  In 2012, physicists and astronomers celebrated the hundredth anniversary of
the detection of cosmic rays by Viktor Hess. One year later, in 2013, there was
first evidence for extraterrestrial high-energy neutrinos, i.e. for signal
which may contain key information on the origin of cosmic rays. That evidence
is provided by data taken with the IceCube neutrino telescope at the South
Pole. First concepts to build a detector of this kind have been discussed at
the 1973 International Cosmic Ray Conference. Nobody would have guessed at that
time that the march towards first discoveries would take forty years, the
biblical time of the march from Egypt to Palestine. But now, after all, the
year 2013 has provided us a first glimpse to the promised land of the neutrino
universe at highest energies. This article sketches the evolution towards
detectors with a realistic discovery potential, describes the recent relevant
results obtained with the IceCube and ANTARES neutrino telescopes and tries a
look into the future.
