Franciscan monastery Greifswald
The Franciscan Monastery in Greifswald , which according to the color of the medal Habits of the Franciscans as Gray Abbey was called, was from the 13th century until the 16th century. It was located southeast of the Greifswald market square and extended up to the city wall . The Pomeranian State Museum is located on the site of the former monastery . The so-called Guardian House has been preserved from the medieval structure.
history
founding
The monastery of the Franciscan order in Greifswald, established in 1210, was founded on June 29, 1262. The Counts von Gützkow had donated a house belonging to them in Greifswald for the construction of the monastery. An important goal of the donors was the creation of a proper burial place for the Gützkow count family. The foundation of the monastery in 1242 by the Gützkow gentlemen Jaczo von Salzwedel and his wife Dobroslawa, which was widely used in literature , was already in doubt in the 1930s. Augustin Balthasar had handed down an inscription from the monk's stalls in the monastery church, which commemorated the foundation of the monastery. The inscription itself had not existed since 1743 at the latest. According to the Pomeranian Document Book (PUB No. 403) it said:
- "[…] Anno 1262, in the apostolorum Petri et Pauli fratres Minores primo intrauerunt hanc ciuitatem (sc. Gripeswaldensem) ad obtinendum, vocati a domino Jackecen comite generoso de Gutzkou, nec (non) nobili (domina Dob) ruzlau ejus uxore, quore corpora hic in choro requiescunt. […] Nota, quod generosus comes Jachecen de Gutzkou hanc aream dedit fratribus in honorem sanctorum Petri et Pauli ac omnium aliorum apostolorum. "
The year was carved in Roman numerals, the parts in brackets had already been broken off in the tradition.
Robert Klempin identified the founders as Jaczo I and his wife Dobroslawa. Since the two died before 1249, Klempin corrected the year from 1262 to 1242 in the first edition of the Pomeranian Document Book. Adolf Hofmeister suspected in 1937 that the couple was actually Jaczo II, a grandson of Jaczo I, and his Mrs. Cecislawa von Putbus acted.
Thus the foundation of the Franciscan monastery probably took place twelve years after the granting of Luebian law to Greifswald by Duke Wartislaw III. instead of. The stronger influence on the city associated with the earlier date is therefore unlikely, because the increasing urban autonomy was evident in Greifswald's appearance as a contractual partner alongside the duke with the Norwegian king in 1262. On the other hand, the founding of the monastery within the city led to a weakening of the ecclesiastical position of the Eldena Monastery , which held the church patronage over the three Greifswald parish churches.
Development up to secularization
The monastery belonged to the Custody of Stettin of the Saxon Franciscan Province ( Saxonia ). In the years 1264 and 1265 the custodian of the Szczecin custody and the guardian of the Greifswald convent appeared for the first time in prominent positions as witnesses in Wartislaw III's documents. on. At the end of the 13th and above all from the beginning of the 14th century, the Franciscan convent attested to documents and privileges for the Greifswald council more frequently. From at least the beginning of the 14th century, the city tried to control the land acquisition of all local monasteries and thus their expansion in the city through the council of church councils. However, it cannot be proven that the Franciscans acquired land outside of their monastery property. The city council reserved jurisdiction for a tower with a cesspool, which was approved for the monastery on the southern city wall in 1305. The surrounding area on the wall remained in the possession of the city because it had to be accessible in the event of a defense.
Around 1330, Werner Hilgemann was the first Guardian who could be identified by name and belonged to one of Greifswald's leading council families. In 1348 the Hilgemann family donated the new building of the choir of the monastery church, in which they also had their burial place laid. In the monastery church, which was closest to the market, the council had its own pews, just as in the parish churches. Before the election of a new mayor, the entire council had to gather for mass in the monastery church, as Heinrich Rubenow wrote in the city's constitution in 1451. When the University of Greifswald was founded in 1456, the Franciscan Nikolaus Vermann, who also taught at it as a professor of theology, gave the consecration speech. Various members of the Franciscan Convention were enrolled at the university.
The records obtained do not allow any conclusions to be drawn about the size of the Convention. The names of individual brothers are known, mainly in connection with cash payments in favor of these people. Since the possession of personal property did not correspond to the poverty ideal of Francis of Assisi , there were reform efforts throughout the order in the 15th century, the observance movement . In 1461 the Brandenburg bishop and the Magdeburg archbishop ordered a visit to the Greifswald monastery. The introduction of the reform, which meant a stricter order and the renunciation of personal property, initially met with resistance. The law faculty of the University of Greifswald , founded in 1456, which was called for legal assistance, was unable to provide a competent expert opinion. The reform of the monastery in line with the moderately strict Martinian Constitutions was finally carried out in 1480 under the supervision of Provincial Eberhard Hille (r) mann, Guardian Nikolaus von Buge and the Greifswald council. In 1518 the leadership of the Franciscan Order divided Saxonia ; Greifswald and over 70 other monasteries formed the Martinian-oriented Province of St. John the Baptist . With the exception of Greifswald and Halberstadt, all of these monasteries would soon perish during the Reformation , so that in 1550 Greifswald became part of the observant Order of St. Cross connected.
After the introduction of the Reformation in Pomerania, the monastery was initially tolerated. It was not allowed to accept new members and not to undermine the Pomeranian church order. The Franciscans were allowed to stay in the monastery until they died. In the autumn of 1556, on the orders of the Provincial of Saxonia, St. Cross handed over to the City Council. The Franciscans kept the founding documents and parts of the institution. The city had a city school and a poor institution set up in the buildings of the monastery.
Library
An inventory of the library (Liberey) in 1545 showed a stock of around 406 books. When the monastery was abolished in 1556, the library was combined with that of the Dominican monastery in St. Nikolai Cathedral . According to a directory from 1599, there were 174 printed works and 44 handwritten volumes. Most of them were theological and, to a lesser extent, legal and philosophical writings. A three-volume Bible commentary by Nikolaus von Lyra , given to the monastery in 1484 by Katharina Rubenow, the widow of the murdered mayor Heinrich Rubenow, is one of the most valuable incunabula .
The books were brought to Greifswald Cathedral until 1602 . They formed the basis of the library of the Ministry of Spirituality .
literature
- Karsten Igel: On the history of the Greifswald Franciscan monastery. On the occasion of the 750th anniversary of the founding of the monastery on June 29, 1262. In: Greifswald contributions to city history, preservation of monuments, city renovation. 6th year, Hanseatic City of Greifswald, Stadtbauamt, Greifswald 2012, pp. 4–15.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Theodor Pyl : History of the Franciscan and Dominican Monastery, the Hl. Spirit and Georg Hospital, the Gertrudenkirche u. of the Greifswalder Convente together with person, place and material reg. (= History of the Greifswald churches and monasteries, as well as their monuments, together with an introduction to the origins of the city of Greifswald. 3rd part), Greifswald 1887, pp. 1106–1122.
- ^ A b Guntram Wilks: The library of the Ministry of Spirituality in St. Nikolai Cathedral in Greifswald - history and significance. In: Felix Biermann, Manfred Schneider, Thomas Terberger (Ed.): Parish churches in the cities of the Hanseatic region. Verlag Marie Leidorf, Rahden / Westfalen 2006, ISBN 3-89646-461-2 , pp. 183-192. (= Archeology and History in the Baltic Sea Region . Vol. 1, ISSN 1863-0855 ).
Coordinates: 54 ° 5 ′ 42 " N , 13 ° 22 ′ 58.4" E