Bubenbach Monastery

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Coordinates: 51 ° 1 ′ 46 ″  N , 9 ° 51 ′ 27 ″  E

Map: Germany
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Bubenbach Monastery​
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Germany

The Bubenbach Monastery was a Benedictine monastery that emerged from a beguinage in 1230 in the now desert town of Bubenbach, about 7 km northeast of Bebra in the Hersfeld-Rotenburg district in northern Hesse .

location

The small village of Bubenbach was first documented in 1230, but existed much earlier. It was located in the narrow valley floor of the Cornberger Water near today's forester's house on the northern edge of today's district of Rautenhausen , a district of Bebra, about 1.75 km east-northeast of Rautenhausen in the Richelsdorf mountains at the foot of the Großer Bärenkopf (413 m). Today the federal road 27 between Bebra and Sontra and the Bebra – Göttingen railway run immediately to the west of the former location and crosses under the Fulda - Werra watershed a few hundred meters west-southwest in the 718 m long Cornberg tunnel . About 100 m northeast of the abandoned village is the former passenger station of Cornberg .

history

Around 1220 a group of beguines moved into a house in Bubenbach. Although they had a so-called master, whom they chose themselves, they were lay people , and the local pastor of Bubenbach, Ekebertus, was their pastor . As their way of life was not in accordance with the rules of the established nuns, they were exposed to considerable hostility from the clergy , and under this pressure they submitted to the abbot and convent of the Benedictine imperial abbey of Hersfeld in 1230 . Ekebertus, the local pastor of Bubenbach, became her provost , and Adelheid was the first prioress . Although they were now pro forma committed to the rules of the Benedictine nuns, until 1258 they basically remained true to the style of the Beguines, which did not include property of the community and sought to secure their livelihood by working in the secular community. The purchase of two properties in Bubenbach was not recorded until 1259. Until 1275, land or income from land in surrounding villages such as Rockensüß , Elrichsüß (desert between Rockensüß and Cornberg), Mönchhosbach , Hübenthal and Weißenhasel were added by donations . The community remained relatively poor. Although their settlement, dedicated to St. Nicholas of Myra , was often referred to as St. Nikolai Monastery in the following, a real monastery complex was not built in Bubenbach next to or in place of the beguinage. The small village church obviously also served the nuns .

When Abbot Heinrich III took office. von Boyneburg-Hohnstein in Hersfeld (1261–1292) the efforts to turn the small convent into a real monastery were reinforced. Around 1275 Heinrich appointed the Hersfeld monk Hartlib as provost of Bubenbach. Until 1292 he bought land for the monastery in at least eight signed contracts, after only three such purchase contracts had been announced by 1275. Abbot Heinrich supported the acquisition of ownership in order to strengthen the economic basis of the small daughter monastery. Important help also came from the families of the Burgmannen of the nearby Boyneburg - the noble families Trott , Boyneburg and Boyneburg-Hohnstein - and the Boyneburg-Hohnsteiner Vögten von Sontra, who bequeathed property or income to the convent in order to provide for their sisters and daughters who joined the convent . The Bubenbach ladies were now able to follow the Benedictine rule, live on the income and do without wage labor.

The decisive breakthrough came in 1277 when Vogt Gottfried von Sontra and his wife Gertrud, sister of the Hersfeld abbot, donated a large estate in Elrichsüß to the monastery, with Abbot Heinrich acting as the official recipient and countersignatory of the deed of gift. As a result, it was decided to build a new monastery on the grounds of this property. However, construction could not begin until 1292, after the sons of Gottfried, who had meanwhile reached full age, had given their final consent to the transfer of ownership from their parents in 1277.

In 1296 the nuns left Bubenbach and moved to the Cornberg Monastery, which was newly built for them in 1292–1296, just 1.5 km further north .

The end of Bubenbach

The plague epidemic of 1348/49, the Black Death , decimated the population of the village of Bubenbach, and most of the survivors emigrated in the following years. As early as 1363 and 1366, the place was only referred to as a courtyard. The Nikolauskirche was still used as a pilgrimage church and was named as such around 1500, but then disappeared around 1600. In 1525 the place was referred to as "die wustenung, gnant zu s. Claus zu Boymbach". Stones, bricks , human skeletons and the remains of a small church were found during excavations in the 20th century . Remains of a monastery complex have not yet been proven.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ "Elrichsüß, Hersfeld-Rotenburg". Historical local dictionary for Hessen. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).