Parochial Church (Berlin)
The Parochialkirche in the parish of Berlin Stadtmitte is a church of the Evangelical parish of St.Petri-St.Marien in the Berlin district of Mitte . The building, built from 1695 onwards, is the oldest church in the Reformed community in Berlin.
location
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The church and the associated cemetery are located between Klosterstraße , Parochialstraße and Waisenstraße directly behind the old city wall of Berlin , which is partially preserved at this point. The historic churchyard with a number of old grave crosses and tablets is located on the church grounds. Behind it, the three-story parish hall of the former Evangelical Georgen Parish congregation limits the area. In 1968 the previously independent Parochial parish merged with the Georgen parish, which finally merged into the Marian parish in 2003. There is also a baroque building that was built as early as 1708 and served as a parish hall and hospital, but since the late 1990s it has housed part of the theological faculty of the Humboldt University .
prehistory
The Parochialkirche is the first Berlin church that was built especially for the supporters of the Reformed Church . The Reformed congregation in Berlin and Cölln came into being after the Brandenburg Elector Johann Sigismund converted to Calvinism in 1613. Since 1632 she used the Lutheran cathedral in what was then Cölln as well as the associated burial place and in 1694 asked Elector Friedrich III, later King Friedrich I of Prussia , for permission to build her own church in Berlin. For this purpose, the Privy Councilors Eberhard von Danckelmann , Georg von Berchem and Joachim Scultetus von Unfried (1638–1705) purchased the property between Klosterstrasse and Waisengasse on which the property of the former electoral alchemist , chemist and glassmaker Johannes was commissioned by the parish Kunckel stood. The elector confirmed the purchase and approved the construction of the church for the personal parish without an associated parish , i.e. without its own parish area, which arose from the supporters of the reformed church of the cathedral parish. From the beginning, the parishioners of the first century included important representatives of Berlin politics and culture such as the ministers Johann Kasimir Kolbe von Wartenberg and Samuel von Cocceji , the master builder Johann Boumann , the porcelain manufacturer Wilhelm Caspar Wegely and the scholar Wilhelm von Humboldt . The former New Reformed City and Parish Church has had its current name since the Church of the Old Prussian Union was formed in 1817.
Planning by Johann Arnold Nering
The plans for the first construction of the Parochialkirche were made in 1694 by the master builder Johann Arnold Nering , the Friedrich III. had commissioned the construction on June 18 of that year. As the chief builder of the Electorate of Brandenburg, he was responsible for the entire construction industry of the Mark Brandenburg . The choice of this man as the builder of the church made the importance of the building project particularly clear. Nering's works, including the Köpenick Palace Chapel , were strongly characterized by Dutch and Italian influences. His design for the Parochialkirche is considered to be one of the architect's most mature works; he combined both styles. The main inspiration was obviously the Nieuwe Kerk in The Hague by Pieter Noorwits (1649/1656) and the church of Santa Maria della Consolazione in Todi (from 1508). Like these churches, his building project represented a simply structured main room with four spacious cones that were to be arranged in a cross. In front of it a portico with a pediment supported by columns was planned, which contained an entrance hall. Nering planned copper-covered domes as the roof structure , which sit on top of a high attic and in the center of which rises the three-story tower of the church with pillars. Corinthian columns gave the outer facade a beautiful structure, and cornices and a vase-crowned attic were also provided. Arched windows in the concave curved wall parts between the pillars should serve as windows. A gallery in the interior was not planned so that the sermons could take place in the center of the building.
On August 15, 1695, Friedrich III. the foundation stone for the church building, which was sunk together with a copper engraving of the floor plan, a Bible and a catechism. However, Nering died in the same year, on October 21, 1695.
Realization by Martin Grünberg
The construction work on the Parochial Church was handed over to Nering's successor, Martin Grünberg . He tried to carry out the construction with a lower budget than the planning provided, and drafted a new plan that was based on the existing foundation and accordingly had the same floor plan. Grünberg downsized the entire building by reducing the area, but remaining with the basic structure of the four-cone hall. The domes were lowered and the roofs replaced by hip roofs , the walls lost their concave shapes and were smoothed. The parapets and cornices were also eliminated, and the Corinthian columns were replaced by simpler buttresses for stabilization. The basic design of the tower was retained by Grünberg, but he placed it on a vestibule that replaced Nering's portico instead of in the center of the building. Contrary to what Nering had planned, Grünberg also built a gallery in the main room. The new laying of the foundation stone, in which the electoral couple also took part, took place in 1695 with great ceremonial effort.
