Johanneskapelle on the cloister
The Johanneskapelle am Kreuzgang in Brixen , also called St. Johannes im Kreuzgang , is located on the southwest corner of the Brixen cathedral district and is entered from the third arcade of the cloister . It was probably built when the first cathedral was built in the 10th century and was a baptistery and episcopal court chapel. According to tradition, the Synod of Brixen met here in 1080 , which deposed Pope Gregory VII and elected Wibert of Ravenna as antipope.
The high nave has a steep Gothic tent roof. The choir merges into an octagonal shape halfway up and is crowned on the outside by a narrow pointed turret. The interior is almost square and very high. It was originally closed with a wooden ceiling, and there were wooden balustrades on three sides halfway up. The people entered the church in the south-west from the outside, from the bishop's court the entrance was in the middle of the west facade on the upper floor. The brick gallery and groin vault date from the 14th century. Starting from a transverse rectangular shape, the choir narrows over a square and the octagonal shape to the dome. In the nave there is a large baptismal font made of red marble in the shape of a chalice, which was probably made before 1038.
The Romanesque frescoes, which reflect the scholastic-mystical symbol theology of the 13th century, are particularly important. The Old Testament wisdom can be seen on the east wall and New Testament wisdom on the west wall, surrounded by all kinds of allegorical figures. The early Gothic frescoes from the first half of the 14th century in linear style are also important. Theophil Melicher from Vienna restored the frescoes in the Johanneskapelle from 1900 to 1902 and filled in empty spaces with new pictures and ornaments.
East side of the Johanneskapelle
Early Gothic frescoes in the choir of the Johanneskapelle
High Gothic fresco of the Man of Sorrows
High Gothic fresco of the breastfeeding Madonna
Frescoes by Theophil Melicher
literature
- Karl Wolfsgruber : The Brixen cathedral district. 4th edition. Edited by Johann Mayr . Self-published by the cathedral administration, Athesiadruck, Bozen 2002.
- Josef Gelmi : History of the Dioceses of Bozen - Brixen and Innsbruck. Echo Buchverlag, 1993.
Web links
- St. John in the cloister in the monument browser on the website of the South Tyrolean Monuments Office
Coordinates: 46 ° 42 ′ 55.5 ″ N , 11 ° 39 ′ 28.3 ″ E