Hans Alberthal

Hans Alberthal (* around 1575 to 1580 in Roveredo , Graubünden , † 1648 in Bratislava ; also Johann Alberthal , Giovanni Albertalli or Albertallo , Alberthaler , Albertolus ) was a master builder from Graubünden who played a decisive role in several Renaissance buildings , especially in Germany .

Life

Hans Alberthal was a son of the bricklayer Peter / Pietro Alberthal, who died on December 18, 1615 in Eichstätt, from Roveredo (part of the village Carasole); It is not clear whether he was born in Roveredo or in Eichstätt. He had several siblings; of his brothers two (Albert, † 1641, and Martin, * around 1593) can be proven to be master masons. He received his technical training from his father, with whom he built the Hirschbrunn hunting lodge , and probably from Gilg Vältin / Giulio Valentini, who had been active in and around Lauingen , Dillingen , Höchstädt and Neuburg an der Donau since around 1584 .

Around 1600 (verifiably 1603) Alberthal was employed in Dillingen, where he married Johanna in 1601 († 1630), with whom he had three sons and a daughter, namely Peter (* around 1601), Margaretha (* around 1605), Johann ( * around 1611) and Heinrich (* around 1616). After the death of his wife in 1630 he married a second time in Dillingen in 1631, namely a Margaretha (Chorolanza) from Chur , who gave him Johann Peter (* 1632) in Dillingen and Maria Elisabeth (* 1638) in Pressburg (Bratislava), Martin (* 1640) and Johanna (* 1642) gave birth. Shortly after Johanna's baptism, he married his third wife Anna Maria in Bratislava, who gave birth to their son Paul in 1648. In 1649 she is mentioned as a widow. Other possible children, in particular the son Albert or Albrecht mentioned in two documents from 1653 and 1656 as heir to Hans Alberthal, cannot be proven because of the incomplete baptismal records.

In 1606 he was co-owner of a house in Dillingen, but built his own house the following year. As a result, he bought and sold houses and land several times. In 1619 he was councilor, around 1623/24 infirmary, 1625 senator and 1632 saint (= church) nurse in Dillingen. His property there was confiscated in 1643 because of the collapse of the Dillingen parish church, for which he was held responsible.

From 1619 to 1621, parallel to his construction work in Dillingen, Eichstätt and the surrounding area, he was responsible for the construction of the Trinity (Jesuit) Church in Innsbruck. His activity breaks off due to differences of opinion with the responsible client, the mathematician, physicist and astronomer P. Christoph Scheiner . Shortly after completion, the church collapsed in 1626.

Around 1633 Alberthal moved to Preßburg in Hungary, where he worked as an imperial builder. Under the supervision of Giovanni Battista Carlone, he renovated and expanded the royal castle . At the same time, he built for the responsible client, Hereditary Castle Captain Count Paul Pálffy, his private house on Schlossberg.

Several times he carried out buildings at the same time in different places. The highlights of his work were the Eichstätt creative period, in which Prince-Bishop Johann Konrad von Gemmingen referred to him as his master builder in 1610 , and the Dillingen creative period as the prince-bishop of Augsburg and his time as the imperial master builder in Pressburg.

The study or Jesuit church in Dillingen can be regarded as his main work . It is optionally referred to as a pioneering development in church building north of the Alps, as a forerunner of the Vorarlberg scheme or as the first baroque church north of the Alps, at least seen as an important work in the development of architecture. Opinions are divided on the authorship: while some see Elias Holl, Joseph Heintz and / or Johann Matthias Kager as well as unknown Jesuits as the plan authors, others consider the builder Hans Alberthal, who built the church, to be the actual inventor of the baroque wall pillar church .

Hans Alberthal died in Pressburg in 1648. That year his last son was baptized on August 6th, godfather was Count Paul Pálffy. In 1649 Alberthal's wife appears in the count's account book as a widow.

A portrait of him has not yet been found; only his signature has survived. Alberthal is considered to be an important architect who helped the strict classical “ Augsburg Renaissance ” of the circle around Joseph Heintz the Elder , Elias Holl and Matthias Krager to break through. His Jesuit Church in Dillingen was an early wall pillar church and became a prototype of baroque architecture that radiated far and wide.

