Konrad Moerlin

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Konrad Mörlin, drawn by Hans Holbein the Elder

Konrad Mörlin (* around 1451 in Augsburg ; † February 2, 1510 there ) was a Benedictine and abbot of St. Ulrich and Afra , in Augsburg.

Live and act

He was the son of the Augsburg citizen of the same name, who immigrated from Ulm , and his wife, a born Ridler . He received his education in the monastery of St. Ulrich and Afra , entered the Benedictine order there in 1472 and made his profession in 1473 .

Soon he was staying in the Tegernsee monastery for a year and then began, because of a now deepened piety, a novitiate in the Buxheim Charterhouse . Due to the strict lifestyle there, Mörlin fell seriously ill before the end of the probationary year and returned to Ortisei and Afra.

Miniature from the prayer book of Abbot Konrad Mörlin. (The figure on the left of a kneeling, corpulent monk presumably represents himself.)

From 1485 he was twice prior of the monastery before he was elected abbot on January 30, 1496 as Ulrich II. His piety, gentleness and administrative skills are praised, as is his sustained commitment to the renewal of the spiritual life. Mörlin was a member of the Sodalitas litteraria Augustana. By sending fellow conventuals to other monasteries (for example to Reichenau ) he contributed to their reform. Under Abbot Mörlin's reign, the Augsburg monastery of St. Ulrich and Afra experienced a heyday. To decorate it, he employed the best artists in town, such as Hans Holbein the Elder , Gregor Erhart and Georg Seld . Konrad Mörlin particularly cultivated the veneration of St. Simpert and campaigned intensively for the transfer of his bones to his monastery church , which happened in 1492. He had a valuable reliquary made for the skull.

Maximilian I valued Abbot Ulrich II. Mörlin and appointed him imperial council. He was also portrayed by Hans Holbein the Elder.

Konrad Mörlin turned out to be careless when dealing with money. As a result of ever higher expenses, there were disputes between him and the convent, in which the Bishop of Augsburg also intervened. When Abbot Ulrich II died in 1510, he left behind a richly furnished monastery, but also a debt of 14,000 guilders . Markus Ries writes about this in the Neue Deutsche Biographie : "This circumstance cast a heavy shadow over his successful work in favor of cultivating piety and science."

His preserved epitaph is now in the Maximilian Museum in Augsburg , as a gift from King Max II , at the opening in 1854. The abbot is depicted on it in an almost identical manner to that of Holbein's portrait. It is therefore assumed that the grave monument goes back to his design. It was created by the so-called master of the Mörline epitaph , whom some experts identify as the sculptor Gregor Erhart already mentioned and known with Mörlin .

Konrad Mörlin's prayer book, illustrated by the Augsburg illuminator Ulrich Taler, is kept in the Széchényi National Library , Budapest , under the registration Cod. Lat. 309 .

literature

Web links

Commons : Konrad Mörlin  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Sönke Lorenz: Books, Libraries and Writing Culture of the Carthusians: Festgabe for the 65th birthday of Edward Potkowski , Verlag Franz Steiner, 2002, p. 48, ISBN 3515080937 ; (Digital scan)
  2. ^ Website of the museum with mention of the epitaph
  3. ↑ Website for the prayer book
personal data
SURNAME Moerlin, Konrad
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Benedictine abbot of St. Ulrich and Afra, Augsburg
DATE OF BIRTH around 1451
PLACE OF BIRTH augsburg
DATE OF DEATH February 2, 1510
Place of death augsburg