Weitmar house

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Ruin of the Weitmar house with the new cube building, view from the east
Schematic site plan of the Weitmar house in 1892

The house Weitmar is a former noble residence in the Bochum district Weitmar . It emerged from a Schultenhof of the Werden monastery , whose roots were in the 8th / 9th centuries. Century. Surrounded by a moat in the 12th century , it was expanded into a representative seat in the first half of the 13th century. Extensions in the second half of the 15th century under the von Brüggeney family, known as Hasenkamp, ​​and an extension in the 18th century resulted in a classicist -looking mansion with a bailey . North West of it was one the holy Silvester consecrated chapel , but during the Reformation lost its function as a private chapel. After the von Hasenkamp family died out, the Weitmar house was briefly owned by the von Vaerst family before it was bought by Andreas Friedrich Wilhelm von Berswordt-Wallrabe in 1780 . His family is still the owner today.

The Weitmar house was - like the Sylvester chapel  - destroyed by aerial bombs in the Second World War . The ruins of the manor house with its outside staircase , the remains of the chapel including three grave slabs as well as a gatehouse and a gate system from the beginning of the 20th century have been protected as a monument since April 26, 1995 .

history

Beginnings

Weitmar house developed from a farm that already existed in Carolingian times. This was proven by ceramic fragments of, among other things, Hunneschan's ceramics , which were found during an excavation and date to the 8th / 9th Century could be dated. Around the year 1000 this courtyard was an upper courtyard ( curtis ) with six dependent courtyards , which Hugbald and his sister Reinwi transferred to the Benedictine abbey in Werden along with important rights in the Weitmarer Mark . The monastery forgave the good from now on as feudal and used it as Schultenhof who was dutiable to the monastery. It appears in documents under different names during the 11th and 12th centuries: Uuedmeri (around 1000), Uuetmere (11th century), Wetmare (1153) and Weitmere (around 1150). Since the 12th century, the courtyard was protected by a moat, making it a typical Westphalian courtyard . Excavations showed that this moat was at least two meters deep and more than ten meters wide. Through the found fragments of Pingsdorf and Paffrath earthenware it could be determined that it must have been filled in in the early 13th century during a comprehensive expansion of the Oberhof. At that time, a two-room house was built in the area of ​​the former moat, which formed the core of the later facility. Apparently a servant of the Werden Abbey expanded the Schultenhof into a more representative seat, because before 1250 a chapel was built on the courtyard area to the northwest of the two-room house.

The first loan taker of the Weitmar family known by name was Johann von Lüttelnau, who lived on Haus Heck in the late 14th century . During his time was Weitmar - as well as the surrounding farming communities Bisping , Klevinghusen, Nevel, Branthorpe and Eppendorf - in Dortmund feud 1388/1389 by 40  horsemen under their leader Bitter Raesfeld looted . Johann's daughter Grete married the later bailiff of Werden and Hattingen , Johann von Kückelsheim , in 1391 . The bride's father made the Weitmar house available to him as a deposit for the trousseau in the amount of 500 gold shields. Accordingly, the Werden abbot enfeoffed Johann von Kückelsheim with the Schultenhof after the wedding. After his death in 1421, Wilhelm von Uhlenbrock von Haus Oefte succeeded him as a tenant of the house. After him, the Werden Abbot enfeoffed Johann and Heinrich von Galen with the estate. The latter ceded it in 1481 to Wennemar von (der) Brüggeney, known as Hasenkamp , who was subsequently enfeoffed with it. In addition, he received the office of wood judge of the Weitmarer Mark and the Bisping farm, which also belonged to the Werden monastery , as a fief .

Gradual expansion

Wennemar was the Brandenburg bailiff of Bochum and had already received permission in May 1464 to build a new house on the grounds of the Weitmar Schultenhof because his old family headquarters in Stiepel had become dilapidated. It is possible that the two-room house was expanded in the second half of the 15th century in connection with Wennemar's move to Weitmar. He was the first tenant to live in the estate himself instead of having farmers work it. During the expansion, an almost square extension was added to the south-east corner of the house, so that it then had an L-shaped floor plan.

