Ratgar Basilica

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View of the monastery from the east, the Ratgar Basilica in the middle, 1655

The Ratgar basilica , also known as Ratger basilica , was built from 791 to 819 in the Fulda monastery and, like the previous building, was consecrated to St. Salvator (Savior). Today it is mostly named after its builder , the monk and later Fulda abbot Ratgar .

history

The basilica was built on the model of the old St. Peter's Basilica in Rome as a double-choir, three-aisled basilica with a west transept and was the largest church building north of the Alps . It replaced the monastery church the of Sturmius built Sturmius construction from the mid-8th century.

At first, like the previous building, it was laid out as a three-aisled basilica with an east apse. After taking office as abbot in 802, Ratgar added a western transept with western apse , in which the erection of an altar for the bones of St. Boniface , which had previously been in the cross altar of the central nave , was planned. With the planning Ratgar took into account the fact that the basilica with its original Salvator patronage had developed more and more into a burial church for the missionary, who was buried in the previous building in 754, and attracted corresponding streams of pilgrims.

The construction devoured so large funds and overstrained the forces of the monastery community so much that Ratgar was deposed by Emperor Ludwig the Pious after a failed attempt by the brothers in 812 due to the extended version of the letter of complaint ( Supplex Libellus ) submitted by the convent of the monastery in 817 .

Ratgar's successor Eigil had the Fulda monk and master builder Rachulf add two crypts at a later date , which are among the earliest hall crypts and were furnished with altars that were consecrated to the monk fathers of oriental (east crypt) and occidental monasticism (west crypt). Thus the claim of the monastic reform of Benedict von Aniane, meanwhile introduced at the behest of Ludwig the Pious, was to legitimately continue the old monastic tradition and at the same time to give visible expression to a Fulda-specific Benedictine self-image. In addition, the new convent building was added to the west transept in the west with the express aim of being as close as possible to the martyr Boniface. As a result, there was now direct access to the west apse with the Boniface tomb, which made it easier to separate the enclosure from the streams of pilgrims, to whom the nave and probably also the crypts, which made it possible to go below the sanctuary, were accessible. In the 9th century, an atrium, the so-called paradise, was built in the east. Two towers flanking the east choir probably come from the same construction phase. With this axial arrangement, too, as with the double choir and the transept, the Roman model (Romano more) of St. Peter's Basilica was followed. The altar arrangement that has been handed down in literary terms can be reconstructed and interpreted as a symbolic representation of the monastic and ecclesiological self-image of the Fulda convent in the age of the monastic reform movement of Benedict von Aniane . The west apse was decorated with a wall painting by the Fulda monk Brun Candidus , which in all probability showed the worship of the lamb by the leaders (ordines) of the heavenly hosts and the monks of the Fulda convent under the leadership of its founder abbot Sturmi .

At the beginning of 919, Konrad I, King of the East Franks, was buried at the cross altar in the middle of the church. The bones of Boniface were in the same place until 819 .

The size and furnishings of the church aroused the admiration of the visitors. In 973 Ibrāhīm ibn Yaʿqūb (Abraham ben Jaʿakow), a Jewish envoy of the caliph of Cordoba Hakam II , came to Fulda on the way to Merseburg . He wrote about the cathedral of "Ebûlda" (= Fulda): "I never saw in any country of the Christians a greater <to add: Church> than they, nor a richer one in gold and silver."

Substantial changes were made in the course of the Middle Ages , and the structure of the building had suffered, but in the judgment of the builder responsible for the new building, Johann Dientzenhofer, a restoration and Baroque renovation of the existing building would have been possible. Instead, it was partially demolished in 1704. On the site of the medieval building, today's Fulda Cathedral was built in the Baroque style above the Bonifatius Crypt using rising masonry on behalf of the Fulda abbot Adalbert von Schleiffras .

Little of the original inventory remained in the new baroque cathedral. The pulpit, for example, came to Rückers near Flieden. The craftsmen built several stone fragments, such as Carolingian stone pillars, in their new dwellings on the nearby Eichsfeld north of the cathedral, where they can still be found today.

The "Goldene Rad", a medieval bell that Johann I von Merlau donated in 1415 as part of the renovation after the fire of 1398, was hung up again (see main article in Fulda Cathedral ). Athanasius Kircher published an illustration in his Musurgia Universalis, Book IX.

