Breitenfelde Church
The Evangelical Lutheran church in Breitenfelde is located in the village of the same name near Mölln and probably has the oldest surviving medieval stained glass window in Germany north of the Elbe .
Construction and history
The village of Breitenfelde was first mentioned in 1194 and in 1230 it was listed as a parish in the Ratzeburg tithe register . It can therefore be assumed that it had a church building as early as the beginning of the 13th century. In the following centuries the patronage law of the church changed several times between the city of Lübeck and the Duchy of Lauenburg . The city of Lübeck only waived its claims to the Möllner Pertinenzien , to which Breitenfelde belonged , in 1747 . The history of the church before 1685 can only be reconstructed very poorly, as on May 16, 1685 the pastorate at that time burned down with all the archive material stored there.
The core of the church is an early Gothic hall church from the 13th century. The three-aisled building is made of field and brick , with the field stones forming the older part of the masonry. A box choir with three windows in the eastern end wall connects to the three-bay nave . The beginnings of an old sacristy can be seen on the north side of the choir . The four main pillars in the interior show a special feature, because the pillars diagonally opposite each other are designed in the same way. Overall, the older part of the church resembles that of the Marienkirche in Büchen . The church originally had two entrances, a small one on the west side and a main entrance on the south side, traces of which can still be seen in the masonry. Until the 19th century, the church had a stepped gable on the west side and a wooden tower for the bells that was set off to the south of the building .
A major renovation from 1866 to 1868 was carried out in the neo-Gothic style . All side windows, the east gable and the entire roof construction were renewed. On the west side an extension and the 36 m high church tower were added, on the east side today's sacristy was built on the south side of the choir. The main entrance was moved to the western annex, and the entrance on the south side walled up. Two side galleries were drawn into the interior and a wooden, very high altarpiece was set up. The entire interior design in the nave was completely renewed in a neo-Gothic style, but in the choir there are still many older elements in the vaults.
From 1967 to 1968 the interior was redesigned. The galleries were removed and the altar replaced by a low, plainly bricked altar block. As a result, the windows in the choir wall came into their own and the entire room became brighter and more spacious. The important parts of the building, such as floors, vaults, wall joints and window frames, have also been completely restored.
The slate roof of the nave had to be completely re-covered in 2019.
Furnishing
The vaults are painted on the remains of the early Gothic motifs. Some parts show late Gothic additions. Large-scale ceiling paintings as in other churches in the area could not be detected in Breitenfelde.
The baptismal font is made of Gotland limestone and its upper part is dated to the 14th century. The baptismal font was not in the church from the beginning of the 19th century until 1931, but was used as a cattle trough. The foot damaged during this time was supplemented and repaired in 1968.
Stained glass window
The middle of the three stained glass windows in the east wall of the choir dates from the 13th century. It is an important work from the then Lower Saxony-Westphalian sphere of influence and shows a relationship with window series in Neukloster , in southern Lower Saxony and on Gotland . The two other windows were re-glazed by Carl Julius Milde as part of the renovation work in 1867 . He used geometric shapes in matching colors for the side windows and made a stylish addition to the defective bottom image in the middle window.
The primary colors of blue, red, green, yellow and white predominate in the panes with only very slight tones. Complex mixed colors can only be found in the window complemented by Milde.
As is typical of the time, the images are kept clear and simple. The image content of the window should be clearly identifiable for the believers of the time and shows a Christ cycle, i.e. typical scenes from the life of Christ . From bottom to top these are: Annunciation to Mary , birth of Christ , crucifixion , resurrection , Christ as gardener , ascension . In the resurrection window there are two coats of arms that show parallels to the coats of arms of the local aristocratic families Schack and Ritzerow.
Bells
The church now has three bells , the oldest of which dates from 1511. In 1913 there were still four bells; two of them were cast from older bells by Lübeck council founder Friedrich Wilhelm Hirt in 1851.
|
No. |
Surname |
Diameter (mm) |
Mass (kg) |
Chime |
inscription |
| 1 | Divorce bell / Jesus bell | 1220 |
Ano Dni MDXI doward ick gheghaten in de rer des hilly Liegammes unde der hillige drefoldichgheit Ick hete ihesus mischalme des frigdages loaded, dat scarf us de passige beduden peter wulf got mi |
||
| 2 | Michalis bell | 620 | ano dni MDXI doward ickgegaten indeer santemiegel des ars enghels | ||
| 3 | (Third bell) |
On the second bell are three pilgrim signs from Cologne ( Hl. Drei Könige / St. Ursula ), Büchen (Madonna) and Königslutter (crucifixion group, including a bust of Lothar III ).
