Balthasar Nick

Three Kings Inn , early 18th century

Three Kings Inn, gate closure

Balthasar Nick (* 1678 , † 13. June 1749 in Dirmstein ), and Franz Balthasar Nigg was an architect of the Baroque and Rococo , in the region of the Bishopric of Worms (now Rheinhessen , Rhineland-Palatinate worked). His main work was done in Dirmstein, 15 km from Worms (today the Vorderpfalz ).

Origin and occupation

Balthasar Nick came from a family of Vorarlberg builders. These originally came as Walser from the Swiss canton of Valais and settled in the Tyrolean municipality of Fließ and in the upper Lech Valley ; other relatives also settled in the nearby Allgäu .

During his traveling years as a bricklayer , Nick came to Dirmstein before 1699, where he resided permanently and founded a construction company. In keeping with the customs of the time, he not only practiced his profession as a master bricklayer, but also worked as a site manager and architect . He received his building contracts in Dirmstein mainly from the Bishopric of Worms - the Prince-Bishop of Worms had his summer palace here - and the local nobility.

family

Nick was married to Anna Catharina König (* around 1680; † March 14, 1749) since around 1700. The couple had nine children who were born between 1701 and 1721.

The daughter Anna Christina Nick (* 19 April 1704; † April 2, 1748) married from the Imperial Abbey of Kempten dating Franz Rothermel (1690 / 91-1759), the bricklayer and carpenter was and how Nick also worked as an architect.

Another daughter, Marie Ursula Nick (* March 5, 1715; † May 23, 1793), was the wife of the master miller of the Lower Mill in Dirmstein , Philipp Johannes Plantz (* 1712; † March 27, 1754). He was a descendant of the Allgäu bricklayer and miller family Blanz / Plantz from Vorderhindelang and came to Dirmstein in 1733.

One of Balthasar Nick's grandsons, Johannes Nick, became mayor of Gerolsheim , the neighboring town of Dirmstein. In 1784 he was the opponent of the famous sculptor and architect Peter Anton von Verschaffelt . It was about repayment modalities after an investment of 1000 guilders. The process illustrates the remarkable connections between the Nick family of builders.

Significant works

Three Kings Inn, Dirmstein

Old town hall Lampertheim

The former Drei Könige inn , which Nick built as a voluminous plastered building with an elaborately furnished facade for his family in the first third of the 18th century, is on the corner of Metzgergasse 1 (address) and Obertor 2. The name of the restaurant only appears to refer to the ecclesiastical celebration of the Epiphany , popularly known as the Three Kings , but rather on both the maiden name of the wife Anna Catharina's king and the first name of the builder, Balthasar.

Lampertheim town hall, 1739

After the Lampertheim town hall burned down, invitations were sent in 1737 to well-known foremen and builders from Mannheim , Ladenburg , Weinheim , Lorsch , Dirmstein and Worms to participate in the tender for the construction of the new town hall. Together with his son-in-law Franz Rothermel, Nick received the order to plan and build the town hall. He suggested putting the new building on the old foundation that was still there. Franz Rothermel was able to report on May 3, 1739 that the masonry was in place and the woodwork was "ready to be opened". In November 1739 the new building received stoves and shutters. The building materials were mainly transported from Heidelberg by water .

Laurentiuskirche Dirmstein, 1742–46

Floor plan of the Laurentiuskirche Dirmstein

Laurentiuskirche Dirmstein

In a list of the “historical monuments of Dirmstein” it was added by hand in the 19th century that the builder of the Laurentius Church was Balthasar Nigg. His son-in-law, business partner and successor, Franz Rothermel, modified Balthasar Neumann's original design and is therefore commonly referred to as the builder.

Franz Georg von Schönborn , Prince-Bishop of Worms from 1732, commissioned Balthasar Neumann in 1740 to plan a new church for his summer residence in Dirmstein. It is likely that the collaboration between Balthasar Neumann and Balthasar Nicks goes back to an old Vorarlberg connection. The Böhme Neumann was in fact from 1716 employees of Joseph Greissing , the Würzburg city master carpenter and important Baroque architect Lower Franconia; Greissing came from Hohenweiler in Vorarlberg and joined the Würzburg city carpenter Adam Nick as a foreman in 1690 . A family relationship between Adam and Balthasar Nick is possible given the same family name, but has not yet been proven. After Greissing's death Neumann took over his office in Würzburg in 1721.

literature

• Othmar Aschauer: Tyrolean hiking builders from Ausserfern in the 17th – 19th centuries. Century . Dissertation. In: Westphalian Research - Journal of the Westphalian Institute for Regional History of the Regional Association of Westphalia-Lippe . tape 20 (1967) . Innsbruck 1962, p. 151-163 .
• Catholic church book Dirmstein . Diocese archive of Speyer (1652–1709).
• Catholic church book Dirmstein . Landesarchiv Speyer (1710–1793).
• Michael Martin (ed.): Dirmstein - nobility, farmers and citizens . Chronicle of the Dirmstein community. Foundation for the Promotion of Palatine Historical Research , Neustadt an der Weinstrasse 2005, ISBN 3-9808304-6-2 .
• Hubert Simon: 250 years old town hall Lampertheim . City Council of Lampertheim, Lampertheim 1989.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Othmar Aschauer: Tyrolean hiking builders from Ausserfern in the 17th – 19th centuries. Century . Dissertation. Innsbruck 1962.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d} Plantz. Ancestors List - Person List Report. Plantz family, accessed June 1, 2015 . 
3. ↑ Dirmstein Catholic Church Book . Landesarchiv Speyer (1710–1793; place of origin of sister Sabina Rothermel when she married Georg Egger in 1723 in Großniedesheim : Hochstift Kempten).
4. ^ Eberhard Ref: Directory of the Palatinate millers and their families. April 13, 2014, accessed May 31, 2015 . 
5. ^ Wolfgang Heiss: Gerolsheim am Palmberg . Local history. tape 1 . Gerolsheim 2002.
6. ↑ ^{a b} Hubert Simon: 250 years old town hall Lampertheim . 1989, p. 21-26 .
7. ^ Franz Rothermel: Floor plan from 1741/42 . Original in the central archive of the Evangelical Church of the Palatinate . Speyer, Dept. 170, No. 698.
8. ^ Berthold Schnabel: Contributions to church history . In: Michael Martin (ed.): Dirmstein - nobility, farmers and citizens . Chronicle of the Dirmstein community. Self-published by the Foundation for the Promotion of Palatinate Historical Research , Neustadt an der Weinstrasse 2005, ISBN 3-9808304-6-2 , p. 227-299 .
9. ↑ St. Peter - with a baroque facade by Joseph Greising. wuerzburg.de, accessed on May 31, 2015 . 
10. ↑ Hans Reuther:  Greising, Joseph. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 7, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1966, ISBN 3-428-00188-5 , p. 40 f. ( Digitized version ).