Rüti monastery

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View of the Schanz, drawn in 1864 by Mrs. B. Aemisegger from Obertoggenburg
The Rüti monastery before the fire of 1706
The Rüti monastery after the fire
The former monastery church, today the Reformed Church of Rüti , on the left the main building

The Premonstratensian Monastery of Rüti in the municipality of Rüti (ZH) in the Zurich Oberland was the owner of extensive land, the final resting place ( burial place ) of the Counts of Toggenburg and comprised 14 incorporated churches from 1206 to 1525 (annulment)  , twelve of them with collatur right . The property, enlarged through donations, purchases and exchanges, was concentrated at the beginning of the 15th century around Rüti (Ferrach, Oberdürnten), between Greifen- and Pfäffikersee ( Aathal - Volketswil area ) as well as on Zurich and Obersee , especially in places where the abbey was located could come into possession of the church statute or the lower jurisdiction . Rüti was an important stage on the Way of St. James via Rapperswil to Einsiedeln Abbey . Initially as a branch of Churwalden, the abbey sancte Maria was subordinated to the monastery Weissenau (Minderau) by the Bishop of Constance from 1230 and was affiliated to the administrative district Zirkarie Schwaben .

Premonstratensian Order

The Premonstratensians ( Latin : Candidus et Canonicus Ordo Praemonstratensis ), especially in Belgium and the Netherlands also called Norbertijnen (Norbertiner) after their founder , were owned by Norbert von Xanten in Prémontré near Laon , remotely owned by the Prüm Abbey , in 1120 at the age of 13 Companions founded as a centralized order of regulated canons . Norbert was friends with Bernhard von Clairvaux and was strongly influenced by the ideals of the Cistercians . The Premonstratensian Order settled in Switzerland from 1126. In the 12th and first half of the 13th centuries, 15 premonstratensic male and female monasteries were established in Switzerland: Bellelay BE; Bollingen SG (women); Chur GR, St. Luzi; Chur, St. Hilarien (women); Churwalden GR; Churwalden (women); Fontaine-André NE; Gottstatt BE; Grandgourt JU; Humilimont FR; Lac de Joux VD; Posat FR (women); Rüti ZH; Rueyres VD (women); St. Jakob im Prättigau, Klosters GR.

history

In particular, the possessions of the monastery are very well documented, with the exception of the years before and after the abolition of the monastery, comparatively little has survived.

Coat of arms and origin of name

The area around Rüti was probably settled in the 8th and 9th centuries. The district Fägswil was mentioned for the first time in 807 in a Sankt Gallen document, in a document from Emperor Otto II (955-983) from 972, Rüti was referred to as Riutun . The name goes back to the Swiss German word Rüti . It means; “ Clearing , a piece of land that has been cleared of wood and bushes and reclaimed”. The coat of arms of the municipality of Rüti goes back to the symbol of the Premonstratensian Abbey of Rüti, attached to the sacrament house in the monastery church in 1490 . After the abolition of the monastery in 1525 it became the shield image of the Rütiamt and in 1803 the coat of arms of the municipality of Rüti. The field name “Chlaus” for a hill south of the monastery reminds of the location of the St. Niklaus Chapel, which existed before the monastery was built and was demolished after the Reformation.

founding

Preliminary remarks

Although there is no founding document, the documentary sources confirm the founding narrative of the years 1206 to 1221 over long distances, i.e. H. 1206 and not 1209 can be assumed as the foundation date. Inaccuracies and contradictions in detail are due to the fact that the history of the foundation was not put down in writing until 1441, and this presumably reflects the legal status at the time of writing or, during the turmoil of the Old Zurich War, in particular was intended to ensure the monastery’s legal claims against the warring parties. In the so-called Diplomatar, a collection of transcripts of documents, the founding narrative was supposed to legitimize the "libertates" (rights of rule); accordingly, the early donation, exchange and confirmation deeds are built into the foundation's history. The author probably worked from written sources: In addition to the documents that he copied into the Diplomatar, there were probably chronological records, supplemented by other traditions. The report that the monastery was built in 1206 under Pope Innocent III. and King Philip of Swabia , the author mistakenly added the name of Bishop Konrad II of Tegerfelden (he was only elected bishop in December 1208 and consecrated in January 1210 ) - probably from the confirmation document from 1209 .

Founding years

Norbert von Xanten

Liutold (Lütold) IV. Von Regensberg , who took part in the Fifth Crusade with Rudolf II. Von Rapperswil and died on November 16, 1218 in Akkon ( Palestine ), founded the Rüti monastery in 1206. As one of the few Swiss monasteries leaves returned his foundation to the participant in a crusade. It can also be assumed that the probable founder of the abbey could have served in the Order of St. John in Palestine, who owned an important commandery in Bubikon just five kilometers away , today's Ritterhaus Bubikon , whose co-founders include the Rapperswil and Toggenburgers.

The grandfather of the brothers Lütold IV and Eberhard von Regensberg was Lütold II .; together with his son he founded the Fahr Monastery , which was to serve as an inheritance funeral for the barons of Regensberg . The modest women's monastery no longer seemed to be sufficient for its grandchildren, and it could not develop freely under the leadership of the Einsiedeln monastery. From his mother, a baroness of Vaz , Lütold IV. Von Regensberg found out that Provost Ulrich, his prior Luther and some canons wanted to leave the Premonstratensian Monastery of Churchwalden after disagreements with the convent, which Luetold IV used, the idea of ​​a monastery independent of Einsiedeln to realize. He called provost Ulrich and prior Luther to found a monastery in Rüti and gave them his property there, including the St. Nicholas chapel. The first building, a wooden chapel, was built in 1208. In 1214 the wooden monastery buildings were replaced by massive stone buildings, but the construction of the monastery complex was not completed until 1283.

The oldest document dates from April 16, 1209 and was issued in the Grossmünster in Zurich. Lütold IV. And his son confirmed in it that they had transferred an estate to the provost and the brothers of St. Maria and documented the agreement between the provost Rüti and the priest of Busskirch , as representatives of the owner, the Pfäfers monastery : The new possessions of According to Busskirch, a Rapperswil foundation, monasteries were subject to a ten-year fee, as was the St. Nikolaus chapel, located on today's Chlaushöhe in Rüti, under the parish church of Busskirch . With the consent of the Abbot von Pfäfers, the latter ceded the St. Nicholas Chapel and the income from its widum property and the tithe to the Convent of Rüti, and the Bishop of Constance waived his rights. On January 13, 1217, a priestly convention in Hombrechtikon confirmed the foundation agreement, the location of the monastery property, as well as the provision that Ulrich (he is mentioned by name) should set up a Premonstratensian monastery with his friars in Rüti.

The Premonstratensian Abbey of Rüti was generously presented with money and goods by Lütold IV and his brother Eberhard, Archbishop of Salzburg , and the surrounding aristocratic families. Before his death in Palestine, Lütold IV gave his monastery 100 marks of pure silver marks , a censer made of gold-plated silver set with precious stones and a stone with great power . On May 6, 1219, Lütold V. von Regensberg confirmed the donations of his father, who had died in Palestine, to the convent, but reserved the bailiwick rights and the patronage rights . On the same day, Eberhard von Salzburg confirmed the foundation in Rüti. Lütold V gave the convent a first external church, Seegräben , comprising the church, the mill, fields, fields, forests, fishing and undeveloped land, but also took over the guardianship over the facilities as well as the farmers, millers and fishermen . In 1221 the Bishop of Constance incorporated the Seegräben chapel into the Rüti monastery; Provost Ulrich was also present at the certification.

Pope Gregory IX confirmed the Rütis Foundation in 1228, took the Marienkloster and its possessions under apostolic protection and excluded it from all spiritual and secular requirements. In addition to other privileges, the Pope exempted the goods produced by the monastery from the obligation to tithe. Rüti was granted baptism and burial rights, and no chapels or prayer houses were allowed to be built in his parish without his consent.

