Dominican monastery in Eichstätt
The Dominican monastery in Eichstätt is a former monastery of this order of preachers in Eichstätt in the diocese of Eichstätt .
Foundation and development
Sophie, wife of Count Gebhard VI. von Hirschberg († 1275) and sister of the Bavarian Duke Ludwig der Strenge , together with their sons Gerhard († 1278) and Gebhard VII († 1305) donated a plot of land in 1271 for the construction of a monastery of the Dominican Preachers on the north-eastern city wall in Eichstätt ( today Luitpoldstrasse). The Dominican Adalbero von Mässingen designed the building plan for the monastery. The soon-to-be-completed monastery, which was raised to a full Dominican convent in 1274 or 1275, was settled from the Regensburg Dominican monastery , according to other tradition, from Augsburg . According to a directory from 1301, this was the 30th monastery in the Dominican Order Province "Teutonia" and there in the "natio Bavaria". The first recorded prior was Friedrich von Kirchberg, who sealed a document in 1291; The prerequisite for a priory was that the convent had twelve clerics .
The monastery complex was expanded in the last third of the 13th century and a church was built in the Gothic style. Between 1278 and 1287, several German and foreign bishops promoted the “building of the preacher brothers in Eichstätt” by granting indulgences . The monastery burned down to a large extent on September 8, 1366, but was repaired again with the help of the Eichstatt Prince-Bishop Raban Truchseß von Wilburgstetten .
Scientific importance
From an unknown point in time, but probably very early on, the Eichstätt Dominicans established an in-house study program to instruct the next generation of the order in theology . The study of the Dominican clergy lasted eight years; Lecturers, the so-called reading masters, who did the in-house study, had to complete a two-year supplementary course beforehand. According to the ordinances of 1220 and 1228, only clerics who had completed a degree were allowed to preach. With the recognition of the Eichstätter monastery as a priory in 1278 at the latest, a lecturer can be expected in Eichstätt according to the ordinance. The first written reports about the school and lecturers in the Eichstätter monastery can only be found for the 14th century in the writings of Apollinaris Nittermayr , who was lecturer of theology, novice master , historian and last librarian of the monastery and then cathedral preacher from 1780 to 1783 . One of the most important professors of the Eichstatt Dominicans was Georg Schwarz (Nigri) with the humanist name Nigri. Several Eichstätter priors had studied at the University of Bologna .
The first monastery library as a prerequisite for home study and the preaching assignment of the order was probably destroyed in the fire in the 14th century. The records of Apollinaris Nittermayr show that since the 16th century, larger book legacies were usually left as a measurement foundation , i.e. with the obligation to regularly read masses for the deceased. However, some book holdings were also purchased. In addition, several of Eichstätts prince-bishops sponsored the library. Georg Truchseß , former abbot of the monastery Auhausen an der Wörnitz (1465–1552), which was abolished during the Reformation , bequeathed around 100 books to the Eichstätter convent; he thanked him for the welcome he had found there in exile . Larger book bequests were added by will or by purchase, for example the libraries of the canon at Eichstätter Willibaldschor and pastor in Landershofen Christoph Braun (around 1560–1611), the cathedral preacher Adam Schmid (around 1550–1616), the prince-bishop's administrator Laurentius Schmidt († around 1673 ), the pastor Friedrich Seßler von Haußheim († 1733), the Mörnsheim chaplain Friedrich Anton Strobel (acquired in 1743) and the episcopal official and councilor Joseph Heinrich Jakob de Battis (1728–1786), who bequeathed 3,000 volumes to the convent alone. Nevertheless, the Eichstätter Dominican Library, with around 100,000 volumes in the end, was one of the smaller monastery libraries when it was abolished in secularization .
From 1645 and 1652, the Dominicans were also able to teach philosophy at their home school . However, through the admission of non-religious students, tensions arose with the Eichstatt Jesuits , who also taught philosophy. As a result, the Dominicans were temporarily forbidden to admit city candidates to the lectures.
Heyday
The importance of the order of preachers can be seen from the fact that there were around one hundred Sundays and public holidays in the church year on which the Dominicans were in demand as preachers. In 1447, the Eichstätter monastery was at the request of Prince-Bishop Johann III. von Eych reformed by the Nuremberg Convention of the Order. The prior was deposed and unrepentant monks expelled. After the monastic discipline was restored, the bishop was able to subordinate the Augustinian Choir Women Monastery, founded in Eichstätt in 1460, to the Dominicans until the women choir moved into their newly built monastery in Marienstein and then became subordinate to the nearby Rebdorf Augustinian canons monastery. A Dominican taught theology at the Eichstätter cathedral school since the 15th century. A total of eight provincial chapters were held in the Eichstätter monastery (1454, 1501, 1509, 1602, 1669, 1701, 1740 and 1773), which underlines the importance of the monastery during these four centuries.
