Elisenbrunnen
The Elisenbrunnen in Aachen is a classical building by the architects Johann Peter Cremer and Karl Friedrich Schinkel . The construction work was the responsibility of the private builder Andreas Hansen from Aachen . The building was named after the Prussian Crown Princess Elisabeth Ludovika of Bavaria (Elise), the daughter of the Bavarian King Maximilian I , wife of the later Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm IV. Her bust was made in 1828 from Carrara marble by Christian Friedrich Tieck and in 1832 in the rotunda set up.
The Elisenbrunnen today consists of an open foyer with a Doric column porch and a pavilion on the left and right with several rooms. The warm water of the Kaiserquelle (52 ° C) flows from two drinking fountains and is conducted via a pipe from the Büchel to the fountain. The water contains a lot of sulfur , so that the Elisenbrunnen always emits a characteristic odor of rotten eggs ( hydrogen sulfide ).
history
Establishment
Due to its numerous thermal springs , Aachen has long been a bathing and health resort . The Romans already used the hot springs to operate thermal baths . At the end of the 17th century, Aachen became a “fashion bath” that was visited by crowned heads and other celebrities .
In 1819 the Aachen city council decided to build a fountain hall. With the new drinking fountain , a representative building was to be built, in which the thermal water of the " Kaiserquelle " 180 m away, which is valued as medicinal water , could be given to spa guests . The wooden ditch was intended as the original location of the well system. However, due to the better morphological position (even slope from the Kaiserquelle), the decision was made to locate it on Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz. The foundation stone of the fountain was laid on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the throne of the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm III. on November 16, 1822. In 1823, Karl Friedrich Schinkel revised the original construction plans by Cremer. Construction work on the new drinking fountain could only start after the Prussian government had granted the building permit in 1824. The rear part of the Elisenbrunnen was built on the remains of the medieval city wall ("Barbarossamauer"). However, further construction had to be stopped in 1825 due to financial constraints in the city. In order to guarantee the financing, the city council demanded the introduction of an indirect tax on animal feed, wine and building materials, but this was rejected by the Prussian government. The Elisenbrunnen was opened on May 2, 1827, but the official inauguration did not take place until 1828. The thermal water was poured out in the basement of the rotunda, to which 20 steps led down two arched stairs from left and right.
The architecture of the (as a whole) 266 feet (with an estimated 30 cm / foot converted: 79.8 m) long drinking fountain consisted of a central rotunda with a diameter of 56 feet, an inner height of 36 feet and an outer one of 46 feet ( the equivalent of approx. 13.8 m), two side colonnades as a promenade of 90 feet each and adjoining wing structures. The left wing, 40 feet long and 28 feet wide, was tiled with marble. The right one consisted of a music room, a snack room and an attached kitchen.
The well overseer lived right next to the rotunda. The main entrance of the underground channel to the Kaiserquelle was in his apartment. The length of the lead pipe line was 680 feet (approx. 204 m). The 46 ° C hot "Kaiserquellwasser" lost 2.5 Kelvin on this route. A gilded pine cone crowned the tent roof of the rotunda. The entire complex was covered with zinc sheet .
The marble plaques in the hall, which were installed during the first major reconstruction in 1883, commemorate the celebrities who drank the water from the Kaiserquelle as spa guests . These include Peter the Great , Frederick the Great , Giacomo Casanova and Georg Friedrich Handel . In the course of the reconstruction, the marble bust of Elise was replaced by a copy and the original was placed in the care of the Suermondt Museum .
The office of the Aachener Verkehrsverein, founded in 1902, had been set up in the right pavilion of the building, while the left part housed a restaurant and temporarily a fountain tavern. The tasting of the thermal water was originally chargeable. In 1938 the lower drinking room was closed and the fountain moved a few meters higher.