That of Rudolf III. Bollingen women's monastery on upper Lake Zurich, donated by Rapperswil, was subordinate to the abbey in Rüti from 1229 until it was merged with the Mariazell-Wurmsbach monastery in 1267 . In connection with the inheritance disputes over the estate of the Alt-Rapperswil possessions, the churches of Bollingen (jointly owned by Rudolf III of Rapperswil and Diethelm I of Toggenburg) and Eschenbach came to the Rüti monastery in the founding years. In contrast to the Toggenburgers, the Regensbergers did not have a single burial place in the Rüti monastery and lost influence despite the hereditary church patronage . They were replaced by the Counts of Toggenburg , whose preferred burial site was the monastery; 14 counts from this house found their final resting place there. As the burial place of so many dead from the nobility, the monastery received rich gifts: The numerous foundations and donations formed the basis for the monastery’s wealth at the beginning of the 15th century.

The small-scale village of Rüti grew around the monastery and, in particular, its farms. Its inhabitants did agriculture , livestock , agricultural and, in the following centuries, increased wage labor in the vineyards on Lake Zurich and later in textile processing. Shortly after its foundation, the monastery used the water power of a Rütner village stream, the Schwarz, at the confluence with the Jona .

Heyday

In 1238, the then provost Ulrich II bought the free people of the village of Ferrach (today's district of Rüti of the same name) from the bailiwick of the Counts of Toggenburg for 80 marks of silver in Zurich currency and took over the rights and obligations of the bailiff:

“ We Ulrich rehearsing and the convent des huses our fröwen zu Rüti, with god's help, have given the high born and noble gentlemen graven of Toggenburg the lüte and the village, which is genent Verrich [Ferrach] , with all rights and vogtey, so the same The gentlemen of Toggenburg had on it around eighty march silver, and hant the same love for verrich with common favor and will frilich give our gotzhus zu Rüti to the aforementioned all irrelevant goods, akker, knowledge, welde, holtzer, mountains and valley and veld rightly own, and hant to himself and your descendants connected with sworn oaths, that asus always to have and uncrowned, and in good will we have redirected that we have lent the aforementioned goods against rightly inferred in and iren descendants who are free, as öch su sint. "

This trade is an important step in the development of the monastery and its immediate surroundings: On the one hand, the monastery takes on functions under public law, and on the other hand, the social status of the people in the hamlet of Ferrach is recorded and remains unchanged for the next 300 years. The document became the opening (municipal code) for the residents of the hamlet, which was read out on court and oath days. In it, the farmers in Ferrach are referred to as free people and paid the monastery an annual interest of six pounds of Zurich currency for its work as Vogt on St. Andrea's Day (November 30th). Over the centuries, various copies of this opening were made, with the legal, economic and social position of the courtiers deteriorating in favor of the monastery. The above-mentioned, relatively low interest rate became the bailiff's tax; the monastery preserved its rights, while the courtiers largely lost their rights over the centuries, which is attributed to the provisions on succession in the Latin version of the document. The legal status of the courtiers became very complex until the end of the Middle Ages and hardly differed from the people of the chapel, the serfs of the monastery. The vast majority of the abbey servants are likely to have been serfs . On March 26, 1325, Baron Heinrich von Freienstein sold his owner Heinrich the Moser von Eschenbach and his son Konrad to the monastery:

“ To all those who see or hear these letters, I tell Einrich von Vrienstein vrio that I have given to the heir spiritual people to the abbot and the convente des gotzhuses ze Ruti, the order of Premonstrei, that I have given to my love and who I to inen han, in a right Köfe to right own Heinrichen the Moser von Eschibach and Chunrat sinen sun, who were quite my own, around six phunt phenningen Zurich coin. "

Witnesses were: Chünrat von Rorbas, Heinrich der Huber and Eglof, the baron's bailiff.

Coat of arms of the Rüti monastery in the Rüti office building

The Regensbergers exempted the Rüti monastery from taxes in Grüningen in 1260 , one of their most important foundings in the Zurich Oberland. Until their decline after the Regensberg feud (1267/68), the barons of the abbey transferred large parts of their possessions to the Grüningen rule. The red, Gothic "R" as the family coat of arms can still be found today in the golden coat of arms of the Rüti community.

The affiliation of the neighboring community of Dürnten (Oberdürnten) to the Rüti Monastery is already documented in a papal document from 1250. In 1286, Countess Elisabeth von Rapperswil sold her farm in Oberdürnten with the associated rights - especially with the lower jurisdiction - to the Rüti Abbey (the Rapperswilers sold Greifensee and probably Uster around 1300 ). In the neighboring Niederdürnten and Tann , however, it was not possible to gain a foothold with the appropriation of goods.

In 1326 the vicar of the Bishop of Constance consecrated three altars in Rüti with an indulgence guarantee . The following year, Pope John XXII commissioned the prince-bishop in Constance to incorporate the parish church in Eschenbach, which Count Kraft von Toggenburg had donated to the monastery of Rüti. The visitor to the Premonstratensian monasteries allowed the Rüti Abbey to set up a cloakroom (“ communem vestiariam ”) in 1328 and gave him the church of Dreibrunnen und Weinberge am Riet near Zurich. The hermit Abbot Herman von Arbon entered into a spiritual fraternization with the monastery in Erlach in 1358 , as well as with the monastery Rüti. An exchange of goods with the Disentis Monastery is mentioned in the Graubünden document book .

In 1359 the monastery received the right of patronage over the Dürnten church as compensation for the severe damage that Rüti had suffered in the conflict between Austria and Zurich (see the Swiss Habsburg Wars and the night of murder in Zurich ). At that time, Rüti and the surrounding area of ​​the contested rule of Rapperswil were in a very conflict-prone situation in the border area between the rival powers. This part of the Zurich landscape was repeatedly the target of looting and devastation, from which the rural population suffered particularly. With the transfer of the patronage rights for the Dürnten Church, Rüti received the right to propose the Dürnten priest in future, for which the monastery was entitled to levies from Dürnten for his remuneration.

The canons succeeded in continuously expanding their territory: They received, among other things, the church rate of the Gossau Church, von Aadorf , Dürnten, Elsau, Eschenbach, Fischenthal, Hinwil, Uster, Wangen im Gaster (SZ) and Wil (SG). Large parts of the land around Oberuster belonged to the Rüti monastery. In the years 1371 to 1450 the possessions of the monastery reached their greatest extent. The most important patrons of the monastery in the late Middle Ages are named: The Counts of Toggenburg, Rapperswil, Nellenburg , Kyburg, the Archdukes of Austria and the surrounding baron families, including those of Batzenberg, von Hinwil, von Landenberg , von Hegi and von Windegg.

Pilgrimage

The parish church in Dreibrunnen near Wil (SG) was founded in 1275 by the Counts of Toggenburg and, like the Rüti monastery, belonged to the diocese of Constance . The Toggenburgers donated the church and the associated courtyard to the Rüti monastery in 1289. At the request of the abbot and convent of Constance, it was incorporated as a parish church in the monastery of Rüti in 1330 , the bishop of Constance reserved the confirmation of each vicar proposed by the abbot for his bishopric and determined his salary with 12  bushels of wheat, 10 bushels of Haber, one pound Constance pennies and offerings .

The monastery of Rüti exercised pastoral care in Dreibrunnen , Dreibrunnen became a place of pilgrimage after the Reformation: In the monastery church of Rüti there was a highly venerated image of the Mother of God. When the Rüti Abbey was looted during the Reformation turmoil (1525), some conventuals saved a statue of Our Lady from the iconoclasm and brought it to the distant church in Dreibrunnen near Wil, which was less exposed to the storm at the time of the Reformation. A letter of purchase from 1526 confirms that the Heiliggeistspital Wil acquired the Dreibrunnen church from the city-state of Zurich after the abolition of the monastery and is therefore in legal possession of the statue of the Virgin Mary. From this point on, the pilgrimage to the Virgin Mary began in the church of Dreibrunnen, but the statue of the Marienkloster Rüti, located on the Way of St. James, was also likely to have attracted numerous pilgrims in the previous decades.

What was venerable (pictures, statues and relics) fell victim to looting during the turmoil of the Reformation and was destroyed, smashed or burned. It is often said that church objects were thrown into the water and miraculously washed up in Catholic places. Allegedly another statue of Our Lady carved in wood was thrown into the flood of Jona in Rüti and is said to have washed ashore near the parish church of Maria Himmelfahrt (Jona) . The statue was cleaned and restored and was venerated as the "Rütner Madonna".