In the 16th century, the von Hasenkamp family was no longer the sole owner of Weitmar. She had to share it with the von Eickel family. Christine, the daughter of Wennemar's grandson Wessel, had married Heinrich von Eickel, who was enfeoffed with part of the Weitmar family in 1577. In 1644, however, Johann von Hasenkamp was of the opinion that the Eickel part was due to him as compensation for unpaid debts and chased Dietrich von Eickel's widow and her children out of the house on August 14th. However, the final and legally binding transfer of ownership of the house did not take place until June 2, 1650, when the widow renounced the Eickel part of the property in return for a payment of 300  Reichstalers for herself and 2125 Dutch thalers for her children.

Weitmar house on a map from 1780

It was probably not until the 16th century that the Weitmar house received the status of a knight's seat . After a pillage by Spanish soldiers in 1588, a new building was built in 1592 under Johann's father of the same name. For a long time this was viewed in research as a new building of the manor house, but this was refuted by excavations in 2009, through which the construction phases of the main house could be dated to other times. It is more likely that a second mansion was built by dividing the fief between the von Hasenkamp and von Eickel families. On a map from 1780, a building can be seen in the outer bailey that was only slightly smaller than the actual main house. This could have been the new building from 1592. In 1823, however, it was put down again, because on the Westphalian first recording from that year it was already marked as demolished.

The Hasenkamp family remained the owners of the property until the 18th century. During his lifetime, the cathedral scholaster Johann Georg von Hasenkamp transferred the Weitmar house to his nephew Johann Werner in 1707. This is the first time in seven generations that ownership has not been passed on from father to son. In 1748 the family built a new Catholic house chapel, as the old Sylvester chapel had been used by a Lutheran parish since the Reformation. However, the family was not doing well financially. In 1756 some goods belonging to the house were forced to be sold. In 1762 bankruptcy was even opened for the property of the owner of the Weitmar house. With the death of the unmarried Johann von Hasenkamp, ​​the family died out in 1764 and the rights to Haus Weitmar were to be sold. An appraisal of the property in June 1764 resulted in a value of 8,200 Reichstalers, which was exceeded by far on the second sale date on November 2, 1764 with a bid of 13,000 Reichstalers.

Weitmar House 1821

In 1774 Friedrich Goswin von Vaerst bought the estate in a public estate process. He dissolved the house from the feudal relationship and became the owner of the property. However, he did not stay there for long, but sold it back to Andreas Friedrich Wilhelm von Berswordt-Wallrabe as early as 1780, whose family is still the owner today and has moved into the neighboring gallery . At the end of the 18th century she had changes made to the manor house again. The space in the northeast in the corner of the core and extension was closed. There was either a major overhaul or a completely new walling up of the facades in order to give them a uniform, classicistic appearance. In addition, the house received a multi-storey mansard roof . Facades and roof shape were the reasons why later art historians often wrongly classified the Weitmar house as a purely classical building. Also in the 18th century, the pond-like moat of the property, which was created by the 16th century at the latest, was drained and replaced by gardens. There was a large orchard north of the house until the 1930s .

19th to 21st century

Wilhelm Friedrich von Berswordt-Wallrabe married Philippine von Syberg in 1848. Through this connection the Kemnade house also came into the possession of the family. At the end of the 19th century, the owners had almost all the gardens converted into a landscape park . At the same time, a stable and residential building, which at the same time had a gate-like character, was built on the outer bailey island, including older buildings such as the house chapel . When designing the landscaped garden, the central axis of the property was retained as the dominant element. It is formed, among other things, by a long access avenue, at the beginning of which a gatehouse was built in the east at the beginning of the 20th century. In 1890 Ludwig von Berswordt-Wallrabe bought back the meanwhile run-down New Year's Eve chapel and the land belonging to it for 1000  marks for the Weitmar house. The small church was so dilapidated that the Protestant parish decided to build a new church in a different location as early as the 1860s and thus no longer had any use for the chapel.

