Cross stones (Hiddestorf)

The cross stones in front of the church in Hiddestorf

The cross stones , formerly also called the 5 stones , are a group of five cross stones in Hiddestorf , a district of Hemmingen in the Hanover region in Lower Saxony . The cross stones, also known as plague stones or Swedish stones, are shown in the coat of arms of the district. Preserved cross stones from the Middle Ages are rare in the region of the former district of Hanover . The stones are under monument protection .

history

The cross stones are marked under the name Die 5 Steine on the map of the Kurhannoversche Landaufnahme taken in 1781, southeast of Hiddestorf on the road towards Pattensen . At some unexplained point in time, they were removed from this location and have apparently largely been forgotten.

In 1934, while researching his work The medieval stone crosses, cross and memorial stones in Lower Saxony, while searching for cross stones in the Calenberger Land, the author Adolf Hoffmann found a single stone "picturesque under a willow " on the corridor border towards Harkenbleck , i.e. east of Hiddestorf. The sieve stone had already been found in a corridor west of Harkenbleck in 1911 .

A Hiddestorfer farm owner told Hoffmann that the cross stone was found during earthworks on the embankment of a water channel and that it was set up by him at its temporary location. Five such cross stones once stood in the Hiddestorf district in the direction of Pattensen. A royal Hanoverian forester told the Hiddestorfer farmer many years ago that these "plague or Swedish stones" were once used to cover the gully.

In 1936, when new earthworks were due in the same section, the four other cross stones mentioned by the forester were exposed. The municipality of Hiddestorf had the five cross stones temporarily set up together in the drainage ditch on the southern edge of the Chaussee to Pattensen. The location, taken from the map from the 18th century, was about two thirds of the way from Hiddestorf to the district boundary with Pattensen.

At a later time, the five cross stones were moved to the churchyard of the Nikolai Church in Hiddestorf, which was renovated in 1974 . The road from Hiddestorf to Pattensen was later widened and provided with a bicycle path on the south side .

description

The five cross stones stand south of the Hiddestorfer church in a semicircle open to the southeast, staggered on the edge of the churchyard behind a low wall on the edge of Ostertorstrasse , the arterial road towards Pattensen.

The left cross stone

The cross stone on the far left

Back of the cross stone on the far left

The cross stone on the far left is the westernmost one. It is a 90 cm high and 58 cm wide disc cross stone made of sandstone with a thickness of 16 cm.

The stone is damaged or worn. Partial abrasion marks can be seen on the upper side . Both sides show a raised paw cross in bas-relief in a recessed disk . The one on the back is sloped to the right edge. Several bowl-like depressions can also be seen on the back .

The half-left cross stone

The cross stones half left

Back of the cross stone half left

The cross stone on the left inside is a 107 cm high and 46 cm wide disc cross stone made of sandstone with a thickness of 16 cm.

The stone is a rounded, weathered stele . Both sides show a weathered and worn paw cross in a recessed disk 39 cm in diameter. The one on the front is flush with the front surface, the one on the back is separated from the front surface by the circular line.

The middle cross stone

The cross stone in the middle

Back of the cross stone in the middle

The middle of the five cross stones placed in the churchyard is a 90 cm high and 65 cm wide sandstone with a thickness of 20 cm.

The lines of a crucifix are carved into a recessed rectangle on the front of the badly weathered and damaged cross stone . The Corpus Christi is raised flat. A rather weathered inscription is engraved in Gothic minuscule in the wide circumferential lettering. The signs that can only be recognized in fragments ... ano dni mcccxcv ... in the luce ... are interpreted as the date of October 18, the day of the Evangelist Luke , in the year 1395.

A faint relief of a longitudinally oriented nasal cross can be seen on the back of the stone .

The cross stone supposedly comes from a former gravestone from an earlier cemetery about three kilometers from the city of Pattensen . For a long time, he stood alone on the field boundary northeast of Hiddestorf.

According to Hoffmann, the stone is said to have been set in memory of a Swedish officer who fell there , or, according to another opinion, from the time of the " great plague " and to commemorate those who died there.

The half right cross stone

The cross stone half right

Back of the cross stone half right

The cross stone on the right inside is a 90 cm high and 50 cm wide disc cross stone made of sandstone with a thickness of 15 cm.

The stone is a rounded, weathered and damaged stele. The front shows a raised paw cross in a recessed disc of 46 cm diameter. It is inclined to the right edge and separated from the front surface by the circular line. The back does not show a disc field. Instead, you can see a deeply grooved, narrow-beamed paw cross, inclined to the left. The intersection has been largely destroyed by impacts or drilling.

The right cross stone

The cross stone on the far right

Back of the cross stone right outside

The cross stone on the far right is a 84 cm high and 60 cm wide sandstone with a thickness of 20 cm.

