicting the Nile in its passage from the Blue Nile to the Mediterranean. Around 100 BCE, Nile landscapes were quite a fashion in Roman art....
Alexandria II
This is the introduction to "Pharos and Pharillon" a book by British writer and literary critic E.M. Forster about Alexandria. The book was published in 1923. Forster was stationed in Alexandria during his service in the British military and wrote two books about the...
Political flood images
In Germany, the imagery of flood or flooding and of Noah's Ark is frequently used in the political discourse to refer to undesired migration. Since the 1990s this dehumanizing topos was in high demand and was used by mainstream media and radical political parties...
medieval flood in Europe
Date and title of this wood print are unfortunately unknown to me. This is the source.
The Wave in Architecture
It's a rather popular architectural motif, particularly of course in coastal and riverside cities. I wonder if there ever has been a historical study of the wave in architecture. Here are a few random examples from Europe: Dessauerstraße, Hemshof Ludwigshafen,...
Tides (2021)
"Tides" (alternative title "The Colony") is a sci-fi movie from 2021 about a post-apocalyptic world at the moment the first human communities are about to re-settle again. The only territory suitable is a coastal strip that is covered by tides twice a day. The area is...
Flood Memorabilia
In Germany as well as in many other countries, images of extreme floods often found their way on postcards. Here is a selection of postcards. (click on the image to find the online source) 1909 1910 1914 1920 1920 1929 2002 undated postcard from Tokyo, Japan undated...
Street Scene on the Rhine
A street in the city of Bonn with the Rhine river in the background, January 2024.
Breach of St. Anthony Dike in 1651
Jan Asselijn (1610–1652): "Breach of St. Anthonis-Dike near Amsterdam", 1651. "During the night of 4-5 March 1651 the Saint Anthony’s Dike was breached near Amsterdam. Jan Asselijn portrayed the fiercely flowing water with a strong sense of drama. The billowing cloak...