Elisengarten

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The Elisengarten around 1910

The Elisengarten is a small park in the city center of Aachen on the rear side of the Elisenbrunnen . The Elisengarten was laid out from 1852 to 1854 according to plans by the Prussian horticultural master Peter Joseph Lenné .

location

The Elisengarten is bounded by streets that were already known in the Middle Ages : Hartmannstraße, first mentioned in 1279 as platea harduni , Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz with the Elisenbrunnen, formerly known as op den graffe in 1460 and Ursulinerstraße, the oldest street known by name in Aachen (1137 via ante capellam s. Aldegundis ).

Earlier development

The Elisengarten with the presidential building around 1855

Flint tools prove that the square was frequented as early as the Neolithic . However, it cannot be said with certainty whether there were settlements from this period here.

The Elisengarten area had been built on since Roman times (1st to 4th centuries). Archaeological excavations have shown that there were accommodation buildings for bathers from the nearby thermal baths . Late Roman half-timbered houses and villas were z. Some equipped with hypocaust heaters. Three Roman settlement levels could be proven.

There is little evidence of the type of settlement in the Elisengarten between the 5th and 8th centuries due to the timber construction method preferred at the time. In the most recent archaeological excavations, however, it was possible to determine on the basis of the findings that the Elisengarten was continuously inhabited during this period.

In the early Middle Ages , the Adelgundis Chapel was built in the northwest area of ​​today's Elisengarten, but it was first mentioned in a document in 1066. In 1137 the Stavelot - Malmedy double abbey became the chapel, which had probably belonged to it for a long time, by a sealed document from Lothar III. approved. In addition to the chapel, the Stavelot – Malmedy Abbey owned 30 other houses in the Hartmannstrasse and Ursulinerstrasse areas.

Over the centuries that followed, the monastery gradually fell into disrepair and most of the buildings fell into disrepair. The buildings suffered great damage in 1248 when the city of Aachen was flooded by Wilhelm von Holland and in the great city ​​fire in 1656. The owners of the still intact buildings changed several times. On October 21, 1786, the dilapidated Adelgundis Chapel collapsed. After the ruins were removed, the area was fenced in and laid out as a garden. Some buildings functioned temporarily as an episcopal palace.

Elisengarten with a bust of Hermes

In 1817 the property came into the possession of the Prussian state . In the period that followed, a new presidential building was built on the foundations of the former chapel according to plans by city architect Adam Franz Friedrich Leydel . In 1852 the extension on the garden side was completed by Johann Peter Cremer .

The presidential building was damaged in the Second World War and demolished on April 7, 1952 after heated controversy.

From the end of the 12th century, today's area of ​​the Elisengarten was bordered to the south by a section of the inner city ​​wall of Aachen, the so-called Barbarossa Wall . Before the city wall was built, a moat formed the southern boundary of the area. The last section of this moat, the so-called Foggen or Mawengraben , was filled in in 1801 because of the unbearable odor nuisance and today forms Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz. The Elisenbrunnen was built on the remains of the Barbarossa Wall in 1822.

Drinking fountain in the Elisengarten

On the northeast side of today's garden, the Ursuline women who moved from Dinant to Aachen began to found their Aachen Ursuline monastery in 1651 . However, the site was only finally acquired after the town fire in 1659. A cloister garden was laid out behind the actual monastery building , which represents the nucleus of today's Elisengarten. In the period that followed, the facility was supplemented by a boarding school for girls . After French troops marched into the Rhineland , the nuns had to leave the monastery in 1792. In 1818 the property was sold to the Prussian state, only a few outbuildings initially remained in the possession of the nuns, who u. a. have set up a school here. The old monastery building served the Prussian government as the main customs house until 1846 . After the former monastery was demolished in 1851, the Elisengarten began to be laid out on the site according to Lenné's plans.

In 1873 a chargeable thermal water drinking fountain, which was supplied with water from the Kaiserquelle, was set up in the Elisengarten so that the spa guests did not have to leave the garden during the drinking cure . As early as 1854, city architect Friedrich Joseph Ark installed glass doors in the right side wing of the Elisenbrunnen so that a convenient connection between the garden and the fountain is available for the spa guests.

In 1913 the Elisengarten was landscaped and slightly expanded.

In 1938 an air raid shelter was built in Elisengarten, which was blown up in 1955. In the war years, a fire water pond and several cover ditches were also created on the site.

In 1954, the redesign of the extended Elisengarten began with the inclusion of rubble sites - in particular the site of the former presidential building. A restaurant was built on the site of the former thermal water drinking fountain. Originally, two fountains were also installed: the sower by Fritz Klimsch and the flute player by Matthias Corr . Both are no longer in the Elisengarten, the sower has been returned to Düsseldorf on loan , the flute player was dismantled in 2008 as part of the remodeling of the Elisengarten and re-erected in the Eilendorf district of Aachen .

