Ellwangen Monastery

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The former Jesuit college and the collegiate church

The Ellwangen Monastery was a Benedictine abbey that existed from 764 to 1460 in Ellwangen , East Württemberg . The buildings of the monastery, especially the former collegiate church and today's Basilica of St. Vitus , still shape the cityscape today .

Foundation of the Ellwangen Monastery

The Ellwangen Monastery was built around 764 on the property of the two noble brothers Hariolf and Erlolf . They probably came from an Alemannic-Bavarian family and hunted on the upper Jagst . Hariolf was in royal service , while Erlolf in the then Burgundian Dijon probably the choir Bishop Office of Langres held. In today's urban area of ​​Ellwangen there was already a small Alemannic village in the immediate vicinity of which Hariolf and Erlolf founded their Benedictine monastery . It was consecrated to the Salvator (Redeemer) and the apostles Peter and Paul , the monks probably called the two monastery founders from the Abbey of St. Benigne in Dijon.

Heyday

Ascent to the imperial abbey

In 814 King Ludwig the Pious took the Virngrund Monastery , which had become an imperial monastery around 775/780 , under his protection, confirmed its already considerable property and granted him the right to freely elect the abbot . In 830 the convent counted 120 and 838 160 priests and lay monks ; The book of fraternities of St. Gallen even mentions 177 religious who lived in the extended monastery area. The patron saints venerated at this time were Christ as Savior (Salvator), Mary and St. Sulpitius and Servilianus , whose martyred bones gave Pope Hadrian I to Bishop Erlolf von Langres in 773 and which are still in a reliquary in the former collegiate church, today's Basilica of St. Vitus, to be kept. Large lands in the area of ​​today's Virngrund also belonged to the monastery property .

The former abbot Sandrad brought an arm relic of St. Vitus from Gladbach to the Jagstkloster between 981 and 987 . This eventually became the new church and monastery patron.

Construction of the Romanesque collegiate church

From 1100 to 1124 a high Romanesque new building of the collegiate church and the convent buildings were built. Fire disasters in 1100 and 1182 made new buildings necessary, each of which exceeded the previous one. The consecration of the first church building, which presumably stood further west than the present one, was carried out in 1124 by the bishops Hermann von Augsburg and Ulrich I von Konstanz. The second church building, for which a master builder named Wunnehard is attested in 1229, was consecrated by the Naumburg Bishop Engelhard on October 3rd, 1233.

The names of the abbots under whom the church was built are also known: Adalbert I von Ronsberg (1136–1173) probably came from the reformed monastery Ottobeuren and renewed monastic life in Ellwangen; the Staufer adviser Kuno I (1188–1221) also built the castle above Ellwangen as a fortified castle and in 1215 even rose to become imperial prince. Liturgical books such as a Latin lectionary and a book of the dead , which also date from this period, suggest that the monastery at Ellwangen was a time of spiritual prosperity.

Decline of the monastery

After 1350 the consequences of the plague , bad harvests and price increases were felt in the area of ​​the Ellwangen monastery ; there was both economic and moral decline.

The mostly noble monks were careful to decide for themselves on important matters; They also opposed all attempts at reform made by the abbeys of Fulda and Ottobeuren , and did not take it very seriously with their vows and Benedictine poverty. In 1384 the number of conventuals was only seven; In 1430 the city was ravaged by the plague, so that only three monks remained. To make matters worse, the night after Lucien Day in 1443, a devastating city fire followed, in which the monastery was also badly damaged. The remaining monks then moved to the city and led a more secular life. In 1459 the monks asked the responsible bishop of Augsburg to convert their monastery into a canon . The Princely Provosty of Ellwangen succeeded the monastery on January 14, 1460 with the consent of Pope Pius II .

See also

literature

  • Otto Beck: The St. Vitus Abbey Basilica in Ellwangen - guide through a place of worship worth seeing . Lindenberg, 2003, ISBN 3-89870-005-4 .
  • Bruno Bushart : Collegiate Church Ellwangen . Munich 1953.
  • Bruno Bushart: The Basilica of St. Vitus in Ellwangen . Ellwangen 1988.

Web links

Coordinates: 48 ° 57 '43 "  N , 10 ° 7' 55.5"  E