Servite monastery in Radeburg

The Servite monastery in Radeburg was a branch of the mendicant order of the Servites (Ordo Servorum Mariae: OSM, popularly also known as Marienknechte ) in Radeburg in the district of Meißen (Saxony). The monastery was founded around 1320 and abandoned in 1536.

City map 1864, from Gurlitt, 1914

location

The monastery was on the corner of Carolinenstrasse and Klostergasse. The Klostergasse in Radeburg is of course named after the former Servite monastery. Old field names in the vicinity of Radeburg such as Klosterfelder and Mönchswiesen are also reminiscent of the former monastery.

history

Around / after 1306 Heynemann von Nuwendorf founded a hospital for poor people in Radeburg. Since it is mentioned in a later document that he carried some of the donated goods from Margrave Friedrich I as a fief, the donation is likely to have been made from 1306/07 at the earliest. Around 1320 the hospital was handed over to the Servite Order by Bishop Withego II of Meissen. After Zinkl the greater part to its members at the beginning of the 14th century after Großenhain have gone, due to lack of livelihood . So far there is no evidence for this claim, Toller dismisses it as a guess.

In 1486 the Prior General of the Servites, Antonius Alabanti, visited the order province of Alamania and held a provincial chapter in the convent in Germersheim . For this purpose, a register was created that recorded the number of monks, the church equipment and the income of the respective monasteries, as well as the contributions from the individual monasteries to the monastery headquarters. The monastery in Radeburg had to surrender 4 guilders, a comparatively high amount if you compare it with the other monasteries with much better staff.

The convent was very small at the end of the fifteenth century and the monastery was very poor; In 1486 only one priest monk lived there, who was also prior. He came from the Erfurt Servite Convention . In the sacristy there were two silver chalices , a large silver pace, two damascus vestments and other vestments sufficient for this monastery, a missal and a votive . The Convention was entitled to six guilders a year in monetary interest . The fruit interest was only three staria of rye and oats (one bushel = 8 staria). The monastery also owned two hooves ; however, no amount of money is given here. The other income amounted to one guilder.

The "Pirnaische Mönch" (= Johannes Lindner ) wrote about / before 1530 about Radeburg: ... has a slos and little monastery, Marienknechten, is very wasted.

According to Toller, the monastery owned some fields, meadows and a piece of forest. Most of the forest had already been cut down by the last monks in 1536. The fields were leased to a farmer for half the harvest. The income of the monastery was 6 guilders, 2 groschen and ten pfennigs a year, as well as a malter and six bushels of grain and almost four bushels of oats (according to the old measure).

During the Catholic period in 1536 the monastery was closed and converted back into a hospital (Saxony only became Protestant in 1539 after the death of Duke Georg). The Lords of Bünau as monastery governors reported in 1544 that in the past 49 years (i.e. since 1495) since they settled in Radeburg, there had never been more than one or two monks in the monastery. The last two or three monks are said to have led a little monastic life. One is said to have stolen a goblet and sold it to buy clothes for his beloved. In addition, they lived from the substance, as the von Bünau lamented, gobbled up everything and killed (= squandered). The church and the monastery buildings fell into disrepair, damage was not repaired. The wood in the monastery's own forest was felled and sold. The last monk, presumably a Herr Kaspar, wanted to secretly leave Radeburg with his lover and child in 1536, and took the grain stores of the monastery with him. However, he was arrested and argued in his defense that he could no longer feed himself in the monastery and wanted to leave the monastery to the Lords of Bünau. He ordered the prior Kaspar Starke and a few other monks of the local convent from the Servite monastery in Grossenhain . But the Großenhain monks also declared themselves unable to maintain the monastery in Radeburg. They signed a contract with the Lords of Bünau that the monastery should be converted back into a hospital. According to the negotiated contract of October 11, 1536, the monastery in Grossenhain was to receive half of the cattle that were still available, the monastery being the first choice. In addition, the monastery in Großenhain received an annual interest of 3 guilders from the future hospital. The remaining income remained with the hospital. The brothers Heinrich von Bünau, Canon and Provost zu Bautzen and Rudolf the Elder from Bünau zu Radeburg first asked Bishop John VII of Meißen for his approval of the contract, which they also received. And finally, in 1537, Duke Georg also gave his consent to transform the monastery back into a hospital.