On September 27, 1698, the almost complete roof vault collapsed. After a necessary re-planning, in which the architect Andreas Schlüter was also involved, and the further construction, the church building was finally inaugurated on July 8, 1703. The Prussian ruling couple, meanwhile endowed with royal dignity, also took part in this. In 1705 the construction was completed with the exception of the tower, this just reached the height of the roof and consisted of only the first floor, there was no spire. The building, finally built by Grünberg, is a baroque building, which is clad with light-colored plaster. The facade of the building is loosened up by high arched windows, and a high portal forms the entrance, also with a rounded arch at the top, which is flanked by two mighty pilaster columns. Other decorative elements and windows of various shapes were found primarily on the church tower and in the roof area. In 1705 a pulpit was built based on designs by Georg Gottfried Weyhenmeyer .
Organs
In 1732, a positive was built into the church by Joachim Wagner , which was later sold to the Berlin poor and orphanage for 35 Reichstaler . The new organ , which was also a work of Wagner, was inaugurated in 1733 . It had 34 registers , 1660 pipes as well as two manuals and a pedal. The price was 3,061 Reichstaler. Well-known organists and composers rated the sound of this organ as excellent. Rebuilds were carried out at intervals of around 30 years with adjustments to suit current tastes. In 1819, the organ builder Buchholz redesigned the tone color requirements of the Romantic era. The organ now had 38 registers and English pewter principal pipes were also installed. In 1903 the Sauer company (Frankfurt / Oder) carried out another major renovation. Now 45 registers were used, which could sound over three manuals and pedal, creating a typical sound from the early days . New organ music by Charles-Marie Widor , Max Reger and others could be heard. In 1931, the Walcker company from Ludwigsburg proposed installing a choir organ behind the altar. The realization of this and the renewed reconstruction of the main organ were carried out by the Sauer company, whose owner was Oscar Walcker. It was difficult to agree on the sound, but eventually returned to the origins of Joachim Wagner's Baroque. In the year of the war in 1944, both organs were destroyed.
The tower and the "Singuhr"
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In 1713, King Friedrich I gave the Parochial Church a carillon that had been cast in advance by Johann Jacobi and was intended for the Berlin Mint Tower . After the collapse of the mint tower, it should find a new place. In order to be able to set up the carillon, King Jean de Bodt commissioned Martin Grünberg to complete the unfinished tower and equip it with a separate floor for the carillon. For the design, Jean de Bodt used a model that he had already constructed in 1712 for the construction of the cathedral church, but which was not then completed.
The project was realized, however, by Philipp Gerlach , that of Frederick William I was commissioned. Deviating from the design, in which de Bodt provided for the tower to be crowned with a polygon , Gerlach added a slim, obelisk-like spire, otherwise he largely adopted the plans.
The bell storey is open and surrounded by four corner pillars, which in the literature with both the Roman architecture of Carlo Rainaldi on Sant'Agnese in Agone in Rome as well as with British architecture by Christopher Wren in the tower of St. Vedast in London to be associated . The tower was adorned with stone sculptures by Johann Georg Glume , Johann Gottfried Weyhenmayer and Johann Conrad Koch , including four lions. These were located under the top of the tower and seemed to support it. The construction of the tower was completed on April 24, 1714, after which the carillon was installed, which was played for the first time in 1715. The garrison church in Potsdam , designed by Philipp Gerlach, was built from 1730 to 1735 also by order of King Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia and is very similar to the Berlin Parochial Church.
Due to the slightly unclean sound, a new carillon was commissioned from the master watchmaker Jan Albert de Grave . He made it from 37 bronze bells in 1714–1717, the largest of which came from the first casting by Jacobi. A complex mechanism drove the carillon, which was controlled by a clock mechanism built into the tower. The bell melodies were very variable and rang every hour. The roar of the lions concluded every game. The melodies were changed 14 to 15 times a year for the various church holidays. This carillon received the name "Singuhr" in the Berlin population and soon became known throughout Europe. At the beginning of the 1930s there were even radio broadcasts of the glockenspiel, especially with the organist Wilhelm Bender .