Nobility memoria

As early as the late 13th century, the Toggenburgers began to bury their high-ranking family members in the Rütner Abbey, where they had their own grave chapel, although two family members were still in 1383 and 1385 in the city church of St. Michael in Uznach , an important Toggenburg foundation found their final resting place. A total of 14 Toggenburg counts and a large number of other nobles found their final resting place in the Rüti monastery. The original crypt was under the open vestibule of the monastery church.

Ostrich egg reliquary from Elisabeth Mätsch , wife of the last Count of Toggenburg

Count Friedrich VII of Toggenburg († 1436) was buried in the Toggenburg chapel in 1442. The abbot of Einsiedeln received a certain amount of supervisory authority over the yearly foundation of the widow of the last Toggenburg count, Elisabeth von Matsch . On September 5, 1439, Countess Elisabeth von Matsch founded a chaplain for the purpose of a daily mass in the Premonstratensian Abbey for his and her own salvation and bequeathed the abbey 30,000 Rhenish guilders and a valuable treasure with ornaments for this purpose . During her lifetime, the donor chose the priest to hold mass in the new side chapel of the monastery church. After her death, the foundation provided that the Rütner abbot and his convent held the daily mass and the usual seasons and that the chaplain assigned for this received board and lodging as well as ten Rhenish guilders from the foundation for Christmas. The incumbent abbot of Einsiedeln monastery had to ensure that these duties were fulfilled and in this way had an influence on the life of the convent, and Rüti monastery had to pay the Einsiedeln monastery fifty guilders if it was not fulfilled.

In the 14th century, Rüti was increasingly preferred as the final resting place by other noble families, probably because it promised regular service to the dead (aristocratic memoria ). In addition to the aristocrats, ministerials like Meier von Dürnten, von Schalchen, von Rambach, Giel von Liebenberg or knight Ital Löw von Schaffhausen were buried in Rüti. Heinrich von Randegg was together with knight Johann von. Klingenberg, brother of Abbot Bilgeri, one of the leaders of the Habsburg troops at the battle of Näfels , where he was killed on April 9, 1388. According to the report of the Rapperswil chronicler J. H. Tschudi, Abbot Bilgeri von Wagenberg asked the Glarus people after the battle of Näfels for permission to bury the Habsburg fallen in their own cemetery and to build a memorial church. When the Glarus refused to do so, he asked to be allowed to bury the corpses appropriately. On November 30, 1389, around 20 months after the battle, the abbot and his entourage went to the battlefield, lend a hand and had - according to JH Tschudi a lot - the remains of at least 20 fallen soldiers brought to Rüti and buried there. In 1982 archaeological excavations in Rüti confirmed the descriptions in Tschudi's chronicle.

The Rüti monastery in the 15th century

1408 came Rüti as part of the Landvogtei Grüningen under Zurich authorities . The Vogt von Grüningen was responsible for the high ( blood jurisdiction) and lower jurisdiction in Dürnten , in Oberdürnten only for the high, the lower jurisdiction was incumbent on the Rüti monastery. In 1415 and 1433 the monastery was placed under the protection of the empire by Emperor Sigismund, and from then on it had a standing red "R" on a gold background in the coat of arms.

Count Friedrich VII of Toggenburg († 1436), who had lived for a time with his entire court in the Rüti monastery, found his final resting place in the Toggenburg chapel together with a nephew in the Rüti monastery , as mentioned . In the course of the Old Zurich War , troops of the Eight Old Places plundered and devastated the Rüti Monastery on June 11, 1443 and are said to desecrate and desecrate the corpses of the nobles, including those of Count Friedrich VII of Toggenburg, whom they held responsible for the war with Zurich With the bones of Count Walraff von Thierstein , " like schoolboys thrown snowballs ". Everything that wasn't walled in, death signs and flags above the graves, cult objects and even the tower bells, was dragged along.

After the war years, which were devastating for the rural people of Zurich, and the repeated plundering of the central Swiss in the hinterland of the city of Zurich, the further expansion of the monastery property came to a standstill, lease payments from the impoverished feudal people failed to materialize, and the building activity of the abbey was suspended for decades. In 1469 the Fehraltorf church and its goods were donated to the Rüti monastery. As a foundation of the couple Baron Bernhard Gradner and Veronika von Starckenberg († 1489) Abbot Markus Wyler left the monastery church in 1492 through Hans Haggenberg.

Reformation and abolition of the monastery

Peasant uprising and turmoil of the Reformation

The population of the Zurich countryside had doubled between 1465 and 1530, and even tripled by 1585, and food production could not keep pace with this. The high tithes levied on the monasteries also represented an enormous burden for the rural population, the more the gap between the abundant monasteries and the poor rural population was obvious. The abolition of the monasteries was a popular demand, and this inevitably led to a peasant uprising in the Zurich area .

Abbot Felix Klauser seemed to have foreseen the dangerous situation, because he fled from the plunder of the monastery on April 22, 1525 with money and the monastery treasure to Rapperswil, where the convent owned goods and a town house. The next day, around 1200 Oberland farmers plundered the abbey after they had learned of the abbot's flight and had even handed it over to the Vogt von Grüningen, who let the abbot move to Rapperswil. So the farmers took the required distribution of the monastery property by hand and destroyed the extensive library of the monastery. The Johanniter commandery in Bubikon was also not spared, as can be seen in the eyewitness report of the chronicler and pastor in Bubikon, Johannes Stumpf (Stumpf'sche Chronik):

“ At the two monasteries of Rüti and Bubikon there was a solich running up, eating, drinking, romping, raging, screaming, kothen, which which the lüt had previously confessed and now looked at, must be very surprised. Large and small crockery, yes, even those that are used to eat the Schwynen, were used to carry wyn uff, as soon as the wyn became unclean, they poured out the us and fetched others. Quite a few attacked the caplan and priest in the forest, and drunk the wyn uss. "

The Zurich Council sent an embassy to Rüti, which reported to Zurich:

“ April 23, 1525. HLM and gracious gentlemen know that I'm going to come to Rüti for one in the night, and when I came there, I found a hundred pure and simple in the monastery. And hattend let out a storm, and were firmly full wyn and utterly ungeschikt. And watch out, this day, they are also unshackled, so, my dear gentlemen, so hurriedly dispatching the message that the thing was put down, because the hoof was there for and for. And in the morning I found a parish, and wned not from one another, until the whole office with one another syg. And it is not only the office, sunder from the lake too. And since one, she turns then all toss. And nobody knows where it ends, namely, where you, mini gentlemen, are not in front of it, so gracious gentlemen, doing so quickly daynno. Date hastily guarded in the morning to Rüti. "

After the iconoclasm on the Rüti monastery, the Zurich council sent some representatives to the Zurich countryside to negotiate with the rebellious farmers. In addition to the Grüningen congregation, Greifensee, Kyburg, Eglisau, Andelfingen, Neuamt and Rümlang had also formulated their demands in writing with the request that they should be examined thoroughly on the basis of the Gospel . The council's response, however, was much to the disappointment of the farmers - no major point was approved. Some angry country folk even wanted to move to the monasteries against the city of Zurich; negotiations were able to defuse the situation. One month after the twelve articles went to press , the Zurich farmers wrote their own complaint articles . In Zurich, however, the farmers' demands were rejected, which led to great unrest, but the situation did not escalate: Often the peasants were calmed down through negotiations and persuaded to return home, and once all the farmers present were invited to the city of Winterthur for food and drink .

Zurich supported the introduction of the new doctrine in its monasteries by all means: when the Rüti monastery was transferred to the city of Zurich in June 1525, the general council resolution on monastery reform had already been passed and was therefore included in the introductory formula of the handover memorial. In the introduction of the agreement between the city of Zurich and the Rüti monastery, the council established its position on the monasteries on June 17, 1525 and justified the reformation of the monasteries. After the abolition of the monastery in the course of the Reformation, the monastery property became the property of the city of Zurich, which had it administered by a bailiff in the Rüti office . The previous administrative tasks of the monastery were carried out by the Rüti Office.

