Golden Ross barracks

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Golden-Ross-Kaserne: Front at the Große Bleiche (2013)
Golden Ross barracks: entrance area

The Golden Ross barracks in Mainz is the building complex of the former electoral stables . It was built in 1766–1767 under Elector Emmerich Joseph von Breidbach zu Bürresheim by the electoral building director Jakob Joseph Schneider . The building takes its name from a larger than life gilded horse figure above the main entrance. Today the Mainz State Museum is located in the building, the main front of which is on the “ Große Bleiche ” street .

prehistory

Although the urban area known as "Bleiche" was located near the Electoral Palace and Martinsburg , it served the population for a long time as an area within the city wall, where laundry was dried (bleached). With the construction of the new electoral stables, which began in 1766, this area was also used and upgraded for urban development. Already before 1750 the house of the chief stable master of the electoral court, which also served as electoral camera administration, was in the immediate vicinity at Bauhofstrasse 1 .

history

Elector Emmerich Joseph Breidbach-Bürresheim had a 15 × 19 m riding hall with two magnificently designed galleries added to the stables, which were completed in 1767 . The model for the electoral riding arena was undoubtedly the winter riding school of the Spanish Riding School in Vienna . This also expressed the symbolism of the larger than life figure of a gilded horse driven from copper above the main entrance of the stables. The horse, which was set up in 1769, was shown in the position of the levade , a typical dressage exercise of the classical equestrian art also cultivated at the Spanish Riding School .

The house in the side wing was repeatedly used by guests of the electors and later as a guest house for the French administration. The “companion” of the last Elector Friedrich Karl Joseph von Erthal , Sophie von Coudenhoven, lived here . The French Foreign Minister Talleyrand resided here during Napoleon's stay in Mainz in 1806.

With the end of the electoral state in 1792 , the building complex was misused. From 1793 to 1797 and again in 1804 and 1833 the building served as a theater. In 1793, Hofkammerrat Jakob Guiollett was responsible for the renovation work , which according to contemporary reports was quite successful. After the Peace of Campo Formio and the permanent surrender of Mainz, now Mayence, to the French, the riding arena was again claimed by the French military commanders and used for military riding training until 1804.

In 1804 Napoleon embarked on his historic trip to Germany from Aachen to Mainz. From Aachen he gave the order, "... a part of the imperial drama company from Theâtre français should come to Mainz and five to six tragedies should be performed." With this, the large riding hall was again converted into a theater at great expense. Napoleon arrived in Mainz on September 20, 1804, accompanied by Empress Joséphine and his staff. During his stay several pieces were actually performed in the riding hall of the Marstall. Famous actors such as François-Joseph Talma and Catherine Josephine Duchesnois appeared in works by Racine and Corneille . Since Napoleon intended to expand Mainz as an imperial residence city, the imperial builder Eustache de Saint-Far was also entrusted with a state-of-the-art theater building in order to finally replace the temporary arrangement in the riding hall. However, the slow implementation of the extensive French building measures in Mainz, the prioritization of military projects and the general political development over the next few years ensured that this building did not take place. The provisional theater in the former electoral riding hall had to fulfill its purpose as a theater in Mainz until 1833. Well-known artists also appeared in the period after the French occupation, including Niccolò Paganini in 1829 .

Only after the completion of the Mainz City Theater in 1833 was theater operations permanently suspended. From then until 1930, the building served as quarters for various cavalry regiments stationed in Mainz, whereby the riding arena was returned to its original purpose. Among other things, parts of the hussar regiment "King Humbert of Italy" (1st Kurhessisches) No. 13 were stationed here .

In 1935, the empty building complex housed the collections of the City Museum of Antiquities and the City of Mainz's collection of paintings. These were previously housed in the Electoral Palace, but should now be permanently exhibited in the Golden Ross barracks. At that time, however, the riding arena only served as a magazine and warehouse for objects that were not on display. The building and many exhibits were completely destroyed in 1942 during the Second World War. The baroque original of the horse figure above the main entrance was also destroyed. From 1949 to 1962 the building was rebuilt in many individual construction phases. The reconstruction was promoted by the "Direction générale des affaires culturelles" in the French occupation zone after Fritz Arens campaigned for the reconstruction. In 1962 the building was restored to such an extent that the antiquity museum and the picture gallery of the city of Mainz could be reopened in the course of the (premature) 2000th anniversary celebration. The riding arena was finally roofed over and made usable again at the end of 1963. From 1964 it was used for the first time as a so-called "stone hall" ( lapidarium ) for the presentation of a small part of the numerous Roman stone monuments.

In 1967 the state of Rhineland-Palatinate took over the museum and with it the structural responsibility for the Golden Ross barracks. From 1975 to 1979 new buildings were added to significantly enlarge the museum area. The baroque structure of the Marstall building was also renovated and redesigned while preserving the baroque exterior. In 1980/81 the riding arena was finally renovated at great expense and equipped with floor heating and lighting. In the museum concept, it now served as a stone hall for the redesigned presentation of the most important stone monuments of the Roman Mogontiacum , a collection that is one of the most important of its kind in Europe.

Necessary modernization measures again led from 2006 to the partial and at times complete closure of the museum and the architectural redesign of individual parts of the building. The renovation work should be finished by 2010.

architecture

The Golden Ross barracks is a building from the late Baroque period with stylistic features of early classicism . The two-storey central building is covered with a gable roof made of slate . The main front to the Große Bleiche shows in the middle a gabled, representative central projection made of stone , the gable roof of which crowns the horse figure. The electoral stables were located here . The use of the part of the building as a horse stable also results in the significantly lower number of windows on the ground floor of the central building that still exist today. On both sides there are flanking three-storey residential wings with dormer-studded mansard roofs , drilled window frames and rusticated corner stone frames made of sandstone .

In the immediate vicinity behind the building and partly connected to it are the Eltzer Höfe, built in 1742 and 1743 . These also have a simplicity that is seldom found for this time. The buildings are structured by rusticated pilaster strips , covered with a mansard hipped roof and only adorned by two baroque portals.

Today's use and conservation

The building complex of the Golden-Ross-Kaserne contains the extensive collections of the Landesmuseum Mainz as well as facilities of the museum such as lecture and seminar rooms, sales room or the catering business in the pavilion from the 1970s in the inner courtyard of the facility.

Since 2004, all buildings have been refurbished and modernized in several steps under monument conservation and museum educational aspects. In some cases, war-related damage still needs to be repaired, and in some cases new structural accents are being set in the exhibition rooms. A glazed inner courtyard arcade was added in the area of ​​the central building by 2007 (at the end of the first renovation phase). With the expansion of the top floor of the building at the front of the Große Bleiche (stables, residential building), an additional exhibition area of ​​779 m² was created.

In the second conversion phase, the rooms on the ground floor of the Marstall and the stone hall will be renovated. A side wing that was added in the 1970s is also affected. In addition, the entire air conditioning, lighting and security technology will be modernized. It is also planned to open the walled up former gate to Schießgartenstraße with a glass wall, thus enabling a view of the exhibits in the stone hall.

This renovation phase should be completed in 2009 and all collections in the museum should be made fully accessible to the public again. In future, a chronologically ordered and barrier-free tour through all time periods of the exhibited exhibits is planned over three floors.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Quoted from: Wolfgang Selzer, Karl-Victor Decker, Anibal Do Paco: Römische Steindenkmäler. Mainz in Roman times. P. 14
  2. ↑ AC 467/7 (PDF; 284 kB)

literature

Web links

Coordinates: 50 ° 0 ′ 13.9 ″  N , 8 ° 16 ′ 4 ″  E