Kleinhöchstetten Church

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Kleinhöchstetten Church

The Kleinhöchstetten Church is the Reformed Church of Rubigen (part of the Münsingen parish ). The church, which dates from the 10th century, is considered to be the only preserved early Romanesque apse in Switzerland. Until the Reformation it was an important place of pilgrimage and was profaned afterwards.

description

On the edge of the Aare slope on the right, between Rubigen and Muri , the small church is surrounded by farmhouses in the hamlet of Kleinhöchstetten in the municipality of Rubigen. The restored church has a vestibule with a pent roof on the gable side and is recognizable as a place of worship because of its clapboard-covered ridge tower. There are cross-shaped extensions on both sides and a semicircular apse with exposed rubble stones on the east side . The church square is enclosed by a wall against the adjacent orchards and farmhouses.

history

There are no written reports about the origins of the church, but the excavations in 1955 and 1956 make it possible to classify the history of the building over time. Already around 700 there was a small church at this place, which was built on the foundations of an older building. Their foundation walls of around 7 × 11 meters were uncovered and documented during the excavations. Their location is marked with copper nails on the covering clay slab floor.

The second larger church was probably built in the 10th century during the time of the Burgundian kings. The niche wreath on the apse and elements of the west facade suggest an early period of construction. Today's church is 18.6 meters long and 9.6 meters wide on the west wall. The slightly conically tapering nave is closed off by the choir wall with a retracted choir arch. Directly connected on both sides are annexes of 4 × 4.4 meters which are open to the semicircular apse with arched passages.

Pre-reformation

The church was a popular pilgrimage destination until the late Middle Ages. It is first mentioned in 1348 as consecrated to Our Lady.

As one of 29 churches in the dean's office in Münsingen, the clergy who worked there had their own benefices, but were subordinate to the dean. From 1498 to 1522, the German priest Johannes Wecker preached there with reformatory ideas. However, he had angered the Bernese authorities with his criticism of funeral masses for the fallen in the Bicocca battle and was transferred to the Bishop of Constance for judgment. During this time, Jörg Brunner from Bavaria worked as a helper for Dean Ulrich Güntisberger . Since he did not preach according to traditional doctrine either, the dean had the bishop transfer him to the little church in Kleinhöchstetten. There, however, Brunner preached all the more zealously against the grievances in the church and was very popular. With this he aroused the indignation and envy of his office colleagues and so he was transferred to the council of Bern to be handed over to the bishop for judgment. However, the new ideas had already gained a foothold in Bern and so Brunner was free to exercise his office again. The hearing on August 29, 1522 in the Barfüsserkloster in Bern is regarded as the first Bern disputation and the little church of Kleinhöchstetten is called "The Cradle of the Bern Reformation".

Post Reformation

In 1534 shortly after the introduction of the Reformation , the chapels of the dean's office in Münsingen were profaned. The people from Kleinhöchstetten had to go to Münsingen to preach like those from the other surrounding towns. A farmer bought the church, used it as a carriage shed and set up service apartments above an intermediate floor. The gate of the west facade was bricked up, the annexes demolished and new entrances built into the south wall.

Until the 1940s, the building was becoming increasingly dilapidated, so demolition was planned. However, the home keepers had already recognized the historical value of the former church. In 1952, parts of the roof collapsed. In the same year a secondary school class with their teacher Ernst Aebi took the initiative after an excursion to the ruins and asked the chairman of the Bern homeland security in writing to preserve the monument. It was heard and the first thing to do was to build an emergency roof. In 1953, the Evangelical Reformed regional church acquired the property with the ruins in order to initiate restoration and return to its original purpose. During the excavations financed by the Swiss National Science Foundation, led by Paul Hofer , the original foundations were recorded.

In 1962, the parcel of the church in Kleinhöchstetten was given to the parish of Münsingen as a donation with the condition that the church be used for worship services again. The restoration work began in 1963 under the direction of the Bern architect Alfred Schaetzle and was completed after three years of construction. Since the inauguration on May 15, 1966, the building has been used as a place of worship again

Furnishing

Fresco on the south wall. From the resurrection story.

In the window niche of the southern apse wall, a stone piscina inserted after 1438 has been preserved. The tabernacle adorned with Gothic tracery, stolen in 1952, could be acquired privately and was reinstalled in the north wall of the choir.

Murals

During the renovation, wall paintings were found both on the western outer facade and on the walls inside. On the left in front of the entrance, under a painted arched frieze, the saints Saint Leonhard , Mauritius , Stephen , Laurentius and another stranger can be seen by their attributes . Inside, floral ornaments have been preserved in the window niches and on the choir arch. Of five pictures on the south wall from an original cycle, one shows the risen Christ as a gardener with Mary Magdalene , the others are less well preserved. The west wall bears a depiction of the Last Judgment , plus a mandorla with the enthroned Christ, flanked by the four evangelist symbols with Mary and John. Large remains of cube patterns have been preserved under a surrounding tendril border. The paintings are comparable in their type to those of Belp or Kirchlindach , but without reaching their quality.

Bells

The roof rider tower designed by Hermann von Fischer bears two bells from the Rüetschi Aarau bell foundry . The larger one was donated by the Rubigen community and the second by the Trimstein school community. They were ceremoniously raised on September 26, 1964.

organ

The house organ on the choir wall comes from Madiswil in Upper Aargau . A single manual work is built into a cabinet-like case from 1787. The folk paintings on the inside of the double doors contrast virtue and vice as well as the choice of grace. According to comparative studies, the builder could be the Emmental organ builder Peter Schärer.

Web links

Commons : Kleinhöchstetten Church  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

literature

  • Zita Caviezel-Rüegg: The church Kleinhöchstetten Swiss art guide GSK. Bern 1996. ISBN 3-85782-592-8
  • J. Lüdi: The Church of Münsingen online PDF 12 MB

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hans Gugger : The Bernese organs. Stämpfli, Bern 1978.
  2. ^ Organ profile in the organ directory Switzerland-Liechtenstein , accessed on January 10, 2017 on a private website
  3. ↑ Texts on house organs by Annerös Hulliger accessed on June 1, 2019.

Coordinates: 46 ° 54 '12 "  N , 7 ° 31' 52.9"  E ; CH1903:  607 065  /  194695