Choir tower

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Choir tower of the town church in Balingen . The polygonal end of the choir is consistently carried over to the entire height of the tower

A choir tower is a steeple built above the choir ( chancel ) of a church , which often also serves as a bell tower . Churches with such a choir tower are called choir tower churches . This type of building originated in the Romanesque period and was widespread in the Middle Ages for smaller churches in rural areas in Central Hesse , Thuringia , Saxony, central and southern Germany, Alsace , Austria and Scandinavia. In some areas this form persisted beyond the end of the Middle Ages.

to form

In 1947, the art historian Joseph Hoster recognized an ambiguity in the literature describing this design and developed a typology of the three most common forms. These should not be confused with crossing towers .

The three forms are according to Hoster:

Choir tower: The choir is located in the basement of the tower. The choir closes in the east with the tower wall and does not protrude over this with an apse .

Chorjochturm: The tower is located above the choir bay of the church, to which an apse is attached.

Choir connection tower : The tower connects directly behind the choir. This shape is also known as the east tower. To observe z. B. at the Jesuit Church of St. Mary's Assumption in Cologne .

Focus of dissemination

In Erich Bachmann's work Art Landscapes in Romanesque Small Church Buildings in Germany there are detailed descriptions of the distribution and, above all, an informative distribution map on which clearly limited focal points catch the eye: Central Hesse (e.g. Lahn-Dill district , list of churches in the district of Marburg- Biedenkopf and list of listed churches in the district of Gießen ), Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt and Saxony; west of the Rhine in the northern corner between Rhine and Moselle and the area between Main and Danube. East of the Elbe there are almost no medieval choir tower churches , exceptions are the village church Grünow in the Uckermark and the village church Hohenseeden near Genthin in Saxony-Anhalt.

According to studies by Wolfgang Müller, there were 84 choir tower churches in the Ortenau with a brick tower. Most of the choir tower churches have disappeared since the 18th century, as new buildings replaced the old churches. The most beautiful examples of choir tower churches in Ortenau are, besides the church of Wittelbach, the churches in Burgheim , Alt freistett and Hausgereut near Rheinbischofsheim . The choir tower was also very common in Alsace, as far as it belonged to the diocese of Strasbourg . This leads to the conclusion that within the diocese of Strasbourg, the same building habits prevailed on both the left and right of the Rhine.

Another area of ​​distribution is the area south of Munich with churches and the like. a. in Unterhaching , Taufkirchen , Großdingharting and Hanfeld .

Examples of choir tower churches

Elevation and floor plan of the choir tower of St. Laurentius (Oberdollendorf)

Web links

literature

Overview:

  • Erich Bachmann: Artistic landscapes in the Romanesque small church building in Germany. In: Journal of the German Association for Art Research, Vol. 8, 1941, pp. 159–172.
  • Erich Bachmann: Choir tower. In: Real Lexicon on German Art History . Volume 3, Stuttgart 1953, Sp. 567-573 online

Individual landscapes:

  • Ulrich Coenen: About the choir's measure and justice. In: The Ortenau. 1999, pp. 373-411.
  • Manfred Eimer: The choir tower church in Württemberg. In: Württemberg quarterly for regional history. NF Volume 41, Issues 3 and 4, Stuttgart 1935, pp. 254-266.
  • Joseph Hoster: Choir towers in the Rhineland . In: Colonia Sacra 1 (1947), pp. 100-162. Also printed in: Festgabe für Wilhelm Neuss on the completion of his 65th year of life , Cologne 1947.
  • Wolfgang Müller: Chorturmkirchen in Breisgau. In: Schauinsland. Journal of the Breisgau history association “Schau-ins-Land”. 81 (1963), pp. 42-55 ( online )
  • Wolfgang Müller: Palatine choir tower churches. In: Sheets for Palatine church history and religious folklore. 34, 1967.
  • Wolfgang Müller: The Ortenau as a choir tower landscape: a contribution to the history of the older village churches. Konkordia publishing house, Bühl / Baden 1965. (Publication of the Alemannic Institute 18).
  • Manfred Eimer: The Romanesque choir tower church in southern and central Germany. Tübinger Chronik Verlag, Tübingen 1935.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Joseph Hoster: Choir Towers.
  2. ↑ a b choir tower. In: The great art dictionary. on: beyars.com