Author Dr. Volker Kartheus will read from his new book about the legend of the sunken city on October 1 at the Vineta Museum in Barth. His research has led to a finding that concerns the region around Zingst.
The Friends of the Vineta Museum Barth e.V. invite you to a cultural salon at the Vineta Museum on October 1 at 6:30 p.m. Author Dr. Volker Kartheus will present his book, *What Became of Vineta? A Megacity Disappears: On New Trails to a Sunken City*, published in April 2026, and read from it.
Kartheus explores the legend of the trading city of Vineta, which, according to tradition, sank into the sea some 900 years ago on a stormy November night. For his research, he analyzes chronicles, songs, fairy tales, and archaeological theories. As a result, he locates the legend in the region around Zingst.
Since 1999, Barth has also been considered a possible location for the sunken city. At that time, journalist Günter Wermusch and Dr. Klaus Goldmann of the Berlin Museum of Prehistory and Early History presented linguistic interpretations of place and field names in the region that, in their view, point to Vineta near Barth. The city registered the name “Vineta” with the German Patent Office that same year.
Kartheus, born in Posen during World War II, comes from a family that has been from Rügen for generations. He studied mathematics in Bonn, earned his doctorate in Heidelberg, and subsequently worked on Heligoland applying mathematical methods to marine biology. After German reunification, he attempted to found a private distance-learning university on Rügen, came into contact with the philosopher Karl Popper in the process, and later devoted himself to the search for Vineta and Jomsburg from his base in Flensburg.