However, the re-established hospital was ordered to hold a weekly mass for the original donors and benefactors. The monastery in Großenhain was also ordered to commemorate these donors and benefactors. The Servite Order was granted the right to turn the hospital back into a monastery if the order were able to do so again, against reimbursement of the costs incurred in the meantime for the restoration of the buildings and possible improvements.

In 1544 and 1555 the lords of Bünau zu Radeburg claimed that the Radeburg monastery was older than the Servite monastery in Großenhain. The ducal chancellery claimed, however, that the Radeburg monastery had granted the monastery in Hayn in ancient times. The gentlemen von Bünau vehemently contradicted this, saying that the monastery in Hayn had never had anything to command the Radeburgers. According to Toller, however, in 1536 the prior Johannes Goich and the senior Kaspar Starke of the Großenhain Servitenkloster and their convent were superattendentes , ie they had ecclesiastical supervision of the Radeburg monastery. According to Toller, it is most likely that the Radeburg monastery was originally completely independent and only came under the supervision of the Großenhain Servite Convent at the end of the 15th and beginning of the 16th century. As early as 1486, the Radeburg monastery was almost extinct. Only one monk still lived there, who also came from the Erfurt convent.

Priorities

• until 1486 Henricus Wigandi, prior, qui est de conventu de Erfordie, was prior in Halle from July 22, 1486, and prior in Erfurt in 1489
• from 1486 Joannes Trutter
• 1536 (?) Mr. Kaspar , last monk and prior?

building

According to Toller, the monastery consisted of a poor house for the monks, a cattle shed, a barn and a church. It keeps the former Ottilie chapel for the former monastery church because the Chapel 1539/40 under the Collatur standing of Bünau. These were also the bailiffs of the monastery. The Ottilienkapelle had an income of three guilders in 1539/40. These three guilders were used to pay the schoolmaster after the secularization of the monastery. Nothing of the buildings has survived.

literature

• Cornelius Gurlitt : Descriptive representation of the older architectural and art monuments of the Kingdom of Saxony. 38th issue: The cities of Großenhain, Radeburg and Riesa. 168 p., CC Meinhold & Söhne, Leipzig 1914 (hereinafter abbreviated to Gurlitt, descriptive representation with corresponding page number)
• Peregrino Soulier: De Antiquis Servorum Coenobiis in Germania. Monumenta Ordinis Servorum Sanctae Mariae, 1: 113–149, Brussels, 1893 (hereinafter abbreviated Monumenta Ordinis Servorum Sanctae Mariae, vol. 1 with corresponding page number)
• Kurt Toller: The former monastery of the Marienknechte in Radeburg. 8 p., Henschel, Radeburg, undated (around 1920) (hereinafter abbreviated to Toller, Radeburg with the corresponding page number)
• Karl von Weber : Notes on the income of the monasteries in Saxony. Archives for Saxon History, New Series, 1: 76–92, Leipzig, 1875 Online at Dresden State and State Library , pp. 86/87
• Gregor Maria Zinkl: The Servite monasteries in Germany before the Reformation. Der Katholik, Journal for Catholic Science and Church Life, 4th episode, 10 (8): 86-101, Mainz 1912 PDF (hereinafter abbreviated to Zinkl, Servitenkloster with corresponding page number)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Gurlitt, Descriptive Presentation, p. 98.
2. ^ Toller, Radeburg, p. 2
3. ↑ Zinkl, Servitenkloster, p. 96.
4. ↑ ^{a b} Toller, Radeburg, p. 3
5. ↑ Monumenta Ordinis Servorum Sanctae Mariae, Vol. 1, p. 142.
6. ↑ ^{a b} Monumenta Ordinis Servorum Sanctae Mariae, Vol. 1, p. 140.
7. ^ Johann Burchard Mencke: Scriptores rerum germanicarum, praecipue saxonicarum. Tomus II. Johannes Christian Martini, Leipzig, 1728 Online at Google Books , p. 1596
8. ^ Toller, Radeburg, p. 6
9. ^ Arcangelo Giani, Luigi Maria Garbi: Annalium Sacri Ordinis Fratrum Servorum B. Mariae Virginis A suae Institutionis exordio ...., Volume 1. Typis Marescandoli, Lucca, 1719 Online at Google Books
10. ^ Toller, Radeburg, p. 5
11. ^ Toller, Radeburg, p. 4

(Location)