Weitmar house before its destruction in 1943

During the Second World War, Weitmar was hit by bombs in an air raid on May 13, 1943 and burned down to the outer walls. The library of the house, which comprised many thousands of volumes, was also lost. The New Year's Eve Chapel was also destroyed by bombs. The outer bailey building from the late 19th century remained undamaged, but was demolished in 1968 and completely leveled. In the same year Alexander von Berswordt-Wallrabe founded the Galerie m Bochum in the adjacent area of ​​the castle . The ruins of the manor house and chapel were saved from final decay in the 1970s thanks to the initiative of the Kunstverein Bochum. The city of Bochum leased the park, which had meanwhile been overgrown, in 1974 and repaired it until 1978, after which it was made accessible to the public. With the opening of the park to a wide audience and the opening of Galerie m at the same time, contemporary sculptures were placed in the park. When the lease expired in 2000, conservation measures were necessary on the ruins because tree roots endangered the masonry . The renovation costs were estimated at 290,000 euros, which neither the city nor the owner wanted to pay. In September 2005, the remains of both structures had to be cordoned off with construction fences because falling rocks endangered visitors.

The planned construction of an event and exhibition building in the area of ​​the former manor house necessitated a previous excavation on the area in order to document the structure that was still underground at the time. The main excavation began in April 2009 and lasted only 24 days. The barrel vault in the cellar was torn down and all fixtures from the 18th to 20th centuries were removed. Originally it was planned to keep the cellar vault . The findings made during the excavation made it possible to correct the history of the Schultenhof that had been handed down until then. Another excavation took place in July 2014 in the area of ​​the former outer bailey, because the “underground museum” was to be built on its area. The foundations of the eastern buildings and a gatehouse were exposed.

Todays use

Thanks to a new lease that the city of Bochum has signed with the family that owns the Weitmarer Park, the care and maintenance of the park and the listed ruins will remain in the hands of the city until 2026.

The "underground museum"

On the initiative of Alexander von Berswordt-Wallrabe, the situation art (for Max Imdahl) was created in the park of Haus Weitmar from the end of the 1980s , a contemporary art collection with sculptures and pictures, which he donated to the art collection of the Ruhr University Bochum in 1990 . The collection was created in memory of the art historian Max Imdahl , who became the first holder of the chair for art history at Bochum University in 1965. For Situation Kunst , a building was completed in May 2010 as part of the RUHR.2010 Capital of Culture year , which provides around 1200 square meters of space for cultural and scientific events, exhibitions as well as storage and work rooms. The building called the "cube" was built according to designs by the architects Pfeiffer, Ellermann and Preckel from Münster and built into the ruins of the Weitmar manor house. In the course of its completion, the old graves of the property were filled with water again. On November 13, 2015, the “Museum unter Tage” (MuT) opened an underground expansion of the art situation .

In the past, students from the Bochum Drama School performed in the park every summer . Traditionally, a play or scenes by Shakespeare were shown. The free performances of this open-air theater were very well attended by the Bochum audience.

description

Manor and outer bailey

The manor house and outer bailey used to stand on two separate islands, which were located in the middle of a house pond (graves) fed by the Linnebecke . A long bridge led to the outer bailey island with its stable and storage buildings. From 1748 there was also a chapel, which was later profaned and used as a stable. The coats of arms of the von Hasenkamp and von Eerde families were located above their entrance.

A single arch bridge made of quarry stone masonry , which is still preserved today, led from the outer bailey island over the moat to the simple, two-story manor house. The building was built in three construction phases. Presumably in the first half of the 13th century, a two-room house measuring 27 × 12 meters was built, the foundations of which were two meters thick. Its above-ground, double-shell walls made of Ruhr sandstone were up to 1.40 meters thick and comprised at least two to three storeys. This building was expanded in the second half of the 15th century on the southeast corner with a 9 × 10 meter extension. At the end of the 18th century, the von Berswordt-Wallrabe family had this L-shaped building expanded into an almost transverse rectangular house with a multi-storey mansard roof. In this third phase of construction, it also received a barrel-vaulted cellar with arched windows. Its slightly bent facade on the east side probably resulted from the unstable building ground in the area of ​​the former moat, which was drained at that time.

Of the former manor house, only the two-storey outer walls on the south and east sides are preserved today. Their rectangular door and window openings have sandstone frames. There are still traces of older elements on the masonry, such as toilet bay and cross-frame windows . A double, curved flight of stairs leads to the main entrance.

