Hans Saphoy

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Stonemason's mark by Hans Saphoy
Minster and Salem Palace

Hans Saphoy von Salmansweiler (actually Johann II. Saphoy ; * in Salem ( Baden-Württemberg ); † November 8, 1578 in Vienna ) was a master stonemason , fortress and cathedral builder of the Renaissance .

Saphoy was a universally trained master who was well versed in both the profane and the sacred .

Life

Hans Saphoy came from a family of builders who can be traced back to the 14th century and were related to the Parlers , the most important member of which was the Cologne cathedral builder Michael von Savoyen . Another builder from the family was a master Hans Safoy , who worked on the construction of the Salem monastery in the late 15th century. Hans Saphoy was a subject of the Swabian Imperial Abbey of Salem , where the family had their hereditary funeral. His call to Vienna can be linked to the properties of the House of Habsburg in front of Austria . In 1552 he built the fortifications of the Carinthian bastion in Vienna, and in 1555 worked as an appraiser for the construction of the minster and the fortifications in Überlingen .

Master builder of St. Stephan in Vienna

From 1556 to 1578 he was the master builder of St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna.

With the instruction to buy marble stones in 1556 and as a master builder at St. Stephen, he received the right that he may keep aine or two companions at his own expense, who in the Stainhuttn make epitaphs from Merblstain . There is no evidence of the purchases of marble (until the 16th century only the red marble from Adnet near Hallein ).

Saphoy hood

In 1556, a Caspar Saphoy is also attested as the leading master in the cathedral building works. Master Hans Saphoy renewed the vaults . In his era, the plan to complete the Adlerturm (north tower) had to be abandoned for good after Vienna became a Protestant city. Saphoy solved this architectural problem with empathy by placing an octagonal bell storey in post-Gothic shapes on the tower substructure , closed by a curved dome, the so-called Saphoy dome .

From 1558, the cathedral master builder was Bishop Anton Brus von Müglitz . Administrator Urban Sagstetter , Bishop of Gurk , followed in 1563 , who tried to find a compromise with the Protestants and gave up in 1568. Saphoy's last bishop was Johann Caspar Neubeck .

Rafael Podmanický's renaissance tomb in Považská Bystrica

The Czech Academy identified this stone sculpture from 1559 in Považská Bystrica as a work by Hans Saphoy.

Stallburg of the Vienna Hofburg

In the Stallburg, the Renaissance palace around a square arcade courtyard, the court stables were rebuilt on behalf of Emperor Ferdinand I from 1558 to 1562 under the direction of Hans Saphoy, master builder of St. Stephen, with the stonemasons and sculptors Antonius and Pietro Solari and Antonius Gardesoni from the imperial quarry.

His first marriage was Regina Eggsteiner, daughter of the mayor of Eggenburg . He signed a second marriage in 1563 with Ursula Eberlin. Two years after his death, she received fl grace money for her five children   .

Imperial builder

On July 14, 1569 he was appointed imperial builder of the Lower Austrian provinces in place of Benedict Kölbl with an annual salary of 200 fl. In 1570, Emperor Maximilian II demanded the release of his master builder from the serfdom of the Salem Imperial Abbey.

Renaissance portal, 1571

Lower Austrian country house

Saphoy directed the construction work from 1567 to 1578. The Liechtenstein house , which was bought by the Lower Austrian estates in 1513 , was redesigned and expanded through additions and additions. In the middle of the 16th century, the stalls bought the stones themselves: for an artistic door, the staircase to the prescription room, Burgschleinitzer stone, i.e. Zogelsdorfer stone etc. According to the bill, Saphoy had the stones for the stairs to the prescription room as a staircase made of hard stain from Leyterberg , i.e. sourced from hard stone from Kaisersteinbrucher .

Saphoy created the core part of the palace, with the vestibule and large hall, the Ordinary Chamber. He arched the rooms and placed the picturesque piers of the staircases in front of the simple facade of the courtyard. The large marble portals and the wide coffered vault of the hall, which was painted in baroque style in 1710, come from him . The various capitals of the large marble portal in the ordained chamber show in the variation of the forms how far Saphoy had deviated from the classical models of the Italian Renaissance. The scope of this order can be measured from the total cost of 5,553 guilders .

According to tradition, the white crystalline marble from Strechau in Styria was ordered for the door and window frames of the new country house in 1569. Hans Saphoy traveled to Strechau twice to initiate the breaking and transport of the pieces. However, since there is only material from Adnet on the remaining marble parts, the delivery was probably not made due to transport difficulties .

He bought house 1 in 1569; Wipplingerstraße 10 (Stump in Heaven 1, “To the golden donkey”), which he left to his children Sebastian (later water toll inspectors in Stein / Donau) and Anna Maria, married hunters.

The imperial builder of Lower Austria worked with Pietro Ferrabosco from 1569 to 1578 in the Hofburg and at the arsenal, in 1571 in repairs to Ebenfurth Castle , in 1575 in Steyr, where he inspected the damage to the city wall and houses caused by the floods of 1572 , and in Wolfpassing , here he planned a manor house for Heinrich von Hardegg .

Weitra Castle

From 1508 Weitra was pledged several times. Although Hans Saphoy had eliminated the worst defects of the old castle, it no longer corresponded to the ideas of a stately home. In 1582 Emperor Rudolf II donated the castle and town to his colonel chamberlain Wolf Siegmund Rumpf Freiherr von Wielroß (Wullroß). In 1584 the imperial architect Pietro Ferrabosco submitted plans for the conversion of the castle into a contemporary palace.

Family epitaph in the Salem monastery church

From Vienna in 1570 he donated an epitaph for the monastery church in Salem for his ancestors who were buried there, the members of the Savoy Salem clan . The first Savoy masters settled in Salem around 1330 through the House of Habsburg.

Hans Saphoy died on November 8, 1578 and was buried at St. Stephen's Cemetery. His grave tablet is lost.

Individual evidence

  1. Alois Kieslinger : Purchases of marble in the 16th century . In: Restorer sheets . Volume 3. 1979, pp. 26-107

literature

  • Alois Kieslinger: The stones of St. Stephan . Herald 1949.
  • Harry Kühnel : Research results on the history of the Vienna Hofburg in the 16th century I. + II. In: Communications of the Commission for Castle Research No. 6 + 9, 1956/1957.
  • Reclam Art Guide Austria: Architectural Monuments Vienna . 1961.
  • Baldass , Feuchtmüller, Mrazek : Renaissance in Austria . Vienna 1966.
  • Rupert Feuchtmüller : The Vienna St. Stephen's Cathedral . Dom-Verlag, Vienna 1978.
  • Franz Loidl , Martin Krexner: Vienna's bishops and archbishops . Vienna 1983, ISBN 3-85268-080-8 .
  • Felix Czeike : Historical Lexicon Vienna . Volume 5. Vienna 1995, ISBN 3-218-00547-7 .
  • Austria Lexicon . 2 volumes. Publishing Association Österreich-Lexikon 1995, ISBN 3-95004-380-2 .
  • Helmuth Furch : Historical Lexicon Kaisersteinbruch . 2 volumes. Museum and cultural association, Kaisersteinbruch 2002–2004. ISBN 978-3-9504555-8-8 .