Archaeological Cellar

In the «belly» of the Teufelhof lies a treasure hidden that can be seen nowhere else in Basel or in Switzerland. This is the Archaeological Cellar, which is a showcase venue for conveying historical building fabric in Basel. Visitors can see the old Basel city walls from the 11th and 13th centuries. An exciting, winding tour leads between the two medieval city walls, and finds from the various centuries are displayed in showcase cabinets. In this way, the history of the city can be experienced live on site and is accessible at any time.

The cellar room by the wine shop lies exactly between the two city walls. On one side stands a smooth wall, carefully plastered between the masonry stones: the front facing the city moat (enemy side) of the older, so-called Burkhard city wall (built around 1080 – 1100). The other side of the room is formed by a rough, unplastered wall: the rear side of the younger Inner City Wall (1200 – 1250). If you enter this “city wall cellar” from the inner courtyard, you first pass through a rectangular defensive tower belonging to the older wall. If, on the other hand, you enter through the wine shop, you will recognise in the floor the foundation of a semicircular tower built onto the younger city wall.

The reason for the small distance between the two city walls lay in the fundamental improvement of the older city wall, which at 1 m thick was fairly weak. The younger Inner Wall is more than twice as thick in the foundations (approx. 2 – 2,3 m), even though it was built long before the use of firearms. It is also founded significantly deeper and therefore has a deeper, and probably also wider, city moat. The deeper moat made it necessary to underpin the older defensive tower, which can be seen from the stepped foundation (arrows) in the modern opening between the city moat and the defensive tower.