In its heyday around 1520, the Eichstätter Dominican Convention had 42 members, making it one of the largest Dominican settlements in the Teutonia order. But with the extinction of the generation that had entered the order up to the beginning of the Reformation, there was a shortage of young people; by 1589 the convent had shrunk to two or three friars. This went hand in hand with an economic decline, so that the Eichstätt prince-bishop Johann Konrad von Gemmingen felt compelled to support the monastery financially in 1597. Soon after, an economic recovery seems to have set in, because as early as 1611 the library of canon Christoph Braun could be bought for 80 guilders, and from 1625 to 1629 the monastery church was refurbished with altars and sacred equipment. When the Swedes set Eichstätt on fire in 1634, the monastery hardly suffered any damage, but it has since been impoverished again. The time of need could be overcome through active support from the episcopal side and through foundations from canons and citizens.
The establishment of an own brewery has already been handed down from 1644 .
Soon afterwards, the Dominicans set about building the new church, including older parts that were still worth preserving. From 1661/62 the west and north wings of the monastery were re-performed with the support of Prince-Bishop Marquard II. Schenk von Castell . In the 18th century there was an artistically important building project in the monastery: In 1740 the stairwell in the north wing was redesigned by the prince-bishop's court building director Gabriel de Gabrieli . The ceiling fresco shows the glorification of God by the Dominican order and was created by Johann Michael Franz . The structure of the facade was also adapted to the baroque taste of the time. A garden was laid out within the cloister area. The latest archaeological excavations have shown that a city wall tower that stood on the edge of the monastery until the 19th century was redesigned in the Baroque period by the Dominicans into a large latrine with water flushing .
The monastery church and the cloister
The original monastery church was completed in 1279 in the Gothic style and was dedicated to St. Saint Peter Martyr consecrated. Probably in the 15th century the patronage was changed to the princes of the apostles Peter and Paul . The medieval church, which was already as large as it is today, had a single nave and had a flat roof in the nave . Only the choir , closed in the dodecagon , was vaulted . Little is known about the furnishings of the Gothic church; There was a donor memorial from around 1430 that has been preserved, an altar from the Eichstätt tailors' brotherhood and an altar in front of the family's hereditary burial, donated by the Absbergers at Rumburg Castle in 1386 . The church also had frescoes showing the Dominican saints.
At the beginning of the 17th century the church was redesigned. Although, according to the building contract of 1630, the old church should be completely demolished, the Gothic nave in the south wall has still been preserved; the Gothic choir also remained. In 1660 the Gothic rood screen was removed. In 1688, Prince-Bishop Johann Euchar Schenk von Castell donated a large Madonna above the church portal. In the 18th century, the church was rebuilt under Prince-Bishop Johann Anton I. Knebel von Katzenelnbogen (r. 1705–1725) by the Eichstätter court architect Johann Benedikt Ettl between 1714 and 1723 in the Baroque style. The interior was sold; according to tradition, to the oak - Renaissance - pulpit from the late 16th or early 17th century in the Catholic Church of Biesenhard have been spent. The Dominican Church of Eichstätts is also called Peterskirche; it had a crypt created in 1716, which was only dissolved in 1967 when the dead were transferred to the choir used as a study church. After the secularization of 1806 the church was profaned until the new owner of the former monastery, Duke Eugen von Leuchtenberg , made the church available again for sacred use in 1822 .
In the cloister adjoining the church to the south, there is still a pointed arched gate from the early 14th century in the east and west wings. The window frames of the cloister with the flat basket arches are probably from the beginning of the 17th century and are in the Baroque Gothic style.
On the night of October 19-20, 1918, the east wing and the church burned down, the steeple, a ridge turret in the middle of the nave roof , collapsed into the church. Almost nothing could be saved from the interior. The church remained in ruins until 1975, after which it was separated into two parts by a wall, with the longhouse auditorium and the undamaged eastern choir of the German grammar school's study church.
