Pastor Kraus systems
The Pfarrer-Kraus-Anlagen is a religious park landscape in Koblenz . The landscape picture Bible, which was built from 1845 and is unique in Europe, is located in the Arenberg district . They are named after their founder, the Catholic pastor Johann Baptist Kraus (1805-1893). In the park there are around 60 chapels , grottos and wayside shrines as well as a way of the cross , which were particularly suitable for people of the 19th century who were not able to read.
history
Pastor Johann Baptist Kraus took over the parish in Arenberg in 1834. Between Arenberg and Immendorf , he began to create a religious park landscape in 1845 and expanded it continuously until his death in 1893. The later German Empress Augusta was the patroness of Pastor Kraus and supported the construction of the grounds. The sculptures were designed in the Nazarene style by contemporary artists from Trier and Münster . The five different sections were laid out as follows:
- 1845–1846: Mount of Olives with eight chapels, tells the suffering of Jesus Christ from the garden of Gethsemani to the crowning of thorns
- 1845–1852: Way of the Cross, consisting of 14 stations
- 1850–1851: Redeemer Garden with the Redeemer Chapel
- 1867-1868: Marie garden, consists of chapels, depicting scenes from the life of the Mother of God show
- 1884–1892: Antoniusgarten, shows scenes from the lives of various saints
A wide variety of materials were used for the construction of the grottoes and pieces of painting. In addition to lava stones from the Eifel , which were very popular for parks in the 19th century, there were also shells, rock crystals and unusual materials such as blast furnace slag or marbles made of clay, which Pastor Kraus said he received as a gift from the children of his parish. Kraus also used spoils such as marble columns or a baroque portal. For the sculptural jewelry, Kraus initially planned individual handicrafts made of natural stone, but for cost reasons, some series products made of terracotta or artificial stone and plaster later had to be used.
Kraus wrote a guide through the facilities, which appeared in numerous editions.
In 1868, pastor Kraus brought the Dominican sisters to Arenberg to maintain the facilities , and they established the Arenberg Monastery there. Arenberg became known as a place of pilgrimage with the building of the pilgrimage church of St. Nicholas from 1860 to 1872 in neo-Romanesque style, also by Pastor Kraus. In the years that followed, the church and grounds made Arenberg a well-known place of pilgrimage. Therefore, a kiosk, which has been preserved to this day, was built opposite the church, in which devotional objects , candles and other souvenirs were sold, and specially employed guides explained the complex to the visitors.
The great popularity continued into the 1960s, after which only a few pilgrims came to Arenberg. The understanding of piety had changed and the Arenberg facilities were sometimes quite rudely referred to as " kitsch "; the theological wealth of thought with which Kraus had planned even small details was no longer accessible to the visitors. The maintenance of the complex became increasingly a burden for the parish. For a few years now, a development association has been looking after the facility, large parts of which have already been restored and returned to their original condition. The area to the south-west of the church was expanded a little by designing the area of the formerly associated nursery (in which floral decorations for the church had previously been grown) also as a park.
Recently, larger numbers of visitors have been recorded again, with many visitors also coming to Arenberg for historical reasons.
description
Starting from the entrance area of the church, the visitor is led the following circular route through the Pfarrer-Kraus-Anlagen amidst the dense forest. The way of the cross is not walked in chronological order and the area is cut through by the L127.
Outbound on a distance of approx. 700 m to the west (red arrow):
- Way of the Cross Stations 9 and 8, then crossing the street
- Mount of Olives
- Mariengarten
- Way of the Cross (beginning)
Way back to the east (yellow arrow):
- Way of the Cross (Stations 1–6), at Station 5 the road to the monastery goes off
- Detour to Antoniusgarten and Kreuzweg station 7, crossing the street
- Way of the Cross Station 8 and Garden of Savior
- around the apse and the north facade of the church Stations of the Cross, Stations 9-14.
On the Way of the Cross, all 14 stations are uniformly designed as sandstone reliefs within a rock cladding. There is always a small cross made of Jerusalem olive wood under the station number.
On the Mount of Olives you first come across an octagon made of quartz and rock crystal with an angel statue in front of glass paintings depicting the city of Jerusalem.