Because the entire top of the tower was destroyed in World War II, the original lions are probably lost forever. After the war began, the bells were taken to a reserve store (in Hamburg ); but they were not melted down.
19th century changes
In the 19th century, the church was made a few minor changes, especially the interior. The gallery built by Grünberg was replaced by a new one in 1837/1838. This was removed again by Gustav Knoblauch and Hermann Wex together with the fixtures in the sacristy area in 1884/1885 in order to create the spatial impression originally desired by Nering. The north and south-east sides received small additions to accommodate the sacristy and a classroom. The central pulpit was later moved to the south-east pillar, and a new gallery for the organ was built in the west area on iron supports. The vaulted ceiling and the walls were given an ornamental painting and the baroque stone elements were removed. The windows were divided by sandstone. The glass was colored and the choir windows decorated with grisaille painting .
The church building between 1944 and the end of the GDR
During an Allied air raid on May 24, 1944, incendiary bombs fell on the church, causing the tower to burn out completely and crash into the nave. In 1946 the upper floor of the vestibule was converted into an emergency church in the ruins, which could only be structurally secured in 1950/1951. In 1961 Fritz Kühn made an iron cross from found scrap parts of the church, which was hung in the chancel. On August 20, 1961, one week after the construction of the wall began , the last service took place in the church. In the GDR era, the building was initially used for exhibitions and concerts, and then from 1970 as a warehouse for furniture.
On the occasion of the upgrading of the old town area for the 750th anniversary of Berlin , the building was given a new roof in 1988.
Comprehensive renovation since 1990
Main house and equipment
With the reunification of the city , an intensive renovation and restoration process began in the historic city center of Berlin. Since 1991 the building has been gradually restored. Work on the vestibule and the tower stump was completed in 2001 and on the nave in 2004. On the attic of the vestibule, one of the still preserved, original flame vase was placed together with five copies.
The main room of the church was restored as part of the work so that it can be used safely. The monument preservation concept of the Kuehn Malvezzi Architects initially rejected a reconstruction of the interior version and left it in a ruinous state, so that the walls are unplastered as a shell and the ceiling is open to the roof structure. Hand-blown glass was installed in the windows of the church. The scrap cross from the workshop of the blacksmith Fritz Kühn in the Ostkonche was posted inside . The anteroom is also largely empty. The gravestones of the former parishioners Georg von Berchem , Friedrich Ludwig Hermann Muzel and August Ludwig Carl Graul hang on the walls as epitaphs . A simple staircase leads to the upper floor. In addition to rare church services on special occasions, the church interior is primarily used as an exhibition space for art projects and other events. Donations are being collected for further construction and possible reconstruction.
View of the interior, which was initially left barren and ruined, 2005
View of the apse with cross installation
View from the apse to the entrance
View into the open roof structure of the crossing
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Reconstruction of the church tower and carillon
For the intended reconstruction of the war-torn spire and the carillon, the association Denk mal an Berlin initiated a fundraising campaign in summer 2008. The construction costs for the reconstruction of the church tower - including the restoration of the carillon - were estimated at 3.5 million euros.
In the summer of 2014, has Lottostiftung approved an amount of two million euros, together with a private donation of the entrepreneur Hans Wall in the amount of 420,000 euros secured the beginning for the tower reconstruction from February, 2015. The plans for a new tower in the contours of the original one were drawn up by the architect Jochen Langeheinecke from Werneuchen . The tower has a wooden top above a bell chamber and a room for the carillonneur and has been clad with gray copper sheet. The new carillon now consists of 52 bells. The Eijsbouts bell foundry received the order in August 2015 and the bells were tuned on February 22, 2016. The topping-out ceremony for the new steeple and the carillon took place on July 1st, 2016. On the occasion of the inauguration on October 23, 2016, the Carilloneur Wilhelm Ritter from Kassel gave a concert.