Destruction in World War II and reconstruction
During the Second World War , the Elisenbrunnen was almost completely destroyed by bombing on July 14, 1943, and was reconstructed true to the original in the early 1950s. In 1948 an architecture competition was organized to redesign the Elisenbrunnen and its surroundings. The submitted, partly modern designs led to fierce controversy among the population. The fountain had so established itself in the hearts of the citizens of Aachen that the world-famous architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, during a visit to his hometown, spoke out in favor of an unchanged reconstruction of the fountain, which was destroyed in the war. Finally, the facility was rebuilt under these strict conditions by the Aachen construction company Robert Grünzig and in 1953 the drinking fountain was given its purpose again. The restaurant was now housed in the right part in exchange with the office of the tourist office. In the left annex there was a well room for spa guests. In 1971 the large fountain bowl with the seahorses was exchanged for two basins made of African granite , which is more resistant to the hot, mineralized thermal water. Since then, the water of the Kaiserquelle gushes from two snapdragons, which are attached to the granite bowls. The old fountain now stands as a seahorse fountain on the square between Kleverstrasse and Kapellenstrasse in Burtscheid .
Development after 2000
In 2009 the Elisenbrunnen was closed to visitors for several months; Static defects were found in the vault of the cellar room below the rotunda . The ground-level floor of the rotunda therefore had to be removed; it was reconstructed with bluestone slabs after the static securing work had been completed .
Behind the Elisenbrunnen building is the Elisengarten as a small park, in which an additional drinking fountain was set up from 1873 to 1891 so that the spa guests did not have to leave the park during the drinking cure . The Elisenbrunnen is currently used for numerous cultural events. In the rotunda of the Elisenbrunnen, salsa and tango argentino take place every Sunday from April to October . There was a photo exhibition as part of the culture festival across the borders . In 2009 the Elisenbrunnen was one of the central event locations on the Open Monument Day in Aachen.
Due to the chemical composition of the thermal water, it must be legally regarded as a medicinal product and, according to the Medicines Act , it may only be dispensed under supervision. As an alternative to the temporary considerations not to put the thermal water wells back into operation after the reconstruction work on the rotunda, "No drinking water" signs were attached to both drinking fountains at the Kaiserquelle.
See also
literature
- Johannes Everling: The architects Adam Franz Friedrich Leydel and Johann Peter Cremer and their significance for Aachen's building history. A study of the art history of the 19th century. Dissertation, RWTH Aachen, Aachen 1923, p. 87f.
- Adam C. Oellers & Caroline Weber: Festschrift: 175 years of Elisenbrunnen. An exhibition by the Frankenberg Castle Museum. Aachen 1998, 20 pp.
- Holger A. Dux : Aachen, a lost cityscape. Wartberg, Gudensberg-Gleichen 2000, ISBN 3-86134-664-8 .
Web links
Entry on Elisenbrunnen in Aachen in the database " KuLaDig " of the Rhineland Regional Association
Individual evidence
- ^ Adam C. Oellers, Caroline Weber: Festschrift 175 years of Elisenbrunnen . Published by Burg Frankenberg & Sparkasse Aachen, Aachen 1998.
- ↑ a b Bernhard Poll (Ed.): History of Aachen in data . City Archives Aachen , Aachen 1960, p. 123.
- ↑ Christian Quix : Historical-topographical description of the city of Aachen and its surroundings. DuMont-Schauberg Cologne, Aachen 1829, p. 19 f.
- ↑ Open-Air Salsa in Aachen. Salsa in Aachen, accessed on July 7, 2010 .
- ↑ Tango in the Elisenbrunnen. Tango Casino, accessed May 2, 2010 .
- ^ Andreas Herrmann: A review of urban culture. Aachener Nachrichten, accessed on July 24, 2009 .
- ↑ The end for the thermal wells in the Elisenbrunnen? Aachener Zeitung, accessed on July 31, 2009 .
Coordinates: 50 ° 46 ′ 27 ″ N , 6 ° 5 ′ 13 ″ E