literature

  • Gereon Becht-Jördens: Sturmi or Bonifatius. A conflict in the age of the Anian reform about identity and monastic self-image as reflected in the altar rituals of Hrabanus Maurus for the Salvator Basilica in Fulda. With appendices to the tradition and critical edition of the tituli as well as to text sources on the architecture and building history of the Salvator Basilica . In: Marc-Aeilko Aris, Susanna Bullido del Barrio (ed.): Hrabanus Maurus in Fulda. With a Hrabanus Maurus bibliography (1979–2009) (= Fuldaer Studien. Vol. 13). Josef Knecht, Frankfurt am Main 2010, pp. 123-187, ISBN 978-3-7820-0919-5 .
  • Werner Kathrein among others: Fulda, St. Salvator. In: Friedhelm Juergensmeier among others: The Benedictine monastery and nunnery in Hessen (= Germania Benedictina. Vol. 7: Hessen ). Eos, St. Ottilien 2004, ISBN 3-8306-7199-7 , pp. 213–434, here pp. 350–359.
  • Werner Jacobsen: Architecture in the Carolingian Empire. In: Art History Worksheets. Journal for studies and universities. Vol. 2, 2004, pp. 5-20, here pp. 8-10.
  • Eva Krause: The councilor basilica in Fulda. A historical research study (= sources and treatises on the history of the abbey and the diocese of Fulda. Vol. 27). Parzeller, Fulda 2002, ISBN 3-7900-0342-5 .
  • Werner Jacobsen: The abbey church in Fulda from Sturmius to Eigil - art-political positions and their changes. In: Gangolf Schrimpf (Hrsg.): Fulda Monastery in the world of the Carolingians and Ottonians (= Fulda studies. Vol. 7). Knecht, Frankfurt am Main 1996, pp. 105–127.
  • Gereon Becht-Jördens: Litterae illuminatae. On the history of a literary form type in Fulda . In: Gangolf Schrimpf (Hrsg.): Fulda Monastery in the world of the Carolingians and Ottonians (= Fulda studies. Vol. 7). Knecht, Frankfurt am Main 1996, pp. 325–364, here pp. 346–352, 363–364, ISBN 3-7820-0707-7 .
  • Gregor Stasch: The Fulda Cathedral between tradition and 'new building'. In: Walter Heinemeyer, Berthold Jäger (Hrsg.): Fulda in his story. Landscape, imperial abbey, city. Parzeller / Elwert, Fulda and Marburg 1995, pp. 227-257, ISBN 3-7900-0252-6 , ISBN 3-7708-1043-0 .
  • Gereon Becht-Jördens: Vita Aegil Abbatis Fuldensis a Candido ad Modestum edita prosa et versibus. An opus geminum of IX. Century. Dissertation, Heidelberg University 1989, Marburg 1994, pp. XVII – XXVIII.
  • Michael Mott : Baroque rubble recycling. Unusual find in the cellar of a house on Eichsfeld in Fulda. The living room rests on a Carolingian column. Rest of the Ratger's Basilica? In: Fuldaer Zeitung , 9 September 1993, p. 15 (series: DENK-mal! ).
  • Gereon Becht-Jördens: Text, image and architecture as carriers of an ecclesiological conception of monastery history. The Carolingian Vita Aegil by Brun Candidus von Fulda (approx. 840) . In: Gottfried Kerscher (Ed.): Hagiography and Art. The cult of saints in writing, images and architecture . Dietrich Reimer, Berlin 1993, pp. 75-106, ISBN 3-496-01107-6 .

Web links

Commons : Ratgar-Basilika (Fulda)  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Fritz Usinger : Residence of Heaven . In: Die Rhön (= Merian , vol. 17 (1964), issue 4), pp. 29–37, here p. 30.
  2. ^ Supplex Libellus monachorum Fuldensium Carolo imperatori porrectus. In: Josef Semmler (Ed.): Corpus Consuetudinum Monasticarum , Vol. 1, Siegburg 1963, pp. 319–327.
  3. ↑ Gereon Becht-Jördens: The Vita Aegil of Brun Candidus as a source for questions from the history of Fulda in the age of the Anian reform. In: Hessisches Jahrbuch für Landesgeschichte. Vol. 42, 1992, pp. 19-48.
  4. ↑ Gereon Becht-Jördens: Text, image and architecture as carriers of an ecclesiological conception of monastery history. The Carolingian Vita Aegil by Brun Candidus von Fulda (approx. 840) . In: Gottfried Kerscher (Ed.): Hagiography and Art. The cult of saints in writing, images and architecture . Dietrich Reimer, Berlin 1993, pp. 75-106.
  5. ^ Gereon Becht-Jördens: Vita Aegil Abbatis Fuldensis, pp. XLIX-LII; the altar titles of the first edition ibid, pp. 64–68.
  6. ↑ Gereon Becht-Jördens: Litterae illuminatae, pp. 348–351 with notes 73–74.
  7. ↑ Josef Leinweber : The Fulda abbots and bishops. Festival of the Diocese of Fulda for Bishop Eduard Schick for the Diamond Jubilee of Priests . Frankfurt am Main 1989, ISBN 3-7820-0585-6 , p. 29.
  8. ^ Fritz Usinger: Residence of Heaven . In: Die Rhön (= Merian , vol. 17 (1964), booklet 4), pp. 29–37, here p. 31.
  9. ↑ Georg Jacob: Arab reports from envoys to Germanic royal courts from the 9th and 10th centuries . de Gruyter, Berlin 1927, p. 24.
  10. ↑ Eva Krause: The Ratgerbasilika in Fulda, S. 41-133.
  11. ^ Gregor Stasch: Der Fuldaer Dom, pp. 233–245, especially pp. 235–240, the written sources ibid, pp. 246–257.
  12. ↑ Eva Krause: The Ratgerbasilika in Fulda, S. 111-112.

Coordinates: 50 ° 33 ′ 15.2 "  N , 9 ° 40 ′ 18.3"  E