Abolition of the monastery

Container for miter and pontifical sandals from the monastery treasure Rüti
Miter and crook from the monastery treasure of the Premonstratensian Abbey of Rüti (ZH)
The cross particle monstrance from the monastery treasure

The last abbot of the Rüti monastery, formerly known as the “Marienmünster”, Felix Klauser, fled to the Catholic town of Rapperswil on April 22, 1525, as mentioned. Whether unselfishly or not, his luggage contained a significant amount of cash, documents and parts of the monastery treasure - including a 450-year-old bishop's hat ( miter ), a crook , a cross-particle monstrance , pontificals and documents - which have since been in the possession of the Ortsgemeinde Rapperswil and the Catholic parish have remained. After Klauser's death, according to an agreement , the sacred objects should actually have returned to the Rüti monastery. Because the monastery had been secularized in the meantime , the staunch Catholics from Rapperswil saw no reason to part with the treasures. Abbot Felix Klauser died around 1530. The local community of Rapperswil-Jona relies on a documented donation for their claim to ownership: Sebastian Hegner, the last conventual from Rüti, came to Rapperswil in 1557 and bequeathed the monastery treasure to the parish of St. Johann in Rapperswil on November 6, 1561 . According to a severance agreement between the Council of Rapperswil, the Council of Zurich and Abbot Felix Klauser, which was already sealed in 1525, the monastery treasure was not listed in the inventory on which the contract was based; the monastery treasure only officially reappeared when it was donated by Sebastian Hegner in 1561. According to the entry for the donation, the Rüti Monastery would need to be restored in order to transfer the monastery treasure back there. In 2007 the municipality of Rüti asked the city (political municipality) of Rapperswil to return it. However, due to non-jurisdiction, this referred to the local community and the Catholic parish of Rapperswil as the responsible legal owner of the cultural assets, in addition to the Rapperswil City Museum as a partial storage location. After an extensive study of the sources, the former Zurich city archivist summed up that the Rüti monastery had never been abolished in formal legal terms, but merely " abandoned to the Reformation " - which means that in Rüti, at least in theory, there is still a monastery with legal claims. Like St. Gallen, which was satisfied with a replica of the celestial globe paid for by Zurich, the mayor of the majority Reformed Rüti promised to be content with copies of the pre-Reformation secular goods. A “ solemn procession from Rapperswil to Rüti ” was also 'threatened' (see also the dispute between Zurich and St. Gallen ), but the monastery treasure will probably remain in Rapperswil. According to a decision of the daily statute from 1559, the Rüti monastery should " no longer be given over to Catholicism and the former monastery property should fall to the canton of Zurich ", to which Rapperswil attributes its claims to ownership of the monastery treasure. The Minderau Monastery , the Rüti superordinate monastery, recognized this decision.

Elementary school and transition to the Rüti office

In Rüti, as elsewhere, the monastery property was used to set up the elementary school . Formally it was founded by the Evangelical Reformed Church so that the parishioners could read the Bible, but it was a continuation of the old monastery schools and was paid from monastery goods or their income, which continued to benefit the Rüti office.

Reformer Ulrich Zwingli planned (in repealed Kloster Ruti an elementary school teacher training establishment Lehrerseminar or a Progymnasium ) to set up. Wolfgang Kröwl came from the canton of Zug, received an education in Paris ( Magister Parisiensis ) and became a teacher at the Fraumünster School in Zurich, where mostly boys of the higher and lower nobility were taught. In the abolished Rüti monastery, the position of the priest and the teacher was combined into one office and Kröwl was elected for this position by the City of Zurich on Zwingli's proposal. In 1530, Kröwl was awarded a modest 30 guilders annual wages, including free board and lodging, for both offices, even according to the circumstances at the time. The project of a teachers' seminar failed on the one hand because of the resistance of the three conventuals who remained in the monastery, who were probably hoping for a reinstatement of the monastery, and on the other hand because of the Zurich council, which only partially approved the necessary funds. Wolfgang Kröwl and three of the former conventuals died with Zwingli in the battle of Kappel . In his letters from 1541, Heinrich Bullinger listed the conflict about the new bailiff in the former monastery, but also briefly referred to the convent brothers who remained in Rüti: « … So we have a graceful expert opinion in front of us in relation to the abolished monastery Rüti, whose few remaining monks caused a lot of trouble due to shameful exuberance and stubborn resistance of the authorities, advises that those monks be transferred to the city, but to build a teaching institution similar to that in Kappel in Rüti ... »

Only one elementary school was founded in Rüti, but at least the first public school in the Zurich countryside, which was headed for 312 years, first by the respective pastors, then by poorly paid and insufficiently trained schoolmasters in the old rectory near the church. The great council of Zurich decreed in 1598 that if the pastors could not give school lessons themselves due to lack of time, they could then employ well-known, pious, unspoiled, skillful, hard-working and capable men . In 1601, Gabriel Schmidt was the first to receive the dual office of Sigrist / Schoolmaster, thus establishing an office tradition that lasted for almost two hundred years. With the ordination of Pastor Johann Jakob Reutlinger, the situation improved significantly: Reutlinger was an enthusiastic supporter of Pestalozzi's teaching method. After his ordination in 1774, he was tutor in Grüningen and Wetzikon for three years , provisional in Nidau ​​from 1781 to 1790 , then an orphan father in the Oetenbach monastery in Zurich and a deacon in Wald . With the beginning of the Helvetic Republic he came to Rüti in 1798 as a pastor and school inspector. In the cramped classroom in the basement of the rectory, he trained a total of 30 school teachers, who in turn had to pass on the knowledge they had received in Rüti to all teachers living in their respective neighborhood.

With the abolition of the monastery, the city-state of Zurich took over the administration of the extensive estates. For this purpose, officials were appointed who had to take up residence in the monastery. From then on, the state paid the pastors and schoolmasters, who, as mentioned, initially served in personal union.

The monastery and its inhabitants

Convention

Habit of the Premonstratensian

As mentioned at the beginning, Pope Gregory IX confirmed. In 1228 the Rütis Foundation took the Marienkloster and its possessions under apostolic protection and excluded it from all spiritual and secular requirements. The brothers should be subject to the Rule of Augustine and the Order of Premonstratensian. They were allowed to take in clerics and lay people as well as free and freed people who wanted to flee the world . Those who took the vows were only allowed to leave the convent with the abbot's permission. In addition to other privileges, the Pope granted the right of free election of abbots by the conventuals.

The general chapter of the Prémontré (assembly of all superiors of the order) subordinated the Rüti Abbey to the Minderau monastery (Weissenau) in 1230, as the first conventuals in Rüti had separated from their mother monastery in Churwalden in a dispute. In 1468 there was a rapprochement between Rüti and Churwalden: the abbots Ulrich Tennenberg (Rüti) and Ludwig von Lindau (Churwalden) signed a fraternity agreement ( fraternitas ) and undertook to notify each other when a conventual had died so that it could celebrate its new year . If a brother was sent to the fraternal monastery by his superior, he should be welcomed there and not treated differently from his own brothers and should submit to the discipline of the host monastery .

Since 1233 the members of the convent had the citizenship of the neighboring Rapperswils, from 1340 from Winterthur and from 1402 from Zurich. In addition to the canonici , lay brothers (conversi) also lived in the settlements of the Norbertines . In 1340 the convent decided that nephews of conventuals and illegitimate persons should not be admitted to the monastery either as canons or as lay brothers .

Double monastery and convent in Bollingen

Until probably 1283 the abbey could have been set up as a double premonstratensian monastery for men and women, the initially provost was elevated to an abbey in 1259 . In 1283, the abbot and the convent decided on instructions from the general chapter not to accept any further sisters. In 1257, the Pope issued a hereditary privilege that allowed the provost and convent to accept inheritances that fell to the brothers and sisters of the monastery. Until the decision in 1283, this is the first and only reference to a double monastery. Whether and how the aforementioned women's convent of Rüti is related to the Bollingen monastery founded by Rudolf von Rapperswil , which was subordinated to Rüti by 1259 at the latest (and was incorporated into the Mariazell-Wurmsbach monastery in 1267 ), or even identical to it, is still unclear. Even if not in this context, there is evidence of an instruction from the Bishop of Constance for the years around 1292, who postponed the church consecration from the first Sunday in May " because the pleasant air encouraged unrestricted enjoyment " to the day after St. Martin (November 12th) in order to prevent " insubordinate hustle and bustle " - his successor was to issue the same order a few years later to the all-male monastery of St. Martin in Zurich.

