Old city library
The old city library is a classical building in Frankfurt am Main . In World War II in the air raids on Frankfurt by aerial bombs destroyed, remained only the portico made. Reconstruction was only decided in 2003. The Old City Library has been used by the Frankfurt Literature House since 2005 .
history
The roots of the city library lie among other things in a "council library" mentioned in a document in the 15th century. In 1529, the council also took over its library when the barefoot monastery was closed . By 1690, the city library had expanded into a collection of objects from art, history and nature in the former monastery rooms. In 1786 the Barfüßerkirche was demolished in order to rebuild the Frankfurt Paulskirche on its site . The other monastery complexes, which housed those of the city library, the general alms box and the city high school , no longer met the requirements. A new library had to be built. However, plans for a “Bibliotheca publica” got stuck in the 1880s. It was not until 1814 that new plans began.
( steel engraving by Wilhelm Lang based on a model by Jakob Fürchtegott Dielmann )
Construction of the library
In 1816 the Free City of Frankfurt regained its independence. The library was the city's first major investment after the Napoleonic era . It was also intended to be a memorial for the restored Free “bourgeois city republic”. The two-storey building was built from 1820 to 1825 by city architect Johann Friedrich Christian Heß on the Schönen Aussicht , the high quay of the Main east of the Old Bridge . The gable, supported by six Corinthian columns, was originally supposed to bear the inscription Studiis libertati reddita civitas , but since it contained three errors in just four words, Arthur Schopenhauer called it "kitchen Latin". He therefore proposed a new inscription that was placed on the gable: Litteris Recuperata Libertate Civitas (“The city [dedicates this building] to the sciences after freedom has been regained”).
When the library was completed in 1825, the development of the Fischerfeld , a marshy floodplain that had been an enclave within the Frankfurt city walls for centuries , was completed. The Obermainanlage , which was built in 1806, begins at the city library . The Obermainbrücke (today Ignatz-Bubis-Brücke ), built between 1876 and 1878, connects the Old City Library with Sachsenhausen .
In 1891 the sculptor Friedrich Schierholz created the figures in the tympanum . The figures depicted Athena as the goddess of science and allegories of art and science. In the corners there were allegories for trade and industry, according to contemporary explanations, art and science would not be possible without these two. In 1893 Franz Krüger created portraits of Matthäus Merian and Achilles Augustus von Lersner on the wing structures . On an area of 900 square meters, the city library offered space for a collection of around 50,000 volumes, which were previously spread across various locations in the city. The library was also used as an archive and museum, it was laid out “exemplary” instead of “systematic” and was therefore already out of date in the first half of the 19th century.
Destruction and rebuilding
In March 1944, the city library was partially destroyed by bombs; the ruin was later torn down except for the portico . Although some of the valuable holdings were lost, the majority had been relocated in good time and in 1958 initially found a place in the Rothschild Palais on Untermainkai (now the Jewish Museum Frankfurt ) that had been preserved . In 1965 the city library was merged with the university library and moved into a new building at Bockenheimer Warte . Today the library bears the name University Library Johann Christian Senckenberg .
The remaining portico was structurally secured in 1958 and placed under monument protection as a memorial. In 1987, at the suggestion of the then Städel director Kasper König, the architects Marie-Theres Deutsch and Klaus Dreissigacker added an extension to the pillared vestibule . Under the name Portikus it made a name for itself as an exhibition hall for contemporary art.
In 2003 the decision was made to use the location for the new literature house. An architecture competition was announced, which the architect Christoph Mäckler won with the design of an external reconstruction of the old city library. The new building he built is trimmed around the two earlier side wings on the back compared to the original.
The construction was financed by a citizens' association and to a large extent by the Hertie Foundation . In October 2005 the new building was inaugurated, which is a faithful restoration of the old state from three sides, the rear has been shortened. The building houses the Literaturhaus Frankfurt and on the right ground floor a restaurant with a terrace and summer garden. A new exhibition hall with the dimensions of the previous building was built not far from the Old City Library on the Main Island at the Old Bridge. The name Portikus was retained for it, although this building has no portico .
literature
- Friedrich Clemens Ebrard (ed.): The city library in Frankfurt am Main. Knauer publishing house, Frankfurt / M. 1896.
- Bürgererverein Alte Stadtbibliothek eV (Hrsg.): Landmark Alte Stadtbibliothek Frankfurt am Main. Donated by citizens, rebuilt by citizens. Kramer Verlag, Frankfurt / M. 2004, ISBN 3-7829-0552-0 .
Web links
- The old city library. altfrankfurt.com
- Literaturhaus Frankfurt
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e Jürgen Steen: “Frankfurt looks great there…!” City and science in the 19th century . In: Research Frankfurt . Special Volume on the History of the University, No. 3 . Frankfurt am Main 2000, p. 16 .
- ↑ Thomas Regehly : Schopenhauer in Frankfurt. In: schopenhauer.de. Retrieved August 30, 2015 .
- ↑ [1]
Coordinates: 50 ° 6 ′ 34 ″ N , 8 ° 41 ′ 36 ″ E