organ
.jpg)
In 1717 the church received a new organ from Hans Hantelmann . The present organ was installed by Marcussen & Søn as part of the renovation in 1867/1868 . It has 17 registers , which are divided into two manuals and pedal . The prospectus is designed in the neo-Gothic style with the tracery forms in the polygonal towers, the ogival central field and the crowning pinnacles with finial and crabs . The disposition is as follows:
|
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
- Coupling: II / I, I / P, II / P
Photographs and map
Coordinates: 53 ° 36 ′ 20.2 " N , 10 ° 38 ′ 11.4" E
Choir view
Outer wall on the north side
Upper part of the baptismal font
literature
- Georg Dehio (Greetings): Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein ( Handbook of German Art Monuments ) . 3. Edition. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 3-422-03033-6 , p. 208 f .
- Carl Julius Milde: stained glass in the church of Breitenfelde . In: Archives of the Schleswig-Holstein-Lauenburg Society for Patriotic History . tape 21 , 1869, pp. 283–285 ( full text in Google Book Search [accessed November 19, 2019]).
- Hermann Augustin (Hrsg.): Country, hear the Lord's word: Ev.-luth. Church and churches in the Duchy of Lauenburg . Schmidt-Römhild, Lübeck 1984, ISBN 3-7950-0700-3 , p. 141-148 .
- Frank Lotichius, Ilse Harms-Lipski: The Breitenfeld Church (Flyer) . Ed .: Parish of Breitenfelde. Self-published, Breitenfelde.
- Hermann Harms: The medieval glass windows of the church in Breitenfelde . Thomas Helms, Schwerin 2001, ISBN 3-931185-33-8 .
Web links
- Homepage of the community
- From the 14th century: why these stained glass windows are a real treasure. Description of the church windows on the website of the north church.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e history of the parish of Breitenfelde. Retrieved November 25, 2019.
- ↑ Carl Julius Milde provides a comprehensive assessment of the age of the stained glass windows: Glass paintings in the church in Breitenfelde . In: Archives of the Schleswig-Holstein-Lauenburg Society for Patriotic History . tape 21 , 1869, pp. 285 .
- ↑ Dirk Jonkanski, Lutz Wilde : Village churches in Schleswig-Holstein . Wachholtz, Neumünster 2000, ISBN 3-529-02845-2 , pp. 70 f .
- ↑ The same design of the pillars can be found in the older part of the Marienkirche in Büchen .
- ↑ Dirk Jonkanski, Lutz Wilde : Village churches in Schleswig-Holstein . Wachholtz, Neumünster 2000, ISBN 3-529-02845-2 , pp. 24 f .
- ↑ See also the reconstruction drawing in the parish's flyer, which corresponds to the description in Augustin, Land, hear ...
- ↑ Article on the renovation of the church in the parish letter Breitenfelde 3/2019, p. 12 f.
- ↑ Hermann Harms lists the oldest parts of the windows of the church in Bücken an der Weser as a comparison .
- ↑ In Harms: The medieval glass windows of the church in Breitenfelde . S. 40 . there is a comparison of two windows from Breitenfelde with almost identical windows from the church of Lojsta .
- ↑ Article on the renovation of the church tower clock in the Lübecker Nachrichten Online of May 7, 2015. Accessed on November 20, 2019.
- ↑ Theodor Hach , ed. by Johannes Kretzschmar : Lübeck bell customer. (= Publications on the history of the Free and Hanseatic City of Lübeck 2), Schmidt, Lübeck 1913, p. 114
- ↑ According to Theodor Hach , ed. by Johannes Kretzschmar : Lübeck bell customer. (= Publications on the history of the Free and Hanseatic City of Lübeck 2), Schmidt, Lübeck 1913, p. 115. High German: In the year of the Lord in 1511 I was cast in honor of the Holy Corpse and the Holy Trinity ; My name is jesus; one should ring me on Friday, that should mean the passion for us ; Peter Wulf poured me.
- ↑ According to Theodor Hach , ed. by Johannes Kretzschmar : Lübeck bell customer. (= Publications on the history of the Free and Hanseatic City of Lübeck 2), Schmidt, Lübeck 1913, p. 116. High German: In the year of the Lord in 1511 I was cast in honor of St. Michael the Archangel
- ^ Pilgrim sign database , accessed on December 2, 2019
- ↑ The organ of the Protestant church in Breitenfelde on orgelseiten.de . Retrieved November 25, 2019.