Kosmas and Damian

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The leg miracle in a 16th century altarpiece. State Museum Württemberg
The holy brothers Kosmas and Damian, miniature from the Book of Hours of Anne de Bretagne (16th century; Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, Codex A 66, sheet 343)
This shrine in St. Michael in Munich supposedly contains the skulls of Kosmas and Damian. More skulls are also in Madrid.
The saints as patrons in the Bödefeld coat of arms

The early Christian twin brothers Kosmas and Damian , also Cosmas and Damian (us) , from Greek Κοσμάς και Δαμιανός Kosmás kai Damianós (both * in Syria ; † allegedly under Diocletian in Aigeai in Cilicia ), were, according to legend, healers ( ἀargyυιυγ “Without silver”) treated the sick free of charge and converted many of them to Christianity. They are venerated as saints .

Life, work, legend and cult

Since the end of the fourth century in Aleppo and since the beginning of the fifth century in Constantinople Opel emerging Arab legend amended According to Cosmas and Damian were children of a Christian mother named Theodota whose other three sons as the twins are also died as a martyr. Kosmas and Damian are said to have worked as doctors in Aigeai in Cilicia (in the south of today's Turkey), especially in the "Son of God Hospital" of Pheremma. They allegedly even managed a leg transplant , namely the replacement of a rotten leg of a white person with that of a deceased black person.

They survived unscathed all attempts by the Roman prefect Lysias, a notorious figure in legendary literature, on whose orders 22 martyrs are said to have died over the years, to drown and burn them with stones and arrows as part of the persecution of Christians under Emperor Diocletian kill, and only suffered martyrdom in the subsequent beheading.

Various other regional variants of their lives, which emerged later and are less likely, have been handed down. According to an Asian legend, the mother of Kosmas and Damian Theodota , who was known in medieval German manuscripts as the inventor of the twelve messenger ointment or apostle's ointment ( unguentum apostolicum , also apostolicum ), was the name of the mother of Kosmas and Damian Theodota. According to tradition, both Damian and later Kosmas died of natural causes. Even according to a Syrian variant, according to which the brothers had converted the Emperor Carinus , no martyrdom took place. On the other hand, a Roman tradition tells of martyrdom through a stoning caused by an intrigue of a competitor.

Her first places of worship were her grave in Pheremma near Kyrrhos in Syria and Aegean, the place of her death, from where the cult spread to Palestine, Egypt and Constantinople, then to Rome, Sicily and across the Alps to German-speaking areas.

Relics

The city patrons Kosmas and Damian at the Essen town hall

Kosmas and Damian are the city ​​patrons of Essen , where some of their relics are located. The sword of the saints shown in the Essen Cathedral Treasure in a splendid gold-sheathed scabbard, however, dates from the Ottonian period. During the Renaissance, Kosmas and Damian were the patron saints of the Medici family , which is why the name Cosimo appears frequently in this family.

At Easter 1334, Burchard Grelle , Prince Archbishop of Bremen , “found the relics of the holy doctors Kosmas and Damian, allegedly walled in and forgotten , personally in the choir of the Bremen Cathedral . On this occasion, Archbishop and Chapter organized a festival at Whitsun 1335, at which the relics were transferred from the wall to a more worthy place. ”Grelle claimed that the bones he presented had been brought from Rome by Archbishop Adaldag of Hamburg-Bremen in 965. Cathedral builder Johann Hemeling commissioned a shrine for the remains around 1400, which was completed after 1420. The shrine made of carved oak wood covered with gold-plated silver sheets is an important testimony to medieval goldsmithing.

Bremen's Lutheran cathedral chapter sold the shrine without the two heads in 1649 to the Osnabrück prince-bishop Franz Wilhelm von Wartenberg , a Wittelsbacher, who gave the shrine to his relative, Elector Maximilian of Bavaria. In 1649 he had him transferred to the St. Michaels Church in Munich, where he can still be seen in the Catholic Jesuit Church St. Michael today. The heads stayed in Bremen because the elector already owned two heads by Kosmas and Damian from the cathedral treasury in Bamberg.

The Bremen heads came into the possession of the Bremen Catholics, who after the Peace of Westphalia were looked after by two Jesuits as court chaplains of the imperial resident - as a grant from the Bremen Council . The heads were exhibited again in 1934 by the then dean Friedrich Hardinghaus in the former Franciscan church and later provost church of St. Johann and, under provost August Sandtel, withdrawn from circulation in 1968 as presumably fake. Provost Klaus Plate buried it in 1994 under the floor of the newly built crypt under the nave.

Patronage

Kosmas and Damian belong - like Cyrus and like Pantaleon - to a group of saints who are called "holy money despisers", Greek: Agioi Anárgyroi (Άγιοι Ανάργυροι), because they stand out from their (poor) patients for their services as doctors or pharmacists not get paid.