In the garden of Gethsemane in a hairpin there is a grotto with a group of sculptures of the sleeping disciples Peter , Johannes and James . In the next grotto, Christ kneels with outstretched arms in front of a glass window with a passion angel. From here you can take a few steps to reach the group of sculptures The Treason of Judas . On the long path straight ahead to the Mariengarten there are four chapels with sculptures, depicting scenes from the Passion of Christ: the capture of Christ , mockery , flagellation (in a hexagon) and crowning of thorns .
The House of Nazareth with scenes around the birth of Christ ( Joseph statue , grotto with sculptural group of the Annunciation ) is located in the Mariengarten . Around the building there are houses with reliefs from the life of Mary . Behind it, to the westernmost turning point of the circular route, there are relief scenes commemorating the pain of Mary . In keeping with this tradition, this place is also known as the “Garden of the 7 Sorrows of Mary”.
There is a small pond in the Antoniusgarten , which branches off in a triangular shape behind the 6th station from the Way of the Cross. The grotto of Lourdes is recreated here. A little further on is the hermitage of Francis of Assisi . Next to it is the Antonius Chapel with a kneeling statue of Saint Anthony of Padua . Another statue of Antonius stands by the lake.
The heart of the Redeemer Garden is the chapel with the theme "Redemption from Evil". Two trees of paradise are depicted on its facade, the tree of life with angel heads instead of apples and, as a counterpart, the tree of knowledge , which bears skulls. The blind pillars of the round arches are the trunks of the trees. The gable is occupied by the apocalyptic sun woman from chapter 12 of the Revelation of John , who is threatened by the seven-headed dragon (symbolizing Satan). In front of the chapel there is a group of sculptures Expulsion from Paradise . Inside there is a Baroque Pietà of unknown provenance, possibly from the Johanniskirche in Lahnstein , which was destroyed in 1794 ; it was restored by Franz Ittenbach .
In the Sacred Heart Grotto next to the Redeemer Chapel there are two Christ statues. A botanical attraction of the Redeemer Garden is the California giant sequoia , which was planted in 1885 and reached a trunk circumference of 4.17 m at the ground in 2005.
Before returning to the church, one finds the sandstone sculpture group Death of Saint Joseph with Mary and Christ in a final grotto.
Pastor Kraus is buried in the cemetery north of the church.
Lourdes grotto
Sequoia in the Redemption Garden
"Nativity" stained glass window in the baptistery
Detail of the mosaic wall made of stones and shells
Monument protection
The Pfarrer-Kraus-Anlagen is a protected cultural monument according to the Monument Protection Act (DSchG) and has been registered in the list of monuments of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate since 1987 . They are located in Koblenz-Arenberg in the monument zone of the Arenberg pilgrimage complex .
The Pfarrer-Kraus-Anlagen has been part of the UNESCO World Heritage Upper Middle Rhine Valley as the northernmost point since 2002 .
literature
- Johann Clausen: Description of the holy places in Arenberg. Trier 1907 ( digitized version )
- Silvia Maria Busch: The Grail Temple Idea and Industrialization. St. Nicholas of Arenberg. A pilgrimage site of the Catholic Late Romanticism in the Rhineland (1845–1892). Diss. Univ. Frankfurt. - Frankfurt a. M .: Art History Institute of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University 1984 (= Frankfurt Fundamentals of Art History, Volume IV).
- Rainer Schwindt (ed.): The pastor Kraus plants to Arenberg. Calvary, Bible Garden and Pilgrimage Complex (QAmrhKG 139), Mainz 2015.
- Ulrike Weber (edit.): Cultural monuments in Rhineland-Palatinate. Monument topography Federal Republic of Germany. Volume 3.3: City of Koblenz. Districts. Werner, Worms 2013, ISBN 978-3-88462-345-9 .
Web links
- Pfarrer-Kraus-Anlagen ( memento from September 17, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) in: koblenz-arenberg.de
- Pfarrer-Kraus-Anlagen in: arenberg-info.de
- Information on the landscape picture Bible
Individual evidence
- ↑ edition from 1892: http://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb10931639_00005.html
- ↑ General Directorate for Cultural Heritage Rhineland-Palatinate (ed.): Informational directory of cultural monuments - district-free city of Koblenz (PDF; 1.5 MB), Koblenz 2013
Coordinates: 50 ° 22 ′ 7 ″ N , 7 ° 39 ′ 11 ″ E