Balzer Lord God
The Balzer Herrgott - also known as Winkelherrgott - is a stone figure of Christ grown into a willow beech in the central Black Forest in Baden-Württemberg . It stands in a forest area between the Hexenlochmühle and the hamlet of Wildgutach, east of the upper reaches of the Wild Gutach in the Gütenbach district . Tree and figure are the destination of many hikers and walkers and some are considered a place of pilgrimage . The origin of the connection and the origin of the statue have not yet been fully clarified.
phenomenon
The figure of Christ that has grown into a beech tree probably comes from the late Gothic period, but even the details of the original crucifix vary greatly. Some say that the cross is made of iron , others that it is made of wood , and third, like the figure of Christ itself, it was made of stone . The first version is supported by the depiction of Fritz Hockenjos, the then head of the neighboring Sankt Märgen forestry office, who mentioned in 1960 in his forest stories about the Balzer Herrgott, among other things, that it was less than thirty years ago that the iron arms of the cross were still made of wood stood out , which the forester von Furtwangen had cut off. In addition, the head of Christ would have previously worn a corona made of sheet metal above the crown of thorns . This could be indicated by the three small, square indentations that are carved on both sides and on the crown. The body was probably made from sand-lime brick in a stone carving workshop in Pfaffenweiler (near Freiburg im Breisgau ) . It is believed that there is an iron cross inside, which was used to fix it in its original location.
Attachment theories
Many sagas and legends entwine around the figure and the explanations for its transfer to the current location are often contradicting. One thesis says that Huguenots left him on the steep slope while fleeing France . According to another, the French were royalists who fled France during the French Revolution . However, a peasant woman from the area said that he came from a monastery and was hidden in the forest on the spot during wartime . A fourth version comes from a source that cannot be clarified, according to which the figure was created around 1800 on the basis of a vow by a farmer named Balzer from Glashütte (in Hexenlochtal) that this farmer later emigrated to America.
The state of the figure is the subject of various contradicting explanations: The fact that it is missing arms and legs is due to a hunter having shot the extremities out of anger over lost prey. According to another variant, grazing cattle have ceded arms and legs to the body lying on the ground.
More likely, however, is the oral tradition, which goes back to statements made by Pius Kern from Wildgutach (1859–1940) in the 1930s, and which was passed on by Oskar Fahrländer in 1993: According to this, the Balzer Herrgott comes from the court cross of the royal court in the Wagner valley . This courtyard was destroyed by an avalanche on February 24, 1844 (one reads in places - incorrectly - also the year 1700) , whereby the arms and legs of the Christ figure must have broken off. According to tradition, young boys carried the torso secretly into the forest to today's location, where it initially lay for a while near the still young beech tree on the forest floor. At the turn of the century, two apprentices from Gütenbach attached it to the tree.
Overflow and care
The age of the beech can only be estimated; the figures vary between 200 and 300 years. The torso is said to have been attached to the tree between 1870 and 1880. The change in condition can be traced on the basis of historical photos: in 1927 the figure was still free from the loins, by 1955 these were already overgrown. Since 1975 it has been overgrown under the breast. In 1986 only the bowed head and part of the chest could be seen. In November 1986 the carver Josef Rombach from Gütenbach exposed his head and chest for the first time. Two tree specialists from the island of Mainau sealed the exposed wood against fungus and moisture and created an artificial bark. In 1995 the tree's growth had to be slowed again. The surrounding wall was so advanced that it was feared that the head would be blown off. That year a groove was carved in the wall to prevent it from growing. Since then, the head has been surrounded by an almost heart-shaped callus . This walling and the effects of the weather, especially water running off the trunk of the beech in the area behind the figure's head, nevertheless caused further damage. The community of Gütenbach therefore initiated further renovation measures in coordination with the district's monument protection authority and the local forestry office. These came to an end in 2014. The area immediately around the remaining sculpture was again cut free by a tree expert. This expert also removed dead wood and endangered branches that were rubbing against each other from the treetop. To protect the trunk, a picket fence was erected directly in front of it to prevent visitors from accidentally causing damage by touching the figure or clamping personal items. The root area was marked and delimited in a wide circle with boulders, so that heavy forestry equipment cannot cause any strain on the root system. The area between the beech tree and the circle of boulders was also covered with mulch to reduce the stress caused by entering groups of visitors. An inconspicuous small tin roof in an angular shape was attached to the tree trunk above the Herrgotts figure in order to divert the rainwater. For this purpose, a natural tree fungus was attached directly above the Christ head. A local stonemason has also expertly prepared the remaining figure so that further damage from incoming (and freezing) rainwater is avoided as far as possible.
