Nikolauskapelle (Nijmegen)

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The Nikolauskapelle in Nijmegen

The Nikolauskapelle or Valkhofkapelle in the Dutch Nijmegen ( German  Nijmegen ) is one of the original two chapels of the Nijmegen Castle Valkhof . It is one of the oldest buildings in the Netherlands and the oldest surviving part of the Nijmegen palace complex .

Building history

The Nikolauskapelle on the Palatinate founded by Charlemagne is a central building originally made of tuff stones in a mortar bond . A sixteen-sided, covered corridor surrounds an octagonal central room, with a portal building in front of it in the west. The two-story corridor had a clear width of almost 12 meters. Its outer walls had arched openings that were let into blind windows . The height of the bypass building did not reach that of the clearly elevated central room, to which it opens up through arcades on the ground floor . The arcades rest on simply profiled, protruding striker plates . The first floor ceiling of the gallery consists of flat groin vaults that support the floor of the gallery . Access to the gallery was made possible by a neighboring building; the chapel did not have a staircase. The openings of the gallery to the central room were provided with double arches over a central column, whose bases and cube capitals of the original building have been partially preserved. The upper end of the central room and the roof solution of the oldest building as a whole are unknown. A flat ceiling probably closed off the space from the central tent roof .

After an initial destruction, in which the upper part of the central room and the entire gallery floor were damaged, the building was renewed in approximately the same forms and using the same materials, but a different type of mortar was used, which allows the old to be added again distinguish. A reconstruction after another destruction meant that only two thirds of the original structure are preserved today. During this restoration, two thirds of the outer wall were replaced, the central building was made higher and provided with a new roof that is still preserved today. According to the results of a dendrochronological examination, the roof structure can be dated to the year 1393/94. In the ten yokes of the gallery, which had to be renewed, rib vaults were inserted . Its ribs were made of profiled bricks, just like the entire masonry was made of bricks. The windows of the outer walls were designed as Gothic tracery , the building as a whole was modernized and adapted to the ideas of the time.

Dating

The building is clearly based on the Palatine Chapel in Aachen , which led to it being dated to its Carolingian model right up to the middle of the 19th century. As early as the 19th century, however, dating to the 11th century was put up for discussion. As a result of a first modern scientific analysis of the building, Hans van Agt dated the original structure to around 1030 in 1957. A large part of the research followed.

But there are also divergent views and the connection with a building occasion depends on the dating. So Barbara Perlich and Gabrielle van Tussenbroek suspect at a date due to the Baubefundes in 1030 a creation of Emperor Conrad II. , Possibly on the occasion of the wedding of his son Henry III. with his first wife Gunhild in 1036. With a similar dating, Torsten Fremer assumes that the abbess Theophanu , granddaughter of the empress, who died in Nijmegen in 991, influenced the building of the chapel. The possibility is also being considered that the chapel was opened as early as 980 by Empress Theophanu in thanks for the happy birth of her son Otto III. was commissioned in the nearby Reichswald for their "favorite saint" Nikolaus von Myra . Elizabeth den Hartog again takes the view that Otto III. donated the chapel around 996 as a memorial building for his deceased mother.

Completely different and with the first destruction of the Valkhof, which is proven to have taken place in 1047, Aart JJ Mekking connects the building, which in his opinion was tackled afterwards. This contradicts the dating of the restorations and the degree of the first destruction, which, according to the results of the building history studies, took place around 1155 and in the late 14th century.