Churchyard and crypt
The churchyard is one of the oldest preserved church cemeteries in Berlin. Like the church, it was inaugurated by King Friedrich I and his wife Sophie Charlotte in 1705. It was the first churchyard of a Protestant congregation in Berlin, which until then had buried its deceased on the burial site of the cathedral church. From 1706 the first burials in the Parochialkirchhof are documented. In addition to the spatially very limited burial field, so-called side vaults were set up. Despite the small area, 5338 burials in the field and 247 in the vaults are documented. The most famous people of the 18th and 19th centuries who were buried here include the theologian and scholar Daniel Ernst Jablonski (1660–1741), the Chamberlain Friedrich Aly (approx. 1666–1716), the royal tutor Auguste Henriette Bock ( 1762–1845) and the founder of the first Berlin porcelain factory, Wilhelm Caspar Wegely . It was officially closed in 1854, after which only a few funerals took place. The last people buried here were two war dead from 1945. After the Parochialkirch-Gasse was included in today's Parochialstraße in 1862, it was widened in 1888. A part of the grave area was cleared and built over, some of the corpses were placed in the communal crypt in the churchyard.
The preserved iron crosses and tombstones from the 19th century are particularly striking in the churchyard. The rear wall is also decorated with epitaphs from the early 18th century. Two larger mausoleums , the rear wall of which also extend to the wall, have also been preserved. One of them can no longer be assigned to any family and is therefore simply called Mausoleum II. The other is the Baroque hereditary burial of Director Brink from the 17th century, which was extended by a chapel from the 19th century in the late classicist style and is therefore unique in Berlin. Particularly conspicuous graves are also the grave monuments “Ankersheim” and “Pistor” as well as the table tomb Bock, which was designed by August Stüler . An angel figure also adorns a larger communal grave in the center of the small churchyard.
There were major redesigns of the churchyard around 1936, especially in the area around the church and the parish hall. When the church was destroyed in 1944, the churchyard was also affected and restoration was very slow. Restoration of the church did not begin until 1988, and from 1999 the churchyard was secured. Funds from the special monument program “Roof + Fach” 1999/2000 were used for this purpose. From 2001 to 2003, the mausoleums were conserved and restored and the historical path and vegetation structures were restored with funds from the Deutsche Klassenlotterie Berlin Foundation. The interior of Mausoleum II was conserved and restored from 2001 to 2005.
The crypt houses 147 coffins. The 25 remaining wooden doors to the burial chambers were installed when the church was built at the end of the 17th century and thus form “the largest inventory of original baroque burial chamber doors in Europe”. The extensive crypt system has good mummifying properties due to a well thought-out ventilation system. The burials from the 18th and 19th centuries have not survived unscathed. Most of the changes and disturbances caused by human hands date back to after World War II. Nevertheless, the mummies represent a unique ensemble. From October 2000 to January 2001, an inventory was carried out by specialists from several fields. In the 110 opened coffins (locked coffins were not examined), 87 mummies or the disturbed remains of them were found, distributed over 69 coffins. In some coffins there were several individuals, but they were only placed there later. The contents of 32 coffins contained stray bones. Only nine coffins were bone-free. 52 individuals were apparently complete. 35 burials had been destroyed. 25 dead had their heads cut off in recent times. The degrees of mummification varied between individuals and were related to the season of the year in which the burial took place. The vast majority (42 burials) are only partially mummified, 32 were well mummified and 13 were completely skeletonized. The organic tissues were colored differently depending on the degree of mummification and showed a spectrum from yellowish to dark brown. Partial purple discolorations were found in nine individuals, the cause of which could not be clarified.
See also
literature
- Sibylle Badstübner-Gröger: The Parochial Church in Berlin . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich and Berlin 1998 (= large architectural monuments , issue 525).
- Christian Hammer, Peter Teicher: The Parochialkirche zu Berlin . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Berlin, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-422-02199-0 .
- Klaus Hammer: Historical cemeteries & tombs in Berlin , Stattbuch-Verlag, Berlin 1994, ISBN 3-922778-32-1 .
- Benno Klink (arr.): History of the Parochialkirche zu Berlin . Parish council of the Evangelical Georgen Parish of Berlin, Berlin 1992.
- Eugen Thiele : The carillon of the Parochialkirche in Berlin. Commemorative publication for the bicentenary of the carillon along with an appendix about the ringing of bells . Berlin 1915; Reprinted in: New Tones for Old Berlin: the Parochial Church and its Glockenspiel, new edition of the memorial from 1915 with a new appendix . Berlin 2012
- Hans-Jürgen Mende , Kurt Wernicke: Berlin district lexicon - center . Edition Luisenstadt, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-89542-111-1 .
- Landesdenkmalamt Berlin , Jörg Haspel (ed.): Parochialkirche in Berlin (contributions to the preservation of monuments in Berlin, volume 44). Michael Imhof Verlag, ISBN 978-3-7319-0238-6 .