Main areas of activity of the Convention

Similar to the Cistercians , the Premonstratensians contributed to the improvement of agriculture in the first centuries after their emergence . Later an aristocratic train established itself and manual labor was gradually pushed back. Writing and copying books remained important, even if no well-known works are known from Rüti, and teaching also gained in importance. The Rüti monastery was also seen as a bulwark against the heresy widespread in the Zürcher Oberland and Tösstal , namely against the Anabaptists , so that the majority of the convent was a community of ordained priests .

In addition to its pastoral care, the abbey also took care of poor relief (welfare), for example in Dürnten there were so-called hunger slips that could be hung on the door and ensured the delivery of food. In contrast to monastic orders, the Premonstratensians combined monastic life with pastoral care in the parish. In the years 1206 to 1525 (annulment) this comprised 14  incorporated churches, twelve of them with collatur right (Bollingen and Fischenthal were not incorporated). Rüti therefore endeavored to acquire numerous collateral rights, but the abbey was unable to fill the parish positions in the parishes it supported with its own convent brothers. In view of the extensive property holdings, economic considerations played an important role, as did the income from the Widumgut and the tithe, for which the abbey sometimes raised four-digit guilders. In doing so, she endeavored to strengthen existing priorities (such as in Seegräben with Fehraltorf and Uster).

The relationships between the monastery economy, with a focus on private farming in arable and dairy farms, and the numerous peasant fiefs (at 185 locations in their heyday) were close and varied. Responsible conventuals were the conductor , the cellar and kitchen master, three wine cellar master and the grain master. The abbot (from 1259) was supported by the prior, subprior, custodian , chamberlain and portner, other canons were partially appointed to the parish offices of the incorporated churches. In their own business, laymen u. a. holds the offices of court masters , master builders , monastery hens, foremen and monastery blacksmiths. Citizens in Rapperswil, Uznach, Wil (SG), Winterthur and Zurich also performed monastic official functions for the abbey.

Whereabouts of the conventuals

Sebastian Hegner, the last remaining conventual in Rüti, fell to his death on the way to the toilet in Rapperswil. Representation from the Wickiana

On November 15, 1524, by resolution of the Zurich Council, all Zurich monasteries were abolished, although the last abbot, Felix Klauser, the mother monastery Weissenau and the monasteries Rot and Schussenried as well as Leonhard Dürr, abbot of the Premonstratensian Monastery of St. Ulrich, demanded that the monastery be Rüti will be restored. Their interventions in Zurich, supported by the Reich, and at the Federal Diet were unsuccessful: on January 24, 1559, the closure of the Rüti monastery was confirmed as final by a judgment of a federal arbitral tribunal. Some canons stayed in their pastors' posts in the Sanktgallen neighborhood, others took on pastoral posts in Zurich parishes after being instructed by the reformer.

Because of careless words to the helper Jakob Baumgartner von Rapperswil, the City Council of Zurich called Abbot Felix Klauser to account, and on February 25, 1525 he was forced to resign from his office; At the end of April a decision was to be made about the abolition of the abbey. After Klauser's flight to Rapperswil, the City Council of Rapperswil reached a written agreement between Abbot Klauser, the Council of Rapperswil and the Council of Zurich, which resulted in a settlement for the abbot and the canons of the Rüti monastery. According to the agreement sealed on June 19, 1525, the abbot's house and goods of the Rüti monastery were given for life. In addition, Abbot Felix received the monastic silver harness, two horses from the stables and all his clothes, and an annual pension of 200 guilders. He was also allowed to keep three chalices, two missals, Levite coats, choir caps and other clericals. After his death, these items would return to the monastery (assuming the monastery would be restored).

With the abolition of the Rütner Abbey, the Zurich Council regulated the relationship with the convent in a contract dated June 17, 1525. The city of Zurich placed the monastery budget under secular administration and had the altars and remaining pictures removed from the church. Conventuals who did not take over pastoral positions were awarded a pension of 30 guilders in addition to food and the buildings in Rüti were left to them. When singing, reading and clothing , they should follow Zurich's instructions, that is, they were not allowed to read masses, wear frocks or tonsure. As already mentioned, some of the conventuals converted to the new faith: Ulrich Kramer, Sebastian Ramsberger and Wolfgang Ramsberger took over pastoral positions in Russikon, Gossau and Pfäffikon and died in the battle of Kappel. Ulrich Zingg, Lord of the Church of Dürnten, became a people priest at the Grossmünster. Wolfgang Huber, Sebastian Hegner (also Hegnauer) and Rudolf Gwerb Spänli stayed in Rüti; As already mentioned, all three aroused the displeasure of the reformer Bullinger because of their lifestyle.

When Abbot Felix Klauser died around 1530 and the legal disputes over the reinstatement of the abbey continued, the mother monastery chose his successor, as none of the conventuals who stayed in Rüti dared to accept the office of monastery head . The choice fell on Andreas Diener, chaplain in the city of Zug and former people priest of Aadorf; his appointment was canceled on April 5, 1530. During his flight to Rapperswil, Abbot Felix Klauser took the most important documents, seals, landlords, books, registers and Rödel to Rapperswil and handed them over to the Weissenau Abbey. The monastic administrative records (interest books, account books, land registers) from Klauser's reign were destroyed during the turmoil of the Reformation. In 1557, Weissenau had to hand over the monastery archives - following an arbitration decision by Aegidius Tschudis - to the Confederates in Baden, after which it went to the Zurich bailiff in Rüti. In 1557 Sebastian Hegner, the last remaining conventual in Rüti, received instructions from the Abbot of Weissenau to move to the Rapperswil house.

Chief

Abbot Gottfried (1390–1422) is named as the most important conventual of the monastery, who was particularly respected as a legal scholar. The abbots Markus Wyler and Felix Klauser made a contribution to the architectural and picturesque decor of the monastery church and the Toggenburg chapel by Hans Haggenberg.

Surname function Term of office Remarks
1. Ulrich Provost 1206-1221 Provost Ulrich died in 1221 on the journey home from Archbishop Eberhard von Regensberg during a stay in the Premonstratensian Monastery of Ursberg in the Swabian district of Günzburg. He was transferred to Rüti and buried there.
2. Luther Prior , Provost 1221-1224
3. Eberhard Canon , Provost 1224-1226
4th Berchtold Dept 1226-1237 The construction of the monastery wall is said to go back to Abbot Berchtold.
5. Ulrich II. Provost 1237-1257
6th Heinrich I. Dept 1259-1266
7th Wernher Prior, Dept. 1272 (?)
8th. Henry II Dept
9. Walther Dept 1279-1283
10. John I of Rheinfelden Dept 1286-1300
11. John II Dept 1300-1317
12. Hesso Dept 1319-1342
13. Henry III. from Schaffhausen Dept 1346-1379
14th Bilgeri (Peregrinus) from Wagenberg Dept 1379-1394
15th Gottfried (Götz) Schultheiss Dept 1394-1422
16. Albrecht (Albertus) Dept 1422-1426
17th John III Zingg Dept 1428-1446
18th John IV. Murer Dept 1446-1467
19th Ulrich Tennenberg Dept 1467-1477
20th Markus (Marx) Wiler Dept 1477-1502
21st Felix Klauser Dept 1503-1525 When Felix Klauser died around 1530 and the legal disputes over the reinstatement of the abbey continued, the mother monastery appointed Andreas Diener as his successor, but his appointment was revoked on April 5, 1530.

Monastery complex

Overview

Overview plan of Rüti monastery
Model of the abbey in the Rüti local museum
View from the rectory: in the foreground the buildings of the former Rüti monastery with today's reformed church , the Spitzer property and the office building.
To the right of the church, the ridge turrets of the Toggenburg chapel built by Elisabeth von Matsch in 1437/39 can be seen. Drawing by Konrad Meyer, view around 1650.
Entrance gate to Rüti monastery, sepia by Ludwig Schulthess, around 1840

After temporary wooden structures, the foundation stone for today's church was laid in 1214, and the church was consecrated by the bishop in 1219. Besides the construction of the Church were at the monastery buildings after temporary wooden buildings in the early years, been largely created from stone: chapter house , cells and living rooms, hospital rooms and related chapel Äbtewohnung, management and orderly room and Pfrundhaus , secondary and farm buildings. The whole complex was tied together by the cloister . The construction of the monastery wall is said to go back to Abbot Berchtold (1226–1237). In the abbey the hospital was occupied from 1282 and the beneficiary house from 1351.

