Most protected trees in the Bamberg district get a number. This one got a name. The district's 2009 ordinance lists natural monument 61 as the Kilianseiche, Kilian's oak, standing where the Hauptstrasse in Schesslitz turns off toward the cemetery. A plain oak a few hundred metres away, number 62, is listed simply as an oak. The name is nearly all the register gives. It records no species, no girth, no height and no age, so even calling this an oak rests on the name rather than on a survey. Which oak it is, and how old, are questions this page cannot answer yet. The name does point somewhere. The parish church in Schesslitz is dedicated to Saint Kilian, and the bus from Bamberg stops at a halt called Kilianskirche. Whether the tree was named for the church, or for some older reason, no source we have found says, so we will not invent a story for it. Then the caveat that matters most. The only photograph of the tree we can find is an old upload to the Panoramio photo site, taken sixteen metres from the register's point, and there is nothing recent. The ordinance still protects it, but we cannot show you dated proof that it stands. Schesslitz is about fifteen kilometres north of Bamberg, roughly twenty-five minutes on the regional bus. If you make the trip, tell us whether Kilian's oak is still at its junction, and if you know your oaks, which kind it is.
Junction of Hauptstrasse and the road to the cemetery, near the Ziegelmuehle, SchesslitzYou can recognise it by where it stands: at the junction where the Hauptstrasse in Schesslitz turns off toward the cemetery, near the Ziegelmuehle. An unnamed protected oak stands 300 metres away on the Demmelsdorfer Strasse.
Free. Stands at a road junction on the way to the village cemetery, on public ground as far as the register wording shows ('an der Abzweigung der Hauptstrasse zum Friedhof'); not checked against OSM tags.
About 15 km north of Bamberg. Regional bus from Bamberg ZOB to the Schesslitz Kilianskirche stop, roughly 25 minutes (line 969 in the 2024 VGN timetable; check the current one), then on foot to the junction of the Hauptstrasse and the road to the cemetery.
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from.