The saints are patron saints of the cities of Essen , Florence , Bödefeld , Gau-Algesheim , Igarassu , El Prat de Llobregat , Gondomar S. Cosme , medical faculties , a variety of medical professions (e.g. bathers , wet nurses , doctors , pharmacists ) as well of the sick , hairdressers and confectioners . You will be called in distress, ulcers, plague and horse diseases. Derived from their name, which is derived from the Italian medici (doctors), the saints are also the patron saints of the Medici .

Attributes

The attributes of the saints often depicted include medical instruments and medicine containers , with Kosmas mostly as a doctor with a urinary glass (matula) and Damian as a skilled surgeon and from the 13th century mainly as a pharmacist with an ointment can or a "first-aid kit" (mostly also with ointment spatula) is shown. The brothers with their martyrdom symbols sword and palm branch are more rarely depicted. They are often depicted in the clothing of medieval doctors in red coats, red coats, and round hats.

Remembrance day

The day of remembrance of the two saints in the Roman Catholic Church of 26. September and was probably related to the consecration of the Church of the Saints in Rome , has been handed down as the date of September 27th. In the Orthodox churches he falls on July 1 and the 1 November . Other festive days are October 17th and November 18th. In addition, “the holy and miraculous anargyrs Kosmas and Damian [...] and all holy disinterested people” are commemorated in the Proskomidy of the Divine Liturgy of the Byzantine Rite .

Both belong to the canon saints whose names are mentioned in the first prayer of the Roman Catholic Church . Kosmas and Damian are also mentioned in the All Saints' Litany .

Pawn rule

The the name- appropriate Bauer rule is: St. Cosmas and St. Damian captures the leaves to color on.

See also

literature

St. Kosmas and Damian ( Johann Anwander , 1762), Study Church of the Assumption , Dillingen on the Danube
  • Ludwig Deubner : Kosmas and Damian: Texts and Introduction. Teubner, Leipzig / Berlin 1907 ( digitized ; basic collection of material and historical-philological processing).
  • Ernst Rupprecht : Cosmae et Damiani sanctorum medicorum vitam et miracula e codice Londinensi (= New German Research. Department of Classical Philology. Volume 1). Junker & Dünnh, Berlin 1935 (important addition to Ludwig Deubner's material compilation).
  • Walter Artelt : The patron saints of doctors and pharmacists Kosmas and Damian. Sequence of images I to XII. Merck, Darmstadt 1954.
  • Anneliese Wittmann: Kosmas and Damian: Spread of cult and popular devotion. Schmidt, Berlin 1967 (with about 800 references).
  • Franz Gräser: In the footsteps of Kosmas and Damian in Hesse and the Rhön. Attempt at a compilation. In: Würzburg medical history reports. Volume 1, 1983, pp. 213-241.
  • Eckhard Reichert:  Kosmas and Damian. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 4, Bautz, Herzberg 1992, ISBN 3-88309-038-7 , Sp. 539-540.  ( Article / beginning of article in Internet archive )
  • Elfriede Würl: Kosmas and Damian. Your impact history in Franconia. In: Würzburg specialist prose studies. Contributions to medieval medicine, pharmacy and class history from the Würzburg Medical History Institute, [Festschrift] Michael Holler on his 60th birthday. Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 1995 (= Würzburg medical-historical research , 38), ISBN 3-8260-1113-9 , pp. 134–155.
  • Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich: Kosmas and Damian, Hll. In: Encyclopedia of Fairy Tales . Vol. 8, 1996, col. 311-313.
  • Bernhard D. Haage, Wolfgang Wegner: Kosmas and Damian. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin and New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 784.
  • Agapito Bucci: I santi medici Cosma e Damiano. Armando, Rome 2016 (new overview of the sources, often with Italian translations).

