Rommersdorf Abbey

View of the abbot and convent building

The former Premonstratensian Abbey of Rommersdorf is the oldest settlement of this order in the area of the old Archdiocese of Trier .

From a geographical point of view, the former abbey is in what is now the Neuwied district of Heimbach-Weis in Rhineland-Palatinate . Today the abbey houses a branch of the Koblenz state main archive .

history

View of the reconstructed church and the tower

Boards at the entrance gate; The abbreviations AR & VGH Æ . C. mean: Abbas Rommersdorfensis et Visitator Generalis Haec Ædificium Construxit, German: Abbot v. Rommersdorf and General Visitator built this building

The monastery was founded around 1117 thanks to a foundation by Reginbold von Rommersdorf (also: Reginbold von Isenburg). The first clergy to reside there were Benedictines from Schaffhausen . The Benedictines left the place after just a few years. The reason is probably the excessive poverty of the branch. After the Benedictines left, Rommersdorf gradually fell into disrepair.

Rommersdorf Abbey, aerial photo (2015)
Rommersdorf Abbey, aerial photo (2016)
Abbey garden

Under the Archbishop of Trier Albero von Montreuil , the abbey should be repopulated around 1135. This time, at the request of the archbishop, Premonstratensians came from the Belgian Floreffe on the Sambre . From now on, the Rommersdorf Abbey was considered a subsidiary of the Floreffe Abbey .

The once magnificent monastery church also served as the burial place of the Isenburg rulers, primarily for the abbot and other convent members , but also for representatives of the surrounding noble families. These included above all the Counts of Wied and Grafschaft Isenburg and the Lords of Braunsberg . The church was under the patronage of St. Virgin mary . She had extensive property in the surrounding Heimbach parish .

Further subsidiary monasteries were founded from Rommersdorf. These were all women's convents. Worth mentioning are the Wülfersberg monasteries, neighboring the Rommersdorfer male monastery, and the Steinbach farm (Westerwald, near Puderbach), Retters in the Main-Taunus district , the Altenberg monastery and the Dorlar monastery near Wetzlar . The monastery chapel in Adenroth near Großmaischeid and the hospital in Andernach also became important .

According to the nature of their order, the Premonstratensians of Rommersdorf endeavored to take over pastoral care in the surrounding parishes. The places Heimbach , Weis and Gladbach , which formed a parish , were particularly closely tied to the Rommersdorf Abbey. Neuwied and Engers were also among the parishes of the Rommersdorf monastery.

In the course of secularization and the Reichsdeputation Hauptschluss , the Premonstratensian Abbey in Rommersdorf was dissolved in 1803. On November 2, 1802, the Nassau-Weilburg judiciary Carl Hergenhahn began to take provisional possession of the Limburg Abbey and the Rommersdorf and Sayn abbeys. On November 16, he arrived in Rommersdorf and began to inventory the property of the Rommersdorf Abbey. According to the instructions of the electorate government, Müller protested, but took no action. Five days later, the electoral councilor Stähler appeared in Rommerdorf, but was unable to enforce the electoral ban on cooperation with Nassau. After the resolutions of the Reichsdeputationshauptschluss, any resistance to the transfer of state rule had become pointless. On June 17, 1803, the Nassau court councilor Kayser announced the decision to abolish the abbey. Augustin Müller was retired with a pension of 1500 guilders per year. Originally Kayser had offered a pension of 2000 guilders, but Müller waived 500 guilders in favor of the convent. The conventuals (if they did not take over parishes) received a pension between 300 and 500 guilders. On July 20, 1803, the first payment was received and the convention was dissolved.

Numerous fires and inadequate building protection meant that after 1912 there were only ruins of the church and the tower.

It is thanks to the sponsors' group founded in 1972 and the Abtei-Rommersdorf-Stiftung , which emerged from this in 1976 - the first foundation in the country to be committed to monument protection - that the rescue of the increasingly neglected complex has been tackled since 1977. Today the former monastery complex serves as a recreation and event location for the open-air festival of the city of Neuwied and the cloister concerts. In 2003 the German Foundation for Monument Protection funded the new roofing of the baroque "guest house or hospital" planned by Nikolaus Lauxen and built in 1783 in old German cover .

List of Abbots (incomplete)

List of Abbots	Term of office
until 1145	St. Dietrich von Rommersdorf († December 16, 1145), founder abbot
1145–?	Macarius, 2nd dept
?	Heinrich, 3rd dept
?	Rudolph, 4th Dept.
?	St. Elias von Rommersdorf († March 24, 1201)
Early 13th century	Purer
1216-1236	Bruno von Braunsberg
until 1559	Thomas von Dievelich
1559-1576	Servatius Gerhard
1657-1671	Gerhard von Entzen , previously Abbot of Sayn
1671-1705	Carl Wirtz , 52nd Dept.
1706-1729	Johannes Wirtz , 53rd Dept.
	Hermann Scheuss, d. 1732
1732-1746	Friedrich (Ludwig II.) From Coll
	Werner Diepram from Xanten, d. 1772
1772-1792	Franz Kech
1792-1803	Augustin Müller , 59th and last dept

literature

Julius Wegeler: The Premonstratensian Abbey of Rommersdorf . Adapted from a manuscript and collection of documents by Auxiliary Bishop WA Günther. Schuth, Coblenz 1882.
Herbert Leicher: The history of the Rommersdorf Abbey from its foundation to the beginning of the Reformation . Bonn 1953, (manuscript).
Hermann Reinhard: The medieval decorative floor in the former Rommersdorf Abbey. In: Heimat-Jahrbuch des Landkreis Neuwied 1981 , pp. 48–51.
Heiko KL Schulze: The former Premonstratensian Abbey in Rommersdorf. Studies of the building history with special consideration of the 12th and 13th centuries . Society for Middle Rhine Church History, Mainz 1983, ( Sources and treatises of Middle Rhine Church history 44, ISSN 0480-7480 ).
Bruno Krings: On the history of the Rommersdorf Premonstratensian Abbey in the 12th century . In: Archive for Middle Rhine Church History 36, 1984, ISSN 0066-6432 , pp. 11–34.
Albert Hardt: The Rommersdorf monastery (near Neuwied) and its daughter monasteries Altenberg (near Wetzlar), Dorlar (near Wetzlar), Mariaroth (near Waldesch), Retters (near Königstein), Steinebach (near Puderbach), Wülfersberg (near Neuwied-Gladbach) . 2nd improved edition. Self-published by Albert Hardt, Wolfenacker 2001.
Dieter Pokorra: The Premonstratensians and their work in the Rhineland using the example of the Rommersdorf Abbey . Vallendar 2006, (diploma thesis at the Philosophical-Theological University Vallendar).

Web links

Commons : Rommersdorf Abbey - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

^ History of Isenburg, website of the Dierdorf Association
↑ Reinhard Lahr: The Middle Rhine communities Heimbach, Weis and Gladbach between manorial rule and industrialization: (1680 - 1880); rural social and economic structure in transition, Diss., 1995, p. 271 ff.

50.4566 7.5377333333333Coordinates: 50 ° 27 '23.8 " N , 7 ° 32' 15.8" E

[1] History of Isenburg, website of the Dierdorf Association

[2] Reinhard Lahr: The Middle Rhine communities Heimbach, Weis and Gladbach between manorial rule and industrialization: (1680 - 1880); rural social and economic structure in transition, Diss., 1995, p. 271 ff.