The following views are from the display next to the figure of Christ:
1930 visible torso
1960 ingrown part of the torso
1986 before cutting free
1986 after cutting free
Dating
It is surprising that the Christ figure was surrounded so quickly and so strongly. One possible answer to this is the particular growth habit of the willow beech :
Willow beeches arise when the shoots of young beeches are repeatedly eaten by grazing animals (e.g. cows and goats) as well as wild animals (especially roe deer and deer). As a result, such beeches develop new shoots again and again and grow more bush-shaped in width than in height. That is why they are also called “cow bush”. Only when the diameter of such a bush is so large that the animals can no longer reach its center can some shoots grow upwards undisturbed. This is how the characteristic shape of the cow bushes is created. As soon as several shoots have grown up at the same time, they form stems. Initially, these sub-stems grow relatively separately. Only when the tree is around 100 years old do the sub-trunks grow together into a single, powerful trunk. This coalescence can create cavities that are often used by cave breeders . Therefore, the willow beeches are often hollow between 200 and 300 years old.
Schwabe & Kratochwil (1987) applied this knowledge to the beech of the Balzer Herrgott and, despite the mighty trunk, could still count ten individual trunks in the 1980s. Based on their investigation, it can be assumed that the tree was approximately 100 years old when the Christ figure was attached to it. At that time it still consisted of several ungrown sub-trunks. Even today you can easily see that the figure is located exactly between two former tribes. The iron skeleton, to which the stone torso was believed to be attached, was probably wedged between these two sub-trunks. The overburdening of the figure took place when the cow bush stage was complete and the willow beech began to grow, especially between the sub-trunks.
Name declarations
The designation "Balzer Herrgott" - the figure is also referred to by the ancients as "Winkelherrgott" - very probably refers to the owner of the farm at that time from which the figure of Christ comes: "Balzer ( Balthasar ) Winkel".
The name “Balzer Herrgott” is popularly used and is often associated with capercaillie , which would have had their courtship area at this point . But this is undoubtedly a folk etymology or a linguistic interpretation. In his self-published volume “Schneeglöckli us em Schwarzwald” in 1914, for example, the Gütenbach dialect writer Bertin Nitz translated the term “Balzer” as “capercaillie” in a footnote to his poem “s'Falligrunder Hüsli”.
Web links
- Tree wonder
- Community of Gütenbach
- Gütenbach Village Museum
- haus-ruf.de: Hiking in St. Märgen 6. Hiking suggestion . Archived from the original on February 27, 2005 ; Retrieved August 11, 2013 .
literature
- Karl Fehrenbach: History of St. Märgens - St. Märgener G'schicht'n: local history - a colorful mix. St. Märgen: Self-published (= series of publications by the Black Forest Association Sankt Märgen; 1), 1988
- Angelika Schwabe , Anselm Kratochwil : Willow beech in the Black Forest and its development through browsing by forest cattle. Spread, history, etc. Ways of rejuvenation. State Institute for Environmental Protection Baden-Württemberg, Institute for Ecology and Nature Conservation, Karlsruhe, supplements to the publications for nature conservation and landscape management in Baden-Württemberg, issue 49, 1987, ISBN 3-88251-121-4 .
Coordinates: 48 ° 1 ′ 14 ″ N , 8 ° 7 ′ 59 ″ E