Nikolaus von Zitzewitz

Huysburg Monastery (1810)

Nikolaus von Zitzewitz OSB (born April 1, 1634 in Besswitz , † October 24, 1704 in the Huysburg Monastery ) was abbot of the Huysburg Benedictine Monastery and a diplomat from the Prince-Bishop of Münster .

Life

Career

Nikolaus von Zitzewitz came from the Pomeranian noble family von Zitzewitz . He was born on April 1, 1634, the eldest son of eight children - six sons and two daughters - of Georg von Zitzewitz in Besswitz in Hinterpommern , one of the family's oldest estates. He received his education in Stolp and from 1650 on the Stettin pedagogy . In March 1652 he enrolled in Lutheran theology at the University of Greifswald , but stayed there only for a short time, since his father died in 1654; In addition, the Pennalism prevailing at the university spoiled his studies. After a ten-month stay in Besswitz, he went to continue his studies at the University of Helmstedt , where Georg Calixt had a decisive influence on him. Calixt, leading head of the Irish people in the denominational dispute, not only wanted to reconcile Lutherans and Reformed people , but also included the Catholic Church in his unification plan . These attempts at understanding, which suited Nikolaus' character, as well as the excessive attacks with which the orthodox Wittenberg theologians in particular showered the revered teacher, led Nikolaus to turn away from Protestantism. He converted to the Catholic Church in Cologne in 1656, where he made the Catholic creed in front of the papal nuncio Giuseppe Maria Sanfelice .

Benedictines in Werden, Siegburg and Corvey

After the conversion he entered the Benedictine Abbey of Werden as a monk . His superiors soon noticed him for his cleverness. After a short time he was sent by the abbot to the Siegburg monastery to reform it. In doing so, Nikolaus showed himself to be so agile that the Corvey Abbot Arnold IV. De Valdois called him to Corvey in 1660. After his death in 1661, the Bishop of Münster Christoph Bernhard von Galen took over the administration of Corvey. In 1664 he appointed Nikolaus cellarer (economic manager) of the monastery . Corvey was deeply in debt and involved in legal disputes with the city of Höxter . In just a few years, Nikolaus managed not only to free the abbey from debt, but also to secure annual income of 40,000 thalers . He also achieved that the city of Höxter, which Rudolf August von Braunschweig sought to bring under his sovereignty, was retained by the monastery and the disputes were ended in 1674 by a recess that gave the city a new constitution and in particular the denomination of the city's churches finally settled.

Vicar General, Abbot, Diplomat and Governor

In 1673 Prince-Bishop Bernhard von Galen appointed Nikolaus prior and vicar general and entrusted him with diplomatic missions. In 1676, with the express permission of Elector Friedrich Wilhelm von Brandenburg, he was sent to the Huysburg Monastery, which had experienced a decline under the aged Abbot Sebastian von Horn . The convent elected Nicholas unanimously as administrator on December 29, 1676 , and after Sebastian von Horn's forced abdication, he was confirmed as abbot of the Huysburg monastery in April 1677. In a very short time the monastery flourished under his leadership. He also tried to get back the documents and documents of the monastery that had been lost during the Thirty Years War . His updating of the monastery chronicle is particularly worth mentioning. Nikolaus, who lived partly in Huysburg, partly in Corvey or Halberstadt , remained a clever adviser to his prince-bishop friend von Galen. Particularly difficult missions took him to foreign courts. In 1677, during the Swedish-Danish War, he was at Christian V's court in Copenhagen, where the king presented him with a precious royal picture set with diamonds out of gratitude.

In 1677 he was appointed governor of the duchies of Bremen and Verden , which had been relinquished by Sweden and briefly defeated the monastery of Münster . After the death of Bernhard von Galen, his successor Ferdinand von Fürstenberg also placed his trust in Nikolaus and confirmed him as governor until Bremen-Verden fell back to Sweden on March 29, 1679.

On September 5, 1696, at the instigation of the Bursfeld Congregation and with the consent of Elector Friedrich III. the impoverished Benedictine Abbey of St. Simeon and Mauritius in Minden was combined with the Huysburg Abbey, which significantly increased Nikolaus' sphere of activity.

Since 1684 he was ailing, suffered from gout and colic , and since Christmas 1703 several strokes had damaged his health. Devoted to God, according to contemporary witnesses, he endured the plagues as a divine providence and died, surrounded by his brothers, on October 24, 1704 after 28 years of successful reign. On November 10th he was buried in the presence of high ecclesiastical and secular dignitaries in the Huysburg monastery church. A richly decorated epitaph commemorates him.

Trivia

A precious cross inherited from abbot to abbot according to monastery custom is said to have been a gift from Queen Charlotte of Prussia to Abbot Nicholas.

Von Zitzewitz is considered to be one of the possible authors of the Vaticinium Lehninense .

swell

• F. Conrad Bruninghoff: Catastrophe Vitæ Et Mortis In Monte Moria, Or: Der Todt im Leben, Das Leben im Tode Auff den Berg Moria, etc. , funeral speech for Nikolaus von Zitzwitz, Halberstadt 1704 ( digitized ), reprint 2014 in the EDITION HUY

literature

• Dirk Klingner: Nikolaus von Zitzewitz (1634–1704) - country nobleman from Pomerania is looking for ways to reconcile the churches. In: Pomerania. Journal of Culture and History. Issue 2/2020, ISSN  0032-4167 , pp. 37-41.
• Wilhelm Kohl :  Zitzewitz, Nicolaus von. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 14, Bautz, Herzberg 1998, ISBN 3-88309-073-5 , Sp. 555-557.
• Max von Stojentin: History of the von Zitzewitz family , Part II, Vol. 1, pp. 173-181 ( digitized version )

Individual evidence

1. ↑ How Höxter became Protestant
2. ↑ Illustrations of the epitaph (Raymond Faure)