Cancellation and Successor Use
The abolition of the monastery took place in 1806 in the course of secularization under the last prior Peter Zurwesten. At that time, the monastery had 120 days of forest, three days of field and one fishing water. In 1818 the new owner, Duke Eugen von Leuchtenberg , set up a "poor employment and food establishment" in the former monastery. In 1832 the Leuchtenbergers sold this property to the Bavarian state. From December 5, 1835, the convent building served as a teachers' college , and from 1880 it was gradually expanded as a teacher training institute. In 1847, a small elementary school was added to enable prospective teachers to acquire practical experience . In 1935 the teacher training institute (LBA) was converted into the German advanced school. When, on February 8, 1942, the Reich Ministry of Science, Education and National Education issued an order for the re-establishment of teacher training institutions, a new LBA was established in the former Dominican monastery as a pure boarding school, which was merged with the Eichstätter Oberschule in 1944. After the denazification of Germany, the school and home operations of the LBA Eichstätt were resumed on February 12, 1946. This was elevated to the “Institute for Teacher Education” in 1954, but already in the school year 1955/56, after teacher training colleges in Bavaria had taken over the teacher training, it was supplemented by the additionally affiliated public “German Advanced School” and soon renamed “Oberrealschule”. From 1965 the current name: Gabrieli-Gymnasium , ( Musisches Gymnasium with student dormitory) prevailed. These have been visited by mixed sexes since 1977. After countless extensions and renovations, the buildings now accommodate around 800 day-school students and driving students, as well as over fifty boarding school residents and around thirty users of the day care center all year round. With No. D-1-76-123-127, the entire area is largely protected as historical monuments and ensembles .
Important Dominicans from Eichstatt
- Friedrich von Berching , author of a treatise from 1381 on the seven liberal arts and theological studies from 1424.
- Heinrich Gotsberger (15th century), from Eichstätt, who as Prior (1427/28) a. a. bought the "Eichstätter Evangelienpostille", an illuminated manuscript around 1425 (today in the Eichstätt UB)
- Georg Schwarz (Nigri) alias Nigri (* 1434), Dr. of theology, prior in Eichstätt 1469–1471, professor at the University of Ingolstadt
- Eustachius Mair († October 22, 1634). General and rosary preacher, from 1625 subprior and preacher in the Dominican monastery in Vienna, founder of the Vienna Arch Brotherhood of St. rosary
- Joseph Dusacker from Alsace, 1701–1709 prior of the Eichstätter monastery and then the first provincial of the new order province of Saxonia in 1709
- Georg Willibald Apollinaris Nittermayr (* 1744 in Eichstätt), novice master, librarian, after the secularization cathedral preacher, † November 25, 1820 in the reputation of holiness
literature
- Ferdinand Von werden : The Peterskirche in Eichstätt before the fire of October 19, 1918. An art historical study. Ph. Brönnersche Buchdruckerei (Peter Seitz), Eichstätt 1919.
- Felix Mader (editor): The art monuments of Middle Franconia. City of Eichstätt. Munich 1924, pp. 286-3096.
- Laurentius Siemer: A directory of the provincial prior of Teutonia from the preachers' convent in Eichstätt. In: Archive of the German Dominicans. 4, pp. 77-96 (1951).
- Theodor Neuhofer : From the history of the Eichstätter Dominican monastery. The members of the Eichstätt / Bay historical association. presented. Funk-Druck, Eichstätt 1958.
- Angelus Walz: Dominicans and Dominican Sisters in southern Germany from 1225 to 1966 . Freising 1967.
- Helmut Hawlata (editor): From the royal teachers' seminar to the arts grammar school. 1835-1985. Festschrift and annual report 1984/85. Gabrieli Gymnasium Eichstätt. Eichstatt 1985.
- Klaus Kreitmeir: The schools in the Eichstätter Dominican monastery. In: Church newspaper for the diocese of Eichstätt. 1985, No. 25, pp. 19f.
- Wolfgang Buchta: Lost grave monuments of the former Dominican monastery in Eichstätt. In: Collection sheet of the Historical Association of Eichstätt. 77/78 (1984/85), pp. 49-87.
- Eva Chloupek: “The holy of holies torn from the fire.” The fire of the century: 80 years ago St. Peter's Church was on fire. and Georg Babl: A contemporary witness looks back. Both in: Eichstätter Kurier. 17./18. October 1998, p. 25.
- Large baroque latrine with water flush. Surprising archaeological finds at the Gabrieli-Gymnasium, but no construction stop necessary. In: Eichstätter Kurier. March 20, 2009.
- Dominican places: The former Dominican monastery in Eichstätt. In: Provincial newspaper for the Dominican Province of St. Albert in southern Germany and Austria , issue 09/2007, pp. 10–12 (on the history of the monastery), online at dominikaner.org ( PDF ( Memento from October 10, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) ; 629 kB)
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ dominikaner-regensburg.de
- ↑ Neuhofer, p. 4.
- ^ History of the Gabrieli Boarding School ( Memento from May 14, 2015 in the Internet Archive ), tabular history on the Gabrieli High School website
Coordinates: 48 ° 53 ′ 35.7 " N , 11 ° 11 ′ 10.4" E