Not only the local population, but above all visitors and guests keep asking about the origin of the name. In the course of over 1100 years, the age of the parish of Hellefeld, it can happen that certain "little things" are forgotten. This is exactly what happened with the origin of the name "Old Testament". Over the years, many specialists and experts have tried to unravel this mystery. These two theories are the most widespread:
The term "Old Testament" originally means "Old Covenant" (lat. testamentum), and refers to the people of Israel, which at that time consisted of twelve tribes. For its part, the parish of Hellefeld originally consisted of twelve villages (Hellefeld, Herblinghausen, Frenkhausen, Visbeck, Altenhellefeld, Linnepe, Meinkenbracht, Weninghausen, Westenfeld, Bainghausen, Schnellenhaus and Selschede) and is one of the original parishes of the Sauerland, so that this name refers to the great age of the parish.
The vernacular likes to quote Friedrich Wilhelm Grimme's statement in 1866 that a church had already stood here before the birth of Christ, which is why the name "Old Testament" was coined. This cannot in fact be completely dismissed, as it was widespread at the time of the missionaries to build churches on the old Germanic places of worship, so that there may have been a kind of "meeting place" there before a Christian church was built.
In the resort of Altenhellefeld, located in the middle of the "Old Testament" and first mentioned in 1236, you can expect an extraordinary natural landscape in addition to the well-preserved fabric of the half-timbered houses in the village center with the Wacholderheide. As there is no evidence of major village fires in Altenhellefeld since the Middle Ages and the original cadastre from 1829 still mainly mentions the farm names listed as early as 1484, it is reasonable to assume that the current village structure has existed since the end of the Middle Ages.
