St. George's Church (Wichmannsburg)

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St. George's Church in Wichmannsburg

The Evangelical Lutheran St. George's Church is located in the old town center of Wichmannsburg , a district of the Bienenbüttel community in the Lower Saxony district of Uelzen . The stone church is essentially a single-nave Romanesque building. The church became known nationwide thanks to the valuable Wichmannsburger altarpiece .

location

The St. George's Church is located on the northern edge of the old Wichmannsburg town center in the Lower Saxony unitary community of Bienenbüttel. It is located on a small hill a few hundred meters west of the Ilmenau on Kreisstraße 1 in the Uelzen district. The church is bordered by a stone wall towards the street. Directly to the north is the cemetery of the Evangelical Lutheran parish of Wichmannsburg with the Wichmannsburger Kiregsgräberstätten . The parish hall to the south is in the immediate vicinity. The associated Wichmannsburg rectory is a few hundred meters south of the field stone church.

history

The oldest documented mention of St. George's Church dates back to 1288. It is assumed that the original stone church was built in the 10th century by Wichmann I or the Kemnade monastery , which came into possession of the Wichmannsburg in 967 . As the influence of the Kemnade monastery deteriorated, the building of the church appears to have taken place before 1150. The original shape of the church can still be recognized today by the field stone masonry of the north wall with small arched windows.

The previous building collapsed during a church service in 1659. As a result, the church was rebuilt with the south wall in front of it in brick construction and enlarged windows. The dilapidated field stone tower on the west side was torn down in the 18th century and replaced by today's two-story half-timbered tower.

In 1869 the church was completely renovated. The round apse was extended by a square choir and the interior of the church was designed in a neo-Gothic style. In 1960 the gallery was partially dismantled. To restore the original interior design of the field stone church, the painting of the ceiling and the walls was removed. In addition, the pulpit, the organ and the stalls were renewed.

In 1991 the church tower was renovated. From 2001 to 2002 the tower helmet was completely renewed. The church tower was also equipped with a new top.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. George has been an independent parish since 1992. In addition to Wichmannsburg, it now also includes Hohnstorf , Edendorf , Bargdorf and the western part of Bienenbüttel . In 2014 the parish had around 1,600 members.

Building description

View of the interior towards the gallery

The building has elements from different epochs. The two-storey, half-timbered church tower contains the main entrance on the west facade and has a pyramid-shaped roof covered with slate. The gold-colored spire consists of a ball, a cross and a weather valve. The tower rests on a field stone foundation and the remains of the original field stone tower are still preserved in the entrance hall of the tower.

The north wall of the nave is made of field stone with small Romanesque windows. Gaps in the field stone masonry were filled with bricks. The south facade was built in the Gothic style from bricks with large ogival windows. The Gothic choir, like the half-timbered tower, rests on a foundation made of field stones. The choir has a square floor plan and is equipped with pointed arch windows. There is a side entrance in the south wall of the choir room. The roofs of the nave and the choir are covered with red tiles. A small cross is attached to the roof of the choir.

The walls in the Romanesque nave are painted white. The wooden gallery and the pews are held in a lighter shade of blue. The red wooden ceiling is supported by white crossbeams. The altar table with a Gothic carved altar stands in the middle of the choir. The gallery, on which the organ is located, can be reached via a staircase in the church tower.

Altarpiece

Wichmannsburger altarpiece from the 16th century

The Wichmannsburger Altarretabel is a valuable Gothic altarpiece from the early 16th century. It originally stood in the monastery church of St. Mauritius in Medingen and was probably brought to Wichmannsburg by the 18th century at the latest. The winged altar is divided into a shrine with two side wings, which sits on a predella and is crowned by an attachment with an image of Mary. The central theme of the reredos is the crucifixion of Jesus, which is depicted in the middle of the shrine with many figures.

Peal

Church bell from 1512

The church bell, which is still preserved today, was cast at the instigation of the pastor Hinrich Möller in 1512 in the workshop of master Heinrich von Kampen in Lübeck . The name, coat of arms and portrait of Pastor Möller are noted on the bell. A relief on the bell also shows a portrait of Mary with the baby Jesus. Today's bell was installed in 1938.

Rectory

The Wichmannsburg rectory was built in 1808 and is now a listed building. The rectory is an important and early example of a successful complete separation into residential and farm buildings. Other comparable rectories, which served exclusively as residential buildings, were not built in the region until decades later. The rectory is a two-story half-timbered building with a half-hip roof. Today it is in dire need of renovation and is currently empty.

Personalities

Karl Kayser

The theologian and church historian Karl Kayser was pastor of St. George's Church from 1871 to 1877. During his activities in Wichmannsburg he dealt with the history of Wichmannsburg and Bienenbüttel. After he had already left Wichmannsburg, Kayser published the work Chronicle of the Wichmannsburg parish located in the Hanoverian office of Medingen in 1878 , his first publication ever. In it he discussed the history of Wichmannsburg and St. George's Church and the associated villages. Due to the extensive analysis with a large number of sources, this work is one of the most important publications on the history of Bienenbüttel today.

