Gasthof Zum Roten Hirsch (Eilenburg)

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Street view of the “Red Deer”, 2012

The inn "Zum Roten Hirsch" is the oldest relaxation and one of the oldest secular buildings in Eilenburg . The building at Torgauer Straße 40, which in its external appearance dates back to the late 16th century , is of enormous cultural and architectural significance. It is a registered cultural monument in the list of monuments of the State Office for the Preservation of Monuments in Saxony . The building and an annex now house the Eilenburg City Museum .

history

The time of construction of the building could not be dated exactly until now. Dendrochronological studies of the roof structure in 1998 showed that the wood used for the beams could not have been felled until 1562 at the earliest. There are also older cloister format bricks in the masonry , but these are probably second-hand stones. The existing vaulted cellar is probably due to a previous building. The inn was one of the first massive houses in Eilenburg and, with its stone construction, was considered the most modern town house of its time.

The reason for the construction is conceivable that the inn served to accommodate participants in a dispute on questions of faith at Eilenburg Castle , to which the Saxon Elector August had invited Wittenberg and Leipzig theologians as well as the Dresden court preacher to Eilenburg in 1563 . However, this theory has not been proven.

In an inheritance dispute before the Eilenburg council from 1599, the name Adam Preil appears for the first time as an inn operator in Eilenburg. Another inheritance dispute in 1624 shows that this inn is the “Zum Roten Hirsch” inn. This means that this name has been used for this inn for around 400 years.

The restored relief above the entrance gate, with the post horn and the stagecoach, indicates its former importance as a post office.

The Rote Hirsch is located near the Eilenburg market square directly on the very important trade route Via Regia Rhein-Schlesien , which used to run through the city, and was a post office for a long time , which is still announced today by a plaque above the entrance portal ("deer relief"). Its exposed location and the upscale furnishings justified the fact that a large number of historical personalities came here. (see the personalities section )

On April 17, 1945, the parliamentary sent by the advancing American associations, who was supposed to surrender the city, was housed in the Red Deer. The negotiations failed, however, because the civil city leadership could not persuade the military decision-makers of the Wehrmacht to give in. The artillery battle that began on April 20 destroyed almost all buildings in Eilenburg city center. The historically valuable Rote Hirsch was spared, however, and is therefore a rare testimony to the historic old town development today.

Even in the times of the GDR , the Rote Hirsch was a restaurant with an attached hotel , which was operated by the trade organization (HO). After the inn was vacated after the fall of the Wall in 1990, the old building fabric soon began to deteriorate. In the 1990s the west gable had to be supported from the outside with a bar construction. The Sparkasse Delitzsch-Eilenburg acquired the building in the late 1990s in order to extensively restore it. During the building archaeological investigation carried out in advance by the restorer Stefan Reuther, the above-mentioned dendrochronological investigations were carried out to determine the time of construction. At that time, a figurative painting was also discovered on the clay cover of a room under a baroque stucco ceiling , which dates from the early Baroque (around 1640) and is unique in Saxony at least . The numerous existing wall paintings and friezes are also considered to be a special feature of a civil secular building. From 2001 to 2003, the building was reconstructed in accordance with the requirements of the listed building, for which the Leipzig architecture firm Kühnl & Schmidt was responsible.

The Rote Hirsch is now owned by the Sparkasse Leipzig and houses the city museum on the first floor, the attic and the western annex that was added during the renovation. There is still a restaurant on the ground floor, but it is currently not in operation. On the western gable of the building above the entrance to the museum in 2005, the air space installation was calendar pages of Michael Stapf attached. The calendar sheets on it reflect important dates of the city's history and are intended to promote a visit to the museum.

architecture

The outwardly simple Renaissance building is located in the city center of Eilenburg, not far from the town hall and the market square in a semi-open area to the commercial buildings along the northern Torgauer Straße on the corner of Hirschgasse. The three-storey building with a basement has a rectangular floor plan. The gate and the windows of the street-side facade are not arranged symmetrically. The arched entrance gate is in the right half of the street facade. The distances between the windows are at different stages and are not between ground and first floor in a flight (except for the three windows on the left). The two windows to the right of the entrance were converted into a shop window after 1909, but reinstalled in their original appearance in 2001. The windows of the west gable (except on the first floor on the left) were installed during the renovation in 2001. Above the entrance is the stone "deer relief", which refers to the animal that gave it its name and the earlier function of the house. The simple saddle roof originally had two dormers that were removed before 1940. Instead, a centrally positioned bat dormer was installed. During the reconstruction of the inn this was again removed and replaced by five dormers on two levels.

On the east side of the courtyard, the Rote Hirsch also has a three-storey, but lower, elongated, half-timbered extension running across the main house. Another three-storey extension from the time of the most recent renovation work creates a roughly U-shape. The equally large, arched courtyard exit is located between the two extensions. Today the courtyard is used as a patio for the restaurant.

Inside there are numerous baroque design elements, such as the ceiling painting, wall paintings and friezes mentioned above. There are also blind arcades and variously profiled joists of the coffered ceiling .

Personalities

As already mentioned, the red stag was the station of numerous historical personalities in the course of its history. These were for example:

The triptych by Ernst Albert Fischer shows the laying out of the King of Sweden in the Red Deer (1906)

Say

According to a legend, the Swedish war treasure is said to have been stolen from the Red Deer or hidden there while Gustav Adolf was laying out. In sales contracts for the red deer, a text passage is said to have been inserted, according to which a quarter is to be given to the Swedish krona and the previous owner if the treasure is found.

Another tradition says that a brick with the year 1502 should be installed in the chimney or in the attic area, which indicates the year of construction. However, this could not be found during the restoration in 2001. Furthermore, according to current knowledge, the year of construction 1502 is excluded, at least for this building.

literature

Web links

Commons : Gasthof Zum Roten Hirsch  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ City tour Eilenburg, information brochure 2006, page 17
  2. ↑ Kulturunternehmung Eilenburg: History of the City Museum (accessed on August 13, 2013)
  3. ^ Andreas Bechert: Gustavstrasse - Part I in Der Sorbenturm (after Flegel 2005), Eilenburg 2008

Coordinates: 51 ° 27 '37.7 "  N , 12 ° 38' 4.8"  E