Belsener chapel
The Belsener Chapel is one of the oldest Romanesque choir tower churches in Baden-Württemberg. The chapel is in Belsen , a district of Mössingen in the Tübingen district in Baden-Württemberg . It is the parish church and preaching place of the Evangelical parish of Belsen in the church district of Tübingen .
history
The church in its present form was built before 1150 on the land that Lorsch had given to the Benedictine monastery of Hirsau . It is mentioned in the Codex Hirsaugiensis along with 16 other churches belonging to Hirsau Monastery. It is dedicated to Saints Maximinus and John. Excavations from the year 1899 by the then pastor Max Duncker in the interior of the church showed that the church was built on much older foundations. At that time it had probably replaced the Carolingian chapel which had been destroyed by fire and originated from the time of Christianization . The excavations commissioned by the Baden-Württemberg State Monuments Office in 1960 confirm the Duncker results. The foundations of this previous building are now generally accessible and can be viewed.
The original form of the church from 1150 was destroyed in the post-Romanesque period. The raised roof, tower and choir and the large windows are no longer original.
In 1824, in connection with the laying out of the cemetery, a sacristy and an exit were created in the north. When the organ was moved to its current location in 1873, a north window was installed in the choir. The sun hole in the original building is now only visible from the inside due to the addition of the sacristy.
This sun hole and the legendary reliefs on the west gable are always attractions for laypeople and archaeologists. The reliefs show cross, human, ram's head, pig's head and bull's head. There is still no convincing interpretation of the image content. The discussion refers, among other things, to connections to ancient symbolism and the established Celtic and Roman settlement epoch.
literature
- Ernst Adam: Architecture of the Staufer period - in Baden-Württemberg and Alsace. Bindlach 1990, ISBN 3-8112-0700-8 , p. 52.
- Wolfgang Sannwald: History trains . Between Schönbuch, Gäu and Alb: The Tübingen district. Gomaringen 1994, ISBN 3-926-969-25-3 , p. 126.
- Karl Schauber: Belsen and Bad Sebastiansweiler in old views , European Library, Zaltbommel 1982, ISBN 90-288-1858-8 .
- Stefan Wintermantel: The Belsener Chapel. An archaeoastronomical, iconographic and meteorological approximation , Mauser & Tröster, Mössingen 2014, ISBN 978-3-941500-16-7 .
Web links
- Website of the city of Mössingen about the chapel , accessed on November 10, 2010
- The Belsen Chapel on the Belsen website
- Website of the local parish , accessed on August 24, 2018
Coordinates: 48 ° 23 '46 " N , 9 ° 2' 45" E