  • Nikolauskapelle June 2018

  • Chapel floor plan

  • inner space

  • Nikolauskapelle December 2010

literature

  • Hans van Agt: The Nikolauskapelle on the Valkhof zu Nymwegen. In: Carolingian and Ottonian art. Become. Essence. Effect (= research on art history and Christian archeology. Volume 3). Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden, 1957, 179–192.
  • Elizabeth den Hartog: a chapel in honor of Theophanus? The St. Nicholas Chapel on the Valkhof in Nijmegen. In: Dirk Callebaut, Horst van Cuyck (ed.): The legacy of Charlemagne 814–2014. Provinciebestuur Oost-Vlaanderen, Gent 2015, ISBN 978-90-74311-89-2 , pp. 228-232.
  • Hans Erich Kubach , Albert Verbeek : Romanesque architecture on the Rhine and Maas. Catalog of pre-Romanesque and Romanesque monuments. Deutscher Verlag für Kunstwissenschaft, Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-87157-053-2 , pp. 882-885.
  • Barbara Perlich, Gabri van Tussenbroek: Valkhofkapelle Nijmegen (Nijmegen). New insights into medieval building history. In: Architectura. Volume 38/1, 2008, pp. 35-48.
  • Aart JJ Mekking: De Sint Nicolaaskapel op het Valkhof te Nijmegen. Patrocinia, functie, voorbeeld en betekenis. Nijmegen Municipal Office, Nijmegen 1996.

Web links

Commons : Nikolauskapelle  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ For a description of the building and the sequence of the building phases, see Barbara Perlich, Gabri van Tussenbroek: Valkhofkapelle Nimwegen (Nijmegen). New insights into medieval building history. In: Architectura. Volume 38/1, 2008, pp. 35-48; a summary of this study under Nijmegen, Valkhofkapelle, building, destruction and reconstruction history 1000-1400 . Research project TU Berlin.
  2. ↑ Compare for example Jacob Burckhardt : The Church of Ottmarsheim. In: Communications from the Society for Patriotic Antiquities in Basel. Volume 2, 1844, pp. 27–32, here: p. 31 ( digitized version ); Franz Kugler : Handbook of Art History. Ebner & Seubert, Stuttgart 1842, p. 355 ( digitized version ).
  3. ^ Franz Kugler: History of Architecture. Volume 2: History of Romanesque architecture, Ebner & Seubert, Stuttgart 1858, p. 317 ( digitized version ).
  4. ↑ Hans van Agt: The Nikolauskapelle on the Valkhof zu Nymwegen. In: Carolingian and Ottonian art. Become. Essence. Effect (= research on art history and Christian archeology. Volume 3). Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden, 1957, 179–192.
  5. ↑ So Barbara Perlich, Gabri van Tussenbroek: Valkhofkapelle Nimwegen (Nijmegen). New insights into medieval building history. In: Architectura. Volume 38/1, 2008, pp. 35–48 with note 7 on further representatives; Hans Erich Kubach , Albert Verbeek : Romanesque architecture on the Rhine and Maas. Catalog of pre-Romanesque and Romanesque monuments. Deutscher Verlag für Kunstwissenschaft, Berlin 1976, p. 882 f.
  6. ↑ Barbara Perlich, Gabri van Tussenbroek: Valkhofkapelle Nimwegen (Nijmegen). New insights into medieval building history. In: Architectura. Volume 38/1, 2008, pp. 35-48.
  7. ↑ Torsten Fremer: Abbess Theophanu and the Essen monastery. Memory and individuality in the Ottonian-Salic times. Peter Pomp, Bottrop 2002, ISBN 3-89355-233-2 , pp. 79-81.
  8. ↑ Andreas Schmitt: The spread of the Nikolauskult in the Rhineland. Theophanus' role as initiator. In: Peter von Steinitz (Ed.): Theophanu. Ruling Empress of the Western Empire. Freundeskreis St. Pantaleon, Cologne 2000, ISBN 3-9805197-1-6 , pp. 70–84, here: p. 73.
  9. ↑ Elizabeth den Hartog: A chapel in honor of Theophanus? The St. Nicholas Chapel on the Valkhof in Nijmegen. In: Dirk Callebaut, Horst van Cuyck (ed.) The legacy of Charlemagne 814–2014. Gent 2015, pp. 228-232.
  10. ↑ Aart JJ Mekking: De Sint Nicolaaskapel op het Valkhof te Nijmegen. Patrocinia, functie, voorbeeld en betekenis. Gemeentearchief Nijmegen, Nimwegen 1996, p. 3.
  11. ↑ Barbara Perlich, Gabri van Tussenbroek: Valkhofkapelle Nimwegen (Nijmegen). New insights into medieval building history. In: Architectura. Volume 38/1, 2008, pp. 35-48.

Coordinates: 51 ° 50 ′ 53 "  N , 5 ° 52 ′ 12"  E