  • Building development of the Weitmar house

  • The ruined manor house before the cube was built

  • Manor house ruins with cube from the southeast

  • Manor ruin with cube at night

New Year's Chapel

Ruin of the New Year's Chapel in the park

The Sylvester Chapel, first mentioned in a document in 1397, stands northwest of the manor house and has predominantly Gothic elements. The small cemetery next to the chapel shows that the church was the church of the evangelical parish for centuries. Parts of its square west tower still show Romanesque forms. The tower has a round arched portal with a bull's eye above . On the upper floor the lower parts of the formerly arched windows are still preserved. A round archway leads into the nave , under which there is an inaccessible crypt . According to a report by a pastor from Weitmar, members of the families who owned the Weitmar and Bärendorf houses were previously buried there. The south wall of the nave is still up to the height of the window sills, but the north wall is only present in the base area. A pointed arch opening on the east side leads into the late Gothic choir , which is three steps higher than the nave. The square area has a 3/8 end and openings for pointed arch windows. The consoles for the former choir vault are still preserved. On the north side there is a late Gothic tabernacle niche with a crowning eyelash . Opposite this is a triangular lava bay .

There are three grave slabs in the ruins. They come from the area around the chapel and were erected there in the 1970s. The years of death 1625, 1705 and 1765 can be found on them.

Castle Park

The castle park

House Weitmar is surrounded by a 7.8  hectare park, which is called the castle park and was last repaired in 2010. The landscape park consists of larger lawns with solitary trees, a pond and an oak - beech forest that surrounds the lawns. Its dominant design element is the long access axis that leads to the manor house from the east. At their starting point on Hattinger Straße there is a gatehouse with a mansard roof and corner turret from the beginning of the 20th century. Directly next to it is a gate system, the large two-winged main gate of which has two octagonal gate pillars made of sandstone with crowning lanterns. The pillars show coats of arms with boar and lily as a symbol for the families Berswordt and Wallrabe. The lattice gate is made of wrought iron and consists of elements in the form of arches, foliage and tongue-like tips. To the right and left of the main gate there are two smaller side gates, the square pillars of which are closed off by spherical structures.

In the park of the Weitmar house there are numerous trees, some of which are centuries old. Ornamental shrubs fill gaps that arose due to the dying and aging of the vegetation. The most valuable plants in the park include sweet chestnuts with a trunk circumference of up to four meters, beech trees with a circumference of up to three meters, and yew trees, which are rare in Germany, and oaks with a trunk of similar size. A twisted European beech is curious. The oldest tree in Bochum, a Süntelbuche planted in 1740, stood there until 2000 , until it broke apart as a result of arson. The tree died in the following years.

Also worth mentioning is a group of erratic boulders made of different types of rock. You can find granite , gneiss , gabbro and porphyry , among others . The large stones were collected by the previous owners of the Weitmar family.

  • Gate system

  • Game in the castle park

  • Alley in the castle park

  • The Süntelbuche, once the oldest tree in Bochum

literature

  • Willi Berneiser: House Weitmar. In: Vereinigung für Heimatkunde Bochum (Hrsg.): Bochum. Homeland book. Volume 7. Schürmann & Klagges, Bochum 1958, pp. 93-97 ( online ).
  • Georg Eggenstein, Wolfram Essling-Wintzer: Deep in the west - new excavations at the Weitmar house in Bochum. In: LWL-Archäologie in Westfalen, Altertumskommission für Westfalen (Ed.): Archäologie in Westfalen-Lippe 2014. Beier & Beran, Langenweißbach 2015, ISBN 978-3-95741-040-5 , pp. 166-169 ( PDF ; 3 , 3 MB).
  • Klaus Gorzny: Castles, palaces and aristocratic residences along the Ruhr. A companion. Piccolo, Marl 2002, ISBN 3-9801776-7-X , pp. 113-115.
  • Albert Ludorff : The architectural and art monuments of the Bochum-Land district (= the architectural and art monuments of Westphalia . Volume 23). Schöningh, Münster 1907, pp. 49-50 ( digitized version ).
  • Stefan Pätzold: House Weitmar. In: Kai Niederhöfer (Red.): Burgen AufRuhr. On the way to 100 castles, palaces and mansions in the Ruhr region. Klartext, Essen 2010, ISBN 978-3-8375-0234-3 , pp. 27–31.
  • Eduard Schulte: Historical images of the knights' seats Crange in Emscherbruch and Weitmar near Bochum . Heitkamp, ​​Bochum 1977.
  • Wolfram Wintzer, Cornelia Kneppe: An eventful fate: on the history of Haus Weitmar in Bochum. In: LWL-Archäologie in Westfalen, Altertumskommission für Westfalen (Ed.): Archäologie in Westfalen-Lippe 2009. Beier & Beran, Langenweißbach 2010, ISBN 978-3-941171-42-8 , pp. 98-101 ( PDF ; 715 kB).

