Weissenfels District Court

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Courthouse

The Weißenfels District Court is a court of ordinary jurisdiction in Germany. It belongs to the district of the Halle Regional Court and the Naumburg Higher Regional Court and is one of three local courts (the others are the Naumburg Local Court and the Zeitz Local Court ) in the Burgenland district . The judicial district is the area of ​​the former Weißenfels district. The judicial district includes the communities of Goseck, Hohenmölsen, the city of Lützen, the city of Teuchern and the city of Weißenfels.

The seat of the court is Weißenfels . The address is Friedrichsstraße 18, 06667 Weißenfels.

The corner plot of Friedrichsstraße / Am Kloster is built on with the main building, which is parallel to Friedrichsstraße, and the prison with a guard's house behind it, which can be reached via Am Kloster. Before that, the district court was located in the so-called “escort house” in Grosse Burgstrasse.

History up to the new building

Before the new building in Friedrichsstrasse was erected, the “Royal District Court Weissenfels” was located in the house at Grosse Burgstrasse 22, the escort house, which was also known as the office building due to its use. In 1815 the Amtshaus passed from the property of the Kingdom of Saxony to the Kingdom of Prussia . The Prussian judicial treasury used it to house the city and regional court and later the district court commission. The building consisted of two parts, the main house, directly on Grosse Burgstrasse, and an extension above the main house built in 1878/1879 as part of the reforms of the Courts Constitution Act.

Land selection

The selection of the plot of land for the new construction of a court building and a prison was in the hands of the Privy Councilor of Justice, Fritzsch, who handled the matter in the Prussian Ministry of Justice. Three plots were under discussion for the new court building. After long negotiations with the city of Weißenfels, the decision was finally made in favor of the so-called seminar property on which the court building was then built. In the negotiations, the costs to be borne by the judiciary played a prominent role.

construction

Particular problems arose with the foundation . Soil investigations had shown that the building ground only consisted of stable materials such as sand and rock at a depth of 5 to 10 meters and therefore had the necessary strength. For this reason, after a thorough examination of several variants, the construction management decided to erect the foundations on 5 to 10 meter long reinforced concrete piles. 215 piles for the courthouse and 116 piles for the prison were made on site and driven into the ground. Despite the frost, this happened within just eleven weeks. The construction time (after completion of the pile foundation ) from the erection of the basement to the complete completion and installation was therefore only 17 months. The prison was completed on September 24, 1912, and the courthouse was inaugurated with a ceremony on December 11, 1912. This means that the planned construction time was significantly shortened; the work was originally planned to last until April 1, 1913. The construction costs amounted to 456,000 marks (estimated: 401,000 marks), of which 59,000 marks (estimated: 26,500 marks) went to the pile foundations of both buildings.

architecture

Entrance portal

The buildings were arranged in such a way that expansion with later additions was possible without any problems and is still possible today. The courthouse, designed based on a corps de logis , is in the Baroque Art Nouveau style typical of Prussian courthouses of this era . The building combines the state's need for representation with a functional and cost-conscious construction method.

The representative design focuses on the areas that are particularly in the public eye: the entrance portal, the main staircase and the jury's courtroom . The facade shows two figures above the main portal, depicting Justitia (justice) with sword and scales and Veritas (truth) with a mirror. The central inscription cartouche below the curved gable is crowned by an owl as a symbol of wisdom.

The middle window of the jury room above has a window opening resting on consoles , which surrounds a cartouche with an eagle and a crown. The middle window above the courtroom has a Medusa head as a keystone . At the same height, the protrusion of the main portal is bounded by two cartridges with heads. They contain a table of laws on the left and a bundle of lictors on the right . In the upper end of the main portal there are two further figures representing “strength” and “learning”: on the left a muscular man is shown tearing the throat of a monster, and on the right a seated woman reading a book.

There is another entrance to the left of the main portal, through which the public can enter the Schöffensaal. The audience is symbolically embodied by a listening boy with his index finger on his mouth above the entrance. Above it are two chatty parrots who represent those involved in the proceedings, while the lower end of the keystone is formed by two crawling snails. The building sculpture was made by the Merseburg sculptor Paul Juckoff , who is best known for the bronze sculpture of the shoemaker boy in Weißenfelser Stadtpark and the Art Nouveau fountain in front of the Marienapotheke in Beuditzstrasse.

Reliefs with the four human characters are placed between the windows of the second floor in the intermediate wing and in its continuation on the north risalit . Depicted are the choleric (with mouth open to scream and sinewy clenched fists), the melancholic (as an old man with the raven as a symbol of death), the sanguine (as cheerful nature with a lute in a vine arbor ) and the phlegmatic (dull-looking, up fists supported).

In the main staircase there are six windows with simple lead glazing, which are framed with a garland of oak leaves. Only the middle window stands out with the symbol of justice, a composition of sword and scales. Another window is reminiscent of the old courthouse, the escort house. There is another group of figures under the upper parapet of the stairwell pillars. It shows two boys on the right and left, holding a snake biting its tail and an hourglass, symbolizing aeternitas (eternity) and vanitas (transience). They frame a centrally placed Archangel Michael and the devil he slain in the form of a dragon. In addition, the twelve signs of the zodiac are attached to the arches and pillars of the stairwell . Together with Aeternitas and Vanitas, they stand for time in its rhythmic sequence.

In the Schöffensaal, the two heating panels are to be emphasized, which are designed as cat- or devil-like grimaces with wide open mouths showing the teeth. These awe-inspiring grimaces probably symbolize something like the jaws of hell and remind everyone involved in court proceedings to testify or judge to the best of their knowledge and belief.

Architects

use

Basically, the courthouse was always used as a district court. The following additional users were added at times: Public Prosecutor of the Weissenfels District (1952–1991), Weissenfels Notary's Office (1952–1990), Council of the Weissenfels District and the Youth Welfare Unit (1955–1990). In the course of the dissolution of smaller courts, the district courts from Lützen and Hohenmölsen (including Teuchern) were added.

jail

Right from the initial planning and the selection of the property, it was always assumed that a prison would be built next to the courthouse. Architecturally, it forms a unit with the main building. The mansard roof is particularly successful . The four-storey building is only 7.20 meters wide.

From its completion on September 24, 1912 until 1968, the building was used as a prison. After that, there were police storage rooms and a sauna in the building. Garages for police vehicles were built in the courtyards. Since 1994 it has been used again by the judiciary. Part of the building was converted into office space that was needed to accommodate the Hohenmölsen land registry .

Personalities

Hans Bogislav Graf von Schwerin , (* July 12, 1883 in Hanover, † August 27, 1967 in Bad Wörishofen), worked in 1908 as the royal Prussian government referendar at the Weißenfels district court.

See also

literature

  • Dehio-Handbuch der Deutschen Kunstdenkmäler, Saxony-Anhalt, Volume II: Dessau and Halle administrative districts. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich / Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-422-03065-4 , p. 463 f.
  • Heiner Lück: 20 years of courthouses in Saxony-Anhalt. Ministry of Justice Saxony-Anhalt, Magdeburg undated

Web links

Commons : District Court (Weißenfels)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 51 ° 12 ′ 0.3 ″  N , 11 ° 58 ′ 1.3 ″  E