The former monastery church - today's Reformed church of Rüti - the Spitzer property ( Marstall ) and today's rectory at Klosterhof-Platz (Amtshof) in the center of Rüti have been preserved. The main building, the interior of the church tower and parts of the nave as well as several of the remaining monastery buildings fell victim to a major fire on December 3, 1706 and made way for the new building of the main building in 1710. The Rüti office was canceled as early as 1833, the remaining monastery and farm buildings were sold and the majority of them demolished.

Monastery church

In 1214 the canons laid the foundation stone for a stone church; they first built the presbytery and two apses . The tower of today's Evangelical Reformed Church, together with the choir and the northern side chapel, forms the part of the former monastery church built in the years 1214 to 1219 and 1250 to 1283, although it was rebuilt in the late Middle Ages, but nonetheless original. The construction work on the church must have been largely completed when Pope Innocent IV granted an indulgence on the occasion of the church consecration in 1250 . Another letter of indulgence, which was supposed to "contribute to the promotion and maintenance of the precious building of St. Mary's Church ", suggests that the construction of the church was completed in 1283. The Toggenburg chapel was added to the monastery church around 1439/1442. The abbots Markus Wiler and Felix Klauser had the church and the monastery buildings completely renewed (the year 1499 on the church portal). At that time the church was a Romanesque, three-aisled complex of stately proportions. The baroque reconstruction of the church - only the choir with the side chapels and the tower remain of the former complex - after the fire of 1706 the late Romanesque choir took over, but its dimensions were modest. In 1770 the damaged nave of the church was shortened by 12 meters and partially replaced by a new building of the same width. In 1904, medieval frescoes were discovered in the choir area, which were restored in 1962/1963.

A total of eleven altars can be found in the Rüti church: the high altar in the choir was consecrated in 1219 in honor of Mary. The Episcopal Collection of the St. Gallen Monastery also includes the later main altar from the Rüti Monastery, which is attributed to Hans Leu the Elder , a Zurich carnation master, as a late work, although it does not have a carnation. The winged altar from 1503, a so-called triptych , is 89 cm wide and 87 cm high when closed with a frame, 162 cm wide when opened. During the Reformation, the altar came to the Wurmsbach Monastery , where it remained until 1798, after which it was brought to the episcopal residence in St. Gallen. The altar painting, which dates back to the late Gothic period, shows Saint Augustine in the open position (from left) and the Christ Child clad in a shirt at his feet, the crucifixion scene in the center and Saint Norbert, the founder of the Premonstratensian order, in the bishop's robe on the right. When closed, Christ is depicted on the left as Ecce homo with his right hand pointing to the side wound, on the top right God the Father as a half-length figure, on the right Maria, showing her son the breasts.

Toggenburg Chapel

In the summer of 1962, the municipality of Rüti had the area between the office building, the church and the former "Schütte" house paved. Before the construction work began, the cantonal preservation authorities examined the building site for possible medieval building remains. The investigation of the excavation area, which was limited to just under 500 m 2 , lasted from May 21 to June 5, 1962. “ The easily tangible remains, the floors, and especially the crowns of the ruins of the wall, averaged only 10 to 30 centimeters below the modern soil surface. The most obvious was a one meter wide wall foundation running south from the southwest corner to the church forecourt. It is placed directly on the Nagelfluhfels , which in this area is on average 1.50 to 1.80 meters below the current soil surface. The foundation showed a very coarse construction of smaller and larger, that is, very carelessly selected pebbles, which are in abundant mortar . »The area examined is likely to have been identical to the Toggenburg Chapel built by Elisabeth von Matsch in 1437/39 , the Peter and Paul altar of which was said to have been inaugurated on January 16, 1442. According to Sigrist and local historian Emil Wüst, this is said to have been connected to the north-west corner of the large three-part western building of the former monastery church, which was demolished in 1770. An attempt at reconstruction based on a plan from the time before 1770 in the Zurich State Archives seems to confirm this assumption. “ A layer of rubble between 40 and 80 centimeters thick as well as tile and ceramic fragments were also explored. The Swiss National Museum dated these throughout the 15th to 18th centuries. The remains of the wall between the south-west corner of the office building and the former north-west corner of the former vestibule wing II later served as the foundations for the surrounding wall and courtyard gate of the Rüti office that was visible on the beautiful engraving by David Herrliberger . These seem to have been removed after 1833 ».

hospital

The hospital, located on the Jakobsweg to Einsiedeln, was within the fence. It is mentioned in 1282 when Lütold VI. von Regensberg made a foundation in favor of the infirmeria , which should serve both the sick and the poor . A closet for clerics and laypeople in need is secured for 1328, and Werner von Batzenberg is an inmate of the beneficiary's house: in 1351 he bequeathed all of his movable property to the abbey, which he had in the chambers or within the walls of the convent building. In 1367, the Vogt von Rapperswil and his wife donated a year to the Rüti monastery to improve the nutrition and benefices of the sick in the infirmary . In 1411 the St. Jodokus and Bartholomäus chapel of the hospital maintained an eternal light in the courtyard of the monastery. In 1452 a married couple bought into the benefice house; They contractually stipulated their payments in terms of food, drink, accommodation and clothing. In the contract of June 17, 1525 with the city of Zurich, which sealed the dissolution of the monastery, the conventuals who remained in Rüti were given the " siechenhus, das si vor inghept hant " and " des Ranspergers besusung und gmach " as a hospital or sickroom.

Monastery cemetery

In the former “Hunggarten” monastery area, on September 24, 1971, during sewer work through the southern forecourt of the modern “monastery courtyard”, skeletal finds were made and two graves were uncovered; both skeletons were 80 centimeters deep. The Anthropological Institute of the University of Zurich characterized the two skeletons as follows: « Eastern grave: Well-preserved, almost complete skeleton ; apparently male; at least maturity; no anthropological peculiarities. Western grave: The following are preserved: calotte, lower jaw, remains of limb bones; apparently male; matur; no anthropological peculiarities. »The skeletons are kept in the Anthropological Institute of the University of Zurich. According to old drawings and written records, this place never served as a community cemetery, but rather the south and west sides of the church until 1864, and since 1864 the east side as well.

Amtshof (Spitzer property)

The so-called Spitzer property, which served the abbey as a stables and the Rüti office as an armory

The so-called Spitzer property (Amtshof 5/7/9/11) is located northwest of the Amtshaus and southwest of the rectory (Amtshof 12) and forms a loose row of houses with them. The row house was built in the course of the 16th century; the south-western part was the former stables , which was probably built in the very last monastery or the earliest time of the Rütiamt. The tract to the north-east could have been the armory of the Rüti Office and appears to have been built in two stages during the 17th century. On the occasion of a planned road construction, the property was added to the inventory of objects worthy of protection in the municipality of Rüti. After unsuccessful purchase negotiations with the municipality of Rüti, it was acquired by three private individuals and, with the support of the preservation department, restored in the summer of 1973, preserving the old facades. The restoration included the renovation of the solid walls of the ground floor and the gable facades , of the frame work, roof truss and wooden structures on the back. The roof was re-covered, and sandstone and wooden walls on the doors and windows were renewed. Since the federal government, canton and municipality made contributions, this terraced house has been a listed building since 1976 .

During the earthworks for the forecourt design, a fragment of a grave slab made of sandstone measuring 110 × 105 × 12 centimeters was discovered at the beginning of October 1974. It was last used as a floor slab in front of the entrance to Amtshof 5. The grave slab must have been removed when the former monastery church was partially demolished in 1770/71, like so many others, the inscription reads:

"Mrs. Anna Magdalena Steinbrüchel, Mr. Rittmeister Hans Rudolf Hirzels des regiment and bailiff all here married woman died on March 27th 1744 your age 39 year 7 month When I gave birth to my gentlemen to the joy - a beautiful child To him the greatest sorrow - life soon lost. My and eleven children are now God comfort and salvation Lord and six others - give all salvation. "

- Complete inscription on the tomb slab Amtshof 5

Emil Wüst, Sigrist and local chronicle, then placed the plate on the eastern outer wall of the former northern side chapel of the church.

