Smołdzino village church

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The village church in Smołdzino ( Schmolsin ) in 2003

The village church in Smołdzino (German Schmolsin ) dates from the 17th century and is considered to be one of the richest village churches in Western Pomerania .

Geographical location

Smołdzino located in the northwest of the Polish Pomeranian Province , 30 kilometers northeast of Slupsk ( Stolp ) between the Lake Gardno ( Garder See ) and the Jezioro Łebsko ( Leba Lake ), and is on the provincial road 213 of Slupsk over Żelkowo ( Wendisch Silkow , 1938 –45: Schwerinshöhe ) in the Choćmirowo junction ( Alt Gutzmerow ). A rail connection, as it used to be through the Stolper Bahnen , has not existed since 1945.

The building and its history

In the pre-Reformation period, a chapel was built on the Revekol near Schmolsin, which was consecrated to St. Nicholas . Like the chapels on the Holy Mountain near Pollnow (today Polanów) and the Gollenberg (Góra Chełmska) near Köslin (Koszalin), it became important as a place of pilgrimage and was destroyed after the Reformation in 1530.

As atonement for this destruction, the owner of the Schmolsiner estates, district administrator and captain of Lębork (Lębork) Schwantes von Tessen, had a new chapel built on the site of the later parish cattle sheds, which was inaugurated at Pentecost in 1582. The dedication sermon has been handed down. It contains a dedication as a quote, which takes up the missing short dedication inscription of the Torgau Castle Chapel from 1544.

Duchess Anna von Croy (1590–1660), the widowed sister of Bogislaw XIV. , The last Duke of Pomerania, to whom Schmolsin's goods passed around 1600, had a new church built in place of the chapel, which on October 16, 1632 her Provision was passed. The construction of a tower, prevented by the Thirty Years War , was not carried out later, although the Duchess and later her son Duke Ernst Bogislaw von Croy (1620–1684) had provided money for it. Copper plates that were already ready were used for the construction of distillery vessels.

In 1828 the church was enlarged by widening it to the west. In 1874 two transverse wings were added so that the shape of a cruciform church was created. A modest tower has now also been built.

The Schmolsiner Church was a Protestant church for over three hundred years until 1945. After 1945, it was expropriated in favor of the Catholic Church in Poland , which rededicated it and gave it the name Kościół Trójce Świętej ( Trinity Church ).

Interior

The dignified, stately and richly decorated interior of the church was made entirely according to the wishes of the founder. The colorful coffered wooden ceiling with paintings of biblical content is impressive. Duchess Anna had 150 pictures made for the church by the Stolper painter Foxkirch , of which only 49 have been preserved in the ceiling panels - just as the entire facility has suffered from the structural changes over time.

The altar from 1630 is a rich, architecturally determined work with larger and smaller columns. It is a passion altar , in the predella the Last Supper , in the middle field a more recent image of the Man of Sorrows , on the upper floor a depiction of the crucifixion . In the two richly decorated cheeks of the altar there are portrait heads of Duchess Anna and her son Ernst Bogislaw, the last male member of the Griffin family.

The pulpit is carried by an excellent Moses figure . The fields are decorated with images like Peter with the crowing rooster.

Baptism is particularly richly decorated with figures and ornaments , the high lid of which is crowned with the figure of Christ and the children, one of whom he is holding in his arms. In September 1729 Johann Georg Lindner , son of the local pastor , was baptized in Königsberg (Prussia) as a professor from 1765 , and court preacher there from 1772 in the Schmolsiner church .

Of particular historical interest was the life-size picture of the first pastor of the Schmolsiner Church, Michael Pontanus , who was born in Stolp in 1578 and which is now on display in the Central Pomeranian Museum in Stolp. He is shown with a gray head and a long white beard, his right hand over a book with Syriac, Greek and Hebrew script, the left on Luther's catechism . During his time in Schmolsin, Pontanus published the catechism of Martin Luther as well as the penitential psalms of David and the story of the Passion in Kashubian . In doing so, he created an important work of literature for Protestant Kashubians. Incidentally, Kashubian preaching continued in the Schmolsiner Church until 1832.

The oil painting also shows the interior of the original church, built in 1632, with a coffered ceiling, pointed arch, baroque altar and pulpit. In addition, the Revekol and in front of him the castle of Duchess Anna are shown, of which there is no other representation.

Parish

Information board in front of the church

Until 1945 Schmolsin was a Protestant parish within the church district of Stolp -Altstadt in the eastern district of the church province of Pomerania of the Church of the Old Prussian Union . In 1940 there were 4625 parishioners who lived in the parish villages of Holzkathen (today in Polish: Smołdziński Las), Klucken (Kluki), Schlochow (Człuchy), Selesen (Żelazo), Vietkow (Witkowo), Virchenzin (Wierzchocino), and of course Zietzen (Siecie Schmolsin lived. It was not until 1610 that Schmolsin became its own parish, after having previously been looked after by the Groß Garde (Gardna Wielka).

After 1945 the Catholic Church in Smołdzino established its own parish, which belongs to the Deanery Główczyce ( Glowitz ) in the diocese of Pelplin ( Archdiocese of Danzig ).

Pastor 1632-1945

  1. Michael Pontanus (Latinized), German: Brüggemann , Polonized Mostnik 1610–1654 (was court chaplain at Schmolsin Castle from 1600)
  2. Thomas Pontanus (son of 1.), 1654–?
  3. Johann Matthias Sporgius, 1697–1719
  4. Georg Friedrich Lindner, 1720–1733
  5. Ulrich Engellandt, 1734–1782
  6. Albert Friderici, 1782-1810
  7. Samuel Thomasius, 1810-1816
  8. Heinrich August Kypke, 1817–1831
  9. Heinrich Ferdinand Edelbüttel, 1832–1865
  10. Gustav August Wilhelm Electoral Staff, 1865–1869
  11. Eduard Karl Ludwig Neumeister, 1870–1900
  12. Friedrich Bartelt, 1901–1932
  13. Fritz Sander, 1933–1937
  14. Ernst Fürstenberg, 1938–1945

literature

  • Johannes Hinz: Pomerania. Signpost through an unforgettable country . Bechtermünz, Augsburg 1996, ISBN 3-86047-181-3 .
  • Hans Moderow , Ernst Müller: The evangelical clergy of Pomerania from the Reformation to the present. Edited due to the Steinbrück'schen Ms. . Part 2: Ernst Müller: The administrative district of Köslin . Sannier, Stettin 1912.
  • Karl-Heinz Pagel: The district of Stolp in Pomerania. Evidence of his German past . Home districts of the city of Stolp and the district of Stolp, Bonn 1989.
  • Heinrich Schulz: Pomeranian village churches east of the Oder. A book d. Memories . Beck, Herfort 1963.

Coordinates: 54 ° 39 ′ 43.4 "  N , 17 ° 12 ′ 55.2"  E

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Marcin Wisłocki: Porta Coeli. To understand Lutheran churches and their furnishings in the light of the writings of Pomeranian clergymen from the 16th to 17th centuries. Century ; in: Jan Harasimowicz (Hrsg.): Protestant church building of the early modern times in Europe. Basics and new research concepts ; Regensburg 2015, pp. 49–58 [52]
  2. ↑ Ludwig Böttger: The architectural and art monuments of the province of Pomerania .T, 3, vol. 2, no. 4, district of Stolp; Stettin 1894, p. 25 - available as PDF on [1]