- Margarete Schilling (Hrsg.): Eugen Thiele: Letters and records of the Carilloneurs of the Garrison Church Potsdam and the Parochial Church in Berlin. Apolda 1999
Web links
- Entries in the Berlin State Monument List: Parochial Church ,Parochial cemetery
- Parochial Church (Berlin). In: arch INFORM .
- Project page for the reconstruction of the tower with pictures of the construction progress
- Kathrin Chod, Herbert Schwenk, Hainer Weisspflug: Parochial Church . In: Hans-Jürgen Mende , Kurt Wernicke (ed.): Berliner Bezirkslexikon, Mitte . Luisenstadt educational association . Haude and Spener / Edition Luisenstadt, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-89542-111-1 ( luise-berlin.de - as of October 7, 2009).
Other sources
- Exhibition boards in the Parochial Cemetery in Berlin-Mitte
- Franziska Arndt, Klaus Bechstein, Sigrid Fundheller, Daniel Krebs, Regina Steindl, Wolf Mankiewicz in 300 years of the Parochial Church. Contributions to history , Ev. Marien parish, Berlin 2003.
Individual evidence
- ^ Church musicians in the Third Reich: Wilhelm Bender (Snippet) on books.google.de; accessed on March 12, 2014.
- ↑ parochialkirchturm.de: Glockenspiel , accessed on July 23, 2019.
- ↑ Klaus Schulte: On the fate of monumental German church bells: Delivery from 1940 - Destruction - Repatriation - Losses after 1945 ( Memento of the original from October 1, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF)
- ^ Knoblauch & Wex (Gustav Knoblauch and Hermann Wex): Parochialkirche, Berlin-Mitte. In: Architekturmuseum TU Berlin. Retrieved April 21, 2020 .
- ↑ Uwe Aulich: A point on the stump . In: Berliner Zeitung , October 27, 2014, p. 18
- ↑ Verrohter Baroque - Kuehn Malvezzi Architects win competition for the Berlin Parochial Church. In: BauNetz , December 18, 2015
- ↑ Gunnar Schupelius: The inside of the church with the new tower looks so sad . In: Berliner Zeitung , July 4, 2016
- ↑ 72 years after the collapse - The Berlin Parochial Church has a tower again. In: de- http://www.bz-berlin.de/ . Retrieved July 1, 2016 .
- ↑ New carillon sounds at Berlin Parochial Church Quelle. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on October 31, 2016 ; accessed on October 23, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Stüler: The monument to Mrs. Henriette Auguste Bock in the Parochial-Kirchhofe in Berlin . In: Zeitschrift für Bauwesen , Volume 1 (1851), Col. 146, Plate 24. Digital copy in the holdings of the Central and State Library Berlin .
- ↑ In the crypt of the Parochialkirche in Mitte . , In: Berliner Zeitung of March 8, 2016.
- ↑ Bettina Jungklaus : The mummies in the crypt of the Parochialkirche - results of the anthropological investigation . In: Bernhard Hänsel, Berthold Riese, Georg Pfeffer, Herbert Ullrich, Heidi Peter-Röcher, Annette Lewerentz (eds.): Communications from the Berlin Society for Anthropology, Ethnology and Prehistory . tape 23 . Verlag Marie Leidorf, 2002, ISSN 0178-7896 , p. 31-39 .
- ^ Bettina Jungklaus , Andreas Ströbl, Blandine Wittkopp : On the cultural-historical significance of the coffins in the Parochial Church, Berlin-Mitte . In: Archeology in Berlin and Brandenburg 2001 . Konrad Theiss Verlag, 2002, ISBN 978-3-8062-1784-1 , p. 33-38 .
- ^ Bettina Jungklaus , Daniel Krebs, Andreas Ströbl, Blandine Wittkopp : The crypt under the Parochialkirche in Berlin-Mitte . In: Ohlsdorf - magazine for mourning culture . tape IV / 2009 , no. 107 , 2009, p. 15-22 .
- ↑ Publishing Brüxenstein, 89 pages.
- ↑ stadtentwicklung.berlin.de ( Memento of the original from October 1, 2016 in the Internet Archive ; PDF) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
Coordinates: 52 ° 31 ′ 1 ″ N , 13 ° 24 ′ 47 ″ E