Tourist importance

The St. George Church is located directly on the "Via Scandinavica", a section of the Way of St. James . The field stone church is also a station for various bike tours. These include the Weser-Harz-Heide cycle path and the Ilmenau cycle path.

Web links

Commons : St.-Georgs-Kirche Wichmannsburg  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wilhelm Lucka: District of Uelzen . F. Vieweg, Braunschweig 1984, ISBN 3-528-06205-3 , pp. 113 .
  2. ↑ Stefan Waltje, Heike Schweer: district Wichmannsburg . In: Working Group History of Bienenbüttel (Ed.): 1010 years of Bienenbüttel . BoD - Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2014, p. 90-92 .
  3. ^ Gerhard Wollenweber: Our Church St. Georg . In: Ev.-luth. St. Georg church community (Ed.): St-Georgs-Bote . Wichmannsburg 2012, p. 15 .
  4. ↑ a b c M. Voigt, GP Hoogen, W. Bauch: The St. Georgs Church in Wichmannsburg . Ed .: Evangelical Lutheran St. Georgs Parish Wichmannsburg. Bienenbüttel, S. 4-12 .
  5. ^ A b Behnke, Eberhard: Pastor Karl Kayser and his chronicle of the parish Wichmannsburg . Books on Demand GmbH, Norderstedt 2006, ISBN 978-3-8334-6316-7 , p. 47-49 .
  6. ↑ Our Church. In: Wichmannsburg Church. November 15, 2011, accessed May 3, 2020 .
  7. ^ Gerhard Wollenweber: Our Church St. Georg . In: Ev.-luth. St. Georgskirchengemeinde (ed.): St. Georgs-Bote . Wichmannsburg 2012, p. 15 .
  8. ^ Wilhelm Lucka: District of Uelzen . F. Vieweg, Braunschweig 1984, ISBN 3-528-06205-3 , pp. 113 .
  9. ↑ Our Church. In: Wichmannsburg Church. November 15, 2011, accessed May 3, 2020 .
  10. ↑ Michael Jorek: The bell of Wichmannsburg . In: Ev.-luth. St. Georgs-Kirchengemeinde (Hrsg.): St. Georgs-Bote . 2020, p. 42-43 .
  11. ↑ M. Voigt, GP Hoogen, W. Bauch: The St. Georgs Church in Wichmannsburg . Ed .: Evangelical Lutheran St. Georgs Parish Wichmannsburg. Bienenbüttel, S. 34 .
  12. ^ Thorsten Henke: The Cistercian monastery Medingen and the medieval church furnishings in Wichmannsburg and Altenmedingen . In: Hedwig Röckelein (Hrsg.): Frauenstifte - Frauenkloster and their parishes . Klartext, Essen 2009, ISBN 978-3-8375-0278-7 , p. 235-256 .
  13. ^ Hector Wilhelm Heinrich Mithoff: Fürstenthum Lüneburg . In: Art monuments and antiquities in Hanover . tape 4 . Helwing, Hannover 1877, p. 271-272 .
  14. ^ A b Michael Jorek: The bell of Wichmannsburg . In: Ev.-luth. St. Georg church community (Ed.): St-Georgs-Bote . Wichmannsburg 2020, p. 42-42 .
  15. ^ Klaus Wedekind: The beginning of the Reformation in the church games: Bienenbüttel and Wichmannsburg . In: Series of publications on the history of Bienenbüttel and its districts . tape 22 . Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2018, ISBN 978-3-7448-8483-9 , pp. 12-14 .
  16. ^ Wilhelm Lucka: District of Uelzen . In: Herbert Möller (Ed.): Monument topography Federal Republic of Germany . Architectural monuments in Lower Saxony. Vieweg, Braunschweig 1984, ISBN 3-528-06205-3 , pp. 113 .
  17. ^ Thomas Spohn: Parsonage in Northwest Germany . Waxmann, Münster 2000, ISBN 978-3-89325-717-1 , pp. 485-493 .
  18. ^ Lars Lohmann: IG Bauernhaus wants to prevent the Wichmannsburg rectory from being demolished. In: az-online.de. May 8, 2019, accessed June 22, 2020 .
  19. ↑ Anna Petersen: The rectory is about to be demolished. In: landeszeitung.de. October 2, 2018, accessed June 22, 2020 .
  20. ^ Klaus Wedekind: 10 years of work group history, 10 years of community archive . In: Klaus Wedekind (Ed.): Series of publications on the history of Bienenbüttels and its districts . tape 10 . Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2010, ISBN 978-3-8391-9528-4 , pp. 11-12 .
  21. ^ Martin Simon: Via Scandinavica . In: The journey is the goal . Conrad Stein, Welver 2015, ISBN 978-3-86686-477-1 , pp. 123-126 .
  22. ↑ Weser-Harz-Heide-Radfernweg. In: https://hann.muenden-erlebnisregion.de . Retrieved May 5, 2020 .
  23. ↑ Uelzen - Bad Bevensen - Bienenbüttel. In: ilmenauradweg.de. Retrieved May 5, 2020 .

Coordinates: 53 ° 8 ′ 9.5 ″  N , 10 ° 30 ′ 24.8 ″  E