Archaeological excavations

Excavation tent in the Elisengarten

In the past, numerous, limited-area construction work has repeatedly led to traces of earlier building eras. As early as 1822, when the thermal water supply line was moved from the Kaiserquelle to the Elisenbrunnen, the remains of the Roman Bücheltherme were found. During the redesign of the area after the Second World War, remains of foundations - mainly Roman and medieval - were repeatedly described in the 1950s.

In the run-up to the redesign of the Elisengarten, extensive archaeological excavations took place from August 2008 to February 2009 .

In the area of ​​the Elisengarten, settlement and handicraft sites from five millennia have been proven.

Excavations in the Elisengarten

The oldest finds are flint tools from the Neolithic Age . It was thus possible to prove that people who quarried flint on the Lousberg also stayed in the predominantly swampy Aachen valley basin .

From Roman times wooden buildings from the 2nd to 4th centuries as well as remains of the foundations of 30 to 50 m long accommodation buildings of the bathers of the Roman thermal baths at the Büchel and today's cathedral have been proven. The most valuable Roman finds from the Elisengarten include a bronze fibula of the Aucissa type, fragments of a Roman plate from the 1st century with the inscription Cassi - probably the reference to the oldest known Aachen resident Cassius. Further ceramic fragments of a plate made of terra sigillata of Mediterranean origin are evidence of intensive trade contacts in the 1st and 2nd centuries.

The excavation was also able to show that Aachen was most likely continuously inhabited in the Merovingian period. Evidence from the Middle Ages , remains of the Stavelot-Malmedy double abbey from the 11th to 15th centuries as well as associated craft workshops, here the remains of a bone carving workshop from the 12th century, could also be found. The most recent finds include remains of the foundations of the Ursuline monastery, which existed in the northeastern area of ​​today's Elisengarten from the 17th to the 19th century, as well as construction work that can be associated with the construction of the Elisenbrunnen.

Redesign

Aachen, Elisengarten - spring 2012

In 2006, the city administration of Aachen commissioned a competition to redesign the Elisengarten. The Berlin landscape planning office Lützow 7 was awarded the contract .

The Elisengarten in 2014

Central design elements of the design are a sloping lawn staircase to the Elisenbrunnen, an opening of the park to Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz that has already been made and the construction of a spring basin at the rear of the Elisenbrunnen. Most of the gardens were completed in the course of 2009.

A 160 m² large archaeological showcase according to plans by the Aachen architecture firm kadawittfeldarchitektur makes a 60 m² representative part of the excavations permanently visible. In addition to the glazed excavation area, the visitor has the opportunity to find out about the archaeological finds and the development of the Elisengarten. The completion of the archaeological showcase was planned for 2010. However, due to unclear financing, the start of construction was postponed indefinitely. On January 11, 2012, the Aachen-based company DSA Daten- und Systemtechnik announced that it would enable the construction of the archaeological showcase with a donation of € 175,000. The groundbreaking ceremony took place in July 2012 and the showcase was officially opened on April 18, 2013.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Quadflieg, Eberhard (1952): Roman villa in the Elisengarten - Aachen
  2. ^ Lehmbruck, Wilhelm (1955): Three Roman settlements among themselves .- Aachen
  3. ↑ City archaeologist Andreas Schaub explains the excavations in the Elisengarten Archaeological work in the Elisengarten. (No longer available online.) City of Aachen, formerly in the original ; Retrieved July 24, 2009 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.aachen.de  
  4. ↑ Andreas Schaub explains the archaeological window in the Elisengarten Archeology in the Elisengarten. (MP3; 1.4 MB) City of Aachen, accessed on July 25, 2009 .
  5. ↑ Redesign of the Elisengarten concept of redesign. (No longer available online.) City of Aachen, formerly in the original ; Retrieved January 4, 2012 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.aachen.de  
  6. ↑ Archaeological showcase. City of Aachen, accessed on May 16, 2013 .
  7. ↑ a b Heiner Hautermans: A unique insight into the city's history. In: Aachener Nachrichten. April 18, 2013, accessed April 19, 2013 .
  8. ↑ Donation: 175,000 euros for the showcase. Aachener Nachrichten, accessed on January 11, 2012 .
  9. ↑ Archaeological showcase in the Elisengarten. (No longer available online.) City of Aachen, archived from the original on January 16, 2013 ; accessed on March 16, 2013 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.aachen.de

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Coordinates: 50 ° 46 ′ 27 "  N , 6 ° 5 ′ 11"  E