Web links

Commons : Haus Weitmar  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Footnotes

  1. ↑ a b c d Entry of the Weitmar house in the list of monuments of the city of Bochum under A336 ( PDF ; 812 kB).
  2. ↑ a b c d e f W. Wintzer, C. Kneppe: A moved fate: the history of the Weitmar house in Bochum. 2013, p. 99.
  3. ↑ a b Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe (Hrsg.): Excavations in the course of the new museum building of "Situation Kunst". Haus Weitmar releases a new chapter in its building history , accessed on March 7, 2016.
  4. ^ A b c W. Wintzer, C. Kneppe: A moved fate: on the history of the Weitmar house in Bochum. 2013, p. 98.
  5. ^ Haus Weitmar in GenWiki , accessed on March 7, 2016.
  6. ↑ W. Wintzer, C. Kneppe: A moved fate: the history of the Weitmar house in Bochum. 2013, p. 101.
  7. ↑ a b c d e f g Lecture by Wolfram Essling-Wintzer on August 23, 2009 on the results of the excavation in 2009 , accessed on March 7, 2016.
  8. ↑ Some publications even date the construction of the chapel to the 11th century due to the Romanesque shape of the west tower. Compare for example Hans H. Hanke: House Weitmar - Artful Romanticism .
  9. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j W. Berneiser: House Weitmar. 1958 ( online ).
  10. ^ S. Pätzold: House Weitmar. 2010, p. 28.
  11. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Hans H. Hanke: Haus Weitmar - Artful Romanticism , accessed on March 7, 2016.
  12. ↑ W. Wintzer, C. Kneppe: A moved fate: the history of the Weitmar house in Bochum. 2013, pp. 98-101.
  13. ↑ Weekly Duisburgische on the interest of the Commercien, the Clevischen, Geldrischen, Moers- and Märckischen, also surrounding country places, furnished address and Intelligentz slips . No. 30, 1756, undated ( digitized version ).
  14. ↑ Weekly Duisburgische on the interest of the Commercien, the Clevischen, Geldrischen, Moers- and Märckischen, also surrounding country places, furnished address and Intelligentz slips. No. 18, 1762, undated ( digitized version ).
  15. ↑ Weekly Duisburgische on the interest of the Commercien, the Clevischen, Geldrischen, Moers- and Märckischen, also surrounding country places, furnished address and Intelligentz slips. No. 23, 1764, undated ( digitized version ).
  16. ↑ Weekly Duisburgische on the interest of the Commercien, the Clevischen, Geldrischen, Moers- and Märckischen, also surrounding country places, furnished address and Intelligentz slips. No. 50, 1764, undated ( digitized version ).
  17. ↑ a b Entry by Tom Bauer about the Weitmar house in the scientific database " EBIDAT " of the European Castle Institute
  18. ↑ a b c S. Pätzold: House Weitmar. 2010, p. 30.
  19. ↑ a b c d Matthias Rasch: Architectural monuments endangered - architectural monuments saved. North Rhine-Westphalia (Westphalia area). In: Castles and Palaces . Volume 47, No. 4, 2006, ISSN  0007-6201 , p. 243.
  20. ↑ Information on the Weitmar house at bochum.de , accessed on March 8, 2016.
  21. ^ Jürgen Boebers-Süßmann: Museum underground in Bochum officially opened. In: Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung . Edition of November 13, 2015 ( online ).
  22. ^ Matthias Rasch: Architectural monuments endangered - architectural monuments saved. North Rhine-Westphalia (Westphalia area). In: Castles and Palaces. Volume 42, No. 1, 2001, ISSN  0007-6201 , p. 52.

Coordinates: 51 ° 26 ′ 52 "  N , 7 ° 11 ′ 21.5"  E

This article was added to the list of excellent articles on May 19, 2016 in this version .