Bantzkow's Atonement Chapel

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Bantzkow Suehnekapelle.jpg

The Bantzkowsche Atonement Chapel (also: Bantschowen-Kapell ) was a former brick Gothic church building in the Hanseatic city of Wismar , which had to be built by the citizens and the city council as atonement for an unjustly executed and executed death sentence .

After the Battle of Copenhagen (1427) during the Danish-Hanseatic War (1426–1435) , which was extremely unfavorable for the Wendish cities of the Hanseatic League, unrest broke out in the Hanseatic cities on the southern Baltic coast. Wismar had already from 1410 to 1416 a new council formed by the craft offices under the leading wool weaver and mayor Claus Jesup disempowered the previous patriciate and expelled the old council . After the defeat of the fleet under the representatives of the patriciate, who came back to power in 1416, Jesup carried out the execution of the mayors Johann Bantzkow and Hinrik van Haren , who were held responsible for the defeat by the leaders of the craft offices. Bantzkow and van Haren were sentenced to death and executed in the market square . After the representatives of the old council had been permanently eliminated, a new council under Jesup was appointed as the new mayor.

The family of the former mayor Bantzkow turned to Emperor Sigismund and obtained his energetic intervention against the New Council , which was deposed in 1430. As compensation for the execution of the two mayors without a legal basis, the city not only had to erect a memorial stone to both of them on the place of execution on the market square, but also a chapel in the churchyard northwest of St. Mary's Church . The rectangular chapel with a hipped roof over two square vaults was completed on March 1, 1433 and was consecrated to St. Mary, St. Elisabeth, St. Benedict and All Saints .

Around 1850 it was a thorn in the side of a wealthy neighbor and a dispute broke out about the cost of an upcoming repair. The demolition advocates prevailed in the inner-city discussion. Since the chapel was demolished without the permission of the church leadership, the Grand Duke Friedrich Franz II of Mecklenburg-Schwerin expressed his "greatest displeasure".

literature

  • Friedrich Schlie : The art and history monuments of the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. Volume II: The district court districts of Wismar, Grevesmühlen, Rehna, Gadebusch and Schwerin. Schwerin 1898, reprint Schwerin 1992, p. 170ff. ISBN 3-910179-06-1