Land ownership and sovereign rights

Feudal yards

The “Lähenhof” at Goldbachstrasse 3 in Rüti
«Hüllistein» on the main road to Rapperswil

The monastery owned extensive real estate in what is now eastern Switzerland and became very wealthy. In its heyday it had manors in 185 places, known in historical research as “Rütihöfe”. Connected properties were called farms , which were usually leased by the monastery. These fiefdoms comprised residential buildings and utility buildings plus land or mere estate fiefs without buildings. In this context, a fiefdom applies to an extended right of use to a third-party property, mostly a piece of land or a complex of land, but also certain rights of use and taxes. The owners are called feudal lords. After the abolition of the monastery, 38 hereditary and 36 handhouses were assigned to the Rüti office, namely in the municipality of Rüti:

  • Alt-Ferrachstrasse, with 117 Jucharten arable land, 15 Jucharten meadows and six Jucharten forest.
  • Goldbachstrasse, an eaves-standing double flat with a tattach roof and a farm building, was given to a farmer as a fiefdom for an annual interest rate consisting of natural produce (kernels, oats, carnival chickens). Another estate on Goldbachstrasse was the so-called "Lähenhof".
  • Hüllistein 4/5, a fiefdom mentioned as early as the 13th century with 83 Jucharten .
  • Matten, a timber frame house or courtyard that was donated to the monastery in 1331.
  • Neugutstrasse 2, the “Bundespalast” named Lehenhof once belonged to the Pfäfers Monastery and comprised 37 Jucharten.
  • Untermoos, as a gift from the Counts of Rapperswil in 1233 and a farm at today's Weinbergstrasse 42.

Other possessions of the monastery

The Rüti Monastery came into the possession of extensive estates through donations in the Zurich Oberland and far beyond:

  • Bassersdorf : In 1277 the monastery of Rüti sold the mill in Bassersdorf to the monastery of St. Blasien (Black Forest).
  • Dürnten : The collature came from Habsburg in 1359 to the Rüti monastery, to which the church was not incorporated until 1414, and in 1525 also went to Zurich. The parish originally also included Fägswil and Wolfhausen (ZH) .
  • Elsau and Räterschen, with a church in Elsau and a collection of farmhouses. The possessions of the nobility of the Counts of Nellenburg came to the Counts of Toggenburg through marriage. Count Donat von Toggenburg then donated these lands to the Rüti monastery in 1396 and 1398, and the church and mill of Räterschen were also mentioned.
  • Erlenbach (ZH) : The ground and ground interest of the Haus zum Anker (1331) went to the Einsiedeln monastery. In 1520 it was sold to the Rüti monastery, and when the monastery was abolished in 1525 it was also sold to the city of Zurich.
  • Eschenbach (SG) : From 1303 to 1536 Eschenbach had to pay a tithing to the Rüti monastery. The Counts of Toggenburg exercised sovereign rights until they died out in 1436. At that time, Konrad and Ulrich Morger were leaseholders of some tithe (Eschenbach, Schmerikon, Bollingen and Lütschbach) in relation to the Rüti monastery.
  • Eschlikon (ZH) : In 1399 the widow Elise Bolliger and her son Johann gave the Rüti monastery a meadow in Eschlikon, previously a fiefdom of Count Friedrich von Toggenburg.
  • Fehraltorf and Mönchaltorf : In the Middle Ages, the farmers of the community had to deliver their interest and tithes to the Rüti monastery. This remained so even after the Reformation and the abolition of the monastery in 1525. The duty existed not only for the people of Rüeggisaltorf (this name also appeared earlier in the documents), but also for Mönchaltorf am Greifensee. In 1469 the Fehraltorf church and its goods were donated to the Rüti monastery.
  • Fischenthal : In 1390 Heinrich von Tengen donated the church and church set to Fischenthal, in 1525 both came to the city of Zurich after the monastery was abolished.
  • Gossau (ZH) : The St. Gallen monastery donates the Marienkirche, the property of which was transferred to the Rüti monastery in 1414. The Rüti monastery was one of the most important landlords in Gossau in the Middle Ages. When the monastery took over the church property in 1414, it built a new one in Gothic style in place of the first church. After 1408 the monastery of Rüti retains the jurisdiction over Grüt, but where the city of Zurich has the right to claim taxes and benefits. Dominion rights in the Landvogtei Grüningen around 1470 include the goods acquired by the monastery up to this point in time.
  • Hinwil : After Christianization and the construction of the first church, it seems that in the 8th and 9th centuries a real gift of gifts broke out among the new converts, so that St. Gallen Monastery soon became the most powerful landowner in the community. Many of these goods were later handed over to the Rüti monastery and the Order of St. John in Bubikon, which remained of great influence in the community until the Reformation through their administrators, serfs and the tithe claims. Around 1280 the "Nobiles von Hinwil" handed over their goods to the Johanniterkommende Bubikon and, to a lesser extent, to the Rüti monastery , along with other goods, especially the Meierhof of the St. Johann im Thurtal monastery.
  • Hofstetten : In the 13th century the area of ​​Geretswil and Scheunberg.
  • Neubrunn (Turbenthal) : In 1362 two women bequeathed their estate " ze Nüwbrunnen, which the Bollinger buwet " to the Rüti monastery. In 1414 the Rüti monastery bequeathed, among other things, “ Our Gotzhus own farm is located in Nübrunnen, and everyone is listened to ” to the monastery of St. Gallen.
  • Rapperswil (SG) : In 1229, among others, " Cunradus Rufus de Mulinon, Rudolfus de Galgene " and Konrad the Red were named as witnesses in a document in which Rudolf (II.), Vogt of Rapperswil, awarded the Bollingen church to the Rüti monastery .
Sea trenches
  • Seegräben : Lütold von Regensberg donated the chapel to the Rüti monastery in 1209, along with other possessions, with the reservation of patronage and property rights. The donation included the Aathal mill, which was first mentioned in the 13th century when it was handed over to the monastery, meadows, forests, fields and fishing . In 1222, Bishop Heinrich von Konstanz renewed the advertised document of his predecessor Konrad II regarding the transfer of the Seegräben chapel to the Rüti monastery.
  • Uster : Large parts of Oberuster belonged to the Rüti monastery.
  • Uznach (Walde): In 1242 a farm " on the mountains, the Anganderiwalt " was sold by the brothers Diethelm IV and Kraft I. von Toggenburg to the Marienkirche Rüti for 63 marks (purchase value of 21 cows). Eight years later this property was named "Zangentonwalde" (for the budding forest) in a confirmation document from Pope Innocent IV . The “Angenenwalde” monastery estate lay at the foot of the Atzmännig Alp and stretches from Alp Aesch to Widen, without Widen, Oberricken and Laad. 1260 renewed confirmation of the sale of the farm by an arbitration award. The younger Toggenburgs Friedrich II and Wilhelm had to solemnly renounce the goods that had been sold to the Rüti monastery by their father or brothers. Among these goods was the one in Angenenwalde.
  • Wil (SG) : Dreibrunnen Marien's pilgrimage church and courtyard west of Wil, founded by the Counts of Toggenburg, donated it to the Rüti monastery in 1289. The church in Dreibrunnen (popularly known as the "Tübrunnen") is a venerable place of prayer. The Counts of Toggenburg as the owners of this area kept numerous servants on their farms and built a house of worship for them in 1272 and consecrated it under the title of Visitation of the Blessed Mother. The church had independent rights and was the parish church for the courtyards assigned to it. In 1330, the church, including all property and income, was given to the Rüti monastery with papal permission and, after the monastery was abolished in 1526, sold by Zurich to the hospital in Wil.
  • Winterthur : In 1225 the Bishop of Constance awarded the Rüti Monastery a property in Seen, which originally belonged to a Wetzel von Hegi.
  • Zollikerberg : Until 1218, the Zollikerberg area was under the control of the Zähringers , then the Barons of Regensberg and later the Rüti monastery. Until 1832 the respective miller had to deliver three and a quarter Mütt kernels, three chickens and fifty eggs to the Trichtenhauser mill as annual interest.
  • Zollikon : Letter of purchase from 1412 regarding the sale of meadows bordering the Zolliker community by the Rüti monastery to the " Dorflut in common zu Zollikon ".
  • Zurich : On December 16, 1345, “ Mayor Rudolf Brun, the council and the guild masters certified that knight Rüdiger Manesse and his brother Ulrich, sons of the knight Ulrich Manesse sel., Two farms in Niederleimbach, built by Claus von Leimbach and Heinrich Lüteltz are, with all rights, sold to Abbot Heinrich and the convent of Rüti for 136 marks and manufactured before the council, as is customary for citizens (with description of the tithing, wood and pasture justice). “These two farms, among others, were sold on July 17, 1375 for 225 guilders. A note from 1315 says that the Rüti monastery leased the farmstead next to its house in Zurich to the Pfister of the Canons, “in order to build a house on it that had to be covered with bricks (it should be fire-proof as it was used as a bakery got to). »

