Ebstorf

Ebstorf grew around a religious foundation established by Count Volrad of Dannenberg in the middle of the twelfth century. After a fire it was resettled by Benedictine nuns from nearby Walsrode. Around 1300 the convent produced the great Ebstorf world map, a vast image of the world with Jerusalem at its centre and the figure of Christ embracing the whole. The community was reformed in the fifteenth century, and Protestant reform was finally established under its superior Barbara von Appel in 1565. The map remained in the convent and was rediscovered in 1832.