St. Catherine Church (Elsterwerda)
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The listed Protestant Church of St. Katharina is located in the city center of the small town of Elsterwerda in southern Brandenburg in the Elbe-Elster district .
history
The main features of the church are likely to be a building from the 15th century. The buttresses that can still be seen indicate that the church was originally vaulted. During the Thirty Years War , the vault probably collapsed in a fire and was later replaced by a flat ceiling.
In 1718 the square tower of the church, which is a new building from 1708, was given an octagonal bell storey, tail hood and onion. In that year, a carved altar that was in the church around 1500 in the Großenhain carving workshop Pankratius Grueber was sold to Tröbitz , where it has been preserved to the present day. It shows the founder Georg von Köckritz, who owned Elsterwerda from 1462 to 1499, and his wife Katharina von Schleinitz, as well as the Köckritz coat of arms. In addition, Baron Waldemar von Löwendal, who has lived in Elsterwerda Castle since 1708, had the patronage box built.
The pulpit altar dates from the middle of the 18th century. The octagonal baptismal font with crossed tracery was created between 1520 and 1530 and bears three lilies of the old Elsterwerda noble family von Köckritz on the shaft .
In 1838 the Dobrilugk master mason Weigelt began to build the Gottesackermauer, but did not fulfill his duty, so that the work had to be put out to tender again. Except for the gate, the wall was completed in 1841. In 1903 two stairways to the galleries were added to the tower . Extensive reconstruction work on the church took place in 1973 and in the 1990s.
Building description and interior fittings
The church emerged as a baroque hall church from a medieval brick building and is probably the oldest building in the city. The church was repeatedly destroyed by fires and rebuilt. The current structure is likely to be the new building from around 1718.
The interior of the church is determined by the Leipzig green color applied in 1831 and is largely shaped by the renovation work carried out in 1718. After the church suffered severe damage in a town fire in 1696, the vaulted ceiling was replaced by a stucco-framed ceiling. In addition, the church has a three-sided two-storey gallery with a dock parapet. The baptismal font dates from 1520 to 1530. On the shaft of the octagonal baptismal font with crossed tracery there are three lilies, which were also found in the coat of arms of the von Köckritz family, who lived in Elsterwerda in the late Middle Ages . Probably the Köckritze were also the donors of the stone. The pulpit altar dates from the middle of the 18th century.
On the inner walls of the church there are twelve portrait gravestones ( epitaphs ) of the noble families von Maltitz and von Rohr from the 16th and 17th centuries.
The vestibule of the church was designed after the First World War in 1922 and 1923 by the artist Professor Hans Nadler (1879–1958), who was born in Elsterwerda, as a memorial hall for the fallen. The room is shaped by a scraffito painting he created .
organ
The organ of the Church of St. Katharina was built in 1887 by the Merseburg organ builder Friedrich Gerhardt (1828–1922). While the original organ he built still had 25 stops (10/8/7) at the time, it currently has 27 stops (10/10/7). The Liebenwerda master organ builder A. Voigt carried out various alterations to the organ in 1924 and pneumatized the instrument. In 1950 the upper work was expanded by the Dresden organ building company Gebr. Jehmlich . Moreover, that was her game table the organ remodeled.
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Bells
The Church of St. Katharina has an electrically operated three-way bell.
Originally, in 1896, the Apoldaer bell foundry Schilling delivered three bells of 600 kg, 300 kg and 200 kg to the Elsterwerda church. During the First World War, the two larger bells were removed again on July 23, 1918. In 1921 a bell from 1490 was acquired as a replacement from the community of Edersleben in Saxony-Anhalt , and with the purchase of another bell from the community of Germendorf near Oranienburg one year later , the three-ring bell was complete again. However, the two larger bells had to be removed again during the Second World War . The larger of the two bells was found again in Hamburg in 1949 and could be hung up again in May 1950. After she jumped while ringing in September that year, she was cast in Apolda. In addition, another bell was cast there for the Elsterwerda church, so that the three-part bell has been complete again since then.
Individual evidence
- ↑ List of monuments of the state of Brandenburg: Elbe-Elster district (PDF) Brandenburg State Office for Monument Preservation and State Archaeological Museum
- ↑ a b c d Felix Hoffmann: “From Elsterwerda's Church History” in “750 Years Elsterwerda 1211 - 1961” . Ed .: Festival committee at the Elsterwerda City Council. Elsterwerda 1961, p. 11 to 15 (Festschrift of the city of Elsterwerda on the occasion of its 750th anniversary).
- ^ Gutenberg Georg Dehio : Handbuch der deutschen Kunstdenkmäler, Vol. 1, Central Germany , Ed .: Ernst Wasmuth A.-G., Berlin, 1914
- ↑ a b Cultural Office of the Elbe-Elster District, Bad Liebenwerda District Museum, Sparkasse Elbe-Elster (ed.): Elbe-Elster Organ Landscape . Herzberg / Elster 2005, p. 14 to 15 .
- ↑ a b Cultural Office of the Elbe-Elster District, Bad Liebenwerda District Museum, Sparkasse Elbe-Elster (ed.): Elbe-Elster Organ Landscape . Herzberg / Elster 2005.
- ↑ Eberhard Matthes, Werner Galle: "Elsterwerda in old views" . 2nd Edition. European Library, Zaltbommel (Netherlands) 1993, ISBN 90-288-5344-8 , pp. 3 .
- ^ Pretzel, Andreas: "Hans Nadler" . Ed .: Cultural Office of the Elbe-Elster District. 1999, ISBN 3-00-004516-3 , p. 138 .
Web links
Coordinates: 51 ° 27 ′ 24 ″ N , 13 ° 31 ′ 26 ″ E