The badly damaged stone looks squat, its upper right corner is chipped. This could also be the result of a long period of abrasion using medieval cutting and stabbing weapons . On both sides, the stone shows a longitudinally oriented, broad-beamed cross with outlines intersecting in the middle.

The Hiddestorfer coat of arms

Coat of arms of Hiddestorf

In 1958, the council of the municipality of Hiddestorf decided to get a coat of arms. As a special feature of the place and because no historical coat of arms was known, the five cross stones were chosen as a motif.

Alfred Brecht's draft was approved on June 18, 1958 by the Lower Saxony Minister of the Interior .

"In the middle of the green shield is the memorial stone adorned with a crucifix, on which the year MCCCXCV (1395) can be seen in the circumferential lettering in Gothic capitals, accompanied on the left and right by two Gothic cross stones, all stones in silver ."

See also

• Section “Hiddestorf” in the list of architectural monuments in Hemmingen

Web links

Commons : Cross stones  - collection of images

literature

• Adolf Hoffmann: The medieval stone crosses, cross and memorial stones in Lower Saxony (= sources and representations on the history of Lower Saxony, vol. 42), Hildesheim; Leipzig: Lax, 1935, pp. 20-21
• Hans-Herbert Möller (ed.), Werner Müller, Günther EH Baumann (co-author): Cross stones and stone crosses in Lower Saxony, Bremen and Hamburg. Existing and lost legal monuments and memorial stones (= research on the preservation of monuments in Lower Saxony , vol. 5), in the series Lower Saxony State Administration Office - Publications of the Institute for Monument Preservation , Hameln: Niemeyer, ISBN 978-3-87585-105-2 and ISBN 3-87585 -105-6 , 1988, No. 3724.2-6

Remarks

1. ↑ It is unclear whether the hallways were directly adjacent to one another at the time. According to older maps, the two were separated by a 100 m wide strip of the Pattensen and Arnum districts along the Göttinger Chaussee .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Hiddestorf (I - V) / OT von Hemmingen. www.suehnekreuz.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  
2. ^ Gehrden-Northen in: Hans-Herbert Möller (Ed.), Henner Hannig (Ed.): Landkreis Hannover. (= Monument topography Federal Republic of Germany , architectural monuments in Lower Saxony , Volume 13.1.) Friedrich Vieweg & Sohn, Braunschweig / Wiesbaden 1988, ISBN 3-528-06207-X , p. 211.
3. ↑ Hemmingen-Hiddestorf in: Hans-Herbert Möller (Ed.), Henner Hannig (Ed.): District of Hanover. (= Monument topography Federal Republic of Germany , architectural monuments in Lower Saxony , Volume 13.1.) Friedrich Vieweg & Sohn, Braunschweig / Wiesbaden 1988, ISBN 3-528-06207-X , p. 216.
4. ↑ Kurhannoversche Landesaufnahme des 18. Jahrhundert, sheet HL122 Hannover , JPG (2.09 MB) in reduced resolution free of charge in the LGLN Internet shop; Retrieved November 26, 2016
5. ^ ^{A b c} Alfred Brecht: The five cross stones before Hiddestorf. www.hiddestorf-info.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 (source: Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung from January 25/26, 1958. pp. 31–32).  
6. ↑ Hemmingen. www.kreuzstein.eu, 2006, accessed on September 9, 2019 .  
7. ↑ ^{a b} The little chronicle of Hiddestorf. www.hiddestorf-info.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  
8. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m} Hemmingen, OT Hiddestorf, Hanover region, Kirchhof ev. Parish church, 'Schweden- or Peststeine' (sandstone). www.kreuzstein.eu, 2006, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  
9. ↑ ^{a b c} Hiddestorf (II) / OT from Hemmingen in Hiddestorf (I - V) / OT from Hemmingen. www.suehnekreuz.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  
10. ↑ ^{a b} Hiddestorf (III) / OT from Hemmingen in Hiddestorf (I - V) / OT from Hemmingen. www.suehnekreuz.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  
11. ↑ ^{a b c d} Hiddestorf (I) / OT from Hemmingen in Hiddestorf (I - V) / OT from Hemmingen. www.suehnekreuz.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  
12. ↑ ^{a b} Jens Schade: Mysterious cross stones come from the Middle Ages. www.myheimat.de, September 30, 2013, accessed October 30, 2019 .  
13. ↑ ^{a b c} Hiddestorf (IV) / OT from Hemmingen in Hiddestorf (I - V) / OT from Hemmingen. www.suehnekreuz.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  
14. ↑ ^{a b} Hiddestorf (V) / OT from Hemmingen in Hiddestorf (I - V) / OT from Hemmingen. www.suehnekreuz.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  
15. ^ Former municipality of Hiddestorf. in coat of arms . www.stadthemmingen.de, accessed on October 30, 2019 .  

Coordinates: 52 ° 16 ′ 48 "  N , 9 ° 42 ′ 44.4"  E