Construction activities

• 1596/97, Dillingen, stairwell of the castle
• around 1600, Hirschbrunn Palace
• 1603–1605 / 06 New building of the Konviktes of the Collegium St. Hieronymi (old seminary) in Dillingen
• 1604 New construction of the St. Walburga church in Mauren near Harburg
• 1607 Dillingen, Hofbrauhaus gate
• 1607 Dillingen, construction of his own house
• 1608/09 Haunsheim, Evangelical Trinity Parish Church as one of the rare pure Renaissance churches in southern Germany
• 1609–1619 Eichstätt, Willibaldsburg, under the prince-bishops Johann Konrad von Gemmingen and Johann Christoph von Westerstetten based on plans by Elias Holl, Augsburg
• 1610–1617 Dillingen, Study Church of the Assumption (Jesuit Church)
• 1610 Dillingen, Domdekanhaus
• 1612 Dillingen, Roth house
• 1612ff. Dillingen, Gasthaus zum Stern and drugstore Werthmann
• before 1617 Eichstätt, buildings near St. Walburg (including Pfister- and Bräuhaus)
• 1617–1620 Eichstätt, Guardian Angel Church (controversial, but likely)
• around 1618 gabled buildings on the cathedral (evidence uncertain; rather unlikely)
• 1618 Regensburg, vault of the cathedral central nave (together with his brother Martin, born around 1593, and a M. Peter Juliet / Julietti)
• 1618–1621 Dillingen, street wing of the seminary (Regentiebau)
• 1619–1621 Innsbruck, Trinity (Jesuit) Church (collapsed in 1626 due to incorrect construction)
• 1619–1621 Dillingen, parish church of St. Peter (due to bad construction building damage soon)
• 1624–1627 Neuburg, facade and tower of the re-Catholic court church
• 1625 Dillingen, repair of the academy
• 1626 Dillingen, groin vault on the upper floor of the so-called prince's corridor, the covered two-story corridor from the castle to the court church
• 1627 Sigmaringen, including the castle's portal wing
• 1628 Dillingen, new building of the academy (removed by a new baroque building)
• 1629/30 Binswangen , brotherhood chapel St. Maria vom Scapulier
• 1631 Catholic parish church of St. Michael in Wengen , built by Sebastian Weber according to plans by Alberthal
• from 1635 Pressburg, building work on the castle
• 1636–1644 Pressburg, garden palace of Count Paul Pálffy
• 1637 Pressburg, construction of the roof of the Poor Clare Monastery and the roof of the Franciscan Church

For the Benediktinerinnen -Klosterneubau Durchholzen in Lech level at Allmannshofen 1612 to 1614 (Outbound) Borromeo Chapel and 1619, was raised when the convent Abbey, the (likewise by the baroque new Outbound) Lorettokapelle of a Johann Alberthal d. Younger built, a son of Albert Alberthal (* 1641), who was one of Hans Alberthal's brothers.

Appreciation

Alberthaler, a "foreman architect" who has worked his way up from a craftsman to an independent architect, is one of those French builders who helped the renaissance in Central and Eastern Europe to break through (see DBE, p. 69), and is also valid his buildings at the turn of the Renaissance to the early Baroque as "bridge builders to the baroque architecture that flourished so powerfully after the Thirty Years' War" (Keßler, p. 4). As a renaissance person he was very careful about his abilities and sometimes he didn’t always happily dared to go to extremes (church collapses in Dillingen and Innsbruck because of the heavy roof construction for which he was not responsible). In any case, the “exile” from Dillingen meant that his overall successful construction activity in Germany came to an abrupt end.

literature

• Margarete Braun-Ronsdorf:  Alberthaler, Hans. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 1, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1953, ISBN 3-428-00182-6 , p. 140 ( digitized version ).
• Walter Büchi: Hans Alberthal. 2019, unpublished.
• Đurđica Cvitanović: The builder Hans Alberthal in Croatia. Bregenz 1987.
• Felix Mader (editor): The art monuments of Middle Franconia. I. City of Eichstätt , Munich 1924 (reprint 1981), p. 319, 490.
• György Kelényi: The reconstruction of the Bratislava Castle in the 17th century. In: Ex Fumo Lucem. Baroque Studies in Honor of Klára Garas. Ed. by Zsuzsanna Dobos. Bp., 1999. Vol. IS 353-362.
• Daniel Keßler: The builder Hans Alberthal from Dillingen. In: Yearbook of the historical association Dillingen. 51 (1945/49), pp. 3-154
• (Article in :) Walter Killy and Rudolf Vierhaus (Hrsg.): Deutsche Biographische Enzyklopädie. (DBE), Volume 1, 1995, p. 69.
• Theodor Neuhofer: Hofbaumeister Alberthal, In: Historical sheets for the city and district of Eichstätt. 1 (1952), No. 8/9, pp. 25f.
• Max Pfister: Master builder from Graubünden - pioneer of the baroque. Chur: Verlag Bündner monthly newspaper 1993 (with catalog of works)
• Max Pfister: Giovanni Albertalli. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . April 25, 2016 , accessed April 1, 2020 .
• Reinhard Hermann Seitz and Friedrich Kaess: The tower of the court church in Neuburg ad Donau as an architectural and architectural-historical problem. The original inventory (1618) and its modification (1624/30). In: Neuburger Kollektaneenblatt. 136: 60-98 (1984).
• Arnoldo Marcelliano Zendralli: Graubünden master builders and stucco workers in Germany during the Baroque and Rococo periods . Zurich 1930.

Web links

Commons : Hans Alberthal  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Photo of the Neuburg Court Church
• Photo of the church of Aufkirch ( Memento from July 10, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
• History and photo of St. Gallus in Steppach ( Memento from September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
• Photo of the Guardian Angel Church in Eichstätt