Web links

Commons : Saints Cosmas and Damian  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Gerhard Fichtner : The transplanted Mohrenbein. On the interpretation of the Kosmas and Damian legend. In: Medical History Journal. Volume 3, 1968, pp. 87-100.
  2. ↑ Ludwig Deubner: Kosmas and Damian: Texts and Introduction. Teubner, Leipzig / Berlin 1907, p. 62.
  3. ↑ Ulrike Ott-Voigtländer: The St. Georgener recipe. An Alemannic pharmacopoeia of the 14th century from the Karlsruhe Codex St. Georgen 73 , Part I: Text and dictionary. Würzburg 1979 (= Würzburg medical-historical research , 17), p. 24.
  4. ↑ Elfriede Würl: Kosmas and Damian. Your impact history in Franconia. In: Würzburg specialist prose studies. 1995, pp. 134-155; here: p. 134 f.
  5. ↑ cf. Bremer Chronik by Gerd Rinesberch and Herbord Schene . In: Bremen . Historical commission at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences by Hermann Meinert (Ed.), Schünemann Verlag, Bremen 1968, (Chronicles of the German cities from the 14th to the 16th century; Vol. 37: The chronicles of the cities of Lower Saxony), p. 112 ; Regesta of the Archbishops of Bremen , Joseph König and Otto Heinrich May (edit.), Hanover: Self-published by the Historical Commission, 1971, (Publications of the Historical Commission for Hanover, Oldenburg, Braunschweig, Schaumburg-Lippe and Bremen; Vol. 11,2, 2), Vol. 2, Vol. 2: 1327-1344, No. 508; Joseph König: On the biography of Burchard Grelle, Archbishop of Bremen and the history of his pontificate (1327-1344) . In: Stader yearbook . 76: 42 (1986); Herbert Black Forest : History of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen . 5 vol., Ext. and verb. Ed., Bremen: Ed. Temmen, 1995, vol. 1: From the beginnings to the French era: (1810) . P. 70; Alfred Löhr: cult and rule, archbishopric and cathedral chapter . In: The Bremen Cathedral. Building history, excavations, art treasures. Manual u. Catalog for the special exhibition from June 17 to September 30, 1979 in the Bremen State Museum - Focke Museum . Karl Heinz Brandt (co-worker), Bremen: Bremer Landesmuseum, 1979, (Focke-Museum, Bremen. Hefte; No. 49, often: 52), pp. 102 and 128 as well as catalog No. 31, documents and seals of the archbishop Burchard Grelle ; Bodo Heyne: The doctor saints Kosmas and Damian and the Bremen Cathedral . In: Hospitium Ecclesiae: Research on the history of the church in Bremen . 9: 7-21 (1975); Johannes Focke: The saints Cosmas and Damian and their reliquary in the cathedral of Bremen . In: Bremisches Jahrbuch . Vol. 17 (1895), pp. 128-161.
  6. ^ Konrad Elmshäuser : The nascent territorial state of the archbishops of Bremen (1236-1511): I. The archbishops as sovereigns . In: History of the country between the Elbe and Weser . 3 vols., Hans-Eckhard Dannenberg and Heinz-Joachim Schulze (eds.) On behalf of the landscape association of the former duchies of Bremen and Verden , landscape association of the former duchies of Bremen and Verden, Stade 1995 and 2008, (series of publications of the landscape association of the former. Duchies of Bremen and Verden; No. 7), Vol. II: Mittelalter (1995), pp. 159–189, here p. 177. Emphasis in the original, omission not in the original, ISBN 978-3-9801919-8-2 .
  7. ^ Konrad Elmshäuser: The nascent territorial state of the archbishops of Bremen (1236-1511): I. The archbishops as sovereigns . In: History of the country between the Elbe and Weser : 3 vols., Hans-Eckhard Dannenberg and Heinz-Joachim Schulze (eds.) On behalf of the Landscape Association of the Former Duchies of Bremen and Verden , Landscape Association of the Former Duchies of Bremen and Verden, Stade 1995 and 2008, (series of publications of the regional association of the former duchies of Bremen and Verden; No. 7), Vol. II: Mittelalter (1995), pp. 159-189, here p. 178, ISBN 978-3-9801919-8-2 .
  8. ↑ Wilhelm Tacke: St. Johann in Bremen a history of more than 600 years - from the beggar monks to the provosts , Bremen 2006 p. 172 ff
  9. ↑ Singular anárgyros (ανάργυρος), literally: "moneyless", derived from the Greek árgyros (άργυρος) = silver, money.
  10. ↑ Richard Zacharuk (Ed.): Ikonen / Icons. Icon Museum Frankfurt a. M. Legat-Verlag, Tübingen 2005, ISBN 3-932942-20-5 , including the chapter Icons and Medicine , pp. 298–323.
  11. ↑ Wilhelm R. Dietrich: Doctor and pharmacist in the mirror of their old patrons Kosmas and Damian: Kultbasis - Kultweg - Kultzeichen - Kultorte in Baden-Württemberg. Lindenberg im Allgäu - Warthausen 2005.
  12. ↑ Wolfgang-Hagen Hein , Dirk Arnold Wittop Koning (Hrsg.): Image catalog for the history of pharmacy (= publications of the International Society for the History of Pharmacy. New series, volume 33). Stuttgart 1969, pp. 116 and 165-169.
  13. ↑ Friedrich v. Zglinicki : Uroscopy in the fine arts. An art and medical historical study of the urine examination. Ernst Giebeler, Darmstadt 1982, pp. 135–146 ( Only heaven helps in times of need. The phenomenon of Cosmas and Damian. ).
  14. ↑ Kosmas in the Ecumenical Lexicon of Saints
  15. ^ Bernhard D. Haage, Wolfgang Wegner: Kosmas and Damian. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin and New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 784.