literature

  • Peter Niederhäuser, Raphael Sennhauser: Aristocratic burials and aristocratic memorials in the Rüti monastery. In: Art + Architecture in Switzerland. Vol. 54, No. 1, 2003.
  • Bernard Andenmatten and Brigitte Degler-Spengler (Red.): The Premonstratensians in Switzerland. In: Helvetia Sacra. IV / 3, Basel 2002, ISBN 3-7965-1218-6 .
  • Ulrich Leinsle: Analecta Praemonstatensia. Information about the former Rüti monastery, index volume Index generalis . Years 1968 to 1999, p. 273, Averbode 2002.
  • Ingrid Ehlers-Kisseler: The beginnings of the Premonstratensians in the Archdiocese of Cologne. (= Rheinisches Archiv. 137). Cologne / Weimar / Vienna / Böhlau 1997, ISBN 3-412-04197-1 .
  • Martin Illi: The Rüti monastery - a burial place of the east Swiss nobility. In: Antiquarian Society Pfäffikon (Hrsg.): An idea of ​​the ancestors . Archaeological journey of discovery to the Zurich Oberland. Wetzikon 1993, pp. 174-177.
  • Emil Wüst: Art in the Reformed Church Rüti ZH . Edited by Church Care Rüti, 1989.
  • Norbert Backmund: Monasticon Praemonstratense . Volume 1, Berlin 1983, pp. 72-74.
  • Heinrich Zeller-Werdmüller: The Premonstratensian Abbey Rüti. In: Communications from the Antiquarian Society . 24, Zurich 1897, pp. 181-230.
  • S. Vögelin: The Rüti monastery. In: Communications from the antiquarian society in Zurich. Volume XIV Issue 2, Zurich 1882.

Web links

Commons : Rüti Monastery  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ↑ For example, BE is the abbreviation for the Swiss canton of Bern and is used to avoid confusion with place names of the same name in other cantons.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ State Archives of the Canton of Zurich : three linear meters of documents for the Premonstratensian monastery in Rüti (see also Hinterrütiamt and Winterthur), running time approx. 1219 resp. 1400, 1384, 1459, 1465-1533, respectively. 1794, signature CH StAZ C II.12 .
  2. ↑ Schweizerisches Idiotikon Volume VI Sp. 1811ff.
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Bernard Andenmatten, Brigitte Degler-Spengler (Red.): The Premonstratensians in Switzerland. In: Helvetia Sacra. IV / 3, Basel 2002, ISBN 3-7965-1218-6 .
  4. ↑ Ernst Tremp: Crusades. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
  5. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Taken from the information boards on the occasion of the exhibition "Rütner Klosterschatz: After 484 years of 'exile' - for the first time 'home leave'", with a big thank you to Ms. Esther Müller, local museum and Chronicle of the community of Rüti.
  6. ^ History of the Dürnten community
  7. ↑ Einsiedeln monastery archives, Book of Professors abbots, 104. Hermann von Arbon
  8. ↑ Rüti Monastery , website of the Dürnten community, accessed on January 17, 2020
  9. ↑ Gift and return in the church records of the Zurich, Thurgau and St. Gallen document books from the beginning up to the year 1336.
  10. ↑ Holy prayers and devotions: Maria Dreibrunnen, Wil SG, prayer in front of the image of grace.
  11. ↑ Einsiedeln monastery archives, Book of professions abbots, 31. Rudolf III. by Sax
  12. ↑ Einsiedeln monastery archive: Summarium Amt S, Volume 1, p. 10 , accessed on December 27, 2009.
  13. ↑ a b c Zurich monument preservation: 3rd report 1962/3, p. 76 ff.
  14. ^ A b c d Emil Wüst: Art in the Reformed Church Rüti ZH . Edited by Church Care Rüti, 1989.
  15. ^ University of Bern, Historical Institute: The Reformation in Switzerland as a social movement. Group peasant uprisings WS 2003/2004.
  16. ↑ Contributions to the history of the Cistercian Abbey of Kappel am Albis, treatise on obtaining a doctorate from the Philosophical Faculty I of the University of Zurich, by Otto Paul Clavadetscher, Zurich 1946.
  17. ↑ a b u. a. NZZ Online (January 17, 2008): Abbot Klauser's legacy causes resentment , accessed on March 31, 2008.
  18. ↑ a b newspaper Südostschweiz (August 18, 2008): Rapperswilers have ripped off Zurichers: On the trail of the monastery treasure.
  19. ^ Abolition of the Rüti monastery . Speech by Rev. Ruedi Reich, President of the Church Council, September 30, 2007.
  20. ^ A b c Emil Wüst: The pastors of Rüti since the Reformation. A loose sequence from the chronicle. Reformed Church Rüti 1983.
  21. ^ Heinrich Bullinger: Life and Selected Writings. Based on handwritten and simultaneous sources by Carl Pestalozzi. Elberfeld Verlag by RL Friderichs, 1858.
  22. ^ Emil Wüst: The Rütner Church with its structural changes and its respective Sigristen and organists since the Reformation. Reformed Church Rüti 1984.
  23. ^ Rüti ZH (on Lake Zurich) , Premonstratensian website, Rüti ZH Abbey, accessed on March 31, 2008.
  24. ↑ Gerald Dörner: Church, clergy and ecclesiastical life in Zurich from the Brunsche Revolution (1336) to the Reformation (1523) . Königshausen & Neumann, Münster 1996, ISBN 3-8260-1192-9 .
  25. ^ Alfred Zangger: Rüti Monastery. In: Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz ., Accessed on December 29, 2009.
  26. ↑ Kdm. Canton of Zurich, Volume II, Basel 1943, pp. 209 and 213 ff.
  27. ↑ Zürcher Denkmalpflege, 3rd report 1962/3, p. 98 ff.
  28. ↑ a b c d Zurich Monument Preservation: 7th report 1970–1974, 2nd part, Zurich 1978.
  29. ↑ Grave slab Amtshof 5: Complete inscription after kindly communicated by Emil Wüst, Rüti, October 26, 1974.
  30. ↑ Ueli Müller: Dürnten. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
  31. ^ Website of the municipality of Elsau, accessed on March 31, 2008.
  32. ^ Website of the municipality of Erlenbach
  33. ^ Website of the municipality of Fehraltorf, accessed on March 31, 2008.
  34. ^ Website of the community of Gossau ZH , accessed on March 31, 2008.
  35. ^ Website of the municipality of Hinwil, accessed on March 31, 2008.
  36. ^ Website of the municipality of Hofstetten , accessed on March 31, 2008.
  37. ^ Doose & Bollinger families in Canada and their ancestors
  38. ^ History of the Tuggen Mill
  39. ↑ Laurenz Kilger : The parish of Walde . Wartmann II, Zurich 1866, pp. 66/247. Escher-Schweizer: Document book of the city and landscape, Zurich 1890 II, pp. 105/110 / 250ff.
  40. ↑ Cornel Dora: Three Wells. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
  41. ↑ Trichtenhauser Mühle website ( Memento of the original from September 17, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed March 31, 2008. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.trichti.ch
  42. ^ Archive guide of the Zurich parishes and parishes as well as the urban suburbs before 1798.
  43. ^ City of Zurich, City Archives


Coordinates: 47 ° 15 '33.2 "  N , 8 ° 50' 56.6"  E ; CH1903:  706748  /  235216