Beneficiary
A benefice house was on the one hand the house that was assigned to the owner of a spiritual benefice as an official residence, in particular the house of the pastor or chaplain, on the other hand the house of a foundation that maintained a town or a village for the citizens to help those in to offer asylum to the need who had contributed financially in good time. Completely poor and strangers were dependent on the asylum of the churches .
The buildings that have survived are in Switzerland, for example, the beneficiary houses in the old town of Rapperswil , the citizens' asylum and beneficiary house (by Leonhard Zeugheer ) in Zurich and the former beneficiary house in Winterthur, now the "Neumarkt Old Age Center", and in Germany the beneficiary house (Darmstadt) .